Colin Howell

Case overview

Colin Howell (born 14 March 1959) was a Northern Irish convicted double murderer. Howell killed his wife Leslie (née Clarke) and the husband of his lover, Trevor Buchanan, who was a RUC officer, in what appeared to be a suicide pact between two lovers.

The bodies were found in a fume-filled car in Castlerock on May 19, 1991. Howell was a native of Portadown and worked as a dentist. He was described as a deeply religious father of ten and a former lay preacher, and he was a member of the local Baptist church. Howell married Leslie in July 1983.

After his wife's death, Howell remarried. Howell confessed his role in the murders to elders in his church, who urged him to inform police. He pleaded guilty to the murders on 18 November 2010 and was sentenced to life imprisonment. He was told he must serve a minimum 21 year jail term.

Related case status (co-accused)

Howell’s former lover Hazel Stewart was a co-accused. She was found guilty of murder in March 2011 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

On 17 May 2011 Howell pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting nine women patients in his surgery over a period of several years. Howell’s five-and-a-half-year sentence for indecent assaults ran concurrently with the life sentencing he was already serving for the two murders.

Timeline

• July 1983 — Howell married Leslie (née Clarke).
• May 18, 1991 — Howell planned and carried out the murders late on the Saturday night, according to the court.
• May 19, 1991 — The bodies were found in a fume-filled car in Castlerock; Howell called police to say his wife was missing and her body was found in the boot of the family’s estate car on the Londonderry coast.
• 2007 — Howell’s son Matthew died, aged 22, in an accident in Russia.
• 2008 — Howell sold a home for 131,000; he lost 353,000 on a Philippines scam involving a scheme to recover gold hidden in chambers by the Japanese.
• 2009 — An investigation was launched after Howell confessed to his church elders over the deaths.
• Late 1990s — Howell discussed with his wife Kyle revealing the crimes, but that was not done.
• 18 November 2010 — Howell pleaded guilty to the murders.
• December 1, 2010 — A pre-sentence hearing revealed details of the double murder at Belfast Crown Court.
• December 3, 2010 — Howell was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum 21 year jail term.
• Early February 2011 — Hazel Stewart’s trial was expected to begin in early February.
• March 2011 — Hazel Stewart was found guilty of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.
• 17 May 2011 — Howell pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting nine women patients in his surgery.
• May 25, 2011 — Howell was sentenced to five and a half years for indecent assaults.

The offence

Howell murdered two victims: his wife Leslie and Trevor Buchanan, the husband of his lover.

Method and staging of death

Howell disguised the murders as suicides. He gassed both victims with car fumes while they slept in May 1991.

In the court account, Howell attached part of a baby's feeding bottle to a garden hose to poison the victims with carbon monoxide fumes as they slept. He ran the hose from a car. The court heard that he then subdued their faint signs of consciousness even when each victim stirred in their sleep.

The court heard that Howell carried Leslie to the boot of the car, placed a blanket over her head, and put a bicycle on top of the body. He placed family photographs beside her body. He pushed the play button on her personal stereo system after placing the headset over her ears to make it seem she was listening to music.

Howell positioned a length of vacuum hose from the car to the exhaust and put the other end into the boot where his dead wife was lying, and then switched on the ignition.

For Trevor Buchanan, the court heard that Howell drove towards Castlerock and left a bicycle on a grass verge near a railway crossing and nature reserve before heading for Castlerock. He went to a row of houses at Cliff Terrace, also known as the Twelve Apostles. One of the houses, number six, had been owned by Lesley’s father, Harry Clarke, who had collapsed and died at his daughter's home 12 days earlier. The murders were staged in a small garage at the back of that house.

The court heard that Howell reversed in, pulled on plastic surgical gloves, heaved Trevor’s body from the boot and placed it in the driver's seat, and left the door open. Howell then connected the vacuum hose so that it put fumes into the vehicle.

After the killings, Mr Murphy told the court that Howell ran along Castlerock beach, burnt evidence he had been carrying with him, retrieved his bike and cycled home, and checked to see his children were still asleep. The court heard that it all happened inside the space of four hours.

