Cheryl Hooper murder: Newport farmer 'thought he had a right to kill'

The daughter of a woman shot dead by her estranged husband has spoken of his coercive control over her mum.

Cheryl Hooper, 51, was killed in front of her daughter outside her home in Newport, Shropshire, in January 2018.

Andrew “Jack” Hooper fled the scene before turning the gun on himself causing severe facial injuries.

Georgia Gabriel-Hooper, who was 14 at the time, said he controlled her mum “to the point where he thought it was his right to kill her”.

Appearing on a new ITV documentary, Ms Gabriel-Hooper said he had been “incredibly abusive in many forms – financially, emotionally and mentally”.

“I grew up thinking that domestic abuse is punches and violence, physical violence, so with Jack I didn’t really feel for a long time that there was a distinct problem with his behaviour,” she said.

She said her mum wasn’t fully aware of his control “because when you’re in it you can’t see it”.

“His main aim was to make her feel completely worthless. It was power and control.”

She said she had been in “complete shock” giving evidence to police on the night of the killing.

“All I could see on repeat was him shooting mum over and over and over and over again,” she said.

After being found guilty of murder by a jury at Birmingham Crown Court in June 2019, Hooper was ordered to serve a minimum of 31 years.

The trial had heard how the farmer suspected his wife was having an affair, and, on the night she was killed, tracked her to a pub in Wolverhampton.

In the documentary Mrs Hooper’s parents, Tony and Rita Gabriel, reveal their last conversations with their daughter.

“Cheryl phoned me up and said ‘dad, Jack has followed me to the pub, I think he’s put a tracker on my car’,” said Mr Gabriel.

“I said ‘Cheryl, go to the police now’ but she didn’t take heed to that. I don’t think she realised enough how she was in danger.”

“She said ‘I’ll see you in the morning mum, I’ll pick you up and I love you,’ and that was the last words, I never saw her again,” added Mrs Gabriel.

Det Ch Insp Mark Bellamy from West Mercia Police said the investigation had been an “emotional rollercoaster” for 18 months, “full of unexpected twists and turns.”

Due to Hooper’s facial injuries officers were unable to interview him until 10 months into the investigation, but what happened next the officer described as being “extraordinary”.

“He’s unable to speak, he hasn’t got a mouth, he hasn’t got a nose,” said the officer.

The documentary shows the dramatic police bodycam footage of Hooper indicating that he was responsible for killing his wife, but later in court he denied her murder.

After the guilty verdict Judge Mark Wall QC told Hooper he “richly deserved” life imprisonment.

Telling Hooper he had not expressed any remorse or regret after leaving a “horrific aftermath” when he fled the scene, the judge added: “This was not a last-minute decision to kill, arrived at outside Cheryl’s, but rather a planned execution.”

“He didn’t get away with killing mum,” added Ms Gabriel-Hooper.

“That was justice.”

A Murder in The Family, is available to watch on the ITVX streaming service from Thursday 5 January.

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