A TEACHER confessed to slaughtering her cheating boyfriend and burying him in the garden in chilling diary entries.
Fiona Beal, 50, tied Nicholas Billingham, 42, to the bed then murdered him "in cold blood" at their Northampton home. She then pretended to be her boyfriend in messages sent from his phone in a move that was "as heartless as it was self-serving".
Beal had been taking part in a retrial but today pleaded guilty to murdering Nicholas in a "chilling execution".
The Year 6 teacher claimed he had run off with another woman and received a "sympathetic" response over the apparent break up.
But as Nicholas' body rotted in the back garden, the Old Bailey was told Beal's mental health began to deteriorate. In March 2022 - four months after the alleged murder - police were called to a holiday cabin she had rented in Cumbria amid concerns for her welfare.
Officers discovered journals where Beal outlined her plans under her alter ego "Tulip 22", which showed a "wholly different side to her personality".
Beal wrote in one entry: "Still my actions haunt me. I sometimes have to catch myself and remember what I did and then remember my cover story - neither seems convincing."
In another, she said: "It was harder than I thought it would be. Hiding a body was bad. Moving a body is much more difficult than it looks on TV." The court was told Beal also claimed she was "controlled and manipulated" by Nicholas as she explained "why she killed him as she did".
Prosecutor Hugh Davies KC said: "They certainly do contain some unambiguously clear declarations of what she had done. These parts were not just her truth, but the truth. What was this?