Helen Bailey: Children's author's fiance sentenced to life in prison for her murder

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The “wicked” fiance of the children's author whose body was found in a cesspit has been jailed for a minimum of 34 years.

Ian Stewart, 56, spent weeks poisoning Helen Bailey with prescription sedatives before smothering her in a “heinous” plot motivated by greed last year.

The 51-year-old Electra Brown writer was dragged into the tank of filth deep below the couple’s luxury home, where she remained hidden for three months.

Her devoted dachshund Boris was found dead at her side.

Following a seven-week trial at St Albans Crown Court, Judge Andrew Bright sentenced the murderous computer expert, who refused to attend the hearing, to life with a minimum term of 34 years.

He said: “I am firmly of the view that you currently pose a real danger to women with whom you form a relationship.”

A jury found Stewart, of Baldock Road, Royston, Hertfordshire, guilty in a unanimous verdict of murder, fraud, preventing a lawful burial and three counts of perverting the course of justice.

He is likely to “end his days behind bars” due to a litany of health problems which have dogged him for decades, his defence counsel said on Wednesday.

The judge told Stewart: “Whilst we will never know whether you may have had some additional motive for killing the woman who loved you and wanted to be your wife, I am in no doubt this is a clear case of a murder done in the expectation of gain with aggravating features which make it difficult to imagine a more heinous crime.”

For months, Stewart spun a complex tale of deception about the disappearance of his bride-to-be, whom he claimed had abruptly left for “space”.

His deceit culminated with a fantastical tale of a kidnap plot by two men named Nick and Joe, whom he blamed for Ms Bailey's death.

He first met the vulnerable widow on a Facebook group for the bereaved in 2011, showering her with affection to win his way into her trust, later her multimillion-pound estate.

After the pair moved into a £1.5m home together, the avaricious predator slowly began slipping her his prescription anti-insomnia medication.

Then, once she had been stupefied by the drugs, he killed her on 11 April last year.

The judge said: “Helen Bailey was only 51-years-old and at the height of her success as a writer when you brought her life to a cruel end and dumped her body and that of her beloved dog Boris in a foul-smelling cesspit to decompose.

“I am satisfied that your principal motive for killing her was to enable you to take advantage of the generous provision she had made for you in the event of her death, which you knew the law would presume after she had remained a missing person for long enough.”

He added that he felt the offence was not serious enough to justify a whole-life sentence.

“A further aggravating feature in this case is that you deceived Helen Bailey's family and friends over a period of over three months by a calculated and callous series of lies which meant that they had to endure the anguish and misery of not knowing her whereabouts or her fate for a long time before the appalling truth emerged.

“I have read the impact statement of Helen Bailey's brother John dated 14 February 2017 in which he sets out the effect which the cruel murder of his sister had and will continue to have on him, Helen's mother and father and her many close friends who all feel an enormous sense of outrage at the way she and her dog Boris met their deaths at your hands.

“As John Bailey rightly observes, the world has lost a gifted author and her family and friends will have to live the rest of their lives with the deep sense of loss your wicked crime has inflicted upon them.”

Detectives are to probe the sudden death of Stewart's first wife, who was found in the couple's garden in 2010.

An inquest at the time concluded she died of natural causes from a “sudden unexpected death in epilepsy”.

Her body was cremated, police said.

Detective Chief Inspector Jerome Kent said: “There is not a murder investigation into Diane Stewart, there is a re-examination of a sudden, unexpected death. It is only right that I would look back on somebody's past.”

On Wednesday, Stewart again refused to return to the dock as his sentencing proceedings began.

Simon Russell Flint, defending, said during his mitigation: “The likelihood is, given his state of health, the sentence has a like-effect of a whole-life order.

“There is every prospect and likelihood Mr Stewart will end his days behind bars.”

PA