A woman has walked free from court after being cleared of cleaning up following the murder of a 'loving dad' found dead in a woodland in north Manchester.
Stephanie Lester, of Lancashire Hill, Heaton Norris, Stockport, was charged with assisting an offender in connection with the murder of Ashley Walsh in January of this year.
The 31-year-old was also accused of cleaning up a property "with intent to impede the apprehension or prosecution of a person who had committed the offence of murder" following the death of Mr Walsh.
At Manchester Crown Court on Friday, Ms Lester was found not guilty on both counts after the prosecution offfered no evidence in the case.
Ashley, from Failsworth, went missing on January 7, 2022. He was last seen on Kintore Walk in Collyhurst at around 11pm.
The 34-year-old's body was later found a short distance away in a wood in Sandhills Park.
In July, Aaron Evitt, 34, of Brentnor Road, Manchester, and Gerrard McGlacken, 45, of Kintore Walk, Manchester were jailed for life after being found guilty of Ashley's murder. They will have to serve a minimum of 28 years before they can be considered for release.
A trial at Manchester Crown Court heard that Evitt repeatedly attacked Ashley with a hammer, before Evitt's cousin McGlacken 'chopped up' his body. The pair then transported his body parts to a local park in four suitcases.
The killing apparently followed claims by Ashley that he'd slept with Evitt's ex.
After his killers were sentenced, Ashley's loved ones told of the 'pure hell' they had endured since his death. His family spent an agonising nine days searching for him until Evitt finally revealed where Ashley's remains were.
"We have heard how he died in horrific circumstances, but the torture endured by his family when they were searching for him in the days after his disappearance was pure hell," Ashley's cousin, Helen Walsh, said. "It sickens me to learn that while we were worried sick, searching for him in Boggart Hole Clough and other places, he was already dead."
Search parties, which included Ashley's 80-year-old grandmother, worked around the clock to try and find him. Helen said the grotesque manner of how Ashley's body was treated after the killing only added to their pain.
"To learn how his body was treated after his death, how he was placed in suitcases and disposed of like he was garbage, was horrendous," she said. "He was not garbage, he was my precious cousin."
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