Deported killer who kidnapped Muriel McKay when he mistook her for Rupert Murdoch’s wife and held her for £1m ransom in 1969 offers to return to the UK to show her family where he buried her body
- Nizamodeen and Arthur Hosein abducted and murdered Muriel McKay in 1969
- Hosein, now 75, revealed that Mrs McKay was buried on an 11-acre Herts farm
A deported killer who kidnapped a woman he mistook for Rupert Murdoch’s wife has offered to return to the UK to show the victim’s daughter where he buried her mother’s body 54 years ago.
Nizamodeen Hosein was 22 when he and his older brother Arthur kidnapped Muriel McKay in 1969 and held her ransom for £1million, mistaking her for Anna Murdoch, the media mogul’s then-wife.
The brothers were caught and jailed for life for murder, but Mrs McKay disappeared and her body was never found.
Now living in his native Trinidad, where he was deported after serving his jail sentence, 75-year-old Hosein claims Mrs McKay collapsed and died of a heart attack at a remote Hertfordshire farm where the brothers were holding her.
He claims he can show the victim’s daughter the exact spot he buried the body of Mrs McKay, who was actually the Australian wife of Mr Murdoch’s deputy Alik and died age 55.
Hosein has since been in touch with Mrs McKay’s daughter Dianne, 82, and offered to return to the UK to show her where he buried her mother’s body.
Muriel McKay was kidnapped from her Wimbledon home on December 29, 1969 after she was mistaken for Anna Murdoch, the 25-year-old wife of media tycoon Rupert, and later died. She was never seen alive again and her body was not found
Nizamodeen (right) and Arthur Hosein (left) were convicted of her murder though police never recovered McKay’s body
The killers mistaked Mrs McKay for Anna Murdoch, the media mogul’s then-wife
Now living in his native Trinidad, where he was deported after serving his jail sentence, 75-year-old Hosein claims Mrs McKay collapsed and died of a heart attack at a remote Hertfordshire farm where the brothers were holding her
After years of refusing to explain Mrs McKay’s fate, Hosein now claims she collapsed and died of a heart attack at a remote Hertfordshire farm where the brothers were holding her.
Hosein says he panicked and buried her body under a dung heap behind the farmhouse near the village of Stocking Pelham.
Scotland Yard detectives were unsuccessful after searching a small section of a field near the house last year – but the family insists they dug in the wrong place.
Hosein says he is certain he will remember the spot where he buried Mrs McKay’s body, even though the buildings, the farmyard and the fields have drastically changed since the kidnap in 1969.
To help him, the McKay family has commissioned computer-generated images to show precisely the changes in the layout of the farm.
In a letter seen by Sky News, Hosein asked the Home Office to lift a deportation order which still bars him from the UK. His brother Arthur died in prison in 2009.
He wrote: ‘I admit my involvement in the kidnap and death of Muriel McKay, and I have been attempting to assist her daughter Dianne in locating her body.
‘I believe I am the only living person who knows where Muriel’s body is and would like her body to be found before I myself die.’
A deportation order requires an individual to leave the UK.
It also prohibits them from re-entering the country for as long as it is in force and invalidates any leave to enter or remain in the UK given to them before the order is made or while it is in force.
A person can apply at any time for revocation of a deportation order made against them.
Dianne told Sky News, after speaking to Hosein by video call, that he was a ‘man of few words’.
Asked what it was like having to speak to the man convicted of her mother’s murder, and rely on him for help, Dianne told the broadcaster: ‘It’s been very hard having so many years of nobody to talk to, no leads and no hope of ever finding her body.
‘It’s actually a relief to talk to him.’
Hosein has been in touch with Mrs McKay’s daughter Dianne, 82, (pictured) and offered to return to the UK to show her where he buried her mother’s body
A police search team dig in an area of Stocking Farm, formerly known as Rooks Farm, in Stocking Pelham, Hertfordshire where Hosein says he buried his victim (pictured in February 2022)
In a letter Hosein asked the Home Office to lift a deportation order which still bars him from the UK
Hosein says he panicked and buried her body under a dung heap behind the farmhouse near the village of Stocking Pelham
Nizamodeen and Arthur Hosein thought they were abducting Rupert Murdoch’s then wife Anna Murdoch, pictured here in 1988
Muriel McKay’s family (pictured in January 1970) have been on a mission to find her remains
A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘We express sympathies with Muriel McKay’s loved ones. While we do not comment on individual cases, we work with the police on any requests pertaining to ongoing investigations.’
