Personal injury news

Millionaire dies of head injury after robbery

Two masked thieves who tied up a millionaire jeweller and beat him to death with a champagne bottle have been jailed for life.

Businessman Douglas Clarke was ambushed by robbers as he spent the evening at his mistress’s home in January 2004, and was beaten so severely that he later died of serious head injuries. After leaving him with fatal personal injuries, the gang stole £6,000 worth of his possessions and fled the scene.

Jailed for at least twenty years each for their part in the murder were Paul Azille, 37, and Caswell Holness, 40. Another man, 42-year-old Gregory Scott, was jailed for at least seven-and-a-half years for his part in setting up the robbery. A jury at the Old Bailey found the trio guilty in a re-trial after the jury at the original hearing were unable to reach a verdict.

Describing the attack, Martin Hicks QC, prosecuting, said, “They subjected him to a vicious assault. The principle weapon was an empty champagne bottle taken from the living room of the flat and used to strike him repeatedly on his head with such force that he suffered severe injury and brain damage.”

44-year-old Douglas Clarke was a married father-of-four who drove a Porsche and dressed smartly. He bore a resemblance to soul musician James Brown and was having an affair with a woman named Muna Worrie, whose house he was at when he suffered his head injuries.

Sentencing the trio of robbers, Judge David Paget, said that Clarke’s death was a “brutal killing done for gain.”