A man who walked free from court for pouring vodka over his girlfriend and threatening to set her on fire went on to brutally murder her two weeks later.
Robert Massey subjected Jacqueline Forest to vile abuse in mid-August after attempting to kick down her front door. By the end of the month, he had strangled her to death before stabbing her body and scrawling profanities over her skin with a pen.
Liverpool Crown Court heard this week that the 49-year-old victim had been in a relationship with the defendant since the summer of 2020 and he had spent time living at her home on Piele Road in Haydock. On August 15 this year, Massey was handed an 18-month community order at Liverpool Magistrates' Court after assaulting her and banned from attending her address for 28 days.
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Andrew Ford KC, prosecuting, described how this had concerned an incident two days previously in which the 43-year-old went to her flat armed with an iron bar and began kicking the door. He stole her bank card before pouring vodka over Ms Forest, who was known to loved ones as Jaki, and threatening to light the spirit on fire as he left the address.
The court was shown video footage of the incident recorded through the keyhole of a neighbouring flat. In it, Massey could be seen repeatedly taking steps back from the door before taking running kicks at it over the course of several minutes.
Ms Forest was heard screaming in fear in the background, but she eventually relented and opened the door. Daniel Travers, defending, said the "spilling of the vodka was reckless during a struggle" and denied there had been a "threat to ignite".
Despite the ban, the couple met up again in a park over the subsequent August bank holiday weekend and spent much of the next few days together - mostly in her home. At around 7pm on Tuesday, August 30, Massey was in her bed while she was in the shower.
He began looking through her phone and found messages which "suggested she had been unfaithful with two other men" - namely Anthony Murphy and Graham Roberts, the latter of whom he considered to be his "best friend". The killer later confessed to police that he "saw red" and attacked Ms Forest by confronting her when she got out of the shower, grabbing her by the neck and "straddling her" on the bed.
Massey repeatedly struck her to the head and face with his fists then placed both hands around her neck, squeezed and "didn't stop" until she "went floppy". He then headbutted her and said: "Was it worth it? Was it worth s***ging them two people?"
In what Mr Ford described as "macabre and sadistic" behaviour, the murderer then covered her dead body with a towel, placed a watch on her wrist and Moschino shoes on her feet, put a handbag over her arm and sunglasses over her face and positioned a jewellery box on top of her. Massey subsequently explained to officers that he had "ruined her beautiful face and decided to put some nice things on her because she always used to look pretty".
He tearfully added that he "wanted to make her look better, because he had ruined her face and he still loved her". But after finding a pregnancy test nearby, Massey stabbed her in the womb with a kitchen knife - although it was later confirmed that she had not been expecting a baby.
Then, he took a green pen and wrote "my best mate" next to this wound before scrawling "slag" on one thigh and the word "baby" on the other. Massey and Ms Forest had been consuming vodka mixed with Fanta beforehand, and he continued to drink in the property after the murder.
He also bought £400 of cocaine and took the drugs, having made a £500 withdrawal from the cash machine at the Asda supermarket in Haydock shortly after her murder using her debit card. A further £500 withdrawal was made in the early hours, with the card then used at Mollie's Bar in St Helens town centre.
Massey then began to "plan his revenge" on Mr Murphy and Mr Roberts, walking into St Helens and visiting the Duke pub. He took a taxi into Liverpool and continued drinking in a bar, bringing Ms Forest's phone with him and updating her Facebook profile at around midnight.
He began sending messages from his own device to Mr Murphy at 4.30am, saying in another at 6.15am "I'll come for those you love". Massey was seen getting out of cab in Haydock 6.45am and returned to the flat, ringing Mr Murphy in a phone call lasting nine minutes.
From 8am onwards, he began messaging his next victim from Ms Forest's phone - "giving the impression she was sending these messages". In one, he said: "Don't worry, he won't risk getting nicked again."
Around the same time, Massey began sending messages to Mr Murphy's brother's partner - believing her to be Mr Murphy's own girlfriend. Massey said Mr Murphy had been "f***ing my fiancée and now she's pregnant", adding in another text: "She thought I was out for the night, but I came home early.
"He jumped out of the window, which I'm really impressed with because we are three floors up. Just so you know, Anthony is properly dead now - no one f***s my fiancée."
Massey later discarded Ms Forest's phone in a nearby field. Mr Murphy had met Ms Forest when both were working at a Sainsbury's store in the area and on one occasion "engaged in sexual activity", during which her boyfriend had returned to the address - leading to him clambering out via the balcony in order to remain undetected.
