Man jailed after ‘shock confession’ to murdering mother of seven 28 years ago

Dunkley, of Himley Road, Dudley, West Midlands, pleaded guilty at Wolverhampton Crown Court in September to murder and preventing a lawful burial.

Sentencing Dunkley to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 130 months on Friday, Judge Michael Chambers KC told the former furnace worker that killing the then 33-year-old had left her baby son and six other children wrongly believing they had been abandoned.

The court heard that one night between September 22 and 28, 1998, Dunkley, who worked as a furnace man, came home from a night shift.

Prosecutor Robert Price said that Dunkley told West Midlands Police in his confession he had “snapped” during an argument with Lashley and “hit her on the head and kept hitting until she went quiet”.

After the murder, Dunkley, who was 38 at the time, told detectives he covered Ms Lashley’s body with bedding and took her down to the cellar, disposing of her remains in four stages.

Mr Price said Dunkley also claimed he did not love the victim, did not have a sexual relationship with her, and “just wanted to help with the baby”.

Ms Lashley was reported missing by her sister in June 1999 and in the years following her disappearance, regular appeals were made to try to locate her, including in the Big Issue and on Good Morning Britain.

Speaking after the sentencing, Detective Inspector Michelle Cordell, from the West Midlands Homicide Unit, said no human remains had been found despite extensive excavation of the cellar.

The senior officer said: “Patricia was reported missing by her sister in June 1999. That investigation had uncovered that she was last seen in around September time in 1998. “The missing person investigation was active from that point onwards.

“It was most recently investigated by our missing persons unit, and ultimately they have retraced all of the information that was known.”

In mitigation, Balbir Singh said Dunkley was a “decent and hardworking man” with no previous convictions and a good work record, adding the murder had not been planned.

Judge Chambers, who was told Dunkley took the baby to social services and claimed Ms Lashley had abandoned him, said: “Twenty-eight years ago in September of 1998, you were in a relationship with Patricia Lashley.

“She had, as you clearly knew, a nine-month-old baby who was still breastfeeding.”

Dunkley, who was not the baby’s father, had covered up the killing by lying that his victim had gone away, Judge Chambers said.

He told Dunkley: “You took the child to social services and he was brought up by adoptive parents.

“He grew up thinking, obviously quite falsely, that he had been abandoned by his mother, as did his siblings. That is in my judgement a grossly aggravating factor.”

The judge said he accepted that Dunkley was genuinely remorseful, but that what he had done was “a dreadful thing”, and that the passage of time was solely due to untruths he had maintained for 28 years.

Several members of the Lashley family, including three of Patricia’s children, were present in court to see Dunkley sentenced.

Dunkley was also handed a concurrent sentence of two years for preventing the mother-of-seven’s lawful burial.