The Metropolitan Police said: ‘We most recently met some members of Muriel’s family in May 2023 and continue to keep in contact with them.
‘An extensive search for Muriel’s remains was conducted in March 2022 at a site in Hertfordshire, unfortunately it concluded unsuccessfully. We continue to review any opportunities to recover Muriel’s body and return her to her family.’
Investigators called off a week-long search after failing to find any evidence of the remains.
Murder detectives had scoured an 11-acre farm and its fields in Stocking Pelham Hertfordshire.
The brothers forced their way into the McKay home in Wimbledon, south London on December 29 and bundled her into a car and took her to a Hertfordshire farm where they lived.
READ MORE: Police call off week-long search at Hertfordshire farm where killer of Muriel Mckay – who was kidnapped in 1969 after being mistaken for Rupert Murdoch’s wife – confessed to burying her body
They then demanded £1million for the return of Mrs McKay, who was married to Mr Murdoch’s deputy Alick, pretending to be a member of the mafia. She was never seen alive again and her body was not found.
Following trial in 1970, the brothers were sentenced to life imprisonment in one of Britain’s first convictions for murder without a body.
In December 2021, Hosein revealed that Mrs McKay was buried on the 11-acre Hertfordshire farm where she was held. The admission was made to a lawyer representing Mrs McKay’s family.
Officers with the Met’s specialist crime command unit and forensic analysts carried out visits to the farm near Royston in the following months.
Pictures shared in February show police forensic tents over being set up on the farm and detectives moving away wheelbarrows of soil that had been dug up.
The killer, who had denied involvement in the kidnap, also insisted that no violence was used against her. He told her family that she collapsed and died while watching a TV news report with him about her kidnapping.
The confession was made after he was tracked down in Trinidad by documentary makers covering the story last year.
The pair claimed they were innocent but Arthur’s fingerprints were found on the ransom notes and a notebook filled with the same paper that Muriel’s letters were written on were discovered at the site.
Nizmodeen told Matthew Gayle, a British barrister in Trinidad hired by the family, that he wanted ‘closure’ before he died and so would reveal the location of McKay’s body.
He said: ‘At the farmhouse there’s a wooden gate, there’s a few wooden gates, it has barn beside, barn beside, and ten foot forward, ten foot this side [left], the body’s somewhere around there. Next to the barbed wire fence, about three foot [from the fence].’
Mrs McKay was kidnapped after the brothers tailed a chauffeured Rolls-Royce belonging to Murdoch that was on loan to her husband Alick McKay.
Nizmodeen Hosein protested he had not killed McKay, maintaining instead that she had collapsed and later died from a heart attack while sitting downstairs in the farmhouse (pictured)
Nizmodeen said: ‘At the farmhouse there’s a wooden gate, there’s a few wooden gates, it has barn beside, barn beside, and ten foot forward, ten foot this side [left], the body’s somewhere around there’
David Dyer, son-in-law of missing Muriel McKay, at a press conference at Wimbledon Police Station 54 years ago
Police dig in an area of Stocking Farm in Hertfordshire looking for the remains of Mrs McKay (pictured in February 2022)
She was abducted in the brothers’s Volvo and taken to Rooks Farm, where they lived with Arthur’s wife and children, who were on holiday at the time.
Newspaper executive Mr McKay returned home to find the telephone ripped off the wall, the contents of his wife’s handbag strewn over the hall.
He later received a call from a man demanding £1million – equivalent to £20million today – if Mrs McKay was to be returned alive, sparking the UK’s first high-profile, kidnap-for-ransom case.
Over the 40-day ordeal the brothers, who claimed to be a mafia group called M3, sent three letters and made 18 further calls demanding the money.
They also sent Mrs McKay’s husband five letters allegedly written by Muriel, including one in which she said she was cold and blindfolded, as proof of life.
Two attempts by police to deliver fake notes to the kidnappers failed but the second try led officers to Rook’s Farm, where Mrs McKay was taken by the brothers.
Nizmodeen told the lawyer he was the only person who buried Mrs McKay, refusing to implicate his brother Arthur who was also convicted for her murder.
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