AN AMBULANCE driver reassured his nervous crewmate as they rushed to the scene of a brutal double killing in response to a 999 call.

But although Mike Ford had not recognised the address, as soon as he pulled up outside the cottage he realised that it was the home of the fiancé of his 19-year-old daughter, Claire, the father of Mr Ford’s baby granddaughter, Charlotte.

As Mr Ford, 46, was held back by police outside, his rookie crewmate, Claire Beattie, went alone into the bedroom. Lying on the double bed were Miss Ford and 18-month old Charlotte. Both had been bludgeoned and the baby had a plastic bag taped over her head.

Yesterday, as their killer was given two life terms at Truro Crown Court, Mr Ford said that his family had been sentenced to life without hope of parole.

Miss Ford’s fiancé, Christoper Adams, 26, a trainee publican who went on the run after the killings, was told he would serve a minimum of 20 years.

But Mr Ford said: “Just ten years for each of our girl’s lives. This is not what we would call justice. Our life sentence has no tariff, we will never be free of this grief as long as we live.”

Earlier Martin Meeke, QC, for the prosecution, told the court how an ambulance was dispatched in response to a 999 call to the tiny hamlet of Rumford, near Wadebridge, Cornwall. Mr Meeke said: “In one of those terrible turns of fate, the ambulance was driven by Mr Michael Ford, who is Claire’s father.”

Adams, who had no history of violence, had left the house earlier after telling his father, who lived next door, that the noise was Claire “having a nightmare”. He was on the run for a week before a policeman spotted him in Ringwood, Hampshire. Handcuffed and arrested for double murder, he confessed: “I don’t know what happened mate. I just lost it.”

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