Murder accused 'admitted killing'

Feb 15 2013

A man accused of murdering a missing businesswoman confessed to killing her and said he disposed of her body in a furnace, a court has been told.

Peter Haddley, 26, said he and Colin Coats were friends when they were prisoners in Addiewell jail, West Lothian, after Coats was arrested on suspicion of murdering Lynda Spence, who disappeared in April 2011.

Mr Haddley said Coats told him he had "cut off her head" and that he had to increase the temperature of the furnace he had put her body in because there was "still parts of it left".

At the High Court in Glasgow, where 42-year-old Coats is on trial along with three co-accused, Paul Smith, 47, David Parker, 38, and Philip Wade, 42, the witness also said he was asked to arrange a reported sighting of Ms Spence in Manchester.

The four men deny kidnapping Ms Spence, 27, holding her at a flat in West Kilbride, Ayrshire, and torturing her for up to a fortnight before murdering her.

Mr Haddley said he and Coats exchanged letters which were written in code, referring to their arrangement to organise a sighting of the missing woman as "the game".

Solicitor general Lesley Thomson, prosecuting, asked Mr Haddley what Coats told him about Ms Spence, to which he replied: "I was told that he had killed her in a flat and disposed of her body on a furnace. It was a long conversation but he just kept going back to the same two points I've just told you about."

Ms Thomson asked if Coats told him anything about the method used and Mr Haddley said: "He cut her head off."

The witness also told jurors Coats said to him there were other people present when Ms Spence was killed, but he did not say that anyone else was directly involved.

When told about how he disposed of her body, Coats apparently told Mr Haddley he had to set the furnace to a "higher degree" because there was "still parts of it left", the court was told. The trial before Lord Pentland continues.