Victims’ circumstances described at court

The pre-sentence hearing described that Lesley woke up and cried out for her first-born son Matthew when she realised her life was in peril. Matthew was aged six at the time, according to the court hearing, and he was sleeping in another room with his sister Lauren (four) and brothers Daniel (two) and Johnny (nine months). The court also described Lesley as wearing night-dress on a sofa while sleeping.

The court heard that there was a struggle when Howell gassed Trevor Buchanan at his house. At one stage Howell feared he himself would be overcome by toxic fumes, and he later returned after going to the garden to catch his breath.

The court heard that Howell bumped his head during the struggle, trapped Trevor’s arms inside a quilt, pulled it over his head, shoved the hose towards his face, and listened as the policeman took his final breaths.

Quoted courtroom and police statements

Judge Anthony Hart said:

“These were truly heinous crimes, cold-blooded, carefully planned and ruthlessly executed. Even when each victim stirred in their sleep, Howell did not draw back, but subdued their faint signs of consciousness.”

Crown lawyer Kieran Murphy told Mr Justice Anthony Hart:

"This was a meticulous and devious plan and pre-meditated in a manner that might be described as professional."

Howell gave a statement to the police in which he said:

"I pulled the quilt over his head first and with my right hand put the hose to his mouth. I remember him sitting up and I pulled the quilt over him. He saw me."

Mr Murphy told the court about Lesley and said:

"She called out Matthew, his son's name, and he said that memory haunts him."

Mr Murphy told the court that Howell’s actions were planned and manipulative, saying:

"That account was of course a total and utter lie from Mr Howell," he said. "That statement was a planned cover up of the murders to escape detection and stop the investigation."

Mr Murphy said of the plan:

"The actions of the dentist were calculated, callous, manipulative, evil and wholly without mercy for two defenceless victims, one of whom was his wife and the other the loving husband of his co-accused."

Howell’s lawyer, Richard Weir QC, said:

"He accepts entirely how bad these matters are, how monstrous they are. "There is a man there, not a monster, a man who allowed distorted thinking, a loss of reason, an illicit passion to completely destroy the lives of his victims and to destroy his own life,"

Mr Weir added:

"Anyone knowing Colin Howell before and indeed after these deeds would find it unimaginable that he could do these monstrous things because he was an upstanding, an effective and a worthy member of this society, not a monster," he said.

Mr Murphy said of Howell’s motive and cover-up:

Investigation

Police had initially treated the victims’ deaths as suicide. An investigation was launched in 2009 after Howell confessed to his church elders over the deaths.

Howell was arrested over the double murder last year, and detectives reopened the investigation in January. Howell walked into a police station telling officers that elders at his church had urged him to give himself up.

Mr Murphy read extracts from an extensive series of interviews Howell gave to the police after his arrest. These interviews disclosed Howell had concocted a story to give the impression that his wife and Mr Buchanan had committed suicide, saying it was after they struggled to cope with his affair.

The then pastor of Coleraine Baptist Church, John Hansford, had been involved in counselling intended to help both couples rebuild their marriages. At the time, Howell claimed that Mr Buchanan had come to his house on the night of the murders and they had an altercation, which resulted in the policeman striking him before leaving. Howell claimed he then went to bed and left his wife lying on the sofa, and awoke the next morning to find her gone, leaving an emotional note in the house.

The court heard Howell later confessed to church elders, and they called in the police. The court also heard that Howell claimed he had lost over 350,000 in a bid to find missing gold in the Philippines, involving a scheme that turned out to be a scam.

Arrest and confession

Howell confessed his role in the murders to elders in his church. He was then urged to inform police and subsequently walked into a police station.

Howell originally denied the two charges against him, but changed his plea when he appeared at Belfast Crown Court.

Howell pleaded guilty to the murders on 18 November 2010.

Trial

Plea and sentencing hearing

Howell was sentenced to life imprisonment on 3 December 2010, with a minimum term of 21 years.

During the pre-sentence hearing at Belfast Crown Court, the court heard detailed accounts of how the scene was staged to make it look like a suicide pact, and how Howell had moved the bodies and arranged the car to suggest suicide.

