Julia James: Callum Wheeler guilty of PCSO murder

A man has been found guilty of murdering police community support officer Julia James while she was walking her dog in woodland in Kent.

Callum Wheeler beat Mrs James to death with a railway jack after “ambushing” the 53-year-old in woods near her home in Snowdown in April last year.

Wheeler, 22, was as an “angry, violent” and “strange man”, who had been seen roaming the woods, jurors were told.

The jury took less than one hour and 10 minutes to reach their verdict.

Prosecutor Alison Morgan QC told Canterbury Crown Court the attack was “not a momentary and spontaneous act of violence”.

It was planned “over many days and weeks”, she said, and was “an ambush attack where the defendant intended to surprise his victim”.

Wheeler was seen walking around the countryside with the weapon the day before Mrs James died, and in the days after as hundreds of police officers scoured the area.

He will be sentenced at a later date.

Mrs James, a mother-of-two, was found dead alongside her Jack Russell Toby in Akholt Wood on 27 April.

The murder shocked the quiet, rural community, and sparked a vast and complex murder investigation.

The court was told Mrs James was “subjected to a very violent and sustained assault to the head“.

Ms Morgan, who also described Wheeler as “highly sexualised”, said: “He knew that if he waited for the right moment there would be a lone female when nobody else was around, when he could commit this attack.”

She also said on one of those occasions Wheeler visited Ackholt Wood before Mrs James’s death “he saw and was seen by Julia James herself”.

Mrs James had been “aware of the presence of a strange male” and had described the man to her husband Paul as a “really weird dude”, she added.

Following Mrs James’s death, Kent Police said they were “not 100 per cent sure” what murder weapon was used, and they had no motive or suspect in the case.

Following police appeals some 1400 people came forward with information, together with 6700 hours of footage from CCTV, dashcams and doorbells.

One of those to come forward was gamekeeper Gavin Tucker who gave police a photo and dashcam footage of a man he had seen acting suspiciously in the area. He was carrying a bag with what turned out to be the murder weapon covered with plastic bags.

On May 7, detectives released a cropped image and issued a public appeal to find out who he was. Later that day Wheeler was arrested at his home in Aylesham.

Bloodstains matching the DNA of Mrs James were found on items seized from Wheeler’s home, including a pair of his muddy black Nike trainers and the metal railway jack.

Pieces of adhesive from the jack were found in Mrs James’ hair while Wheeler’s DNA was found on her jacket and white vest.

When he was arrested, Wheeler told officers “sometimes I do things that I cannot control” and “you can’t go into the woods and expect to be safe”.

He also told a member of police staff that he would return to the woodland and rape and kill a woman.

The court also heard he had told a custody officer following his arrest: “She was a copper and deserved to die.”

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