A jailed assassin dubbed The Iceman has finally revealed the details on two killings that landed him with a whole life sentence.
Mark Fellows was convicted by a jury at Liverpool Crown Court last year of the murders of two high-profile underworld figures - Salford's "Mr Big" Paul Massey, 55, and "gangland enforcer" John Kinsella, 53.
The Salford hitman, who is already serving a whole life sentence, came clean and admitted to both killings when police went to interview him in prison about the gang war that erupted in 2015, and culminated in Massey being gunned down outside his home in Salford in July of that year, and Kinsella being killed in Rainhill less than three years later.
Now the Sunday Mirror has revealed how and why he showered a hail of bullets on gangland rivals.
Fellows, 40, tells all in letters due to be published in the true crime book Salford Lads.
In the letters from jail, Fellows tells how he:
- Hid in a graveyard wearing a fake beard and a mask until “Mr Big” Paul Massey came home.
- Fired bullets at Massey’s feet so he “danced like a cowboy” before firing the fatal shots.
- Joked about killing a PC who nearly interrupted a stakeout.
- Shot Massey’s mob fixer John Kinsella as he walked through woodland .
- Wants to die from cancer rather than serve decades in London’s tough Belmarsh jail.
- Is prepared to kill again in prison – knowing that his sentence cannot be increased.
The hits were the bloody culmination of a tit-for-tat drug war between Massey’s “A Team” and the “Anti-A Team”.
He reveals how, night after night, he lay hidden in a churchyard with an Uzi submachine gun waiting for the perfect moment to kill Massey, 55.
Fellows writes: “The night before I was waiting for Massey and a police officer turned up when I was laying there.
“I thought that I was going to have to do him but he never saw me. Ha ha ha!”
It was 7.27pm on July 26, 2015, when Fellows pulled the Uzi from a bag and fired round after round at Massey.
Fellows says that despite the false beard, mask and being clad in combat fatigues, Massey still spotted him as he stepped from his Series 5 BMW.
A murder trial at Liverpool Crown Court was told 18 rounds were fired – four hitting Massey’s chest.
Fellows pleaded not guilty to two murders but was convicted.
Now he explains in grisly detail just what happened.
Of Massey, a grandfather, he writes: “I parked my van in the estate, my bike was in the back. I had my mountain bike gear on.
"I rode to near Paul Massey’s house and put my bike in the bushes.
"I got to the church, changed into the army gear and put a false beard on. I was laying in the churchyard, Massey’s house in front of me.
“[Massey] saw me, so I shot at him from across the road, but missed. When I crossed over, he was behind the bins, hiding. I was playing games with him, shooting at his feet like they do in cowboy films.
“That’s why he got shot in his foot and that’s why so many bullets were fired. He tried to make it to his front door, so I put one in his chest. He hit the floor, out cold. I didn’t want to get close, so stood back and shot four times at his head.
“I missed and my clip had run out, so I made my way home. If I’d have got close... I’d have hit his head and he wouldn’t have been able to make any phone calls, but at least he is dead.”
The murder trial heard a 999 call made by Massey.
He said: “Ambulance. I’ve been shot... hurry up”.
The operator asked the postcode – then the line went silent.
Massey made his name selling drugs in Manchester's 1990s rave scene and was a known “face” in Salford.
Meanwhile, Kinsella, 53, was respected and feared in equal measure and famously intervened when a gangster threatened “to maim” former Liverpool and England footballer Steven Gerrard, 40.
Fellows was said to be a trusted foot soldier in the so-called Anti-A team.
The gang feud – which as recently as last year spilled over to the Costa del Sol – is thought to have begun when a woman threw a drink over a member of the A Team in summer 2014.
Violence quickly escalated. A shotgun was fired into a car, injuring one man, before another victim suffered horrific injuries in a machete attack.
In March 2015 a grenade was thrown at an A Team family member’s house. Months later Christian Hickey, seven, and his mother Jayne were shot and injured at their home.
The picture of Christian in a hospital bed shocked the nation.
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He was left in a wheelchair and needed a string of operations to be able to walk again.
His dad, Christian Hickey Snr, had been the intended target.
Fellows – nicknamed Iceman for being cold and calculated – was already in the frame for Massey’s murder when he shot Kinsella in May 2018.
The victim was walking in woods in Rainhill, Merseyside, with his pregnant partner at the time of his murder. He was considered a small-time player but the killings were strikingly alike.
Detectives found a Garmin watch Fellows used for long-distance running. It recorded him on a reconnaissance run shortly before Massey’s killing.
The data correlated with the hundreds of hours of CCTV and phone records analysed by police.
Fellows was found guilty in February 2019 of murdering Massey and Kinsella.
He is one of only 70 UK people to get whole life terms.
Co-defendant Steven Boyle, 36, was found guilty of the murder of Kinsella, but cleared over Massey’s killing.
He was jailed for life and will serve a minimum of 33 years.
Last month Fellows was handed another life sentence for his part in a machete attack on Aaron Williams, an associate of the A Team gang.
Police found £10,000 in Fellows’ house, thought to be his assassin’s fee .
But in his confession from jail Fellows says he shot Massey after the mobster threatened to kill him over the drugs turf war.
Fellows says he killed Kinsella after hearing the Merseyside gangster had offered £20,000 to anybody prepared to “cut” him.
Fellows writes: “Massey didn’t want me selling drugs in that area and that’s when all this started to happen.
“I knew the threat wasn’t going to go away, I knew Massey would keep sending people to my home until he achieved his aim. He left me no choice. I had to protect my wife and children.
“I decided therefore, to shoot him before he shot me or a member of my family.”
Chillingly, Fellows also said his sentence gives him the freedom to kill again if he feels threatened behind bars. And he told how he hoped he would die of cancer so he would not have to serve his whole jail sentence
Fellows adds: “If I need to, I can kill again if people try things. I am not a**ed about my appeal. If someone tries anything in here and I see them coming, then I can do what I want and can’t get no extra time.
“I will be 40 years old soon, only another 60 to go until I am released. Ha ha ha! Knowing me I will live until I am 100 or more.
“I hope I have only got a couple of years to do. I hope I get cancer soon, so I don’t have to see these walls for a long time.”
- Salford Lads: The Rise And Fall Of Paul Massey, written by Bernard O’Mahoney, available from Amazon in January.
