Image copyright Family photo A man who kept the body of a chef in his flat for five days after a fatal chemsex encounter has been jailed for six years.
Tesco Express worker Neil Cuckson, , went to work as normal while Hiran Chauhan, , lay dead, Manchester Crown Court heard.
The pair had discussed drugs on dating app Grindr before taking GHB and crystal meth at Cuckson’s home.
Cuckson, from Salford, admitted a number of offences.
The court heard he awoke on 3 July to find Mr Chauhan dead.
“Pungent smell”
Rather than alert authorities, he kept the body in his flat and purchased a Suzuki Swift, a wheelbarrow and a pitchfork.
Five days later, Cuckson was caught on CCTV struggling to lift the body into the boot of the car, before dragging Mr Chauha n’s body across the road to nearby woodland.
Three passers-by found Mr Chauhan’s remains the next day.
When police went to Cuckson’s flat they noticed a “pungent smell” and arrested him on suspicion of murder.
‘Elaborate plan’
On the way to a police station, the court heard he told officers: “He overdosed that’s what happened, I didn’t kill him.” Michael Lavery, prosecuting, said Cuckson told police he was “panicking and that he was trying to cover up what had happened”.
In a statement read to the court, Mr Chauhan’s sister Gemma said there was a chance he could have been saved had Cuckson phoned an ambulance.
She added: “What kind of individual thinks it’s normal to sleep next to a body for six days, wrap him up, buy a car to hide a body, drag a body across a road and dump a body in a field? “
Judge Alan Conrad QC told the defendant that concealing the death and hiding the body “made it impossible for experts to obtain the results which they usually can in the case of a suspicious death”.
He said Cuckson had “embarked on an elaborate plan” to dispose of Mr Chauhan’s body “to save your own skin”.
Michael James, defending, said Cuckson “can never apologise enough to the family” and “does show some real remorse”.
Cuckson admitted supplying drugs, administering a noxious substance, preventing lawful burial and perverting the course of justice.
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