Scottish Daily Record
Paul O'Hare
JAILED AT LAST SCOTLAND'S MOST DANGEROUS JAILED AT LAST
A HORRIFIED mum read of Charles O'Neill and William Lauchlan's evil past in the Daily Record - and saved her young son from them. The single mum was chilled when she saw the smiling faces of the men who had befriended her and her six-year-old son under the heading "Beasts On The Loose".
She had known them as a kind-hearted pair who took her and her son on days out and who she trusted enough to allow them to babysit him. But our article, part of a series by the late crime writer Reg McKay, referred to them as men with "an interesting past and an evil present", as well as the prime suspects in Allison McGarrigle's murder.
The stunned mum, from Falkirk, who had agreed to start a new life in Spain with O'Neill and Lauchlan, immediately spoke to police. Central Scotland officers had already been working with her after discovering the pair's involvement with the little boy as they monitored them.
Prey
And last month, in a trial which can only be reported now the pair have been convicted of murdering Allison, O'Neill and Lauchlan were convicted of grooming the six-year-old for sex. During the three months they knew the little boy, the predators bombarded the schoolboy with presents including Playstation games and a mobile phone. It was used to contact the boy and his mum, by phone or text, a staggering 2000 times in just six weeks.
And they were heading to Falkirk to bring Easter eggs for their prey when the mum called them under police supervision to say she wanted nothing more to do with them. Within 24 hours, the pair were arrested in their bedsit in Blackpool.
Detective Superintendent David Wilson said: "They embarked on a determined campaign to access the boy through his mother. "They persuaded her to leave the child in their care. One night when this happened, they took semi-naked pictures of the boy. "He was only wearing underpants and they photographed him licking a lollipop in a suggestive manner."
After the pair were arrested, a search of their bedsit uncovered a pair of children's pants with O'Neill's DNA on them. Inquiries linked them to the little boy and the forensic breakthrough proved to be a critical pillar of the prosecution case at the grooming trial.
At the same trial, ONeill and Lauchlan were also convicted of abducting a 15-yearold boy in Spain.And O'Neill was convicted of drugging a 14-year-old boy in Irvine, Ayrshire. Both teenagers were sexually abused.
The harrowing case at the High Court in Glasgow was subject to a reporting ban so as not to prejudice the pending murder trial. But it was lifted yesterday as the sick lovers were convicted of killing Allison McGarrigle in 1997 and disposing of her body.
The family of the six-year-old boy said last night they hoped lessons could be learned from the case. A statement said:
"Lauchlan and O'Neill befriended us through a third party and they seemed like a genuine couple. When they showered us with gifts, we began to suspect their motives and we contemplated phoning the police.
"We decided not to, a decision we regretted after finding out who they really were. We'd like to urge any family who suspects anyone who has contact with children to get in touch with the police."
At the end of the sex abuse trial, Lord Pentland described the cunning lovers as "evil, determined and manipulative paedophiles of the worst sort". Their record for abusing children and young teenagers dated back at least to the early 1990s. In 1998, they were convicted of 31 charges of indecent assault and drug offences.
O'Neill , a former pro boxer, was sentenced to eight years in jail and Lauchlan to six for offences dating back to 1993. The High Court in Glasgow heard they lured children aged between nine and 15 to a house in Skelmorlie, Ayrshire, where they fed them drugs and alcohol and then molested them.
In 2002, they were released early but it was not long before the perverts were violating their parole, which forbade them from approaching boys under 17.
The following year, O'Neill targeted a 14-year-old boy in Irvine after befriending his family. And once he had earned their trust he drugged the unsuspecting teenager and sexually abused him.
O'Neill then joined his partner in crime in Benidorm and they began searching for a new victim. In the spring of 2004, they abducted a 15-year-old English boy after befriending his family in a karaoke bar and put him through a three-day abuse ordeal.
In April 2005, they appeared before Kilmarnock Sheriff Court charged with the murder of Allison McGarrigle. But after "very careful consideration of the evidence" the case was not indicted. The following year, the beasts again fled the country in search of new victims.
They have been linked to the unsolved disappearance of Yeremi Vargas, seven, from the island of Gran Canaria, where they ran a cleaning firm.
When the beasts returned to the UK in November 2007, they set up home in Blackpool and had to register with the police as convicted sex offenders. But when it emerged they had failed to declare they had a van, alarm bells started to ring. Lancashire Police were so concerned, they set in motion a round-the-clock surveillance operation. They also got permission to bug their van and install a hidden camera.
And Central Scotland Police came into the inquiry after Lancashire cops intercepted a phone call from the pair to the six-year-old boy in Falkirk.
A 20-strong inquiry team was set up to work on the Falkirk case and a Fife Police-led taskforce, Operation Aspen, was set up to examine O'Neill and Lauchlan's activities. Aspen used analysts to compile a timeline of the beasts' movements in Scotland, England and Europe.
This work unearthed the horrific abuse of the English teenager in Spain. And, in a unique move, the Spanish authorities gave the green light for the men to be tried in a Scottish court.
Crucially, the inquiry also brought new leads in Allison's murder, because of comments they made about her death. It also emerged in court that the pair had planned to buy a campervan and take the Falkirk mother and child to Spain. The monsters had also persuaded the woman to agree to become a surrogate mother and give them a child.
Had the police not intercepted the killers when they did, there is every chance they would have fled the country with the boy and his mother, putting the little boy at grave risk.
Asked if there are any outstanding cases linked to O'Neill and Lauchlan, Detective Chief Superintendent John Mitchell said: "There is nothing I can specifically speak about. But at this point, who knows? "They are very, very dangerous predatory paedophiles."
PARTNERS IN CRIME
CHARLES O'Neill met William Lauchlan when he returned to Scotland after a troubled stay in Australia.
O'Neill emigrated with his family when he was two and grew up in Sydney and Perth.
But his childhood was marred by sex abuse at the hands of his own relatives. In his teens, he was jailed for armed robbery.
In 1986, he attacked a prison officer and left the man in a permanent vegetative state. As he would do in later life, he went on the run and returned to Scotland.
O'Neill set up home in Ferguslie Park, Paisley, in the same street as the Lauchlan family.
Within no time, he befriended Lauchlan, who was 14 years his junior.
The relationship gradually developed into a love affair which has left a trail of misery in its wake.
O'Neill and Lauchlan have often masqueraded as cousins but police have confirmed they are not related.
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