Man accused of killing and dismembering friend in Dorset ‘would do it again and again’ court hears

Warning: This article contains some distressing information.

A 49-year-old man accused of killing and dismembering the body of a friend told his girlfriend that he would “do it again and again and again” and he would “decapitate and eat” them, a court has heard.

Benjamin Atkins and Debbie Pereira, 29, are both charged with the murder of 48-year-old Simon Shotton, whose remains were found in packages on the Manor Steps Zig Zag footpath on Boscombe seafront in Bournemouth, Dorset.

They are also on trial at Winchester Crown Court accused of preventing the burial of a corpse and perverting the course of justice.

Paul Cavin KC, prosecuting, told the jury that a member of the public was taking shelter under a tree on the cliffside footpath on August 26 when a package landed with a “thud” beside her.

When she got closer to the packet which was wrapped with grey masking tape, she “realised that the shape was that of a human foot and some of it had become exposed” and she called police, the court heard.

A search by police discovered a second package – DNA tests found that body parts belonged to Mr Shotton who had been released from prison in September 2022 having served a sentence for supplying drugs in the Ipswich area.

Mr Cavin said the police were informed by the probation service that Mr Shotton had moved to Bournemouth after his release and investigations traced his mobile phone to a Cash Creators shop in Boscombe and that it had been sold to them by Pereira.

The prosecutor said that when police raided the defendants’ home address, Atkins was found hiding in the garden behind a wheelbarrow.

Further searches of the garden then uncovered two black bin bags containing Mr Shotton’s remains.

In police interview, Pereira told detectives that Mr Shotton was a crack and heroin user and had visited their flat to take drugs with them.

She denied knowing Mr Shotton had died, but admitted that he had stayed in a tent in their garden and said Atkins had been cutting wood and burning things including his own shoes in the fire pit, and that he had also “bought large black bin liners, bleach and silver tape”.

Mr Cavin said that as the pair were taken in a police van to a magistrates’ court hearing, they were recorded on a concealed listening device talking about the dismembered body parts.

Mr Cavin continued: “Ms Pereira asks Mr Atkins ‘Do you regret anything?’

“Chillingly, he responds ‘I’ll look ‘em straight in the eye and say, yeah. I’d do it again and again and again. If you let me go today, I’d find another one and do it again.’

“Ms Pereira told Mr Atkins that the police had taken ‘stuff from under my nails’, and he responded, ‘you’d have had nothing, the amount of bleach you used’.”

Mr Cavin continued: “Ms Pereira also said in interview that she had asked Mr Atkins ‘Did you kill him?’ and that he had replied ‘Yeah’.

“She also said that he had been telling her that God had told him to do it, which was not what the recording had captured.”

He said Pereira went on to say that Atkins and Mr Shotton had an argument about the deceased not having supplied them with enough drugs for allowing him to stay at their home.

The defendants deny the charges and the trial continues.

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