Bournemouth: Man jailed for murdering lodger and cutting up body

A man has been jailed for a minimum of 19 years for murdering his lodger and scattering his severed body parts in packages and a suitcase.

Benjamin Atkins, 49, killed Simon Shotton, of the same age, at their home in Bournemouth in August 2023, following a dispute over money and drugs, Winchester Crown Court heard.

Atkins’ partner, Debbie Pereira, 39, was jailed for four years for perverting the course of justice and preventing the burial of a corpse.

The judge, Mrs Justice Stacey, said Atkins’ actions were “gruesome” and “shockingly callous”.

Mr Shotton’s legs were disposed of on the Manor Steps Zig Zag footpath at Boscombe seafront in August 2023.

The trial was told how a member of the public was sheltering under a tree when a package containing the human remains landed beside her.

In September, the victim’s arms were found in the couple’s garden in Aylesbury Road, and his torso was discovered in a suitcase at Boscombe Chine Gardens.

Police said skull fragments were also found in Walpole Lane in February 2024.

The judge said a fight broke out between the two men after Atkins stole money from Mr Shotton’s wallet and used it to buy drugs.

She said she assumed Atkins killed the lodger in an act of “excessive self-defence”, repeatedly stabbing him and using a loudspeaker to stove in his head.

The judge added: “The violence you used was ferocious, unnecessary, wholly out of proportion.

“You were by far the stronger. He was not a threat to you.”

The couple then sold Mr Shotton’s phone and shoplifted a hacksaw together, the court heard.

Atkins cut up the body and started a fire in the garden lasting for several days in an attempt to dispose of Mr Shotton’s head.

Pereira spent several days cleaning her blood-spattered utility room before Atkins repainted the walls, the judge said.

She said neither defendant had shown genuine remorse.

Atkins was recorded in a police van telling his girlfriend he would kill again, the court heard.

The defendant said: “I’ll look ’em straight in the eye and say: ‘Yeah. I’d do it again and again and again. If you let me go today, I’d find another one and do it again.’

“‘Drug dealers and pushers. Kill, decapitate and eat the [expletive term].”

In a victim personal statement read by a barrister, Mr Shotton’s son Wesley said his father “used drink and drugs to escape the battles in his mind”.

Wesley Shotton wrote: “I just loved our time together. I was every bit my daddy’s boy.”

Addressing Atkins, he added: “The lengths you’ve gone to in destroying my dad is completely different.

“There was no opportunity for us to visit his body to tell him we loved him, to kiss him goodbye.”