John Heald: The South Yorkshire man who avoided justice after stabbing a seaside B&B landlady to death
John Heald had been on the run for an alleged Sheffield rape at knifepoint when he fatally stabbed Bei Carter
It is now more than 11 years since John Heald - accused of murdering a guesthouse landlady - took his own life while jurors in his trial were considering the verdict.
The Rotherham criminal had been on the run for an alleged Sheffield rape at knifepoint when he fatally stabbed Bei Carter at the Morayland Hotel in Bridlington, East Yorkshire on July 18, 2014.
Admitting the killing but denying murder, Heald went on trial in January the following year, however on February 6 Judge Jeremy Richardson KC told a jury Heald had been found dead at Hull prison the previous night.
A Prison Service spokesman said the alleged murderer was found unresponsive in his cell and pronounced dead shortly afterwards.
During Heald’s trial jurors heard he picked the Bridlington B&B where he killed Mrs Carter by pure chance - having won between £60,000 and £70,000 on the English and Irish lotteries.
He claimed to have been contemplating suicide during his stay in East Yorkshire and said he knifed Mrs Carter - a Chinese citizen who had taken on the guesthouse just two months prior with her husband Terry - when spooked as he was fleeing the hotel.
Earlier the same day he had got wind that two men had recognised him as wanted by the police on Facebook and while “panicking” decided to head back to Rotherham.
However Heald told jurors in his trial that as he exited his room to flee the hotel Mrs Carter "tapped him on the shoulder" and at some stage she made to “grab” the knife he had drawn, suffering a stab wound when a struggle followed.
Having pulled the 49-year-old into the room and leaving, husband Terry found her dead in the same room later that night at around 11pm.
However Graham Reeds, prosecuting, told jurors that, after stabbing Mrs Carter, Heald had “put her to the floor and stamped on her face three times”.
The court heard Mrs Carter died from a single stab wound to the centre of her chest. Heald was on the run for another week before he was arrested in Rotherham, having been spotted at Parkgate.
Speaking about his wife during the trial Mr Carter said she was a “fantastic” artist whose work had been shown in exhibitions, adding he couldn't imagine her being “confrontational” with anyone. He said: "She would back down, she wouldn't know what to do."
The court heard Heald had previously been jailed for six months aged 22 in 1983 for possession of an offensive weapon, threatening behaviour and assaulting a police officer.
He was fined for threatening behaviour when he was 23 and aged 24 was jailed for six months for burglary and for two counts of causing actual bodily harm.
He had a further conviction for threatening behaviour in 1985 and served his most recent prison sentence in 1992 for disorder.