PSNI question dentist murder suspect

A dentist facing a double murder charge is to be questioned for another three days by investigating detectives, a court heard today.

Dr Colin Howell, 50, from Castlerock, Co Derry, will be interviewed at Antrim Serious Crime Suite, District Judge Robert Alcorn heard.

Detective Inspector Ian Magee, who is heading up the investigation, told a Magistrates’ Court hearing in Antrim today that officers wanted to interview Howell about other matters.

Howell has been in custody since the end of January charged with the murders 18 years ago of his wife Lesley, 31, and his ex-lover’s policeman husband Trevor Buchanan, 32.

He is also accused of drugging and indecently assaulting four woman patients on separate occasions over a 10-year period up until December last year.

Details of the new line of questioning were not disclosed in court today, but Howell is expected to be back in the dock again for another remand hearing on Friday once officers finish with their interviews.

Yesterday, police divers searched a trout fishery behind Howell’s luxury seven-bedroom home in Glebe Road, Castlerock, as part of their ongoing investigation into the double murder.

Mrs Howell and Pc Buchanan were found dead in a car filled with exhaust fumes in a garage in Castlerock in May 1991.

At first it was thought the pair had died as a result of suicide, but police launched a murder investigation after they interviewed Howell last January.

His former lover, Hazel Stewart, 46, from Coleraine, Co Derry – she later remarried – is also charged with murdering her husband Trevor and Mrs Howell.

She is currently on £15,000 bail after being ordered to surrender her passport and report daily to police.