A MAN who killed a retired teacher while on bail pending trial for rape has been jailed for life. And the authorities were warned by Mr Justice McCollum in Belfast Crown Court yesterday that Richard Close might kill again.
The jury voted by 11 to one to convict Close, of Ballymaconnell Road, Bangor, of murdering a retired teacher, Ms Daphne Taylor (59), in Co Down in December 1994.
Close (24), who served in the Gulf War and later deserted from the French Foreign Legion, killed Ms Taylor six weeks after being freed on bail on charges of rape. He was jailed for 10 years last February for raping a 16 year old north Belfast schoolgirl in August 1993.
Mr Justice McCollum said he would always pose a threat to women. Close showed no emotion at the verdict but shook his head in disbelief when the judge called him an unrepentant liar.
Ms Taylor was walking her dog on an isolated path on the Co Down coast on December 1st, 1994, when she encountered Close, who was high on vodka and cannabis. He claimed that he had gone to the beauty spot to commit suicide because his girlfriend was seeing another man and was refusing to let him see their two year old daughter.
Ms Taylor tried to stop him slitting his wrist, he claimed, and was stabbed accidentally. But the state pathologist, Prof Jack Crane, demonstrated to the court how Close had attacked Ms Taylor from behind and plunged a pocket knife into her throat.
She had been stabbed twice in the neck, her coat was covered with slash marks and her breast bone and nine of her ribs were fractured.