Aren Pearson jailed for life after stabbing 24-year-old Claire Leveque to death in a Shetland hot tub

A man who murdered his girlfriend in a remote Shetland village has been jailed for life after a court heard how he stabbed her at least 26 times during a frenzied attack in a hot tub.

Aren Pearson, 41, was convicted at the High Court in Edinburgh of murdering Claire Leveque, 24, at his mother’s home in Sandness on 11 February 2024. Jurors heard that the young Canadian woman suffered 19 stab wounds to her face and neck alone, the culmination of a months-long campaign of domestic abuse.

Pearson, who is also Canadian, repeatedly confessed to the killing in harrowing 999 calls and to police officers who arrived at the bloody scene. “I stabbed her about 40 times,” he told the emergency operator, adding that he had also turned the knife on himself and driven his Porsche “into the ocean”.

When officers and medics reached the property, they found Claire lifeless in the hot tub. The water, witnesses said, had turned dark with blood. Former police officer Dana Jamieson told the court: “She was floating on her back. The water was black.”

Pearson’s mother Hazel, who has since died, was the first to call 999. She told operators her son had “done something really terrible” and that the hot tub was “full of blood”. In the call played to jurors, Hazel could be heard saying she had tried to pull Claire from the water but could not recognise her because of the severity of her injuries.

She said her son had appeared “like a zombie” in the days leading up to the killing, becoming increasingly aggressive and unstable. Moments before police arrived, Hazel watched him stab himself in the neck with a kitchen knife.

Despite his repeated confessions, Pearson later claimed in court that Claire had stabbed herself multiple times and that he was innocent — a defence dismissed by the jury as cruel fantasy.

Prosecutor Margaret Barron told jurors that Pearson’s own words, along with forensic and witness evidence, proved overwhelming. “He tried to erase responsibility by inventing an impossible story,” she said.

Judge Lord Arthurson sentenced Pearson to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 25 years, telling him his crime was one of “unrelenting violence and pitiless cruelty”.

Defence solicitor advocate Iain Paterson KC offered no mitigation, admitting there was nothing that could lessen the horror of the crime. “He has said to me that not a day goes by when he doesn’t think about that night with sadness,” Paterson said. “We’ve had him psychiatrically examined and there’s nothing by way of mental disorder.”

In evidence, doctors who treated Pearson at Lerwick’s Gilbert Bain Hospital said he had superficial neck wounds and had swallowed brake fluid in what appeared to be a failed suicide attempt. A&E consultant Dr Caroline Heggie recalled a chilling remark from him: “I’ve been trying to get rid of her for a while.”

Jurors were also played an audio recording of the couple before the murder in which Claire confronted Pearson over his abuse. “You beat the sh*t out of me on my 24th birthday,” she said. Pearson replied coldly: “You deserved every bit of it and more.” Moments later she told him: “You’re going to kill me.”

Outside court, Claire’s cousin Hope Ingram thanked police and prosecutors for securing justice. “Claire was bubbly and full of life,” she said. “There’s a shadow over our family now she’s gone, but we’re grateful we were able to get justice for her.”

For the quiet community of Sandness, the killing remains one of the most violent crimes ever to take place in Shetland — a tragic end to a young woman’s life that began with love but descended into terror.