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You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/nov/16/two-men-cleared-of-nicola-payne-murder
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| Two men cleared of Nicola Payne murder | Two men cleared of Nicola Payne murder |
| (34 minutes later) | |
| A former warehouse worker and his brother-in-law have been cleared of murdering a young mother who disappeared in 1991. | A former warehouse worker and his brother-in-law have been cleared of murdering a young mother who disappeared in 1991. |
| Jurors at Birmingham crown court deliberated for around eight hours over three days before finding Thomas O’Reilly and Nigel Barwell not guilty of killing Nicola Payne in Coventry. | Jurors at Birmingham crown court deliberated for around eight hours over three days before finding Thomas O’Reilly and Nigel Barwell not guilty of killing Nicola Payne in Coventry. |
| Barwell, 51, punched the air and mouthed “Thank you very much” towards the jury; O’Reilly, also 51, stood silently in the dock after he was acquitted. | Barwell, 51, punched the air and mouthed “Thank you very much” towards the jury; O’Reilly, also 51, stood silently in the dock after he was acquitted. |
| The prosecution had alleged that the two men abducted and killed Nicola, aged 18, as she walked to her parents’ home across waste ground on December 14 1991. | |
| Both defendants were charged in January this year after DNA testing linked a tent recovered by police in 1991 to the victim, whose body has never been found. | |
| Barwell, of Coventry, told the five-week trial that he and O’Reilly were drinking in Rugby on the day of her disappearance. | |
| In his evidence to the jury, Barwell described the case against him as “absolutely absurd” and denied deliberately delaying his attendance at identification parades held in 1991 and 1992. | |
| His co-defendant, also from Coventry, broke down in the witness box after telling jurors that a well-built police officer had threatened to “do” him during questioning in early 1992. | |
| O’Reilly further claimed that he was bundled into a van, blindfolded and questioned about the disappearance by a group of men later the same year. | |
| After the acquittals, trial judge Mr Justice Openshaw told the jury of eight men and four women: “You are now discharged with my thanks and the thanks of the community for the part you have played in the administration of justice.” |