Retired Fettes teacher was lured to his death, killer tells court
A retired Fettes College teacher was lured to his death after being duped on a gay dating app by a man who stole thousands of pounds from him and spent it on a trip to Blackpool, a court heard.
Paul Black, 65, is on trial at the High Court in Edinburgh where he denies murder and 17 other charges including stealing a total of £50,000 from Peter Coshan, aged 75, between September 2021 and June 2022, and disposing of his body in Northumberland.
Coshan’s lover, Paul Mcnaughton, 29, pleaded guilty last year to murder and perverting the course of justice. Giving evidence, Mcnaughton told the court how he and Black planned to murder Mr Coshan. They pretended to be someone else when they invited Peter Coshan to their flat in Edinburgh, where they planned to suffocate him.
He said this was part of a plot to steal Mr Coshan's £102,000 life savings. Mcnaughton, 29, pled guilty to a murder charge last year.
Mcnaughton said: “Both of us decided something was going to happen when he came through the front door, he was going to be suffocated with a plastic bag put over his head.”
Mcnaughton told the court he was fed up with messages from Mr Coshan and set up a profile on Gaydar on July 26 2022, using a picture of “random off the internet” and claimed it was planned “a couple of days before Peter was murdered”.
He added: “We had decided to get Peter to come to Paul’s house then we were going to do it. I was fed up with having to keep doing sexual favours and not getting anything from it. There were text messages on my phone which the police have got, saying I had to do sexual favours for a year or he was going to go to police and say I’d stolen the money. ”mcnaughton told the court he met Mr Coshan through Gaydar, which he described as a “hookup app” around a year before, and said: “He offered me money for sexual favours.” He said he gained access to Mr Coshan’s savings accounts without his knowledge, after finding handwritten bank details beside a computer and admitted knowing that £102,000 was in the accounts.
On September 2021, £8,000 was transferred from Mr Coshan’s bank account without his knowledge, and
Mcnaughton told the court that Black spoke to the bank “because Joe sounds a lot older, so obviously he could speak to these people on the phone”.
Two days later, Mcnaughton transferred a total of £30,000 from Mr Coshan’s account, and said he went on a trip to Blackpool with Black, after the initial theft.
Advocate depute John Keenan KC said: “What happened to the £8,000?”
Mcnaughton said: "It got spent, by me and Paul Black. We went to Blackpool. Joe knew it came from Mr Cosha’s bank, because I had said to him.”in June 2022, a further £15,000 and £17,000 were taken from Mr Coshan’s account without his knowledge. Mcnaughton said when Mr Coshan realised, he demanded sexual favours for a year, in return.
The trial, before Judge Lord Scott, continues at the High Court in Edinburgh.