Killer who fled Britain 15 years ago found living in caravan in Cork

Roy Normon Kenyon

Robin Schiller and Ken Foy

A violent criminal who murdered a woman was hiding out in a rural caravan after being on the run from UK police for more than 15 years.

Roy Norman Kenyon had been serving a lengthy jail sentence for the murder of an elderly shopkeeper, who he beat to death with a poker following a row over 50p, when he fled the Oldham area.

He was convicted of the murder of Margaret Potts in 1972, but absconded while on licence from HMP Leyhill in 2003. UK police had been searching for Kenyon for the last 15 years, but despite a number of public appeals he had not been caught.

However, gardaí recently received information that the killer had been staying in a caravan in the village of Eyeries on the Beara Peninsula. Last week, members of the Garda extradition unit, assisted by gardaí from the Cork West division, arrested Roy Norman Kenyon on foot of a European Arrest Warrant.

He appeared at a sitting of the High Court last Thursday in relation to the warrant. It has not yet been established if he will contest or accept extradition to the UK.

Before his arrest in west Cork, the convicted killer had been staying in Tullamore, Co Offaly. A number of public appeals were made by Avon and Somerset Police in the hunt for the killer over the years.

In 2011, the 40th anniversary of the murder carried out by Kenyon, the victim's daughter described her anger that Kenyon was still at large.

Locals on the Beara peninsula, where Kenyon was last week arrested, expressed their shock at his violent past.

He was regarded as a recluse, only associating with locals when he went for a drink in a pub in the area. "I just thought he was only an odd sort of fella," one local said.