When Jamie Varley and John McGowan-Fazakerley splashed out £450,000 on a five-bedroomed home, their affluent new neighbours welcomed them with open arms.
A major milestone in the lives of the young couple, they were seen as successful high-flyers moving up in the world to build a better future together.
The expectations were that the couple had made their big move to expand their family and would soon be making plans to become loving parents.
Now, stunned neighbours have been left shell-shocked after it emerged that one of Britain’s most depraved couple’s branded by police as ‘pure evil’ had, for two years, been secretly living among them.
They were handed the keys to their spacious new detached home in August 2023, less than three weeks after, Preston Davey, the baby boy they had adopted, had been murdered. The 13-month-old had been subjected to a campaign of sexual abuse by the pair from the time he was handed into their care by authorities.
School teacher Varley, 37, and McGowan-Fazakerley, 32, were arrested over the murder in July 2023, but were released on bail while enquiries continued.
With the justice system in disarray in modern Britain, it’s not unusual for defendants to spend months, or even years, anxiously waiting for the legal process to take them to court.
Jamie Varley (left) and John McGowan-Fazakerley (right) were sentenced at Preston Crown Court last week
Preston Davey was sexually and physically abused before his tragic death at just 13 months old in July 2023
But rather than slipping into a life of quiet anonymity, the pair flaunted their highly-curated ‘Instagram perfect’ lifestyle in front of their unsuspecting new neighbours, some of whom would go on to become close friends.
Now, the Daily Mail can reveal extraordinary new details of how the couple hoodwinked families on their new-build estate into believing they shared the same aspirations.
Neighbours told how the pair quickly won them round – lavishly decorating their property at Christmas, Easter and Halloween.
They welcomed families into their home and enjoyed socialising with locals – taking food round and bringing comfy fold-up camping chairs to sit on driveways and while-away summer evenings chatting and laughing.
The couple became particularly close to a former prison officer and his wife who lived nearby.
It was only when police swooped a second time – the first occasion at their new address – in June 2025, that families became aware the couple had been harbouring a dark, sordid secret.
Suddenly, celebrations focusing on children during the holiday season took on a sinister new outlook.
But it was more than a year before the full horror of the pair’s sickening and degrading crimes emerged.
Varley – who was described by one police officer as an ‘arrogant, self-centred liar’ – had routinely abused Preston for his own ‘amusement and gratification’.
Rather than slipping into a life of quiet anonymity, the pair flaunted their highly-curated ‘Instagram perfect’ lifestyle in front of their unsuspecting new neighbours, some of whom would go on to become close friends
He will now spend the rest of his life in prison after murdering Preston, who he had repeatedly sexually assaulted and subjected to ill-treatment during the four months he was in his care.
Following a seven-week trial, Varley was found guilty of murder, assault by penetration, sexual assault, causing grievous bodily harm and cruelty.
His claim that Preston accidentally drowned in the bath was dismissed after it was found the baby suffered 40 traumatic injuries during his short time with the couple.
Financial sales manager McGowan-Fazakerley was not present in the home when Preston was killed, but he was found to have also sexually abused the youngster.
He was jailed for 25 years for causing or allowing the death of a child, cruelty and sexual assault.
The pair had lived in a more modest, semi-detached home in Blackpool when the horror took place.
The couple were in the process of buying their new home when they were arrested shortly after Preston’s death. Varley, who was head of Year 11 at South Shore Academy in Blackpool, was suspended from work following his arrest, but remained on full pay until his employment was formally terminated after he was charged in the summer of 2025.
Two years earlier, on August 18, 2023, the couple moved into their dream home in the charming Lancashire village of Grimsargh – just 22 days after Preston’s horrific death.
Just five miles from Preston city centre, the village, which has historical roots dating back to the Doomsday Book, is known for its strong community feel, while offering ‘tranquil countryside living and excellent local amenities’. And so the pair were able to quickly became acquainted with local residents and seemed ready to set down roots.
