Wife-killer Malcolm Webster abandoned his attempts to have his 30-year jail term cut yesterday – in case it made him look guilty.
The former north-east nurse has always denied murdering his first wife Claire Morris in a staged car crash and trying to do the same to his second wife Felicity Drumm five years later in New Zealand.
The crimes were part of an elaborate scheme to pocket almost £1million, which included shaving his head while pretending to have cancer so he could get close to Oban woman Simone Banarjee, whom he hoped to bigamously marry to gain access to her estate.
The 54-year-old fraudster was largely unsuccessful in the first part of his appeal last year, failing to convince judges to quash his murder and attempted murder convictions.
Yesterday, the appeal was due to continue at the Court of Session in Edinburgh, where judges expected to hear submissions about the length of sentence handed down to Webster after he was found guilty in 2011.
Instead, the court heard Webster had made an 11th-hour decision to drop the appeal, in case it looked like he was trying to “mitigate his guilt”.
Defence counsel Gary Allan QC said: “Malcolm Webster has consistently and vehemently denied his guilt of the crimes of which the jury has convicted him.
“His position remains entirely unchanged. He maintains he did not commit the crimes and the verdicts of the jury represent a gross miscarriage of justice.
“He has now instructed me that he considers that for me to advance any argument in support of the appeal might wrongly give the appearance that he has changed his position and is now simply seeking to mitigate his guilt.
“He maintains his innocence and any observers should make that clear in their minds.”
Mr Allan said Webster had told him to make no argument for reducing the 30-year sentence when he visited him at HMP Shotts on Thursday.
Lord Eassie, sitting with Lady Clark and Lord Wheatley, allowed Webster to drop the appeal.
Last night, Peter Morris, the younger brother of murder victim Ms Morris, said he did not think people would be fooled by the killer’s claims.
The 51-year-old – who did not attend the hearing – said: “I think it’s typical that he is trying to create the illusion of innocence, it’s what he has always done. He likes to sow seeds of doubt in people’s minds, but quite frankly there is no doubt because when it comes to answering questions about all the evidence against him, he can’t.
“I don’t think people will be taken in by this stance.”
Although Webster lost the appeal against his conviction last September, he could still try to persuade the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission – which looks at possible miscarriages of justice – to listen to him.