The partner of a retired university lecturer who was fatally shot with a crossbow has called for his murderer to reveal exactly why he killed her best friend.
Terence Whall, 39, was convicted at Mold Crown Court today of killing Gerald Corrigan, who was fatally injured as he adjusted a satellite dish outside his home on Anglesey in the early hours of Good Friday, April 19, last year.
The jury in the trial, which lasted more than four weeks, was told it may never know why the 74-year-old was murdered.
North Wales Police said a parallel fraud investigation was ongoing after claims the pensioner and his partner Marie Bailey, 64, handed over £250,000 to convicted fraudster Richard Wyn Lewis, before his death.
The court heard the couple handed money over to Mr Lewis, who remains under investigation, for a land deal, work to a house and a horse.
Mr Lewis also grew cannabis in an outbuilding at their property but removed the drugs farm when Mr Corrigan realised the scale of the operation, the court heard.
Detective Chief Inspector Brian Kearney said Mr Corrigan may have become a "source or potential source of grief to local criminality".
He said a prosecution file on the fraud investigation, understood to involve three suspects, was awaiting review by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).
In a statement, Mr Corrigan's partner Ms Bailey said: "Gerry was my partner in life, my best friend, he meant the world to me.
"Every day I am faced with the reality of no Gerry Corrigan in my life any more. Each day my heart is broken, I feel it breaking again and I can do nothing.
"For Gerry's family and friends I am sorry we have lost him, our lives poorer and somehow empty without him.
"To that sad, twisted broken soul who murdered him, I say if you have an ounce of humanity, any sense of decency then you would tell us now why you have done this."
She urged anyone who might know why Whall had carried out the murder to come forward.
She added: "To you, I will say this, I am sorry for you and you have been given what you deserve."
DCI Kearney said: "We really want the Corrigan family to have the answers to understand why someone has so brutally executed their partner, their father."
Mr Corrigan's daughter Fiona said nothing could prepare her "for a 7am telephone call on a bank holiday weekend to tell you your dad has been shot."
She said she had to drive from one hospital to another to be there for her father.
"The mental torture of having a loved one in critical care is not something I'd wish on anyone.
"Being given a glimmer of hope just because for that hour, they had stabilised his blood pressure only to have it dashed because of the reality of the situation.
"The injuries caused by a crossbow are not designed just to kill, they are designed to mutilate.
"The particular weapon is designed for hunting to bring down... game and that is what my dad became. Prey. We may never know why."
She said her dad was "just an average bloke enjoying his retirement".
"He enjoyed a lie in, a nice cup of tea and reading books.
"He loved Laurel and Hardy films and photographing flowers and mountains.
"Our lives won't be the same without him."
The court heard evidence Whall and co-defendant Gavin Jones, 36, who were both convicted of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice for a plot to set fire to Whall's car, were also involved in a dispute over money with Mr Lewis.
Whall, a twice-married tai chi instructor from east London, denied ever meeting Mr Corrigan, who died in hospital on May 11.
But, the court heard he hid outside the father-of-two's remote home and waited for him to leave after the Sky signal was interfered with.
The crossbow bolt passed through the pensioner causing serious internal injuries and bruising his heart before shattering a bone in his arm as it left his body.
The GPS system from Whall's state-of-the-art Land Rover Discovery, which was found burnt out in a disused quarry on June 3, showed he had been in the area of Mr Corrigan's home, near South Stack, at the time of the shooting and on the previous night.
Whall initially told police he was at home on the night Mr Corrigan was shot but, when the GPS showed he was not, he said he was in the area because he was having a sexual encounter with friend Barry Williams.
Mr Williams denied the claims.
Part way through the trial, which lasted more than four weeks, Jones' brother Darren Jones, 41, and his friend Martin Roberts, 34, pleaded guilty to the arson of the Land Rover Discovery.
Whall, Gavin Jones, Darren Jones and Roberts are due to be sentenced on Friday, February 28.
