Mystery of animal lover's 'murder by mistake'

IT WAS the murder that no one could have foreseen. Even the attacker who gunned down the animal-loving bachelor Ian Butler probably didn't want him dead.

Neighbours in Stokenchurch, the quiet Buckinghamshire village where Mr Butler, 49, died last Thursday night, were dismayed and amazed yesterday; nothing like it had happened there before. That it should happen to a man who was thought not to have an enemy in the world was all the more shocking.

Mr Butler lived with his parents and sister in a semi- detached house in a quiet close around a manicured green. He kept a Rottweiler and four cats. His pets, and keeping fit by running, were the centre of Mr Butler's life. He was well liked.

But somebody wanted to hurt him and waited outside his house last Thursday night, knowing that he started work for a local contract cleaning firm at midnight. The gunman lurked until Mr Butler left home as usual at 10 minutes to 12. When he was just outside his gate the attacker blasted him and ran away.

Yesterday the speculation in local pubs was of an attempted knee-capping that went wrong. One villager said he understood Mr Butler had had a heart attack after being shot in the leg. 'Nothing like that has ever happened here. In fact, nothing much happens at all.'

Stokenchurch is comfortable, affluent. Most of its 4,000 residents commute to work in Oxford, London or High Wycombe. Many are retired. The only local employers to speak of are a model aircraft manufacturer and a picture-framing company. Around the village is prime farming land.

Outside the Butlers' home yesterday small boys played football and cycled around the green. Neighbours leaned on their gates and updated each other on the latest news about the horror that had come into their midst. Apart from the raucous cries of young men leaving pubs on their way to a local football fixture, it was a perfect picture of suburban England. The police are trying to find out who shattered that picture.

Detective Superintendent John Bound, who is heading the murder hunt, has based his 50- strong squad at High Wycombe, the nearest large town. Stokenchurch's own police station is a small satellite office which is seldom open.

Yesterday detectives made house-to-house enquiries, quizzing family, friends and work colleagues to try and find a motive. 'This guy's obviously been in some sort of aggravation,' Det Supt Bound said. 'It appears to me that they didn't want to kill him. If they wanted him dead they would have shot him in the body or head rather than in the leg.'

There is no description of the gunman, but police want to speak to four Asian youths who were seen in a white saloon car in the area shortly before the attack. There are very few non- white people in Stokenchurch. Last Friday the hunt centred on High Wycombe, where there is a larger Asian population. Vanloads of police officers had searched the area around Mr Butler's home, neighbours said. The search yielded little. 'There just isn't a motive for this at the moment' Det Supt Bound said. 'But obviously he's upset somebody.'

Mr Butler's father, Bill, said he could not understand why anyone would want to gun down his son.

'He was a very gentle man,' said Mr Butler, 80. 'A good man. An animal-lover and a very careful person. If he was driving the car and he saw a hedgehog or anything he would stop and put it off the road.'

Back in the bar of the King's Arms Hotel, drinkers asked one another who had heard the gunshots and discussed whether it had been sensible of two local lads to try to chase the gunman.

They sat and shook their heads over pints of Brakspear's and Flowers real ale. Then, slowly, the conversation turned to the weather, the football and hangovers from the previous night.