A man with an obsession for the television serial killer Dexter has been convicted of murdering two homeless men, dismembering their bodies and concealing the remains in woodland. James Desborough, 40, killed Claudio Aquilino, 57, and Daniel Coleman, 43, in Cornwall last year, later hiding their remains in remote woodland near Sticker.
Desborough, a former builder, was already serving a life sentence for strangling his cellmate at HMP Exeter while awaiting trial. His conviction for the two earlier killings makes him a triple murderer who carried out three separate killings in the space of five months. A jury at Winchester Crown Court returned unanimous guilty verdicts on Tuesday (July 28) following three hours and 15 minutes of deliberation.
The Murders
The court heard that Mr Aquilino and Mr Coleman had previously resided with Desborough at a homeless hostel and were last seen alive in his company. Following their disappearances, Desborough, who stands at 5ft 10in and weighs nearly 18st, proceeded to spend their money on drugs and alcohol. Their bodies were dismembered in Sticker Woods, near St Austell, where Desborough had been living in a wooden cabin. Police uncovered 1,900 burned bone fragments from Mr Aquilino's body, deposited in a nearby stream. Parts of Mr Coleman's body, including his torso, legs and feet, were recovered from a shallow grave in the vicinity.
Desborough informed a forensic biologist searching the woodland for Mr Coleman's remains that he 'particularly enjoyed the dismemberment scenes' in the television programme Dexter. Officers discovered multiple handwritten documents inside Desborough's cabin, including one titled 'Bug out list' and another 'Hostiles'. Amongst the documents was one stating: 'I know I am a killer and ready to execute any predators' and another reading: 'Take care of the remaining muppets,' which also included Mr Coleman's name.
Desborough had additionally sketched a series of concentric circles with Sticker Woods at the centre, and London and Benidorm marked at the outer edge, which bore the title 'Kill Zone', with the sub-heading 'Operational spheres'. He had also arranged to leave the UK weeks prior to his arrest.
The Trial and Defence
The father-of-one denied both killings and informed the jury it was a 'series of unfortunate circumstances' that the two men perished on his property within a brief period. Desborough murdered Mr Aquilino, who struggled with drug and gambling addictions, shortly after he was last spotted alive in April last year. The defendant insisted he had actually discovered Mr Aquilino hanging deceased from a tree on his land in May or early June while under the influence of ketamine.
His involvement, Desborough claimed, was merely assisting Mr Coleman – who had dismembered and incinerated the remains alone – in disposing of Mr Aquilino's body in a stream. He claimed Mr Coleman reassured him and persuaded him to get rid of the body and continue utilising Mr Aquilino's bank card. 'The idea was to cover up the death, carry on using his card. I'm not proud of it, it was like dangling the carrot,' he said. 'I was homeless, jobless, I had no money and addiction problems.'
He also refuted murdering Mr Coleman during the early hours of 4 June, instead maintaining he had come back to his cabin later that month and discovered him lying naked, face down and deceased in a stream. Concerned about there already being one corpse on his property and that he was in possession of Class A drugs, he dismembered Mr Coleman with an axe and buried the remains. He acknowledged subsequently spending their money on beer and drugs, but informed jurors: 'They were friends, I got on well with them.'
Desborough, of Old Oak Woods, Lower Sticker, Cornwall, had earlier admitted to preventing the lawful burial of the two men's bodies.
