Pre-meditated savagery

LIFE . . . Cregan

Killer’s ruthless spiral of violence had no limits.



One–eyed killer Dale Cregan will spend the rest of his life in prison for the ruthless murders of two unarmed policewomen and a father and son.

Cregan (30) acted “with pre–meditated savagery” when he lured PCs Nicola Hughes (23) and Fiona Bone, 32, to their deaths in a horrifying gun and grenade attack,

He went on the run days before he killed David Short (46) last August. He had gunned down Short’s son Mark (23) in a pub in Droylsden, Greater Manchester, three months earlier.

The manhunt reached its ghastly conclusion on September 18 when he lured the constables with a bogus 999 call to a house in Abbey Gardens, Hattersley.

His last comment to the call handler as he was told officers were on the way was a chilling: “I’ll be waiting.”

When the women arrived he opened the front door and shot them in the chest as they walked towards him.

Pc Hughes was hit eight times, including three times to the head as she lay on the ground.

Pc Bone was also hit up to eight times but managed to draw and fire her Taser at Cregan, who fired 32 bullets in barely half a minute.

He then threw his “calling card”, a military grenade, at the bodies of the women before handing himself in at a nearby police station.

He told an officer: “You were hounding my family so I took it out on yous.”

Sentencing him to whole life terms with no prospect of release, Mr Justice Holroyde said he had no doubt Cregan acted with pre–meditated savagery: “You drew those two officers into a calculated trap for the sole purpose of murdering them in cold blood.”

Preston Crown Court heard it was the first time grenades had been used on the mainland UK with such devastating consequences.

Outside court Nicola’s father Bryn Hughes said: “She was brutally and callously murdered in the most despicable and cowardly way.

“We can only imagine what thoughts and feelings she experienced in those few seconds it took for this person to pull the trigger and for Nicola to draw her last breath.

“Our lives have been shattered beyond belief and will never be the same again, to have a child taken from you in such a cruel and meaningless way is without doubt the worst thing any parent can wish to imagine.”

Paul Bone said of his daughter: “My family is still coming to terms with our loss and not a day goes by without thinking of Fiona.

“I am told that it gets easier in time, but for the moment every Tuesday lunch time is difficult, for that was when our lives changed forever.”

The spiral of violence began in May 2012 when a balaclava–clad Cregan shot Mark Short in Droylsden’s Cotton Tree pub.

Cregan had a long–standing hatred of David Short and intended to kill as many of the Short family and associates as he could.

The killing was followed by the cold-blooded killing of David Short, who died that August outside his home in Clayton. Cregan chased Mr Short into his house and gunned him down at close range, before throwing a grenade at the dying man.

During his four–month trial, Cregan admitted at various stages the four murders and the attempted murders of three others, along with a count of causing an explosion with a hand grenade.

Nine other defendants faced trial alongside him on various charges linked to the deaths of the Shorts. Four of them were cleared.

Cregan smiled and shook hands with the other defendants after the verdicts were returned by the jury of six men and five women.

Mr Justice Holroyde went on to criticise Cregan and his co–accused for not showing any signs of remorse or compassion for his victims during the trial.

Sir Peter Fahy, chief constable of Greater Manchester, described Cregan and his gang as a “scourge on society”, Greater Manchester’s police and crime commissioner Tony Lloyd called them “animals”, while Ian Hanson, chairman of Greater Manchester Police Federation, said Cregan was an “abomination upon our society”.