DANIEL Sharples was today jailed for life by a judge for the murder of Michael Mairs.
From a boozy breakfast in a town centre pub to a brutal killing committed in full view of shocked passers-by, these are the events which led to Michael Mairs’ murder and Daniel Sharples’ subsequent conviction:
READ MORE: Why did Daniel Sharples fatally attack a disabled man he had never met before?
- Sunday, October 6 2019
At around 9.30am, Daniel Sharples takes the bus from his home on Grisedale Avenue in Orford into Warrington town centre.
He enters Wetherspoons’ Looking Glass pub on Buttermarket Street and has his breakfast, pancakes and a pint of lager.
Michael Mairs leaves his home on Church Street in Howley roughly half an hour later.
After buying four cans of beer at the Zabka Polish shop on Winwick Street, he meets up with friends under the railway bridge near to Central Station and the group sit in this area drinking.
Between 11am and 11.30am, then 37-year-old Sharples moves onto the Hop Pole pub in Horsemarket Street.
His behaviour inside is ‘somewhat odd’, and he appeared to believe that he was in the Scoop ice cream parlour in Golden Square Shopping Centre.
He drinks two pints of lager and downs several sambuca shots before leaving the premises after he is told that he will not be served again.
At 12.15pm, Sharples angrily confronts Mr Mairs and his friends – only minutes after two police community support officers had chatted with them.
The martial arts enthusiast physically attacks three of the group, two of whom are left with ‘comparatively minor injuries’.
But Mr Mairs was ‘subjected to a particularly brutal attack’, being kicked and punched to the head.
Sharples even tipped his victim out of his wheelchair while he was barely conscious and threw the chair aside.
He is rushed to Warrington Hospital and is later placed into an induced coma.
The attacker attempts to flee through the nearby King’s Head pub – having taken off his jacket and cap – but is arrested in the adjoining car park, having climbed over a wall in the rear beer garden.
Sharples, who was ‘intoxicated with alcohol and Valium’, makes unfounded claims to police that Mr Mairs had sold his son spice or heroin.
In custody, he states: “I’m glad I did it and I’ll do it again.”
- Tuesday, October 8 2019
Sharples is charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm, two counts of assault and possession of cannabis in connection with the incident.
He admits all of these charges at Warrington Magistrates Court and is remanded into custody ahead of his scheduled sentencing at Liverpool Crown Court the following month.
CCTV: Murderer explodes in fit of rage in eerie foreshadowing of savage killing
- Monday, October 28 2019
Mr Mairs dies as a result of his injuries aged 53.
- Tuesday, November 26 2019
Sharples, who is being held in HMP Altcourse, appears at Warrington Magistrates Court again as his charge for assaulting Mr Mairs occasioning him actual bodily harm is upgraded to wounding with intent.
- Monday, January 6 2020
Daniel Sharples is charged with Mr Mairs’ murder at Liverpool Crown Court after a complex legal process which involved gaining the consent of the attorney general.
He pleads not guilty to this charge.
- Monday, October 5 2020
Sharples goes on trial at Liverpool Crown Court.
- Wednesday, October 14 2020
The defendant is found unanimously guilty of murder by a jury.
- Tuesday, October 27 2020
Sharples is sentenced nearly a year to the day since Mr Mairs' death.
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