A woman has pleaded guilty to murdering her parents after their bodies were found at the family home last year.
Virginia McCullough, 36, appeared by prison video link before Chelmsford crown court on Thursday and pleaded guilty to murdering Lois McCullough, 71, and John McCullough, 70, between 17 and 20 June 2019.
She poisoned her father with prescription medication and stabbed her mother shortly afterwards, Essex police said.
McCullough, of Pump Hill, Great Baddow, near Chelmsford, told Essex police she killed her parents at their home at some stage in the summer of 2019. She then concealed their bodies within the property and continued to live at the address.
To cover her tracks, McCullough lied about their whereabouts, telling doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday, or away on lengthy trips, police said.
Her actions were uncovered after her parents’ GPs raised concerns over missed appointments in 2023 and police executed a warrant at the Pump Hill address on 15 September 2023.
It was then McCullough confessed to poisoning her father with prescription medication and stabbing her mother shortly afterwards, the force said.
Police initially attended McCullough’s address on 13 September 2023 after concerns for the welfare of her parents, who were missing, were raised.
McCullough appeared by prison video link, wearing a grey top. She spoke to enter pleas of guilty to two counts of murder and to say she understood the judge’s comments.
Judge Christopher Morgan said: “You will understand that there is a single sentence that can be passed upon you in these circumstances. Consideration, however, has to be given to the minimum term.”
An inquest into the death of Lois McCullough previously heard she died of stab wounds to the chest.
The Essex area coroner, Michelle Brown, said in October last year the “human remains believed to be” John McCullough were also found at the address. His provisional cause of death was “pending further investigation”, Brown said. Inquests into their deaths were opened and adjourned.
People living around Pump Hill in September last year described McCullough as “quite chatty” and a “little bit odd”.
A worker at a nearby shop, who asked not to be named, said McCullough had told him her parents had moved to be by the seaside. He said he had not seen them since before the Covid-19 pandemic, but that previously “I would see them two or three times per week”.
He said he had not really spoken to her parents but they “seemed nice, normal people. We’re all shocked, we didn’t think she was capable of this.” He said McCullough would speak to workers in the local shops and buy them things. “If anything she was just like a pest,” he said. “She would be talking about the problems she had in the street.”
The worker said McCullough was a “little bit odd sometimes”, adding: “She would come in and go ‘do you want a coffee’ then five minutes later, there would be a coffee sitting there.”
Dave Oldershaw, a neighbour, said McCullough had been “carrying on, going up to the Chinese [takeaway] like nothing has happened”. He said he “thought she lived on her own” at the house, adding: “I only knew her to say hello to – she wasn’t trouble.”
Another neighbour, Phil Sargent, said McCullough was “quite chatty” and “would always come and descend on you. It would be a fair comment to say she was slightly irrational with her thinking. She didn’t appear to be a threat of any kind.”
McCullough will be sentenced on 10 October.
