Italian guilty of hair fetish murder

Danilo Restivo, 39, is also linked to the murder of a teenager in Italy who was murdered in a similar way to seamstress Heather Barnett in November 2002.

Mrs Barnett’s family quietly sobbed in the public gallery yesterday as he was found guilty in just five hours by a jury at Winchester Crown Court. The Italian national showed no emotion.

Restivo entered the flat of his neighbour in Bournemouth, Dorset, and bludgeoned her with a hammer before cutting her throat. He then cut off the 48-year-old’s breasts and left a clump of someone else’s hair in her right hand and some of her own beneath her left in a bizarre ritual. He left the body for Mrs Barnett’s children Caitlin, then 11, and Terry, then 14, to find in the bathroom.

Restivo even comforted the horrified youngsters as they fled the scene just as he arrived home opposite.

Outside court, Mrs Barnett’s sister Denise Le Voir welcomed the conviction, and said: “Heather would have been horrified by the cruel and callous way Danilo Restivo designed her murder and mutilation so her children would find her body on return from school.

Detective Superintendent Mark Cooper, who led the inquiry, described Restivo as a “dangerous predator” and added: “Despite his guilt, Restivo never moved away from his house that looked out onto Heather’s property and, perhaps most chilling of all, he even consoled her two children the afternoon following his cold and calculated actions.”

In finding Restivo guilty, the jury of five women and seven men agreed with the prosecution the manner of Mrs Barnett’s murder was Restivo’s “hallmark” and linked the killing to the murder of 16-year-old Elisa Claps in Potenza, Italy, in 1993. He is now subject to a European Arrest Warrant and is expected to be extradited back to Italy to stand trial for the murder of Miss Claps.

The court heard Restivo had arranged to meet Miss Claps at the Most Holy Trinity Church on September 12 1993 to give her a present for passing her exams.

The teenager was never seen again and her body was discovered in a loft of the church on March 17 last year –– giving Dorset police vital evidence to finally charge their prime suspect.

The Italian was part of the Barnett investigation within days when officers discovered he had put his trainers in bleach. Officers’ suspicions were then strengthened when they learned he was implicated in the disappearance Miss Claps.

Unusually, the jury heard evidence of the Italian murder but did not have to establish his guilt for it. But it decided there were “striking similarities” to the murders carried out nine years apart.

Next to Miss Claps’ body there were locks of her own hair. Her trousers and pants were lowered to the same level as those of Mrs Barnett and Miss Claps’ bra was cut or broken in the same way as Mrs Barnett’s bra.

Restivo had moved to Bournemouth in March 2002 after meeting his wife Fiamma Marsango on the internet. He had been convicted of lying to the investigation into Miss Clap’s disappearance but never charged with murder.

He denied Mrs Barnett’s murder, claiming he was on a computer course in Bournemouth all day, and said Miss Claps was alive when she left the church. But his DNA was found on the body of the teenager near a stab wound on her back and on a green towel found in Mrs Barnett’s flat.

Restivo had a bizarre hair fetish and had cut women’s hair on buses or in cinemas in both Italy and Bournemouth for years.

Restivo was remanded in custody until a life sentence is imposed today.