'Controlling bully' guilty of wife's Earls Barton murder

A "controlling bully" and his accomplice have been found guilty of shooting dead his estranged wife.

The body of Marion Price, 63, was found in a car park in Earls Barton, Northamptonshire, on 15 December.

Northampton Crown Court heard Michael Reader - who was "all but divorced" from Ms Price - had been due to give her £10,000 days before she died.

Reader, 70, of Booth Rise, Northampton, and Stephen Welch, 61, of Kingsthorpe, were found guilty of murder.

Prosecutors told the jury Ms Price was in her car when Reader shot her dead, having pulled up alongside her on a motorbike.

According to mobile phone records shown in court, the two defendants met up near a car repair garage in Moulton, about seven miles (11km) from Earls Barton, shortly after Ms Price died.

The prosecution said Welch - a "willing and knowing accomplice" - then travelled to a spot on the River Nene in Northampton where he stopped for about 15 minutes.

When police searched at the same location, they found a bag of clothes and toiletries weighted down with bricks in the water.

Jurors heard Reader installed a tracker on Ms Price's car a year before her death to "keep tabs on her".

The court was also told Reader was due to transfer £10,000 to Ms Price as a "financial settlement" on 9 December - six days before she died.

Det Ch Insp Joe Banfield said: "Michael Reader is a manipulative, controlling bully, who could not stand the fact that Marion Price had escaped his clutches, left him, and was starting to enjoy her life again.

"The campaign of abuse Reader imposed on Marion throughout their marriage caused her to live in almost constant fear. He continuously put her down, ridiculed her, used threats of violence and made her life hell while they were together."

In a statement, Ms Price's family said: "We can all now begin the process of healing, knowing that justice has been served and the men responsible for Marion's murder are locked away."

The pair will be sentenced at a later date.

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