killing of Richard Petty over a mere £80 sheds a harsh light on the perils of Teesside’s drugs underworld

killing of Richard Petty over a mere £80 sheds a harsh light on the perils of Teesside’s drugs underworld, even at its lower levels. CCTV captured the murderers’ movements with chilling precision. Into the lift, up to the seventh floor, back down, then out - in four minutes.
CCTV captured the murderers’ movements with chilling precision. Into the lift, up to the seventh floor, back down, then out - in four minutes.“They had at the most 90 seconds in that flat,” says Detective Inspector Andy Greenwood, above, from Cleveland Police’s murder investigation team, who retraced their steps at the Melsonby Court flats.Mark ‘Peo’ Pearson and Joe Tingle were hardly sophisticated drugs kingpins living in high-rolling opulence.As heroin users themselves, they had advanced up the food chain to using at least one “lieutenant” to sell drugs for them and share the profits.But their savage execution of Richard Petty in his Billingham home between 2.36 and 2.40pm on March 25 was every bit as vicious and ruthlessly efficient as any gangland ‘hit’.With heroin and half a bottle of vodka inside him, Pearson walked silently into the living room and spoke to Mr Petty.Without giving him a chance to reply, Pearson was seen swiping and lunging at him with a large kitchen knife, twice thrusting the blade into his body up to the hilt.Richard Petty was left lying on his back, dying in a pool of blood with seven stab wounds, one into the heart.“It was a totally unprovoked attack on a man who was sitting in the living room of his flat, unprotected,” says Det Insp Greenwood.