Shedding new light on murders

When two men were jailed in Spain for the horrific killing of a couple from the Shropshire-Wales border, justice was seen to be done. But is there another chapter to the chilling story, with links to notorious London crime boss Reggie Kray? Former Shropshire Star crime correspondent Arthur Mills investigates.

The terrifying plight of Anthony and Linda O'Malley, who were kidnapped and murdered while searching for a retirement home in Spain five years ago, has been well-documented by the Shropshire Star.

Two Venezuelan nationals - Jorge Real Sierra and his brother-in-law Jose Antonio Velazquez - were subsequently tried and convicted and each jailed for almost 60 years.

As the Shropshire Star's crime reporter in April last year, I was in court in Alicante for the trial, with long-standing friend and fellow journalist Danny Collins, the former news editor of the Costa Blanca News, the region's leading English language newspaper.

Kindly, he assisted me with vital translation during the brief and almost charade-like hearings to confirm the defendants' guilt, decided earlier by a magistrate behind closed doors; a world away from the orderly and methodical jury trial system in the UK.

I filed my reports by phone from a bar no more than 20 yards from the court entrance. Later, over a coffee, Danny would confide in me that evidence he had uncovered, suggesting the defendants were not the only people involved in this heinous crime, had been ignored by Spanish police and that others should also have been in the dock.

Now details of his suspicions are included in "Nightmare in the Sun", his recently published account of Anthony and Linda O'Malley's kidnap, torture, the theft of more than £20,000 from their bank accounts and their brutal murders.

Linda, 56, and Anthony, 42, from Llangollen, were buried together under concrete in the cellar where they were kept prisoner in a villa on the Baradello Gelat urbanisation at Alcoy, a town less than an hour from the Costa Blanca's famous holiday resort of Benidorm.

But were the portly Real Sierra and his younger brother-in-law the only people involved in the scam to fleece their unsuspecting victims?

The author presents previously unpublished evidence that supports the probability that at least two more men were involved in the crime - a UK former armed robber and ex-Benidorm bar owner with connections to Reggie Kray, and a notorious tout who worked Malaga airport seeking out gullible tourists to rob.

The true identities of his "suspects" - dubbed "Bradley" and "Hal" - cannot be revealed because of libel and Contempt of Court laws.

Danny Collins, now 68, was born in London and was previously based in Madrid with the Ministry of Defence, owned a pub and a nightclub in the UK, before returning to Spain in 1990 with his delightful wife, Nikki.

An accomplished cartoonist, he joined the CBN as a freelance investigative journalist and was news editor until 2004 when he semi-retired. Danny continues to write a column on British affairs for the paper under the pseudonym of Gilly Beaumont from his mountain village home in the Sierra Aitana.

Most investigative crime reporters are only as good as their contacts - the good, the bad and the ugly, as I referred to them. On the Spanish Costas Senor Collins appears to have collared the market.

His reporter's instincts and his "dog with a bone" attitude as he chased various leads and followed up snippets of information, unravelled what he believes to be the real story.

There was also plenty of traditional "door-knocking" required of the determined reporter, which produced exclusive interviews with witnesses not contacted by police, and the use of mediums - a personal interest of Danny's and a source of information used in previous cases.

From the evidence he gathered, and relying on an old hack's intuition, Danny dismisses the widely held view that a small ad in his own CBN on September 6, 2002, offering a villa for sale, was the O'Malleys' initial introduction to their killers.

He talks of specific mobile phone contacts - known to UK and Spanish police but not part of the ultimate trial in Alicante - that were made between Jorge Real Sierra and Anthony O'Malley on the couple's arrival in Malaga on August 30.

And the author asks why vital information provided to him by a witness, concerning the sighting of the O'Malleys' hire car being driven by the wife of the Malaga tout in Benidorm on September 1, was ignored.

He questions the lack of interest in the case by the Spanish police and the bureaucracy of Interpol and, quite rightly, gives full credit to North Wales detectives Alan Jones, Steve Lloyd and David James for finally trapping Real Sierra and his brother-in-law.

The author's scripted scenarios offer a chilling description of the couple's ordeal and their wretched and terrifying last few hours.

"These are based on the most logical and likely conjecture, combined with the forensic evidence, pathologists' reports and some assistance from people who spoke to one of the defendants," he explains.

In reality it is difficult for anyone to imagine the unspeakable horror and psychological terror inflicted on Linda and Anthony O'Malley in the cellar that was to become their tomb.

It is an intricate story with many time gaps and various strands which have been presented from the author's vast and detailed case file in a conversational and occasionally old-fashioned style, but "Nightmare in the Sun" is a must for all true crime enthusiasts.

It certainly provides support for the claim that truth is often stranger than fiction - and you are left wondering just who else was involved in this Costa Blanca conspiracy.

? Nightmare in the Sun by Danny Collins is published in hardback by John Blake Publishing Ltd at £17.99.