With a manicured green garden, a double garage and tarmacked drive, the jailed couple’s home looks immaculate, like a show home on a quiet street surrounded by fields
Speaking of Varley, one sickened neighbour told the Daily Mail: ‘He and John hid behind a mask of respectability.
‘They were this warm, sociable couple, who knew everybody and who everybody liked – but really they were the worst kind of abusers. Jamie was a baby killer and nobody knew.
‘They made friends here, appeared to set down roots and you’d always see them laughing and joking.
‘Nobody had the slightest inkling of what was really going on with them.
‘That’s what has really got me. How they could act so brazenly, with this outward attitude that everything was OK when they were really hiding a dark, horrible secret.
‘It’s beyond anyone’s comprehension how they could just almost wipe the slate clean and go about their life normally… unless they’d thought they’d got away with it.’
The neighbour told how Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley decorated their home at Christmas by leaving giant festive parcels outside their front door, hanging baubles from the trees in the front garden and festooning the property in lights.
During Easter the pair adorned their home with a cardboard Easter bunny – attracting local children to happily pose for pictures.
The neighbour revealed how the couple would ‘go all-out for Halloween’ – fearing now it was a way to lure families into their home.
She said: ‘My daughter came to visit me with my three -year-old granddaughter that Halloween and we all made a beeline to Jamie and John’s house because they’d really gone to town on it.
‘They had this big spider’s web across the front of the house which sort of stretched out to a tree in the front garden.
‘Along the path around the side of their house were skeletons dangling on wooden posts with spooky music and ghostly sounds being piped in from a speaker.
‘We knocked on the front door and John answered. He said, “Come in and help yourself, pick what you want”, and just inside the door was a table covered in sweets and cans of pop.
‘What I find strange and particularly disturbing is that they were encouraging kids to visit their home – but this was only a few months after they’d abused and killed that little boy.
‘This estate is full of families with young kids – it’s shocking.’
The neighbour said that Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley had struck up a close friendship with a retired couple who lived close by.
She added: ‘Jamie and John were always sitting on the neighbours’ driveway on these fold-up camping chairs they’d brought round.
‘You’d see all four having a few drinks and chatting for hours, particularly when the weather was good.
‘I really feel for that couple. They had absolutely no idea of who Jamie and John really were.
‘He was a retired prison officer and refused to believe they could’ve done such a thing, until the evidence began to mount up. We hardly see him or his wife now.
‘They’ve been left shattered. They wouldn’t have had anything to do with them had they known, but Jamie and John both completely pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes.
‘They fooled everyone, even me.
‘I remember I saw them walking their dog past my house. The home next to me was up for sale and one of them, I can’t remember who, joked, “Oh, if we knew… we’d have bought that house instead.” I replied, “I wish you had, then you’d be my new gay neighbours!”
‘Nobody had a bad word to say about them at that point. They were really friendly and they’d chat to anyone. I’d always see them at the local corner shop and in the village.
‘But knowing what I know now, there’s no way I’d want them anywhere near me. Nobody would. They’re a stain on this community and people now wish they’d never made a home here.’
Another neighbour echoed these sentiments saying: ‘They carried on like nothing was wrong, nobody knew anything about the little boy who died or what they were accused of.
‘They’d decorate their home at Christmas with these great big fake Christmas presents’ at Halloween they’d have this huge spider’s web at the front of the house.
‘They would even decorate their trees outside the house with hearts on Valentine’s Day.
‘It’s creepy now I think about it. They were doing it to show off and to encourage neighbours to go round with their kids when they’d abused and killed a little boy.
‘I’d see them both walking up the road with a tray of food under a sheet of tin foil. They’d take it to a couple who lived on the corner.
‘They carried themselves with this veneer of respectability, but really they were baby killers .’
The couple’s home now stands eerily empty. It was sold in March at auction with a guide price of £385,000 – £125,000 less than they paid for it nearly three years ago.
Residents now fear the couple’s association with the estate will have a long-lasting impact.
A businessman who lives on the estate told the Daily Mail: ‘Someone has got themselves a bargain.
