Killer ordered to pay £86,000 to victim’s son
Failure to attend court taken as admission of guilt
THE man convicted of murdering pensioner Jenny Methven has been ordered to hand over £86,184 damages to her son in a groundbreaking legal action.
David Methven won the payout at the Court of Session in Edinburgh after killer Billy Kean failed to turn up to defend the civil action against him.
Mr Methven took Kean to court in the highly unusual civil case to force him to accept guilt for the killing of his mother, Jenny, in the Perthshire cottage he shared with her.
Mr Methven, who was present to hear the ruling in his favour yesterday, has vowed to hand the money over to charities supported during her lifetime by his mother.
He declined to comment after the hearing.
Kean, who is serving a life sentence, conceded through court papers that he repeatedly bludgeoned the pensioner with a blunt instrument in her home.
Kean, who consistently denied any involvement in her death at his trial, initially defended the civil claim but decree was granted against him when he failed to turn up to defend himself yesterday.
The case was due to be heard over four days last December but Kean and his legal team withdrew their opposition and accepted the terms of the claim – tacitly admitting total guilt.
Lord Brailsford, the Lord Ordinary, initially granted summary decree “in terms that the Defender assaulted Janet Methven and did strike her repeatedly on the head and body with a blunt instrument and did murder Janet (Jenny) Methven.”
He said that as a direct consequence he would “find the Defender liable to the Pursuer in damages under section 4 of the Damages (Scotland) Act 2011.”
At that stage, the cause was put back for three months to allow Kean – serving a minimum of 22 years – to make an application for legal aid.
However, that was refused as it was a civil matter.
Throughout his trial Kean, 47, a handyman from Blairgowrie, denied killing 80-year-old Mrs Methven at Kildinny Cottage, Forteviot, in February 2012 but he was found guilty of murder and jailed for life in 2013.
The High Court heard how Mrs Methven’s son found her battered body in the cottage they shared after coming home from work.
Mrs Methven had suffered horrific injuries to her head and body.
She had been hit over the head at least 11 times with such ferocity that her skull was fractured from one side to the other and bone splinters were embedded in her brain.
Outside court at the time, Mr Methven, 60, said: “No verdict will bring my mother back or spare her the terrible ordeal that took her life.
“I will never be able to imagine her suffering in those moments or comprehend the cruelty of a man who would do that to an elderly woman who regarded them a friend to the family.”
He said he and Kean had been friends for more than 20 years.
“We were almost like brothers. I cannot begin to understand or forgive what he did to my mum,” he said.
“It was an act of betrayal and his denials in the time since, and particularly during this trial, leave him beneath contempt.”
The investigation leading to Kean’s conviction was one of the biggest ever carried out by Tayside Police.
Mr Methven declined to comment on yesterday’s ruling, but a source close to him said he had raised the civil case in the hope of getting Kean to accept responsibility and now felt vindicated.
The source said: “By failing to oppose Mr Methven’s motion, Kean has held his hands up at last, and accepted liability.
“This was never about the money for David – he has made clear he will donate whatever he is awarded to charity.”