A damning report has accused a police force of “individual and systemic failings” after a couple were murdered following an 18-month terror campaign against them.

Maureen Cochrane, 45 and her husband Alex, 54, were killed in a firebomb attack on their home in Wythenshawe, Greater Manchester, in January 2006. Their daughter Lucy, then 17, also suffered severe burns in the attack in which petrol was poured through their letterbox and set alight, trapping them in their upstairs bedrooms.

Greater Manchester Police failed to visit the family’s home after an unsuccessful arson attack five days earlier, a damning report by the Independent Police Complaints Commission said today.

The report further criticises GMP, who apologised for their failings at the time, for not recording complaints from the family and for not replying to a letter from them outlining the harassment.

The IPCC report recommends one constable be given a formal written warning and an inspector “advised” over his conduct.

The couple’s son, David Cochran, has been critical of the police response to his parents requests for help. Speaking at a press conference in Manchester last year, he said his mother, who worked in a craft shop at a garden centre, had been “sadly let down” when police ignored her initial plea for help: “Possibly, if action had been taken on that day, the second incident may not have occurred,” he said

Michael Connor, 40, and his ex-wife Jane, 40, were jailed for life for the double murder last December. Michael Connor must serve a minimum 32-year sentence before parole after he poured more than a litre of petrol through the letterbox of the Cochranes’ home, killing them in a 1000-degrees vortex of flames.

He had been plied with drink and urged on by his ex-wife, who kept watch as he carried out the attack on January 12 last year. She must also serve a minimum of 32 years in jail.

Their daughter, Natalie, 18, had made up false claims that the Cochranes’ daughter Lucy had been bullying her at school - prompting the hate campaign. She was jailed for 11 years after being convicted of two counts of manslaughter.

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