Who was Lois McCullough and why did her daughter Virginia murder her and live with her mother’s body for four years?
LOIS McCullough was the mother of convicted killer Virginia McCullough, who murdered her and hid her body in their family home.
After years of lying about Lois’ whereabouts, McCullough was finally sentenced to life in prison for the murders of her father, John, and Lois.
Lois’ life in retirement
Lois and John had moved to the Clacton area, on the UK’s Sunshine Coast, after they retired.
John had worked as a business studies lecturer before making the move.
Their daughter, Virginia McCollough, had moved in with them and claimed that she was actively looking for work.
Unbeknownst to Lois and her husband, McCullough was manipulating them and spending their pensions.
McCullough also told her mum and dad that she was working on her paintings, which she claimed would make the family a lot of money.
Suddenly, Lois and John disappeared.
Lois and John were active members of the community, who regularly went into local shops and chatted to the people who worked there.
They also regularly attended GP appointments, which raised eyebrows at the doctors’ office when McCullough began to regularly cancel appointments.
Killer daughter
Although McCullough was telling Lois’ relatives and friends that the elderly couple were on holiday, she had actually murdered her parents in 2019.
She poisoned both of them with prescription medicine, before hitting Lois with a hammer and, then, stabbing her to death.
The COVID-19 pandemic made it easier for McCullough to hide her parents’ disappearance, but eventually, a GP decided to raise a welfare concern.
The police launched a missing persons investigation and even spoke to McCullough at her home while her parents’ bodies were hidden in the house.
Eventually, a murder investigation led the police to search the home in 2023.
They discovered Lois behind sleeping bags and duvets in an upstairs bedroom and found John in a makeshift tomb, beneath McCullough’s paintings.
McCullough confessed on the spot and joked “Cheer up, at least you’ve caught the bad guy”.
McCullough faces justice
McCullough was given a life sentence for her crime, with the possibility of parole in 36 years, on October 11, 2024.
She was 36 at the time.
Lois was 71 years old at the time of her murder and John was 70.
It was revealed that McCullough had spent £21,000 on online gambling between 2019 and 2023 and had generated over £149,697 from her parents’ pensions and assets.