'Evil' Couple Murderer Jailed For Life

A grandfather has been handed four life sentences for two double-murders and a violent sexual attack dating back decades - after footage from TV show Bullseye was used to help identify him.

John Cooper, from Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, murdered brother and sister Richard and Helen Thomas in 1985 and Peter and Gwenda Dixon in 1989.

He went on to attack a group of teenagers in 1996, raping a 16-year-old girl and sexually assaulting her 15-year-old friend at gunpoint.

Cooper, now 66, has previous convictions for armed robbery and served a 10-year sentence after being sent to prison in 1998.

The killer repeatedly shouted over High Court judge Mr Justice John Griffith as he was sentenced at Swansea Crown Court.

The judge said: "The murders were of such evil wickedness that the mandatory sentence of life will mean just that.

"I am confident that you will never express any remorse and so help the victims come to terms with their loss.

"You are a dangerous man who is a highly organised predatory burglar whose hallmarks were balaclava, gloves and shotgun.

"Each of your offences were well planned and so it was that you evaded arrest for so long.

"Indeed, but for the advances of forensic science, you may well have never been brought to justice."

Siblings Richard, who was 58, and Helen, 54, were attacked in their home near Milford Haven in December 1985.

Ms Thomas was found entangled in rope, with a man's shirt tied around her head as a blindfold.

Her brother was killed in the outhouse of the property - police believe he had come home early and interrupted the attack on Helen.

Both were shot at close range and then doused in diesel before the house was set on fire.

In July 1989 Peter Dixon, who was 51, and his 52-year-old wife Gwenda were murdered as they walked along a coastal path in Pembrokeshire.

They had been on the last day of their camping holiday near the beautiful village of Little Haven.

It was a damp morning so they had decided to go for one final walk along the tourist trail while they waited for their tent to dry.

Wearing a black balaclava and brandishing a sawn-off shotgun, Cooper accosted the couple on the path and forced them to make their way down a steep gully towards the cliffs.

In a small clearing, screened from the footpath overhead by trees and undergrowth, he tied up Mr Dixon, sexually assaulted his wife and then made them hand over their bank cards and pins, before shooting them both several times at close range.

The killings were described in court as merciless executions, carried out for pitiful financial gain and Cooper's sexual gratification.

"John Cooper is an evil man," DCS Steven Wilkins, who led the case for Dyfed-Powys Police, told Sky News.

"John Cooper was a man who thrived on control: his ability to control people, his ability to control his environment.

"He was an individual who could live within the family home a relatively nomal life, and then the next moment display the most disproportionate amount of violence and and be prepared to kill."

In a bizarre twist, Cooper had appeared on the TV gameshow Bullseye the month before he murdered the Dixons.

Detectives compared footage from the show with an artist's impression of a man seen using Mr Dixon's bank card in the days after the shootings.

The TV clip was played in court to show the jury what Cooper looked like at the time, and how he compared to the police artist's sketch.

Dyfed-Powys police began a cold case review of the crimes in 2006 after advances in forensics techniques offered new techniques to re-examine the original evidence.

Scientists at LGC Forensics made the breakthrough when they found a tiny fleck of Mr Dixon's blood on shorts found in Cooper's home and, crucially, on the barrel of his shotgun - even though it had been cleaned and painted over.

"The key elements of the DNA evidence were finding the blood on the shorts and also finding the blood underneath the paint on the shotgun, which matched that of Peter Dixon," lead scientist on the case for LGC, Dr Philip Avenell, said.

"In 1989, DNA profiling wasn't in existence and these are all techniques that were only really available to us in the past five years or so and, in those days, just weren't available."

Cooper has always maintained his innocence and has yet to show any remorse for his crimes.