Mum drank with instructor who murdered her son in ‘intercourse recreation’ as his physique lay metres away
Yvonne Valentine admitted she was invited to drink with Fiona Beal just moments after Yvonne’s son Nick was killed in a sex game — as the murderer relaxed and laughed with his mum
Nick Billingham was brutally murdered after being stabbed in the neck(Image: PA)
The mother of a man who was murdered in a brutal “sex game” has admitted she drank with his killer as his body was just metres away. The pair were seen laughing and drinking together whilst her darling son was lying six feet under in the garden of his home.
Fiona Beal, 50, pleaded guilty of fatally stabbing her partner Nick Billingham, 42, in a sex game in 2021. In an attempt to cover his death, she went on to bury his body in the garden of the home that the pair shared in Northampton.
After he was last spotted that November, Fiona was accused of being involved in his death and taken to court charged with his murder. She was later sentenced for his murder and jailed for 20 years.
Now, as former primary school Fiona begins her two decade stint in prison for killing her partner, Nick’s mother Yvonne Valentine has spoken about how she had drinks with her son’s killer while he laid underground.
According to the Daily Mail, Yvonne was clueless that her darling son’s dead body laid just metres away from her, as she revealed all in a new ITV documentary.
Just a matter of weeks after the pair had “split”, Yvonne visited Fiona on December 23, 2021 looking to bring Christmas presents. Fiona answered the door and it appeared that everything seemed normal between the pair.
“I wouldn’t say there were any concerns,” she recalled. “I drove round and she just seemed the same as she usually did; gave me a hug, said ‘come in and have a drink.’
“I walked into the living room and I said ‘Oh, you been decorating?’ and she said ‘yeah, I have’. And I said ‘oh it looks okay, quite good’. So she said ‘yeah’.”
She admitted that she had no idea that Nick was already dead when the pair had met up right before Christmas, spending around hour together. Yvonne recalled there being a warm atmosphere between the pair, filled with lots of hugs and kisses.
“Little did I know that my son was buried in the ground a few feet away,” she said. “I still can’t get my head round it.”
Yvonne had been told that after separating from Beal, he had moved away to Essex and was now in a new relationship with a woman called “Faye”. However, it later turned out that Faye was actually Fiona, who had seized Nick’s phone and started to send messages as him, having already killed him.
Police eventually pieced together Nick’s final moments, having taken part in a sex game with his partner, which resulted in Beal stabbing Nick in the neck. She then disposed of his body by burying him, partially mummifying him in the process, in a small grassy path under their home.
Yvonne said she was left bereft when she learned of the murder, saying: “Nick wasn’t perfect, I don’t know who is, but why would you put somebody through what Beal put him through? There’s just no answer.
“I still think that Nick’s going to come and walk through the front door one day and say ‘hello mum’. But it’s not going to happen, is it?”
Beal would go on to plead guilty to murdering Nick in court in April 2024 at a retrial at the Old Bailey.
She was officially sentenced to 20 years in prison, whilst the judge read out a letter written by Nick after he had had an affair, describing Beal as “the most beautiful woman in the world” and would never “belittle” her again.
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