Wisbech: Two Guilty Of Sonny Gray Murder

28 February 2013, 14:46 | Updated: 1 March 2013, 12:42

Two men from Wisbech have been found guilty of murdering a 72 year old man in Lincoln.

Sonny Gray [pictured - right] was attacked at his council home in Westwick Gardens by intruders who poured scalding, boiling water over him on the 29th October 2011.

The intruders also strangled Mr Gray using a ligature, and ransacked his home, stealing property including jewellery. 

Mr Gray managed to crawl out of his home and was found by family members before being taken to hospital.

However, he died from his injuries on the 31st October 2011.

Today (Thursday) 25 year old Rocky Curtis [pictured - middle], of Newbridge Lane, Wisbech and 24 year old Robert Michael Holmes [pictured - bottom], of Redmoor Lane, Wisbech, were convicted of murder at Nottingham Crown Court.

Detective Superintendent Stuart Morrison said: "This was a brutal attack on a 72-year-old man carried out by vicious thugs who used a horrific level of violence . 

Mr Gray died in a considerable amount of pain and this has caused his family an enormous amount of distress over that the last year or so.

We hope this verdict offers them some small consolation that justice has been done and that they may now be able to start moving forward with their lives.

We also hope that this conviction demonstrates our commitment to tackling serious violence in Lincolnshire and that it sends out a very clear message to criminals operating in the county. 

We will not tolerate such attacks and offenders will be arrested and put before the courts.

This was a protracted investigation that required hundreds of hours of analytical investigation work and I would like to praise the diligence and dedication of my team, which once again, has included officers from across the region – further demonstration of the benefits to Lincolnshire of a regionalised approach to tackling major crime."

Curtis and Holmes will be sentenced at Lincoln Crown Court tomorrow (Friday).