Cory Youlden jailed for Rednal burglary murder
A man has been sentenced to at least 22 years in prison after admitting the murder of an 83-year-old man during a burglary at his Worcestershire home.
Cory Youlden, from Birmingham, strangled Paul Cox last June before taking some vegetables, his car and loose change.
Mr Cox had been sleeping downstairs in his lounge after several previous unrelated burglaries at his home in Waseley Road in Rednal.
He died days before his 84th birthday.
Youlden, 23, from Hagley Road, pleaded guilty to murder, at Worcester Crown Court earlier this month.
Judge Robert Juckes QC described the killing as a savage attack.
Sentencing Youlden to life, Judge Juckes did accept he had not intended to kill Mr Cox during the burglary.
"Instead of leaving, what you did was to go and confront him and in the course of what followed - and it seems there was little by way of resistance from him - you then applied pressure to his neck," he said.
"That probably lasted in the region of 15 to 20 seconds."
The court heard Youlden had been released from prison on licence three months before he killed Mr Cox, having served half of a 42-month sentence for three street robberies.
Youlden, who also admitted burglary and theft, has 24 previous convictions and received his first custodial sentence aged 14, the court also heard.
Prosecutor Alex Warren said Youlden's fingerprints were found on a door and broken glass at the semi-detached property in Rednal. Marks matching his footwear were also found upstairs.
The court heard Mr Cox's Ford Focus was sold by Youlden for £400 and was later found burnt out in the Erdington area of Birmingham.
Concerned neighbours had contacted police to say Mr Cox's car was missing from his drive and a glass pane had been smashed at the front of the house.
Officers found Mr Cox, who had lived at Waseley Road for 55 years, dead in his living room.
Det Ch Insp Paul Williamson of West Mercia Police said Mr Cox was fiercely independent.
He said: "He had been sleeping down there due to previous burglaries at the house and he was in fear of people doing it again so he spent a lot of time in his downstairs in his rear living room.
"It was a brutal killing of an elderly man by a man who is 60 years his junior, and Mr Cox was absolutely no match for this burglar who had come into his house.
"From the outset he was deceitful, callous and calculated. He desperately tried to cover his tracks by trying to clean up at the murder scene."
Mr Williamson said there was no evidence to suggested Youlden was involved in the earlier burglaries at Mr Cox's house.
In a statement, Mr Cox's family said his relatives "feel they have the life sentence."
"There is no reason to think that he would not be with us now if it was not for the vile actions of another person," they said.
"Cory Youlden... received all the consideration that the law has to offer after eventually pleading guilty to murder.
"It is hoped that the custodial sentence passed by the court will ensure that he takes responsibility for what he has done and is unable to harm anyone else for a very long time."