Investigation into unsolved Yemen killing

THE National Crime Agency is gathering background information about the unsolved murder of Devon marine surveyor David Mockett in a car bomb in Yemen, it has been confirmed.

- EDWARD OLDFIELD

The death of the father-of-two, from Plympton, was raised in Parliament by local MP Sir Gary Streeter in November last year.

The South West Devon MP claimed the killing in 2011 may have been linked to the loss of an oil tanker which Capt Mockett had been asked to survey.

It later emerged that an apparent attack by pirates on the vessel called the Brillante Virtuoso in the sea off Yemen had been staged as part of insurance fraud, according to a court judgment.

Capt Mockett, a former merchant navy master, died in an explosion near his office in the Yemeni capital, Aden, after reporting his suspicions about the ship.

A judge in the High Court in London later rejected a $77 million claim from the ship’s owner and a bank.