Fifteen years after her murder, the brutal killing of Lynda Spence remains one of Scotland's most shocking cases. The 27-year-old financial advisor was held captive for 14 days, subjected to extreme torture, and murdered by Colin Coats and Philip Wade in a West Kilbride flat around April 28, 2011.
The Torture and Murder
Lynda was snatched off the street in Broomhill, Glasgow's West End, and taken to Ayrshire. Bound to a chair with tape, her captors cut off her thumb and pinkie with bolt cutters, smashed her kneecaps, burned her with a hot iron, beat her with a golf club, and denied her food, water, or toilet access. They placed tape over her mouth and glasses with taped-up lenses over her eyes. Coats used Lynda's phone and email to pretend she was alive, while two small-time crooks guarded her.
The Investigation
Lynda's parents reported her missing in May 2011. Coats, a computer expert who worked for the Civil Aviation Authority, became a prime suspect, but witnesses were initially too scared to speak. The breakthrough came when a witness fearing for his life went to police. In October 2011, officers raided the flat. Despite efforts to clean up—removing carpet, replacing floorboards, and burning the chair—forensics found a spot of Lynda's blood on the bathroom floor and Coats' fingerprint on the door handle. Mobile phone evidence placed Coats and Wade in West Kilbride throughout the ordeal.
The Trial
At the High Court in Glasgow in February 2013, Coats and Wade, both 42, were tried for murder despite no body being found. Witnesses included Lynda's business partner Tony Kelly, who recalled Coats saying, "I killed her last Thursday." Another witness said Wade confessed to disposing of a woman's body in the hills. An inmate claimed Coats said he cut off Lynda's head and put her body in a furnace. Company director John Glen, testifying from behind a screen, said Lynda phoned him, distressed, saying, "He is going to kill me." Coats later told Glen, "If you want a valuation, you will need to organise a seance."
The trial also revealed Lynda had committed alleged frauds, including taking £175,000 in deposits from Glasgow's Chinese community. It emerged she had been recruited as an informant for the Scottish Crime and Drugs Enforcement Agency (SCDEA) weeks before her murder, tasked with spying on an Albanian underworld network.
Verdict and Sentencing
After a 46-day trial, the jury took 20 hours to find Coats and Wade guilty of murder. Coats received a life sentence with a minimum of 33 years; Wade got 30 years. The two guards were each jailed for 11 years. Lynda's parents said, "There is no verdict that will bring our daughter Lynda back or spare her the terrible ordeal that took her life." Police appealed to Coats and Wade to reveal where they buried Lynda.
After the trial, the Daily Record published video of Coats from 2008 dressed as a woman, saying in a spoof advert, "New gangster in town seeks young men for extortion, abduction and tying up...funerals and bar mitzvahs."
Ongoing Searches
Lynda's body has never been found. Coats is believed to have suffocated her in the bathroom and put her remains in the boot of her silver Vauxhall Astra, which also remains missing. In 2022, a five-month search at a remote spot 12 miles from Dunoon in Argyllshire drew a blank. Graeme Pearson, former Director General of the SCDEA, compared the violence to a war crime, saying, "The extent of the violence she suffered was completely disproportionate." A Police Scotland spokesperson said, "Should any new information be received it will be fully assessed. Anyone with any information is asked to contact Police Scotland via 101."
