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Boasting killer faces the rest of his life in prison
Murderer 'lusted after' retired teacher's collection of classical CDs
A MIDDLE–AGED killer who boasted he would get away with
murder now faces dying behind bars.
Male nurse Mark Pacelli Papazian will be sentenced next month
after confessing at the Old Bailey to killing retired schoolteacher
Roger Hendra.
The gay pensioner was attacked with a hammer and a knife at
his flat in Pond Street, Hampstead, opposite the entrance to
the Royal Free Hospital.
Papazian kept a diary in which he chillingly penned his thoughts
about the killing – and said he had targeted another unsuspecting
homosexual victim he met near Jack Straw’s Castle on Hampstead
Heath.
Judge Christopher Moss, QC, adjourned the case until March 17,
and called for psychiatric reports on Papazian, of Finchley
Road, Swiss Cottage, who will have turned 50 by then.
The judge reminded him that life imprisonment was the fixed
term for murder, but a minimum number of years to be served
before being considered for parole has also to be laid down.
As Papazian took a life in the furtherance of robbery, the tariff
can be near the 20-year mark.
A detective said: “He’s not the first cold-blooded
killer who believed he could put two fingers up to the law and
get away with it.
“This was callous, premeditated homicide.”
Papazian was convinced he had covered his tracks after battering
Mr Hendra senseless and slitting his throat with a razor-sharp
fishing knife in June last year.
They had met just over a month earlier on the Heath.
Papazian wrote in his diary: “I’m a genius. I’ve
thought of everything.”
The diary extracts were to prove his undoing when police found
the book.
Defence barrister Robert Ellison indicated that Papazian’s
mental state played a major role in the attack.
Papazian wrote of visiting his victim’s flat and how he
“lusted after” his large collection of classical music
and opera CDs, which he eventually stolen.
Mr Hendra, an avid reader, was to be attacked from behind as
he sat in his favourite armchair.
Papazian said: “Thought of a plan to do him with a hammer
while he is in his chair. I have it down to a fine art.”
Of the murder he wrote: “It was a struggle. He had some
fight left in him so I brought him to the ground. He tried to
beat me so I cut his throat.”
Having tidied the flat, Papazian remained inside until dawn
when he took his blood-stained clothes to a laundry. He returned
to the scene to wipe away fingerprints.
Friends discovered the body on June 9, six days after the killing.
A further month went by before detectives traced Papazian –
through a telephone link with the victim. Mr Hendra’s DNA
was linked to him from blood on his shoulder bag and his fishing
knife.
Entries in a diary kept by Mr Hendra indicated the dangers faced
by gay men involved in casual pick-ups on the Heath.
Mr Hendra wrote of being offered sex by “dreadful Mark”
Papazian.
• THE conviction of a killer who met his victim on Hampstead
Heath has brought a renewed appeal by police for gay men to
come forward and report attacks.
A Camden police spokesman said: “Cruising for sex is not
a crime; the actual offence is Public Indecency and in order
to investigate we need a witness and a complaint.
“We definitely want any men who are on the Heath who witness
a crime to report it, and to feel safe doing so.” |
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