A Dublin man who led police to the body of his lover 10 years after she disappeared in London has been found guilty of her murder.
After beating and strangling the school cook in her own home, Samuel Kerrigan stole her handbag, chequebooks and cards and went on a spending spree with her money, the court heard.
The former roadsweeper, who is originally from Dublin but had been living in London for some time, buried Catherine Corridan (31) in a shallow grave near a cricket ground in west London where her partially clothed body lay undiscovered for 10 years.
Last year, after British police reopened the investigation, Kerrigan (35) admitted to officers that he had buried the body but blamed the killing on his sister.
He was coming to the end of a nine-year sentence for armed robbery when he was charged with the murder.
Ms Corridan was originally from Ireland but moved to London in the mid-1980s. She was a cook at a school for blind children in Middlesex at the time of her "sudden and unexplained" disappearance in March 1994.
The court earlier heard how Kerrigan, who was married at the time, had struck up a relationship with Ms Corridan.
The initial police investigation did not lead to any criminal charges but the case was reopened in April 2002. Under police questioning last March, Kerrigan admitted burying the body. He later took police to the burial site and the skeletal remains were discovered in a wooded copse.
He spent the day after the murder with friends forging cheques and using Ms Corridan's cards. He also tried to sell jewellery which he had taken from her body.
The jury took three hours to return a unanimous guilty verdict. Kerrigan will be sentenced today. - (PA)