A FARM labourer was found guilty today of four brutal shootings in which couples were murdered by point-blank blasts from a sawn-off shotgun.

John Cooper, 66, of Letterston, near Fishguard, west Wales, carried out both notorious unsolved double-murders - including that of Witney couple Peter and Gwenda Dixon.

A Swansea Crown Court jury unanimously found him guilty of the four merciless killings, which go back more than 25 years.

He was also found guilty of raping a teenage schoolgirl, sexually assaulting another, and five separate attempted robberies, all in March 1996.

He murdered tourists Peter Dixon, 51, and wife Gwenda, 52, of Moorland Road, Witney, on the final day of their holiday.

The couple, from Oxfordshire, were attacked as they walked along a coastal path near Little Haven, Pembrokeshire, in June 1989.

Judge John Griffith Williams passed directly to sentencing Cooper after the verdict.

He gave him four life sentences for the killings, telling him: "The murders were of such evil wickedness that the mandatory sentence of life will mean just that."

But Cooper refused to listen and repeatedly interrupted the judge, claiming evidence had been kept from the jury.