From AUDREY GILLAN
in Jersey
TWO Scottish brothers were jailed yesterday almost seven years after
the murder of their parents, one for life for beating them to death in
their Jersey home.
Roderick Newall, 29, had admitted killing his father, Nicholas, 56,
and his mother, Elizabeth, 47, in a frenzied, bloody attack.
His younger brother, Mark, 28, was sentenced to six years for his part
in burying his parents' bodies, disposing of evidence, covering up the
murder, and lying to the police.
A packed Royal Court in the island's capital, St Helier, was told that
Roderick had planned the murders and had bludgeoned his parents while
they lay on the floor of their bungalow.
More than 60 journalists and 50 members of the public huddled together
on creaking mahogany benches to listen to Jersey's Attorney-General, Sir
Michael Birt, give the horrific details of the murder of the happily
married, middle-aged Scots couple.
Earlier this year, Roderick pled guilty to the charge of murder while
Mark admitted a reduced charge of assisting an offender after murder.
The Crown yesterday attempted to prove premeditation.
The Attorney-General told of the mystery surrounding the disappearance
of the Newalls who were never seen again after October 10, 1987, and how
their bodies had lain together, head to foot, undiscovered in a shallow
grave for six years.
Mr Birt told the bailiff, Sir Peter Crill, that the double murders had
been premeditated and alleged that Roderick had gone out on the morning
of the murders to buy equipment which he would later use both to kill
and dispose of his parents' bodies. This included blue and green
tarpaulins which eventually became their shrouds.
He said the wounds inflicted on Mr Nicholas Newall were not all
consistent with the rice flails with which Roderick said he attacked
him. Instead there was an eight-inch gash consistent with the edge of a
pick-axe.
After the murders, the brothers had wrapped the bodies in tarpaulins,
driven them away, and buried them. They then returned to the bungalow
where they began a painstaking operation to remove any evidence.
The 10 jurats -- responsible for determining sentence in Jersey's
criminal cases -- sat on the French-style bench and listened as Mr Birt
told how the family had been out for a champagne dinner as an early
celebration for Mrs Newall's pending 48th birthday.
At the Sea Crest restaurant they seemed a normal family, except Mark,
described by one witness as quiet and miserable.
He spoke of how the family, except Mark, had drunk a large amount of
alcohol and continued to do so when they returned to the Newall bungalow
at 9 Clos de l'Atlantique. Mr Birt also told a hushed court that the
relationship between the sons and their parents was ''cold and
complex''.
The stuffy courtroom heard how Mr Nicholas Newall was killed in front
of the fire in the lounge, a number of rapid blows being rained on his
fallen body. His wife was killed in her own bedroom, again on the floor
but not with the same brutal force.
As the Attorney-General gave these gruesome details, the two
fair-haired, smartly dressed brothers appeared calm as they sat at the
front of the court. Listening intently, they read through their own
copies of Mr Birt's statement, Roderick sometimes leaning forward to
consult with his advocate, Mr David LeQuesne.
Roderick did not flinch as Mr Birt said the murders were not, as
Roderick claimed, a result of an argument which reopened old wounds and
led to a head to head between his father and himself.
They were instead premeditated and when the disappearance of the
Newalls became the subject of a police investigation he gave statements
that were in fact lies, ''carefully crafted with meticulous care''.
Mr Birt said Mark's part in the tragedy was ''chilling and shameful''
and that his ''bland admission that he helped his brother bury the
bodies at Greve de Lecq, to clean the house and dispose of the evidence,
disguises the most callous disregard for his parents' fate and
understates the extraordinary efforts and lengths taken to hide a
vicious crime and its perpetrator''.
Mr LeQuesne rebutted allegations that the murders had been
premeditated, saying the Crown's evidence was meagre and unreliable. He
asked the court to consider that Roderick, as a former Army officer,
would have had ''the requirement for careful planning drummed into
him''.
He asked nine questions, including ''why would he plan a murder in
which he would inevitably be a prime suspect?'', and ''why plan a murder
in such a way as to cause a bloodbath?''
The advocate contested that the murders rang true of ''a sudden,
terrible violent episode resulting from a frenzy fuelled by drink and
provoked by his father pushing him over''.
He said Roderick had not bought the equipment, including pickaxe and
tarpaulins, from a builders' merchant on the morning of the murder.
Addressing the issue of the brothers' alleged poor relations with his
parents, Mr LeQuesne said: ''I have been specifically instructed not to
excuse Roderick Newall for his crime by indulging in character
assassination. Roderick Newall accepts his crimes were inexcusable.
However, such crimes do not happen in normal happy families.''
The advocate then referred to a taped conversation between Roderick
and his uncle, Dr Stephen Newall, in the Dunkeld House Hotel.
He said: ''Stephen Newall said, 'We of course watched from the
sidelines and saw two very badly treated little boys . . .' ''
The same uncle also said that Mark ''always came in for the heavy end
of the thing. Suffice it to say that Mark Newall knew from an early age
that his parents disliked him and as he grew older, so he grew apart
from them''.
He said Mark has ''had to live under the sword of Damocles since 1987.
He had lost his job, his position in the world and his friends. All of
this is the result of a wrong decision made under threat of his brother
blowing his brains out, when aged 21.''
Returning after just 25 minutes to pass sentence, Sir Peter Crill said
he had decided not to consider premeditation, but told Roderick Newall
that his crimes of patricide and matricide were odious and that he would
serve concurrent life sentences.
Mark Newall's involvement in the cover-up was ''a very grave
interference to the course of justice'' and he was given concurrent
sentences of six years.
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