Karen Buckley: A timeline to murder

By Joe Leogue

21-year-old Alexander Pacteau this morning admitted to murdering Karen Buckley after a night out in Glasgow last April.

Following Pacteau's guilty plea before Lady Rita Rae, Glasgow High court heard how Karen, a 24-year-old nurse from Cork, had left the Sanctuary nightclub at approximately 1am on the morning in question, crossed the road and was seen on CCTV speaking to Pacteau.

Scottish police footage of Alexander Pacteau being interviewed. He describes the moment he first met Karen Buckley outside the sanctuary night club.

Using CCTV and forensic evidence, Scottish police subsequently established that Pacteau drove Ms Buckley from the vicinity of the club in the direction of her apartment only to pull into Kelvin Way for approximately 12 minutes.

It was in this 12 minute timeframe that Alexander Pacteau murdered Karen Buckley by choking her and beating her repeatedly in the head with a large wrench.

Pacteau then discarded Ms Buckley’s bag in a park near his apartment on Dorchester Avenue in West Glasgow. Pacteau’s housemate’s mother was visiting on the night of the murder – both she and Pacteau’s housemate were asleep as he brought Ms Buckley’s body into his bedroom where he kept it for the night.

Scottish Prosecutors then outlined how in the hours after the murder, Pacteau used his smartphone to search the internet for information on sodium hydroxide, a chemical better known as caustic soda, which is commonly used as a drain cleaner.

CCTV footage showing Alexander Pacteau making a number of purchases in the days following the death of Karen Buckley have also been released.

Over the next two days Pacteau bought dozens of litres of the chemical from stores across north Glasgow. While his housemate was out hillwalking with his mother, Pacteau submerged his victim’s body in caustic soda in his apartment’s bathtub.

The chemicals did not work as he had intended. He then wrapped the body in a duvet, brought it to his room, and cleaned his apartment before his housemate returned.

The next day he attempted to destroy the evidence of his crime and attempts to hide the murder, and bought a barrel in which he placed Ms Buckley’s remains, partially covering it in sodium hydroxide.

Pacteau then locked the barrel and hid it under a sheet and other items in a storage unit on a farm north of Glasgow.

Ms Buckley’s friends quickly became concerned for her whereabouts shortly after she left the nightclub. They called the police the next day, who used CCTV footage to trace Pacteau.

He was questioned as a witness in a missing person case, a status that changed when sniffer dogs indicated that a body had been in Pacteau’s car. DNA samples taken from his apartment showed traces of Ms Buckley’s blood, and scratches on his arms indicated that he had been in a recent struggle.

Mr Pacteau had claimed that Ms Buckley had come with him to his apartment, injured herself in his room, and then walked home. Forensic evidence of blood taken from his car proved that this was not the case. Pacteau was detained by police at lunchtime on the Wednesday April 15.

After Pacteau was named in the media as the last person to see Ms Buckley alive, a member of the public contacted police to inform them that Pacteau used to sell fireworks that he kept in a storage unit on a farm north of Glasgow.

It was here that police discovered Ms Buckley’s body, less than four days after she had disappeared.

Pacteau had then claimed that he had struck Ms Buckley after she hit him first. He said that this happened in his room, but a combination of CCTV evidence and blood samples from Pacteau’s car proved that Ms Buckley was dead by the time she was brought to the apartment.