Movements at the McCullough family home were secretive, but neighbours could never have known why.
Virginia McCullough knew why the police had smashed through her front door, but part of her wondered why it took them so long to discover she had murdered her parents. "Cheer up, at least you've caught the bad guy," she calmly told the officers handcuffing her. Neighbours thought John and Lois McCullough had retired to the seaside, but the reality was they were callously poisoned by their daughter.
John McCullough, a retired business studies lecturer, had been fatally poisoned and the 70-year-old's body was hidden in a crudely-built tomb made out of breeze blocks and blankets. "The curtains were always drawn and you couldn't see if anybody was in the house," said Phil Sargeant, who lived next door to the McCulloughs for 20 years.Mr Sargeant now knows why there was such secrecy at his neighbours' house.
Conveniently for her, the country had been in Covid-enforced lockdowns for a large period of time they had not been seen. Documents recovered inside the property painted a picture of a woman desperately trying to keep her parents from discovering a financial black hole she had dug. In total, McCullough benefited from £149,697 as a result of murdering her parents - combined from their pensions and spending on their credit cards, as well as selling assets.Her lies - and the fear of being exposed - ultimately led to her cruelly killing her parents.Paul Hastings, a greengrocer at the Vineyards shopping centre near their home, had also noticed their disappearance.
Debbie Pollard said McCullough would visit the flower shop she ran and bombard her with food and presents.
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