Kevin Shepperson: How cash-strapped trio murdered for money
They had been drinking, smoking cannabis and listening to loud music during the night and were short of money.
Wayne Kendall lived in the flat directly below Kevin Shepperson’s, had known him for about a year and realised he was an easy target.
He also knew the 39-year-old was obsessed with security, had three locks on his front door and was reluctant to let people he did not know well into his flat.
So 22-year-old Kendall – probably still high on drink and drugs – climbed out of his second floor flat, shinned up the wall and got through an open window into Mr Shepperson’s home on top of the three-storey block in Bloxwich Road South, Willenhall.
The stunt was captured by a CCTV camera at around 9.15am on August 21 last year.
WATCH: CCTV footage captures callous killers
Once inside he opened the front door to his cousin Nazeem Kendall, aged 22, of no fixed address and 22-year-old friend Cameron MacKenzie, of Richmond Street, Walsall – who had both used the stairs – and the trio launched a savage attack on the startled occupant who lived alone.
The victim was ruthlessly kicked, punched and hit with boxing gloves and a dumbbell before being left to die on the hall floor of the blood bespattered flat where he was found bound and gagged by his friend Jamie Bryan.
The attackers ransacked the place while taking anything of value, even an old TV that Mr Bryan had given to Mr Shepperson – a heavy drug user and drinker – a couple of years earlier and valued the set at £10.
Mr Bryan has since died.
Stolen bank card
Later that day the victim’s stolen bank card was used to put more credit on the mobile phone of Nazeem Kendall and pay for the three of them to stay at the Beverley Hotel in Walsall overnight.
Several of the items taken from the address – and not immediately sold – were discovered in Wayne Kendall’s flat when he was arrested four days after the murder.
He admitted kicking Mr Shepperson in the face but insisted he had never intended to have the man killed and had tried to calm down MacKenzie when he ‘lost it’ while battering the helpless victim.
Wayne Kendall said he had considered calling an ambulance but did not, adding: “There are a lot of what ifs in life.”
He maintained he lost his temper when Mr Shepperson admitted fancying the 15-year-old daughter of a woman they knew – a claim dismissed by the prosecution.
The DNA of Nazeem Kendall was “highly likely” to have been part of a mixed profile discovered on a swab taken from under the nails of the deceased.
His cousin’s DNA was inside boxing gloves which had the blood of the dead man on them.
Yesterday Wayne Kendall, Nazeem Kendall, of no fixed address, and Cameron MacKenzie were all sentenced to life in prison.
Wayne Kendall must serve at least 23 years, Nazeem Kendall must serve at least 21 years and MacKenzie, who pleaded guilty, must serve at least 19 years and 4 months.
Both Kendalls had denied murder but were found guilty after a trial.
Killed two months after narrow escape
Mr Shepperson was bludgeoned to death just two months after narrowly escaping death when he was assaulted in the street by another killer.
The unemployed loner was knocked out by a punch from total stranger Shaun Addison who had climbed on board a stationary bus outside The Malthouse Wetherspoons pub in New Road, Willenhall, on July 9 last year to get involved in a dispute over a missing phone that had nothing to do with him.
Moments later the 27-year-old thug launched another random attack while getting off the bus, killing 31-year-old barman Matthew Powney with a single punch.
He was jailed for five years in November after admitting manslaughter and assault.
