The killer of a Scots woman and her husband found dead in their home in rural France was ‘definitely caught on camera at some point’, detectives believe.
The bodies of Andrew and Dawn Searle, who were both in their 60s, were discovered in horrific circumstances in Les Pesquiès, south of Villefranche-de-Rouergue, on Thursday, the Mirror reports. Mr Searle was a former financial investigator involved in the battle against organised crime, leading to fears that gangsters arranged a savage professional hit late at night and disappeared unseen.
But – despite its rural location – the hamlet is surrounded by police and road video surveillance cameras that operate 24 hours a day. There are also private devices belonging to neighbours of the Searles who often leave their properties empty.
“It would be absolutely impossible to get in or out without being filmed,” an investigating source said on Saturday. “The likelihood is that a car was used, but even if someone managed to get across the countryside on foot, they were definitely caught on camera at some point.”
Specialist officers appointed by prosecutors have already started examining days of footage in a radius of at least five-miles around the suspected murder scene. Gendarmes are also making house-to-house enquiries, and collecting all footage available.
“Criminals can take all kind of precautions to disguise their activities, but cameras are everywhere,” said the source. “We’re not dealing with open countryside – Villefranche-de-Rouergue is a well policed municipality and cameras play a huge part in the fight against crime.”
Mr Searle’s body was hanging from a ceiling, with a gag around his mouth, while his deceased wife was just outside the house, naked and with a head wound.
There was no gun or knife nearby, and – by this weekend – there had been no arrests in connection with the suspected crime. Mrs Searle is the mum of Callum Kerr, who starred in the Channel 4 soap between 2020 and 2021. Mr Kerr, who also starred on Netflix’s Virgin River, has not spoken publicly about the deaths.
Callum, 30, is also a country singer who is based in Nashville, Tennessee, and walked his mum down the aisle when she married Mr Searle in September 2023. he shared a photo on Instagram of the wedding and wished the pair a “tremendous life together.”
He added: “Not many people can say they walked their own mother down the aisle. What a pleasure!! I love you mum. Congrats to Dawn and Andy on their wonderful wedding day and here’s to a tremendous life together for the happy couple.”
The couple had moved to France from Scotland a decade ago after Mr Searle spent his working career involved in ‘fight against organised crime and terrorism’, according to his LinkedIn profile. This included taking on major money-laundering syndicates in countries where sanctions have been imposed, such as Russia.
Mr Searle worked in the financial crime assurance arm of Barclay’s Bank in Edinburgh, and at Standard Life, which is also based in the Scottish capital. On Saturday, the couple’s property and surrounding land remained sealed off. Jean-Sébastien Orcibal, the mayor of Villefranche-de-Rouergue, said the ‘deaths were clearly a homicide,’ and not a ‘burglary gone wrong,’ as had been speculated earlier.
He said a neighbour found the bodies at around 12.20pm on Thursday, after they did not arrive to walk their dogs together as planned. A forensic doctor working for the judicial authorities in Montpellier arrived at the site by helicopter on Thursday, and is likely to release autopsy results on Monday.
The Searle’s house included a two-bedroom flat designed for paying guests. There is a swimming pool outside, and then thick woods which put the house in an isolated position, away from the centre of the hamlet, where around 100 people live.
Nicolas Rigot-Muller, the Rodez prosecutor, is in charge of the investigation, with judicial police and gendarmes supporting him. Villefranche-de-Rouergue is in the Aveyron department – the French version of a county. It is full of British expat, and holiday home owners from the UK.
Another local source said the couple ‘had numerous friends locally and further afield including in Britain, and often organised dinner parties.’
He added: ‘They both loved the countryside, and were very happily settled. They were very proud of their house, which is situated well away from other buildings in the hamlet’.
A spokesperson for the Foreign Office said: ‘We are supporting the family of a British couple who died in France and are liaising with the Local Authorities.’
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