Two men who murdered a British couple on honeymoon in Antigua have avoided the death penalty but been jailed for life.
Ben and Catherine Mullany were gunned down at the end of their dream holiday in a chalet at a luxury hotel. They were buried together in the grounds of the same church where they had been married four weeks before.
Kaniel Martin, 23, and Avie Howell, 22, who also shot dead a shopkeeper two weeks later, were given three consecutive life sentences.
Martin and Howell had faced the death penalty for the killings, however Judge Richard Floyd instead sentenced them to life imprisonment.
Friends had paid for the Mullanys, both 31, to travel to Antigua two days after their wedding in July 2008 to stay in a chalet at the five-star Cocos Hotel.
At 5am on the last full day of their honeymoon the two gunmen burst into their chalet overlooking Jolly Beach and ordered the pair, who were from the Swansea valley in south Wales, to kneel in front of their bed.
They then shot the Mullanys in the back of the head before escaping with a little cash, two inexpensive mobile phones and a cheap camera.
British police, who assisted the local force, believe the attackers' main aim had been to kill and that robbery was no more than a secondary intention.
The Mullanys were discovered by an American nurse. Ms Mullany, a doctor, was beyond help but the nurse managed to stabilise Mr Mullany, a student physiotherapist.
He was initially conscious but slipped into a coma and was flown back home to Swansea's Morriston hospital, where his wife had worked. His life-support was turned off a week later.
The couple were buried in the grounds of St John the Evangelist church, Cilybebyll.
Two weeks after killing the British couple, Howell and Martin, nicknamed Sample Dan and Demon, murdered 43-year-old Woneta Anderson at her Morning Glory Sunshine shop on Antigua. They shot her dead at close range and ran off with two mobile phones and a handful of phone top-up cards.
A bandana with Howell's DNA was found at the scene. While the murder weapon was never found, tests later showed the bullets in all three killings came from the same gun. Gunshot residue was found on Martin and Howell's clothing.
More than 90 witnesses gave evidence during their trial at Antigua's high court in St John's earlier this year. The men continued to protest their innocence and refused to face questioning. Relatives of the Mullanys, who had sat through the proceedings, broke down in tears as the jury returned its guilty verdicts after 10 hours of deliberation.
Outside court the families had said there was no joy in the verdicts, "just a sense of relief that after three years of waiting there is justice for our children. These two individuals can never again inflict the same anguish and devastation to any other family as they have to ours.
"We will never be able to comprehend the senseless nature of their deaths, the total disregard shown for human life and that no remorse has ever been shown."
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