Mr Murphy arrived at the scene at around 8.30am on Wednesday, August 31. Massey had turned on the shower and pretended Ms Forest was in there. His adversary pleaded with him, saying "please don't kill me".
Massey then took him into the bedroom and showed him Ms Forest's body, telling him "look what you've f***ing caused". He then began attacking him with the same blade, "going for his ears".
The knifeman later admitted to police that he was trying to cut Mr Murphy's ears off and was "intending to throw him out of the window". He was stabbed three times to the back and twice in the neck, but was able to flee to a neighbouring flat for help.
Mr Murphy was rushed to Aintree Hospital and underwent surgery, having lost 20% of his blood. He was discharged after a week.
Merseyside Police then discovered Ms Forest's body shortly after 9am. The apartment was filled with steam, the shower having still been running, while the blood-stained knife was located on the sofa.
Massey was subsequently seen walking through the streets covered in blood with no top on. At 9.15am, he bought vodka from an off-licence on Clipsley Lane and asked to drink on the premises, but was told he could not.
Shortly after 9.30am, he boarded the bus to St Helens town centre then took a taxi to Prescot and drank in pubs in the area before getting another bus to Wavertee. Massey stopped at a corner shop to buy a knife but the store did not have any for sale, so he bought a pair of scissors instead.
Now armed, he flagged down a taxi to take him to Mr Roberts' workplace at the end of the East Lancs Road in Norris Green. The pair had known each other around 20 years, but Mr Roberts had had a "one night stand" with Ms Forest at a time when she and Massey had split up.
He had confronted his friend in a phone call around a week previously and was "angry", but had not made any threats. Massey walked straight into the offices at 6.30pm, half an hour after Mr Roberts had started a night shift - chasing him out of the building while brandishing the scissors.
Massey said "I'm gonna kill you if you think you can get away with this" and struck him with the implement out on the street, causing him to fall to the floor. A witness also heard him say: "I don't care, I'm doing 20 years anyway - I've killed two people already."
Mr Roberts managed to disarm his assailant and jumped into a passing car, instructing the driver to take him to a nearby pub. He had sustained stab wounds to his right arm, chest and behind his right ear.
Massey was arrested while walking down Long Lane "sweating and smelling of drink", with blood on his t-shirt. After being arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder, he replied: "I hope it was two murders.
"What would you do if your best mate was shagging your Mrs? I would have thrown the f***ing c*** out of the window.
"My best mate s***ged my wife, so I f***ing did them. I'm getting done for two, might as well be three."
Under interview, Massey added: "It's nice to get it off my chest. I don't want the family to have to go through a trial.
"They must be devastated. I loved them to bits."
Massey said he had stabbed Mr Roberts in the back "like he done to me" and accused him of "sharking her" in messages on Facebook. He said that he had been trying to "come off" cocaine, and said he had also been unfaithful during his relationship with Ms Forest.
His previous convictions include a four-year prison sentence in 2018, having swallowed packages of drugs in order to import them into the UK. Massey was released from this stretch in May 2020.
Mr Travers told the court that his client was "clearly preoccupied" by the thought of Ms Forest being pregnant, but "did not actually believe she was pregnant". He added: "Those listening will have been appalled by what are undoubtedly three extremely serious offences.
"He was candid, both on arrest and also in interview. Mr Massey is genuinely remorseful - he did not want to cause any further upset to the family of the deceased.
"It is exceptional for someone to have made full admissions and pleaded guilty at the first opportunity for three offences where there is an intent to kill. Mr Massey did everything he could after his arrest to start making very small steps to making amends for his actions."
Massey admitted murder, two counts of attempted murder and possession of a bladed article in a public place and was jailed for life with a minimum term of 28 years. Sentencing, Judge Brian Cummings KC said: "I express my remorse and condolences for all of the victims in this case and all of those connected to them.
"This was undoubtedly a brutal murder. It was apparent that the victim, I regret to say, must have endured significant mental and physical suffering before she died.
"I accept that there was no premeditation, but I do not consider that to be a particularly significant factor given that the trigger for your murderous attack appears to have been information you gained when scrolling through the victim's mobile phone. That behaviour is an indication of controlling behaviour on your part.
"I accept there is an element of remorse, but your explanations and admissions - full and candid though they were - appear to me to have been accompanied at all times by an air of justification, as if you were in a position that there was nothing else you could have done. What you did, you did by choice."
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