A woman who murdered her parents and lived with their bodies for four years has been jailed for life with a minimum term of 36 years.
Virginia McCullough, 36, poisoned her father, John McCullough, 70, with prescription medication that she crushed and put into his alcoholic drinks, the prosecutor Lisa Wilding KC told Chelmsford crown court. She then murdered her mother, Lois McCullough, 71, the following day.
The barrister said McCullough “beat her mother with a hammer and stabbed her multiple times in the chest with a kitchen knife bought for the purpose”.
Both murders took place in June 2019 at the couple’s home in Great Baddow, Essex, where the defendant continued to live with her parents’ dead bodies for the next four years.
McCullough “built a makeshift tomb” for her father, who had worked as a university lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University, Wilding told Chelmsford crown court.
The “rectangular tomb” was found in a room that had been Mr McCullough’s bedroom and study, and was “composed with masonry blocks stacked together”. It was “covered with multiple blankets, and a number of pictures and paintings over the top”, Wilding said.
“She concealed the body of her mother, wrapped in a sleeping bag, within a wardrobe in her mother’s bedroom on the top floor of the property,” the barrister said.
The murders were uncovered after her parents’ GPs raised concerns over missed appointments and police forced entry to the home on 15 September 2023. For years McCullough told lies about their whereabouts, frequently telling doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday or away on lengthy trips.
Bodycam footage of the arrest showed police forcing entry to the property before confronting McCullough in a hallway, where she confessed to her crimes.
In reference to the arrest, she told officers: “I did know that this would kind of come eventually. It’s proper that I serve my punishment.”
She added: “Cheer up, at least you caught the bad guy.”
McCullough gave a detailed account, to officers in custody after her arrest, of how she had killed her parents.
When telling officers where the murder weapon was, she said the knife used to stab her mother was underneath the stairs and “will still have blood on it, it’s rusted, but it will still have blood traces on it”.
She also told police she had to “build up gumption” to kill her mother as “I knew I had to get it done”.
Det Supt Rob Kirby, of Essex police, said: “Virginia McCullough murdered her parents in cold blood,” adding she was an “intelligent manipulator” who lied about “almost every aspect of her life”.
Wilding said the defendant “had been thinking about killing her parents since March 2019 and had been planning for it” and that she had not been employed for many years.
Statements were read on behalf of McCullough’s siblings, who have been granted anonymity by the judge.
One said they had been left “devastated and bereft” at the deaths of their parents.
“To me this situation is quite literally a living nightmare from which I will never wake up,” they wrote. “The haunting thoughts of [whether] my parents suffered, if they were taunted.”
Another said they felt “sick to my core” every day.
“We have been cruelly robbed of more loving memories and bonds with our mum and dad for years to come,” they added.
“How dare Virginia rob us of that life? “So many lies have been told to cover the horrific truth that she had murdered our loving mum and dad.”
The prosecutor said the defendant “engaged in online gambling” and spent £21,193 in transactions related to gambling between 1 June 2018 and 14 September 2023.
Wilding said McCullough “made arrangements to ensure that she continued to enjoy the benefit of the pensions” that continued to be paid in her parents’ names after their deaths. The prosecutor said McCullough “benefited from” £59,664.01 from the state pension and £76,334.58 from McCullough’s teacher’s pension between 18 June 2019 and 15 September 2023.
Wilding said money appeared to have been “frittered away and the investigation has not revealed any expenditure on expensive, luxury or extravagant items”.
Richard Butcher, Lois McCullough’s brother, said in a victim impact statement that his niece was “very dangerous” and that the details of what had happened had “undermined my faith in humanity”.
The judge, Mr Justice Johnson, said McCullough’s actions were a “gross violation of the trust that should exist between parents and their children”.
He said he was sure the offences involved a “substantial degree of both pre-meditation and planning” as McCullough had accumulated “a large amount of prescription drugs” and bought a knife in May 2019 as well as “implements to crush and separate tablets”.
“These were considered acts of aggression following months of thought and planning,” the judge said.
Sentencing McCullough, he said: “I’m sure a substantial motive for each of the murders was to stop your parents discovering you had been stealing from them and lying to them and to take money that was intended for them.”
