Primary school teacher Fiona Beal, 50, pleaded guilty to murder on Friday which brought her Old Bailey trial to a standstill
She dances in front of dolls months before she stabs her partner, that is master assassin Fiona Beal.
The primary school teacher stabbed Nicholas Billingham in the neck before burying him in his garden. But, as our exclusive footage suggests, few would have suspected that the popular class figure was capable of killing.
The 50-year-old dramatically pleaded guilty to murder on Friday, bringing his Old Bailey trial to a standstill. Yesterday Billingham’s 42-year-old cousin branded Beal “a psycho” – saying “she deserves a long sentence”.
The video was posted on a social media page by Eastfield Academy, in Northampton, in December 2020 during the pandemic. Beal performed a light dance routine in front of the class at the school, where she teaches year six, before laughing.
In another post in March 2021 in reference to World Book Day, the school shared a photo of Beal reading. Less than a year later he lured Billingham with the promise of sex and then murdered him.
She wrapped up the builder’s body, burying it in the garden of her Northampton home in a coffin made of wood and cinder blocks.
Beal’s diary shows that she had an alter ego “Tulipp22”. In one entry, he wrote: “It was more difficult than I thought. Hiding a body was bad. The movement of a body is much more difficult than it seems on TV.”
On Saturday, Billingham’s cousin Tracy Anderson, 49, said of Beal: “She’s a psycho. There are no words to explain it really.
“I’m so sorry cousin Yvonne, Nick’s mother. How did she know and everything was just terrible. She deserves a long sentence.”
Her husband Steven, 61, added: “I can’t understand how they can put everyone through all this and then come back and plead guilty to murder. They have to throw away the key.”
Nicholas’ mother, Yvonne Valentine, had told how Beal gave her a Christmas drink. “It still hits me because, I think, Nick was buried in the garden a few meters away and I didn’t know he was there,” she said.
A prosecutor told jurors last week that Beal sent several people on November 1, 2021, and in the days that followed, she and Billingham contracted Covid-19 and needed to be isolated.
Jurors heard Beal sent messages to her sisters on November 8 saying she and Billingham had split up – with one saying he left because he was having an affair. The narrative that Billingham had eloped with another woman was “completely false”, the prosecution said.
But jurors heard that Billingham appeared to have cheated on Beal first. Beal returned to work “completely offloading his considerable responsibilities as a teacher to Year 6 students”, receiving a “sympathetic response” from people who had heard about his breakup.
Billingham’s partially mummified remains were found in March 2022, four and a half months after he was last seen. Beal was arrested after police discovered the body.
He initially pleaded guilty to manslaughter by loss of control, but denied murdering Billingham between October 30 and November 10, 2021.
However, jurors at the Old Bailey on Friday heard that she had changed her plea. Judge Mark Lucraft told Beal: “This morning you pleaded guilty to murder, which, as you have no doubt said, carries a life sentence.”
A two-day sentencing hearing will begin on May 29 where the judge will determine the minimum term, he confirmed.
