Builder is found GUILTY of murdering two sex workers six months apart

Builder, 41, is found GUILTY of murdering two sex workers six months apart after court heard how killer put one of victim into an oil drum, doused it with petrol and set her remains on fire

• Builder Mark Brown, 41, has been convicted of murdering two sex workers
• Brown killed Leah Ware in May and Alexandra Morgan at a farm in East Sussex
• Court heard he put Ms Morgan head-first into a home-made incinerator
• Ms Ware’s body has not been found but prosecutors say he used similar method
• Jury took 10-and-a-half hours to convict Brown of both murder charges 

A builder who described himself as a ‘psychopath with a conscience’ has today been convicted of murdering two escorts six months apart. 

Perverted double murderer Mark Brown killed Leah Ware and Alexandra Morgan and torched their bodies in an oil drum at a remote farm near St Leonards in East Sussex after meeting them through a sex work website, a jury at Hove Crown Court was told. 

Brown put single mother-of-two Ms Morgan, 34, head-first into a home-made incinerator before dumping her remains. Only charred teeth and bone fragments remained. The body of 33-year-old Ms Ware has never been found, but the prosecution believe he used a similar method – as well as also killing her Pomeranian dog, Lady.

The jury of 10 men and two women took 10-and-a-half hours to convict Brown of both murder charges.

Mark Brown has been found guilty of killing two escorts at Little Bridge Farm following a seven-week trial at Hove Crown Court 

Brown has been convicted of murdering Leah Ware (left) and Alexandra Morgan (right)

His Honour Judge Nicholas Hilliard KC told Brown: ‘There is only one sentence which can be passed and that is imprisonment for life.’ 

The judge said he would decide by January if he would be jailed with no possibility of parole. Judge Hilliard said the impact on the families of his victims had been devastating.

He showed no emotion when the judge told him: ‘it is clear this is a case of the upmost gravity.’

Judge Hilliard asked Brown to tell the family of Ms Ware what he did with her before he is sentenced next month, adding: ‘If he wishes to confirm what he had done with Leah Ware’s body, he has that chance.’ With Alexandra Morgan, if he lied about why she was being lured to the farm, the question is what his plans were.

‘They must have involved violence and sexual activity against her will and for some time. The question is what would have happened when it was over. How does he prevent her from reporting it? Murdering her would be a way of doing that. Knowing that he had already successfully disposed of one body.

‘Alex was more suspicious of him than he knew and it would not have taken much to confirm her suspicions.’

Brown met Ms Ware in 2018 when he hired her as an escort and they developed an ‘on again, off again’ relationship.

He killed her on or around May 7 last year after tensions grew when she pressed him to leave his partner of 14 years, Lisa Clark, the court heard.

Brown hired Ms Morgan for sex around a dozen times before offering her an escorting job worth £100,000 in October 2021.

But when she visited Little Bridge Farm, the site he rented, the following month, he killed her and burned her body in an incinerator made from an oil drum.

He then dumped her remains in a skip at the building site where he worked in Sevenoaks, Kent.

Brown claimed she died in an accident at the farm after hitting her head when she slipped in his workshop and he burned her body ‘in a panic’.

He told the jury he and Ms Ware broke up in early 2021 and, as far as he knows, she is still alive.

This is a breaking news story. More to follow  

The killing of Leah Ware and Alexandra Morgan by ‘psychopath’ Mark Brown: Timeline

2021

– May 6: Ms Ware spends the evening of May 5 into the early hours of May 6 with friend and convicted drug dealer Jack Tyler. The pair take drugs and have sex. This is the last confirmed sighting of Ms Ware by anyone other than Brown.

– May 7: The last outgoing contact from Ms Ware’s phone is at 8.55am. The phone leaves the network in a ‘disorderly shutdown’ that evening. The police believe she died that day.

– May 8: Ms Ware’s phone returns to the network at 8.57am and comes in and out of the network before being switched off manually for the last time at 2.38pm.

– May 20: Brown rejoins the AdultWork website, which he used to meet Ms Ware in 2018.

– June 8: Brown meets Ms Morgan for sex at her home in Sissinghurst, near Cranbrook, Kent, for the first time after booking an appointment through AdultWork.

– June 13: Brown messages old school friend Elizabeth Howard: ‘I’m going to be very careful how I word this – it happened again, not very long ago when disposing of something. It’s a very unpleasant thing to do – an old oil drum, five litres of diesel, and hey presto, there’s not very much left. It gets hot, very hot, it glows almost white. The things I have done weigh heavily on my heart, on my head and my soul. A psychopath with a conscience – it’s a joke really.’

– June 21: Brown meets Ms Morgan at Little Bridge Farm for sex – and again on seven more occasions during August and September.

– October 23: Over WhatsApp, Brown offers Ms Morgan an escorting job paying up to £100,000.

– November 13: Ms Morgan’s parents collect her son and dog to allow her to go on a trip for four days. She tells family members she is going on a spa weekend with a friend but is in fact meeting Brown for sex at Little Bridge Farm.

– November 14: Ms Morgan leaves home and is seen buying fuel on CCTV at Ashwal Garage in Cranbrook at 7.20am. She arrives at Little Bridge Farm at about 8am. Ms Morgan is killed by Brown and he destroys her remains by burning her body in a homemade incinerator.

– November 17: Brown and an associate move Ms Morgan’s car to Holmhurst Lane, St Leonards, where it is left bearing false number plates. Brown dumps the oil barrel containing Ms Morgan’s remains into a skip at a building site he worked at in Sevenoaks. Ms Morgan fails to return to her parents to pick up her son and dog as planned.

– November 18: Ms Morgan is reported missing by her mother.

– November 20: Kent Police’s Major Crime Unit commences an investigation.

– November 23: CCTV footage is found showing Ms Morgan’s car following Brown’s Jaguar up the track to Little Bridge Farm. Kent Police cordon off access to the farm. Brown arrives and gives a non-custodial interview, offering DNA and fingerprints. He admits to meeting Ms Morgan for sex but said she left after 45 minutes.

– November 24: Brown tells his colleague Alan Downs he is about to be arrested for a ‘double murder’.

– November 25: Brown is arrested on suspicion of Ms Morgan’s murder.

– November 26: Kent Police contact Sussex Police in a bid to Ms Ware. During a search of Brown’s work van, Ms Ware’s prescription medication is found and she is identified as a potential witness. A missing person inquiry is opened.

– November 28: Brown is charged with Ms Morgan’s murder.

– December 1: Bone and tooth fragments are found in the oil barrel Brown dumped in a skip at the Sevenoaks building site. Forensic odontologists say the teeth were Ms Morgan’s.

– December 8: Believing Ms Ware has been killed, Sussex Police change their missing person case into a murder probe.

2022

– January 7: The search at Little Bridge Farm ends. Bones belonging to a Pomeranian dog are found. Police believe they are the bones of Ms Ware’s beloved pet Lady and both Miss Ware and Lady died at the farm on the same day.

– February 1: Brown is charged with Ms Ware’s murder.

– February 4: Brown appears at Lewes Crown Court charged with both murders. He pleads not guilty to the murder of Ms Morgan but, after the discovery of her remains, he admits to destroying her body with fire – claiming she fell and died on the farm in an accident.

– March 25: Brown denies Ms Ware’s murder.

– October 17: Brown’s trial begins at Hove Crown Court.

– November 29: The jury retires to consider its verdict.

– December 1: The jury of 10 men and two women find Brown guilty of murder.

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