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Orville Donovan Gordon

Age: 39

Sex: male

Date: 16 Jan 2004

Place: Beachy Head, East Sussex

Orville Gordon was found dead in a plastic barrel at the foot of the cliffs at Beachy Head near Eastbourne.

He had been bound and gagged, slashed on the face, and stabbed with a screwdriver in the back. He also had a plastic bag over his head. His inquest stated that he died from a stab wound in the back that had pierced his right kidney.

It took police six weeks to identify him. His identity was found by the Metropolitan Police as they were investigating an unconnected assault and had gone to the Hellshire Chat Bout Cafe, a Jamaican-style takeaway in Loughborough Road, Brixton, where they found a heavily bloodstained chair in the back. They then later confirmed his identity with DNA and dental records.

The cafe had closed at the end of January 2004 and the police said that they were trying to find out who had been running it.

The police said that everything indicated that he had been murdered in the cafe and that he had defintley been dead when he was rolled over the cliff edge in the barrel. The police said that they recovered a white Talbot van that they thought had been used in the disposal of his body. The van was discovered in Camberwell.

It was first thought that his murder had been in revenge for a robbery at the cafe that he might have carried out. It was later suggested that he might have been the victim of a drugs-related gangland killing. The police stated that Orville Gordon was a heavy crack cocaine user. They said that analysis of his hair showed that in the previous six months he had been a very frequent user of the Class A drug.

Orville Gordon was from London.

Three men were arrested in 2004 but no one was charged or convicted. Three suspects were also said to have left the country.

The police said 'From our enquiries in the Brixton area it is clear that a number of people know what happened in this case but are unwilling to talk to police'.

Orville Gordon was a Jamaican and was thought to have entered the UK in April 2001. He had used a variety of aliases and had three street nick-names.


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