Murder house buyers lose case
LONDON, England -- A couple who said they were forced to sell their home at a loss because it was the scene of a grisly murder have failed in their attempt to win damages from the previous owners.
Alan and Susan Sykes were offered sympathy by one of the three judges hearing the case but were told the law as it stood put no obligation on vendors to disclose the history of a property.
The judges ruled that James and Alison Taylor-Rose had not been dishonest when they answered "no" to a question form asking: "Is there any information which you think the buyer may have a right to know?"
The Sykes said they never would have bought the £83,000 pound ($155,000) house in Wakefield, West Yorkshire in December 2000 if they had known that 15 years earlier a doctor had murdered his 13-year-old adopted daughter there and dismembered her body into more than 100 pieces.
The couple put the house on the market soon after they learned about their home's gruesome history. The Sykeses struggled to find a buyer and ultimately lost £8,000 pounds on the sale.
A county court judge rejected their original claim for damages, but they took their case to the Court of Appeal, where they lost on Friday.
The Taylor-Roses had been unaware of the history of the house when they bought it in 1998, but they learned about it in early 1999 when an anonymous note was pushed through their letter box.
University dental biologist Dr. Samson Perera was convicted of murder in 1985. Parts of his victim's body were found hidden under the floorboards, in pot plants and a coffee jar at the house, while others were never traced.
