Pole gets two life sentences for elderly couple’s brutal murder

The judge said he was close to tears as he sentenced Ireneusz Bartnowski yesterday, branding him “cold-blooded” and “evil beyond belief” for the attack with a hammer and a knife.

Bartnowski, 22, had only been in the UK two weeks before he battered and stabbed Guiseppe and Caterina Massaro in their Wolverhampton home, before stealing two televisions and their car.

The bodies of Mr Massaro, 80, and his 77-year-old wife were found by their granddaughter Lindsey Booth, 24, who yesterday said she still suffered flashbacks of the moment she opened their bedroom door to find them on the floor.

Bartnowski, who had been staying with his sister next door, denied killing the couple in April last year, blaming the murders on a friend, Wojciech Ostolski, to whom he lied in order to get his help in selling the TVs and car.

He was found guilty of two counts of murder by a jury at Wolverhampton Crown Court and sentenced to two life sentences, each with a 34-year minimum tariff. The terms will run concurrently.

Ostolski, 32, of Chervil Rose, Heath Town, Wolverhampton, was cleared of handling stolen goods.

Mr Justice MacDuff told Bartnowski: “You broke into their home after dusk and, armed with a claw hammer and a knife, you bludgeoned and stabbed them both to death.

“You showed no mercy, no compassion. You left them dead upon their bedroom floor and you set about stripping them of their valuables. You stole their money, you carried two televisions into their car and you drove that car away.

“You went out with your friends to a supermarket and you used the cash you had stolen from them to buy drink. You have told this court breathtaking lies in an attempt to escape justice. But you did not fool this jury.”

The judge, who commended jurors for reaching “the correct verdict”, added: “I have read the impact statements provided by members of the Massaro family and I have been moved almost to tears by the anguish you have caused.

“You lack all humanity, you are evil beyond belief.”

Bartnowski was seen on CCTV as he took the televisions from the couple’s home on April 21 and drove away in their Peugeot car.

Prosecutor Peter Grieves-Smith told the jury a “wealth of scientific evidence” – including blood-staining and fingerprints – also proved his guilt.

He had told the court the Massaros, who emigrated from Naples in Italy to England in 1960, suffered “dreadful injuries”.

“Who was attacked first, we can’t say, but one of the victims must have seen the other attacked and, as they did, must surely have known that the same thing would happen to them,” he added.

Mr Massaro died from multiple injuries to the head, neck and abdomen, including numerous stab wounds, a fractured skull and haemorrhages to his brain. His wife had also been stabbed in the neck suffered massive blood loss.

The judge told him: “The fear and pain they must have felt in their dying minutes is unimaginable.”

Referring to Bartnowski’s attempt to pass the blame to Ostolski, he added: “You have shown no remorse, no pity, concerned only with saving yourself and heaping the blame on an innocent man.”

Miss Booth, one of the couple’s seven grandchildren, said afterwards: “If he rots in there for the rest of his life, if I am honest, it is never going to bring them back and it will never be enough.”