JUNKIES KILL MAN FOR A FIX

WILD-EYED junkies craved their next fix just hours after battering a
man to death with a statue of an ANGEL. Drug-crazed Paul O'Shea, and
Ian Noonan broke into the home of Julian Hayford to plunder his
savings. They tied up the mature student, beat him to death in front
of his wife - then ran off to satisfy their cravings with another fix
of heroin. And as the harrowing photo suggest, the monsters were
still high when police arrested them hours later.

They were jailed for a total of 58 years last week, and their twisted
features offer a glimpse of a soulless world where junkies will do
anything for a hit.

The pair - both thought to be prolific burglars and one on the run
from another trial - struck on July 7, just hours before the London
Tube bombings were to plunge the capital into chaos.

Dubliner O'Shea, 27, and lowlife pal Noonan, 40, broke into Mr
Hayford's flat through an open window hours after he had celebrated
his 55th birthday.

The junkies knew their victim had recently inherited UKP50,000 and
was planning to use it to rebuild a church in his native Ghana.

They bound Mr Hayford with his own tie and battered him at least 10
times over the head before his wife burst into the room.

Their makeshift weapon was a carved, wooden statue of an angel
grabbed from a mantelpiece.

In a cut-throat defence, the pair blamed each other - but both were
convicted of murder and jailed for life on Thursday.

Judge Paul Focke told Noonan he would serve at least 30 years behind
bars and O'Shea 28 years.

He told them: "You both decided to burgle this small flat believing
there were substantial sums of money and portable items to steal to
fund your addiction to drugs.

"You both broke into the flat knowing violence would probably be
needed to achieve that aim.

"This murder has had a devastating effect on his widow and it is
likely to cause her permanent psychological scarring."

The court was told that O'Shea and Noonan heard about Mr Hayford's
windfall through O'Shea's aunt Angela, who lived next door to the
Ghana-born victim in Sedley House, Newburn Street, Kennington.

After celebrating his birthday on July 6, Mr Hayford went to bed, but
his wife, Happy, left open a window of their one-bedroom, fifth-floor flat.

Sallie Bennett-Jenkins, prosecuting, said Mrs Hayford was woken by a
noise and walked in to see her husband on the floor with a man on top
of him beating him.

The pair fled but Mrs Hayford recognised one of them as O'Shea.

"She went to her husband who was on the floor," the prosecutor went on.

"His face was severely swollen and bleeding.

"It was clear he had been tied up and restrained. His hands were
behind his back and one of his own ties had been used as the binding.
It was clear he wasn't breathing."

Dead

Mrs Hayford called police and paramedics but her husband was already dead.

His killers were arrested that day after returning to the squat where
they were staying, Noonan having already scored a large bag of heroin.

O'Shea was on the run from a burglary trial in County Clare, Eire, at the time.

O'Shea and Noonan, both of no fixed address, had denied murder and
Noonan denied intimidation.

He was also jailed for 30 months concurrently, after being convicted
of intimidating a witness.