Ex-soldier Collin Reeves jailed for life for murdering neighbours as sons slept upstairs

21 June 2022, 13:14 | Updated: 21 June 2022, 16:25

An Afghanistan veteran who stabbed his neighbours to death during a parking row as their young children slept upstairs has been jailed for life.

Collin Reeves knifed Stephen and Jennifer Chapple six times each at their house in Dragon Rise, Norton Fitzwarren, near Taunton in Somerset, on the evening of November 21 2021.

Reeves, also of Dragon Rise, had been involved in a row with the couple over designated parking on the housing development since the previous May.

The 35-year-old former Royal Engineer used a ceremonial dagger given to him when he left the army to kill the couple.

Minutes later, he himself called the police to confess to what he had done, but later denied murder, claiming he was only guilty of manslaughter on diminished responsibility.

However, two forensic psychiatrists found he was not suffering from psychosis or acute post-traumatic stress disorder, and diagnosed him with only mild to moderate depression.

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Reeves had also been having trouble in his own marriage, with his wife having asked for a trial separation hours before the attack, a jury at Bristol Crown Court learned.

Reeves was unanimously convicted him of murder last Friday after a jury deliberated for five hours and 21 minutes.

Jailing Reeves for life with a minimum term of 38 years, Mr Justice Garnham said the killings had "torn the heart out of two perfectly normal, decent families".

"You left (Mr and Mrs Chapple) on the floor bleeding to death, and all of the time their two children were asleep upstairs," the judge said.

"Your murderous behaviour left them orphans. They were put to bed that night by their parents and they would never see them again. The harm you did those two innocent children is incalculable."

Mr Justice Garnham said that, at the same time, Reeves had inflicted enormous damage on his own daughters, who will now grow up without their father.

Mr Chapple was a teacher in a local school, while his wife worked in the coffee shop at a nearby garden centre.

The couple's family paid tribute to the "wonderful parents" they were following the sentencing.

In a victim impact statement, Ann Clayton, Mrs Chapple's mother, described her daughter as "an exuberant, caring, beautiful light in the world".

She said: "For a mother to lose a child is something that causes never-ending pain, knowing there will forever be a darkness inside you, a light switched off in your soul that can never be replaced."

Ms Clayton continued: "The thoughts that enter your head every day, dark, horrid thoughts, you don't want to imagine the fear that they felt, the suffering that they endured, what their final thoughts were."

She said she would give anything to hold her daughter one last time, "tell her how much she was loved and cherished and never let her go".

"Jennifer lived for her children, she loved them with all her being, there was nothing that she wouldn't do for her children," Ms Clayton said.

"Now they will never know what it feels like to love her, hug her, get bedtime kisses from her."

Marie Chapple, Mr Chapple's sister, who is now bringing up her two nephews, said she was devoted to keeping the victims' memories alive so their sons would "never forget how loved they were".

"I know from experience working with troubled teenagers that it will be their adolescent years that will be difficult, when they truly understand everything that has happened and begin to process it in the same way as I am now," she continued.

Ms Chapple added: "My life has been turned upside down in the wake of this, not only from the heartache or the surrealness of the situation, but because I'm now trying to balance a career with being a single parent, because I want to give the children everything they deserve and would have had from their parents, and the worry that I might not be able to provide this."