‘Vigilantes’ murdered innocent dad-of-one they thought was a paedophile

Two men murdered a dad-of-one they mistakenly thought was a paedophile.

Mark Roberts and David Garland killed Michael Wheeler after they found news reports about a man – also called Michael Wheeler – who sexually abused two 13-year-old girls in 2003.

Prosecuting, David Elias, KC, said Mr Wheeler, 37, from Yeovil, Somerset, was not the same person and had no convictions for child sexual offences.

He was also friends with both men but owed £100 to Roberts.

When Mr Wheeler disappeared, his mum was suffering from a terminal illness and passed away before she found out what happened to her son.

Bristol Crown Court heard Mr Wheeler was attacked at Roberts’ flat in August last year, and suffered 11 skull and facial fractures.

Garland and Roberts then hid his body, and three weeks after Mr Wheeler’s death, police received information he had come to serious harm.

They found no proof of his being alive after 24 August 2024. One of the last sightings of him was on CCTV at a petrol station just a few hours before his death.

His remains were eventually found in a derelict caravan on farmland in Yarlington on Wednesday 25 September.

Detective Superintendent Lorett Spierenburg said: ‘Michael Wheeler was brutally murdered by people he had considered as friends.

‘He was killed over a £100 debt and because they wrongly decided he had been jailed for child sex offences in 2003, when he would have been just 16 years old.

‘The defendants gave Michael no opportunity to tell them they were wrong. Instead, they took the life of a man whose last words to his ex-wife were of love for her and their daughter.’

Roberts, 39, of Juniper Close, and Garland, 40, of no fixed abode, were both remanded in custody pending a sentencing hearing, expected to be Friday 13 June.

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