‘Nothing untoward happened at that house, but nobody wants any kind of association with the couple who lived there.
‘We’re worried that being linked to them and such a horrific crime will have a detrimental effect on house prices.
‘I didn’t know them. I’d see them socialising with the neighbours closest to them and they’d wave enthusiastically whenever I drove past. They were quite extrovert.
‘But nobody suspected anything, because they hid things very well. It’s not the sort of thing you’d drop into conversation.’
On the face of it, it appears the couple had attempted to distance themselves from Preston’s horrific death and launched a calculated bid to reinvent themselves.
But locals find it chilling that they never showed any sign of remorse or betrayed any clues as to the dark secret they were hiding.
CCTV shows a paramedic carrying Preston into the hospital, while Varley, right, and McGowan-Fazakerley follow
Varley outside Blackpool Victoria Hospital. He told doctors Preston accidentally drowned in the bath while his back was turned
Detective Chief Inspector Andy Fellows, who led the murder investigation, described Varley as ‘a manipulator’
McGowan-Fazakerley with their miniature pinscher Maximus, who they were said to have ‘doted on like a baby’
During their trial, the court heard that neighbours at their old property feared that not all was as it seemed after the couple adopted Preston in April 2023.
In a statement read out at Preston Crown Court, neighbour Jasmine Nuttall said that she would hear ‘raised voices’ between the couple and ‘an unusual amount of crying’ through the paper thin walls that divided their properties.
She said at one point McGowan-Fazakerley knocked on her door to apologise.
Her father, Michael Nuttall, described Varley as being the ‘more confident’ of the two and ‘full of himself’.
He said he had heard him raise his voice to his partner but never the other way round.
He added: ‘Preston cried a lot. In fact, I think a one-year-old shouldn’t cry as much as that.
‘The crying was high-pitched and he did seem distressed.’
Mr Nuttall said he did not say anything to them as he did not want to be an ‘interfering neighbour’.
The two men met in a bar in Manchester’s Gay Village in late 2018. Varley, who was one of five siblings, was brought up in close-knit family headed up by his mother who lived nearby, in an area in Blackpool bordering Grange Park, a notorious estate among the most deprived areas of the UK.
Not long after meeting, McGowan-Fazakerley, an only child raised by doting parents and his grandmother in Congleton, an affluent market town on the edge of Cheshire’s golden triangle, was living with Varley.
Privately educated at Kings School, Macclesfield, he went on to study at Keele University, progressing to phD level before leaving to pursue a career in sales.
Varley was described in court as a self-confessed ‘Drama Queen’, while McGowan-Fazakerley was said to be more reserved and level-headed, and was considered the steadying influence in their relationship.
Despite their different backgrounds they quickly hit it off. After that first night, McGowan-Fazakerley went to stay at Varley’s home and never left. A year later, they purchased an extended three-bedroomed semi in nearby Staining Road.
They also bought a miniature pinscher called Maximus, who they were said to have ‘doted on like a baby’.
DCI Fellows said: ‘For the first nine months of his life, Preston was a happy and healthy child, but by the end he was a broken shell’
Together, they built a life that was Insta-ready – all they needed was a child to complete their picture-perfect family.
But after adopting Preston, the realities of parenthood quickly shattered that illusion – and it seems they may have had a far more sinister intention right from the start.
In court, it emerged the couple had helped condemn themselves by the number of trophy photographs they had taken.
Detective Chief Inspector Andy Fellows, who led the murder investigation, said: ‘Almost from day one, they set about abusing Preston and making his short life a harrowing tale of misery and pain.
‘For the first nine months of his life, Preston was a happy and healthy child, but by the end he was a broken shell.
‘This was due to the sordid and wicked acts of Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley.’
He went on to describe Varley as ‘a manipulator’.
Outlining the way the couple lived their lives he added: ‘They’ve tried to present as the perfect family, living in the perfect home, having the perfect lives. Instagram ready, aren’t they?
‘Everything’s on social media, everything is brilliant and I think if you scrape away the veneer of that you come to something that is entirely different.’