Sentencing remarks (double murder)

Judge Anthony Hart sentenced Howell and made remarks including:

A judge’s remark reported for indecent assaults sentencing included:

Judge Corinne Philpott said although he had known what he did to his indecent assault victims, they did not know precisely what had happened. She said he was an intelligent man who had the “means to stop yourself from doing this”.

Indecent assaults / sexual offences (separate guilty plea)

Howell pleaded guilty on 17 May 2011 to sexually assaulting nine women patients in his surgery over a period of several years.

He was sentenced to five and a half years for indecent assaults on five of his former patients. The five women were sedated and assaulted over a period of four years. This sentence ran concurrently with the life sentencing he was already serving for the murders.

Aftermath and related legal proceedings

Co-accused outcome

Hazel Stewart was found guilty of murder in March 2011 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Her trial was expected to last up to a month and was due to begin in early February.

Personal and family details included at sentencing

The court heard that Howell’s former lover Hazel Stewart remarried and had two children.

The court heard that Howell told his second wife Kyle, an American divorcee with two children, about the killings in the late 1990s, but the admission was not disclosed until January last year, when Howell confessed all to his church elders.

Mr Weir said Howell’s son Matthew died, aged 22, in an accident in Russia in 2007. Mr Weir also described Howell’s church and community situation, stating that after the affair with Stewart Howell was “isolated and traduced” within his church and his own community.

Other details: financial circumstances and insurance

Benefits and payments described in court

The court heard that while Howell claimed money had not been the motive, he benefited by several hundred thousand pounds from the deaths of his wife and father, a retired company director who had moved to Castlerock from Hillsborough, Co Down.

Mr Murphy said Howell received 212,446 left in his wife's will, and he benefited from the estate of her father worth 27,000.

Insurance against Lesley’s death paid out 120,000 and Howell received 54,635 from an endowment policy.

Mr Murphy said Howell was able to pay off debts, including his mortgage and develop his dental practice in Ballymoney. He also said Howell’s dental business began to grow and flourish, having previously been in deficit at the time of the deaths. In 2008 he sold a home for 131,000.

Bankruptcy/scam loss described

Mr Murphy told the court that Howell lost 353,000 on a Philippines scam involving a scheme to recover gold hidden in chambers by the Japanese.

Howell’s lawyer, Richard Weir QC, said it was transparently a fraud and questioned whether Howell knew it was doomed to failure. Mr Weir added:

"Was that a symptom of Colin Howell seeking out his own destruction, his downfall?"

Legal representation and quotes on remorse and delay

Howell’s lawyer, Richard Weir QC, said the delay in the guilty plea was caused by advisors probing Howell’s mental state and described Howell’s remorse. Mr Weir said:

"He accepts entirely how bad these matters are, how monstrous they are."

Mr Weir said:

"He had always accepted his role in planning and conducting the crimes and had never attempted to minimise it."

Mr Weir said:

"The product of that crime is not happiness for the perpetrators but instead unhappiness, discord and even tragedy."

Mr Weir said Howell regarded incarceration after a litany of tragedy as yet another awful outcome. He also said:

"Colin Howell regarded this as yet another awful outcome for the sins that he had committed and conceived."

Mr Weir told the court that Howell did not regret being incarcerated, and described how the bereaved families could now enjoy vindication from knowing their loved ones had not committed suicide. Mr Weir said:

"At least that part of their reputation is restored and at least the family now know the truth of these matters."

Mr Weir also said:

"These crimes would not have seen the light of day and been properly prosecuted by this criminal justice system had it not been for the fact that his conscience and his conscience alone troubled him over the years."

Mr Weir said Howell had discussed telling his wife Kyle about the crimes but did not do so. He said:

"The reason for this is a demonstration this man's conscience had not been left in peace," Mr Weir said.

Mr Weir said:

"Colin Howell regarded this as yet another awful outcome for the sins that he had committed and conceived. "It gave him particular insight into the effect that his actions must have had on the family of Trevor Buchanan."

Mr Weir said Howell knew he was a fraud of the worst type who destroyed people's lives and those of their families:

"He said Howell knew he was a fraud of the worst type who destroyed people's lives and those of their families."