Rhys Bennett, who is no stranger to ridicule and rejection, has always been an outsider – teased and bullied for being different.
Born in Abingdon, Oxfordshire, Jill Barclay’s killer moved to Angus when he was six and spent most of his life on a farm near Edzell.
As a schoolboy at Brechin High School, Bennett displayed an aptitude for maths and physics but his distinctive appearance drew the attention of fellow pupils and he became the target of bullying.
A former pupil told The Press and Journal that most people didn’t even know his name or bother to get to know him.
However, they remembered calling him “briefcase boy” because of his unusual school bag.
“Everyone knew of him because he was an odd character,” she explained. “He dressed quite old-fashioned, like a farmer. He wore braces to keep his trousers up and had long sideburns.
“I can’t imagine he had the easiest time at school. People weren’t very nice to him.”
Bennett’s briefcase was soon replaced with a military backpack, which he also used during his time as part of the local Cadets.
Who is Fife man Rhys Bennett?
Others who knew Bennett during his school days describe him as impressionable and easily led, such as the time he took the blame for vandalising a toilet block at the secondary school.
He spoke about going to university to pursue a career in engineering, however, those plans never came to fruition and he ended up enrolling on a two-year horticulture course at Dundee and Angus College.
During his studies, Bennett attended Dundee Flower and Food Festival, where he was photographed in September 2019 wearing a herringbone cap and sporting a distinctive moustache.
After Bennett completed his college course, he was eager to earn money and soon signed up to work for a fencing contractor.
The work took him all over the country and even to locations in England.
It’s understood Bennett struck up a relationship with an NHS worker while he worked in Fort William from the end of September 2021 until Christmas that year.
Bennett started living with the woman during his work week and commuting back home to Fife at the weekends but when work prospects dried up in the Highlands the pair decided to split.
In the wake of Jill Barclay’s brutal killing, friends told Police Scotland that Bennett was a “gun freak”.
Investigators were told that all he had talked about while studying horticulture for two years was guns.
Four-day search of Bennett’s home
After Bennett was arrested a search of his home in the village of Ballingry was carried out and an air rifle and replica guns were taken into evidence. However, all were established to have been purchased legally.
The four-day search of Bennett’s home, involving at least seven police vehicles, drew the attention of residents, who began to realise how little they knew about their new neighbour.
He had only moved into the terraced house at the end of August – just a few weeks before Bennett was arrested – and the heavy police presence alarmed neighbours.
On a street where everyone seems to know each other and their business, no one knew anything about Bennett.
Neighbours all used the same words – “quiet” and “weird” – to describe him and all mentioned that Bennett dressed and looked different.
“He didn’t look like he was from around here,” said one.
A neighbour told The P&J that police also seized Bennett’s work van, which he’d used to travel back to Fife after killing the 47-year-old mum.
As detectives searched for clues in Bennett’s bedroom, they may have been surprised by what they found.
An avid reader, he had dozens and dozens of books, many of them about military aircraft and warships, as well as models of historic naval vessels and military aircraft, which he meticulously built and hand-painted from kits.
Far from providing answers as to why this quiet loner would commit such an unspeakable act of violence, it only added to the disturbing mystery.