Bigamist sentenced to life for murdering wife and children who disappeared 27 years ago

A bigamist and confidence trickster was jailed for life yesterday for murdering his wife and two children 27 years ago in one of the most extraordinary cases in British criminal history.

Anthony John Allen, from Poole, Dorset, was convicted of killing his wife Patricia, 39, and their children, Jonathan, aged seven, and five-year-old Victoria in May 1975 while they were living in Salcombe, south Devon.

Allen never reported his family missing, nothing has been heard from them and no bodies have been found.

At Exeter Crown Court yesterday Mr Justice Steel told Allen: "Only you know what truly happened in May over 25 years ago. There is no possible explanation for their disappearance other than you murdered them."

Police believe Allen probably used his small boat to ferry his victims out through the estuary at Salcombe and dumped the weighted bodies at sea. But it took almost three decades for the life-long conman to be brought to justice.

The crucial evidence was the testimony of his former mistress, Eunice Yabsley, now aged 67, who said she saw scratch marks on his wrists after his wife disappeared.

Throughout his life, Allen used his charm and impressive 6ft 2in frame to win over and con a succession of women.

Even his name was a deception. Born Anthony John Angel on 11 June 1934, in Torbay, Devon, he spent much of his early life in Bournemouth. In the 1950s, he married Monica, whom he knew from his home town.

Allen – then known as Angel, and living in Sussex – was caught in 1966 stealing money from wage packets at the office where he worked. To escape the charge, and his failing marriage, he drove to nearby Beachy Head, Britain's most notorious suicide spot. In a bizarre attempt to start a new life, he left a pile of clothes and a note on the foreshore, plunged into the cold water and swam along the coast where he had hidden fresh clothes. He changed his name to Allen and moved to the north of England to begin a career in catering. In 1967, he met and married Patricia, who was to become his eventual murder victim. But Allen's cover was blown in a chance encounter with an old friend on a street in Manchester and he was convicted of bigamy, theft and obtaining money by false pretences. He escaped with a a suspended sentence, after Patricia made a tearful plea to the judge.

Two years later, Allen was in trouble with the law again, when he was convicted of setting fire to three bags of mail he had been supposed to deliver. He served one year of a three-year sentence.

In 1975, the couple and their two children moved to Salcombe, where Allen became a restaurant manager. The family lived in a flat in Powderham Villa, a large Victorian house.

He quickly started an affair with the attractive and recently widowed Mrs Yabsley, who ran the town's trendiest restaurant, The Galley. Just weeks into the relationship, he asked whether she would be prepared to look after his children if he separated from his wife, but she refused.

Days later, on 27 May, the morning after his wife disappeared, Allen went to see his mistress with his two children. She would later recall: "He said flatly, 'Pat's gone'. The hand that took the cigarette back to his mouth was shaking, but he was otherwise perfectly in control. As his cuff slipped back, I saw that there were deep scratches running down his forearm. I asked him what happened?

"He said, 'We had a row first thing this morning. She's packed and gone to meet her boyfriend. She's taken her car'." Later she asked Allen: "How did you get those scratches on your arm?"

She said he told her: "I told her I wanted to finish it. She flew at me. I put my arms up to protect my face."

Two days later he said his wife had returned in the middle of the night and left with the two children, probably to go and live with a former boyfriend in North America. None of his wife and children's clothes, toys and belongings were taken from the flat, and money in Patricia's bank account was left untouched.

Two months after the disappearance Allen moved in with Mrs Yabsley. Later, she said: "He certainly knows how to charm a woman. His manners were always perfect, just the sort of man a woman could dream about."

Allen never reported his family missing and police got involved only three months after their disappearance, when a local officer began to hear disturbing rumours. After a police inquiry in 1977, the Director of Public Prosecutions ruled there was insufficient evidence for a prosecution. Allen and Mrs Yabsley moved to London in 1982 and their relationship ended in 1987. Allen continued with his life of deceit. In May, 1990, a crooked deal put him back in jail when he was sentenced to three years for swindling house buyers out of £165,000.

He later moved into the home of his last girlfriend, a council officer in Poole, and was arrested at their house in October last year.

The renewed police interest had been sparked by Mrs Yabsley, who after their break-up wrote about the affair in a book called Presumed Dead, published in 1992. The book contained, for the first time, a reference to the scratch marks, although it would take police eight years before they reinvestigated the case in 2000. At his trial at Exeter Crown court, the jury was told that neighbours living below the Allens heard a child screaming "Daddy, daddy, you are hurting mummy", at the time Mrs Allen disappeared.

Another witness spoke of seeing Mrs Allen "in distress" in their car with Allen and the children. Mark Evans, QC, for the prosecution, told the jury: "The clear motive is that he was involved with Mrs Yabsley and he might have perceived her successful business as a route to a new life. Patricia was clearly an obstacle and as it turned out the children also became an obstacle."

Outside court, Mrs Yabsley said: "I think he is a psychopath. That is an unqualified opinion but I think he is."