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Face of son quizzed over parents’ knife killings
Felix Allen2 Oct 2009
This is the son being questioned over the double killing of his retired teacher parents.
Classroom assistant Daniel Dighton, 34, was found by police in the loft as his father Barry, a popular former prep school headmaster, and mother Elizabeth lay dead from stab wounds at their home in Croydon. He had recently moved back in with them after a short-lived teaching job in Thailand.
Neighbour Cathy Jarvis, 58, said: “The police came out with a guy cuffed, barefoot and with blood over his feet and jeans. He was chewing nervously but didn't say a word.”
Mr Dighton senior, 61, was the respected headmaster of £2,750-a-term Elmhurst School for Boys in Croydon — a leading prep schools — for 21 years until he retired in 2006.
His wife, 60, taught the reception class before retiring at the same time and the couple divided their time between England and a home in Normandy. It is believed the Dightons had rented a flat for their son, a well-liked teaching assistant and caretaker at Elmhurst for 10 years, to encourage him to lead a more independent life.
But he had moved back in with them after they moved from Surrey to Campden Road, South Croydon, to be closer to him about a year ago. He had signed up to a teaching agency in Purley. Scotland Yard said a 34-year-old man arrested on suspicion of murder was still in custody today.
