A 19-YEAR-OLD man was being questioned by the police last night about the apparent revenge murder of a couple who were tracked down to their secret seaside hideaway and shot.
The teenager was arrested in Nottingham and brought for interview to a police station in Lincolnshire where detectives are investigating the murders of Joan and John Stirland at their bungalow in Trusthorpe this month.
Officers fear that the double murder was carried out in retaliation for the murder in Nottingham of Marvyn Bradshaw, 22, by Michael O’Brien, Mrs Stirland’s son.
The couple left Nottingham last September after their lives were threatened after the murder of Mr Bradshaw.
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Mrs Stirland, 53, and her husband, 55, were shot dead minutes after calling police to report a prowler outside their home. Neighbours reported seeing two men wearing blue boilersuits near the house on the Radio St Peter estate.
The police later found an abandoned Volkswagen Passat car in flames about two miles from Trusthorpe.
They said that a second man from Nottingham had been arrested after presenting himself voluntarily for questioning. He was released without charge on police bail pending further inquiries.
The couple’s deaths are believed to be connected to gangland turf wars surrounding the drug trade in Nottingham.