A pensioner went to a Wetherspoons pub for lunch before killing and dismembering his “soul mate” and then leaving her body in his freezer for nearly three years, a court has been told. Delia McInerney was found dead in George Gordon’s flat on Gerards Court in St Helens alongside her five “beloved” guinea pigs, which he is alleged to have drowned and frozen, in January this year.
The 62-year-old, from Anfield, was said to have been killed as long ago as April 2023, apparently after being hit over the head with a hammer. She had been planning to move to Portugal to enjoy a “new life” only days later.
Prosecution opens case
Gordon, 65, went on trial at Liverpool Crown Court on Wednesday, accused of her murder. He was absent from the dock as Martin Reid KC, for the crown, told a jury of five men and seven women, plus two reserves: “On the 8th of January this year, the police attended the defendant George Gordon's flat in St Helens. They went there because concerns had been raised by a number of people and agencies about the whereabouts and wellbeing of Delia McInerney.”
Ms McInerney had been friends with Gordon for many years and spent much of her time living at his flat, although she had her own house in Liverpool and property abroad. Her friends had not seen her for some time, and Gordon, for over 18 months, lied to them about her whereabouts and sometimes pretended to be Ms McInerney when communicating with her friends by phone messages or email.
“Unbeknown to them, but known very well to the defendant, Delia McInerney had died in April 2023 at the defendant's hands. Her dismembered body was found in a chest freezer in the defendant's flat on the 8th of January this year,” Mr Reid said. “In the meantime, the defendant fraudulently obtained thousands of pounds from her bank accounts and obtained a loan and credit cards in her name. The defendant admits that he killed Delia McInerney but claims, we understand, that he acted in self-defence.”
Items bought before death
Ms McInerney was remembered by family members as “a free spirit and kind and generous”. The artist spent much of her time living with Gordon due to concerns over 5G masts near her home on Douglas Road in Anfield. She had been planning to move to Portugal, where she also owned property, “just a day or two after her death”, believed to have occurred on April 11, 2023.
Gordon and Ms McInerney were described as “soul mates and very close”, though “not in a romantic relationship”. His relatives and neighbours recalled “a really bad smell, like a bin lorry” coming from his home before the discovery, which followed concerns raised by social services and the Department for Work and Pensions over an application to vary the bank account into which her benefits were paid.
In the months before her death, Gordon collected prescriptions for medications later found in her system and “researched overdoses online”. He made searches for purchases from websites such as eBay, including a pair of “heavy-duty scissors” advertised as “sufficient to cut through small bone”. In January 2023, he created a note on his phone with a PDF file described as an “instruction manual providing information on assisted suicide”, including “how to prepare a lethal cocktail of drugs”. The following month he bought a copy of Gray's Anatomy, a “leading textbook on human anatomy”.
Gordon also purchased an electric handsaw, a sledgehammer and a book titled “Wicked Women” before Ms McInerney's death. Mr Reid said: “Over the space of just over a week, the defendant had purchased items consistent with those that would later be used, or required, to kill and dismember Ms McInerney.” His web history also showed searches for “butchers' tools, meat saws, cleavers and choppers”.
Conflicting accounts
Mr Reid said of the events of April 11 2023: “In his police interview, the defendant said that he came home to his flat to find Ms McInerney writhing on the floor in pain, having taken an overdose of pills. He said that he hit her on the head, once, with a nearby hammer, to end her suffering. He would later claim, including in a letter to his cousin, that Ms McInerney attacked him on this day, causing him to defend himself by hitting her on the head with the hammer.”
“The defendant's case, as the prosecution understands it, is that he was out on 12th of April in Blackpool and came home at about 7 or 8pm to find Ms McInerney under the influence of something, and incoherent. The crown understands the defence case to be that Mr Gordon wanted to call an ambulance but was attacked by Ms McInerney with a hammer and a knife and, fearing for his life, he struck her to the head with a hammer or mallet. The prosecution says that neither of these tales is true.”
Gordon visited a JD Wetherspoon pub at lunch on April 11, with a receipt showing a £27.33 purchase for a pint of San Miguel, a guest ale, a five-bean chilli, half a chargrilled chicken with mashed potato and gravy, a small bowl of chips and an eight-inch garlic bread with cheese. That evening, shortly after 6pm, he recorded a video of Ms McInerney “interacting with her guinea pigs and rabbit” in the last known footage showing her alive.
Mr Reid told the court: “The evidence suggests that Delia McInerney died on the night of the 11th of April 2023 or early on the 12th of April, just before she was to begin her new life in Portugal. Of note, there is an email from Delia McInerney's email address at 8.44pm.” He noted “curious differences” between this message and earlier ones, including a lower case 'I' used twice and the absence of her usual sign off, “Dee”.
Discovery in freezer
With Gordon having credit card debts totalling more than £26,000, he was alleged to have transferred thousands of pounds of Ms McInerney's money into his own bank account during hundreds of transactions. In August 2023, he took out a £10,000 loan in her name with Tesco Bank.
Mr Reid said Gordon's “web of lies began to unravel” in December last year after he made the requested change to Ms McInerney's benefits under the guise of being a social worker. Officers then attended his address at Gerards Court. “The address was full of clutter, in disrepair and with bodily fluids on a number of surfaces,” Mr Reid said. “PC Roberts asked if Delia was safe and well, and the defendant did not provide an answer. PC Rooke also asked if she was safe and well and asked for a yes or no answer. The defendant said that she was not, and when asked why said 'she isn't alive anymore'.”
Gordon was arrested on suspicion of murder. As he was escorted from the address, he said “she's in there” and added “she's in the freezer”. He clarified that Ms McInerney's body was in two pieces, stored together. Officers later opened the chest freezer, which was still turned on, and found a body inside. “They could clearly see human legs and feet. Wrapped in and around some black plastic bags were what appeared to be human legs and another item which looked like an organ. Also located within the freezer were the remains of five guinea pigs, which had been placed in a plastic bag next to Ms McInerney's body.”
Gordon, represented by Gordon Cole KC and Philip Tully, denies murder and causing unnecessary suffering to an animal after allegedly drowning five guinea pigs. The trial, before Mr Justice Goose, continues and is expected to last up to six weeks.
