Police reopen forensic probe into the unsolved murders of elderly couple found shot dead and hidden under hay bales in a cowshed at their farmhouse in 1993

• Harry and Megan Tooze were murdered near Bridgend, south Wales, in July 1993
• Decades after a man was convicted and acquitted, police are reviewing the case

Investigators are reopening a historic case into the murders of an elderly couple shot dead in their farmhouse in south Wales over 30 years ago. 

Officers believe advanced DNA techniques could be the key to unlocking the mystery behind the deaths of Harry Tooze, 64, and his wife Megan, 67.

The couple were killed at their rural home in Llanharry, near Bridgend, on July 26, 1993, and their bloodied bodies later found hidden under hay bales in a cowshed.

Three decades on and police have launched a new review of the case and brought in one of the UK’s top forensic experts to help.

Dr Angela Gallop is credited with cracking many of the UK’s most notorious cases including Lynette White – whose killer Jeffrey Gafoor convicted of murder in 2004 – 16 years after her death; as well as serial killer John Cooper, who was behind the Pembrokeshire coastal murders.

Forensic experts explore the crime scene in the rural south Wales farmhouse where Harry and Megan Tooze were killed in 1993

Harry Tooze, 64, and his wife Megan, 67, were killed at their home in Llanharry, near Bridgend, on July 26, 1993, and their bloodied bodies later found hidden under hay bales in a cowshed

Senior investigating officer Detective Superintendent Mark Lewis said: ‘We hope that by using the latest modern forensic techniques we can deliver justice for Harry and Megan.

‘As is usual in such reviews, no outcomes can ever be guaranteed.

‘This case has affected many people over the years and our aim is to find the answers to the unanswered questions which remain about their deaths 30 years on,’ he added.

‘Even with this passage of time I appeal to anyone who has any information about the murders to come forward and speak to police.’

Mr and Mrs Tooze were found dead with gunshot wounds at Ty Ar y Waun Farm.

That Monday morning, they had left the farm to visit a Tesco supermarket in Llantrisant and collect their pensions before arriving back home at 11am.

At around 1.30pm, two gunshots were heard by neighbours, but this was not considered to be unusual due to it being a farm.

Police were called after a regular phone call from their only child, Cheryl Tooze, went unanswered.

The couple’s only child Cheryl Tooze and her partner Jonathan James, aged 35 at the time, who was subsequently convicted and then acquitted of Mr and Mrs Tooze’s murders

Police officers, pictured in 1993 with sniffer dogs along the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path, investigating the murders of Harry and Megan Tooze

Miss Tooze had first rung her parents’ neighbour Owen Hopkins to ask if he would check on them. When he phoned back to say they were not at home and suggested  calling the police, Miss Tooze said her partner Jonathan Jones was driving from their home in Kent and would be there shortly.

Mr Hopkins called 999 at around midnight, prompting officers to attend the farmhouse and search the scene. Mr Hopkins saw Mr Jones a short time later inside the property.

Officers eventually discovered the bodies of Mr and Mrs Tooze in a cowshed adjoining the farmhouse.

They had both been shot in the back of the head from about a metre away with a 12-bore double-barrelled shotgun.

They had been covered in carpet and hidden under hay bales.

Police believe they were not killed in the cowshed, but were likely to have been carried there after their deaths.

Items in the house, such as a teacup and saucer and a shirt laid out for Mr Tooze in the bedroom, led detectives to believe the suspect was someone known to the couple and that they had perhaps been expecting them.

Miss Tooze was at work during the killings but Mr Jones’s alibi was less ironclad and suspicion turned towards him.

Pictured here is are barrels that had been found and painted white by a member of the public near the site of the murders of Megan and Harry Tooze

One red and one blue shotgun cartridge found during searches near the site of the murders of Megan and Harry Tooze

Two days after her parents were killed, Miss Tooze made an appeal to the public with her partner sitting beside her.

She said: “If there’s anyone out there who knows anything in connection with the brutal murder of both my parents please contact the police, please help find the person who has destroyed my life, my mum and dad were my life. They may as well have killed me too for all my life is worth now.”

Hundreds of calls to police followed with people offering information, but the killings remained a mystery.

The police appeared to be no further forward until five months later, when Jonathan was arrested and police announced they weren’t looking for anyone else in connection with the investigation.

The then 35-year-old, who was a self-employed recruitment consultant, told police on the day of the killing he taken the day off work and went into their hometown of Orpington to look for office space to rent – but police could not find anybody who had seen him that day.

His partial thumbprint was also found on the cup and saucer that had been found in the living room, and his trial heard it was that fingerprint that had led to his arrest.

The prosecution claimed he wanted access to the couple’s £150,000 inheritance as Cheryl was an only child, but his defence said the fingerprints could have got there after Jonathan went to the farm to help police.

Dr Angela Gallop is credited with cracking many of the UK’s most notorious cases, including serial killer John Cooper, who was behind the Pembrokeshire coastal murders

He was found guilty, and jailed for life in 1995, but in a strange twist of events, the judge who sentenced him wrote a letter to the Home Secretary saying he had “significant doubt” about the conviction.

In a copy which was sent to Jones’ barrister, Mr Justice Rougier said he was surprised the jury convicted Jones for the murders, and that if Jones was guilty he was exceptionally cunning.

It gave Jonathan Jones, who was by now married to Cheryl with a baby son, fresh hope for freedom. and a year later, his conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal.

After an independent review of the murders in 2000, a new team of detectives was brought in to reinvestigate the deaths in November 2001.

Between November 2001 and January 2003, officers from South Wales Police’s Specialist Search Unit searched the area around Mr and Mrs Tooze’s farmhouse, including a nearby iron ore mine and a disused quarry.

In 2003 it was announced that the team of detectives, led by Detective Chief Inspector Brent Parry, who solved the murder of 20-year-old Lynette White in Butetown near Cardiff’s docklands were joining the hunt for the killer.

Although a number of new leads were generated following the appeal, no-one was charged.

Information can be submitted to the investigation via online public portal here.

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