Timothy Crook to be sentenced next week over killings of Robert and Elsie Crook in 2007, with court to hear psychiatric evidence

A man who killed his parents before putting their bodies into their car and dumping them in a garden 150 miles away has been found guilty of their manslaughter.

Timothy Crook, 51, who had paranoid schizophrenia, attacked his father Robert Crook, 83, and mother Elsie Crook, 76, in the bedroom of their home in Swindon, Wiltshire, in 2007.

Son murdered parents and dumped bodies 150 miles away, court told Read more

He killed them by strangling, kicking, punching and stamping on them as well as hitting them with a weapon, believed to be a hammer.

After the killings, Crook, who worked for the Ministry of Defence, put his parents’ bodies in the back of their Nissan Micra and drove them to a property he owned in Lincoln.

The couple were reported missing four days later by friends when they failed to attend a dance class at their church. Police went to Crook’s house in Lincoln and discovered the bodies under wheelie bins in the overgrown back garden.

Crook was arrested a few days later, and denied murdering his parents. He was later found to be unfit to stand trial due to mental health problems and was detained at the high-security Rampton psychiatric hospital in Nottinghamshire.

After his health improved, he was brought before a jury at Bristol crown court. Crook was acquitted of two charges of murder but was convicted of the alternative counts of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

He was remanded into custody by trial judge Mr Justice Hamblen and will be sentenced next week when the court will hear psychiatric evidence.

Crook was sectioned in 2002 and under the supervision of mental health services in Lincolnshire, but refused to register with a doctor when he moved back to Swindon.

Speaking after the verdict, the Crooks’ daughter, Janice Lawrence, said: “After eight very difficult years we are pleased to finally have a guilty verdict and hope that this will provide us with some closure.

“However, as a family we still feel that we have been severely let down by the authorities regarding the help we were trying to access leading up to the deaths of my parents. We have found it very hard to come to terms with the way two such loved members of our family lost their lives. They were wonderful people, amazing, supportive parents and a devoted couple who adored their grandchildren.

“They were loved by the whole family and their many friends. Our loss has affected us deeply. We will never forget the special times we shared with them and they will always remain in our hearts.”

In court Lawrence said her brother “domineered the home”, swore and threatened his parents and banned them from having any visitors.

“They had got to the stage where they felt they couldn’t cope with him living there any more,” she said. “He was very suspicious, wanting to know where they were and what they were doing.

“For a few weeks before, he had been saying: ‘I want these old people out of my home. I want to get them evicted.’ He kept saying he was under surveillance, people were watching him.”

DCI Deb Smith, of Wiltshire police, said Crook had been arrested days after the killing. She said: “Never once from this moment on and during this case did he accept or show remorse about what he’d done.”

Crook, who had always been single, moved back in with his parents after losing his job at the Ministry of Defence in Lincolnshire after harassing a colleague.

Their difficult relationship was deteriorating, with Crook threatening to evict his parents from their home, the jury was told.

Robert and Elsie Crook were last seen alive on the morning of their deaths reversing their car from their drive. After killing them that afternoon, Crook dumped their car and caught the train back to Swindon where he attempted to clean up any evidence of the killings and dispose of bloodied items of clothing in bin bags.

Crook, who does not accept he has mental health problems, denied two charges of murder. He called no evidence in his defence.