A young couple who accidentally killed their landl

A young couple who accidentally killed their landlord when
they ‘hog tied’ him when he arrived home drunk have been jailed
by an Old Bailey.

Pretty blonde Michelle Pavett and her Australian boyfriend
Paul Borton, both 25, planned to hold victim Mr Kenneth Dixon,
61, prisoner for a week.

But their callous plan to have some peace from his eccentric
behaviour ended in tragedy when Mr Dixon suddenly died from
heart failure.

Borton, a plumber, left the corpse in his victim’s room for
two weeks at the start of summer, attributing the increasingly
overpowering stench to ‘a plumbing problem.

‘
The unfortunate Mr Dixon’s body was then buried in a shallow
grave in the backyard until a visitor looked at the mound of
disturbed earth and unwittingly joked: ‘That’s probably Ken.

‘
Borton and Pavett had maintained a charade that Mr Dixon was
in Manchester on holiday.

The corpse was dug up, covered in a sleeping bag and then
wheeled through the streets in an abandoned shopping trolley
before being dumped beside a railway track.

The couple had moved into Mr Dixon’s home in Yuletide Close,
Willesden, less than a fortnight before the June 11 attack last
year.

At the Old Bailey, they were cleared of manslaughter.

They
admitted false imprisonment.

Borton, originally from Sydney,
also admitted obstructing the coroner.

Mr Daniel Hollis QC, for Borton, said his client found
himself in an ‘extraordinary situation’.

‘He was not in a Sydney suburb but in a pretty low grade
place near the north circular road.

‘He is a young, hard working man, not with an enormous amount
of brain power able to work out the problems that had befallen
him.

‘He came to be in a most extraordinary situation.

‘
Mr Hollis went on to say that it was Borton who went out
to work everyday and paid the rent.

‘He was the provider for this most extraordinary miscellany
that lived at this address.

‘There is absolutely no doubt the landlord was drunk and
behaved towards Miss Pavett in a wholly unacceptable way.

If
that had not happened and Borton had been a layabout (not
providing money which in turn was used for drink by the
landlord) these offences would not have happened.

‘
Mr Godrey Carey QC, for Pavett, said she had been sexually
assaulted by Mr Dixon in the minutes before the fatal attack.

‘Mr Dixon was absolutely impossible.

It was a horror show.

‘
Judge Francis Petre told Borton and Pavett only an immediate
jail term ‘could possibly be justified’.

‘This was an absolutely horrific episode and was described by
Mr Carey as a horror show.

‘It is deeply depressing to listen to these sort of
circumstances.

‘Mr Dixon was an unusual and eccentric personality – no doubt
about that – and at his age he was an ideal candidate for bullying.

‘Both of you could have left these premises if you did not
like them, but you did not.

‘That man died hog-tied and trussed up.

‘I accept that you were not the cause of his death but the
danger of what you did must have been apparent to anyone.

‘
The judge said the body was disposed of ‘in panic’ and said
it must have been ‘perfectly awful’ for the defendants until the
body was found weeks later.

‘That is punishment you have both already served but this was
a humiliating end for this man and I have a public duty to
perform.

‘
Borton was sentenced to three years jail for the false
imprisonment and a further 12 months for disposing of the body.

He was also recommended for deportation back to Australia at
the end of his sentence.

He shrugged as he was led to the cells.

Pavett was sentenced to three years jail for her role in the
false imprisonment.

She waved to the public gallery as she walked
down to the cells.

ENDS