Where is my Kerry? Have you killed her? Mum's plea to Stoke-On-Trent businessman

Sep 8 2008 By Ben Goldby

A MIDLAND businessman who allegedly beat up and abandoned his ex-girlfriend who is feared dead in Dubai is being quizzed by cops.

It has been claimed that Mark Arnold, from Stoke-on-Trent, confessed to attacking Kerry Winter, 35, who disappeared more than two weeks ago.

Her mum, Carol, from South Africa, pleaded with Mark, 42, to admit if he had killed her on Friday.

Detectives in the United Arab Emirates allowed her to question Mr Arnold over the phone from her home in Johannesburg.

Carol claims he told her that Kerry was alive when he left her on August 20.

Lia Winter, Kerry’s sister-in-law, said: “All he kept telling her was that he was sorry and things got out of hand.

“Carol said ‘Mark, please just tell me did you kill her? Where is she?’

“He just replied ‘I’m not a killer, I’m not a killer.’

“He said he wished he knew where she was.”

She said Carol Winter, 60, who had a quadruple bypass two years ago, is on heart medication and the family is extremely concerned for her health.

The Winters claim Mr Arnold had been harassing Kerry since their relationship ended in May.

Lia Winter said: “The last three months were absolute torture for her - he was stalking her outside her villa, outside her work, he would follow her car.

“We used to talk every day, and she would say to me, ‘you will not believe it, but he’s outside my villa’.

“She was getting to the point where she was quite scared by the constant hounding.”

Kerry was last heard from on the evening of August 20 when she phoned a pal to say that Mr Arnold had followed her to a hotel.

Friends and family received a number of texts from Kerry’s phone over the next few days, but they fear the messages were sent by someone else.

Witnesses in Dubai told cops that they saw her being beaten with a baseball bat in the stairwell of her apartment and bundled into a 4x4.

In June, while Kerry was visiting family in South Africa, Mr Arnold made a false allegation of theft against her, prompting police to confiscate her passport when she returned.

The Stoke businessman then dropped the charges two days before her disappearance.

Lia said Mr Arnold had told her husband Kurt - Kerry’s brother, who is leading the search effort in Dubai - he had beaten Kerry up, but kept changing his story about where he had left her.

“One day it’s the desert, the next it’s the side of the road,” she said.

“Only he can tell us the truth, and that’s not been forthcoming.

“This is just a nightmare. It’s a nightmare and I don’t think anybody deserves to be put through it.”

Mr Arnold was working in Dubai as an operations manager for an interior design firm.

He flew to Britain two days after Kerry’s disappearance and returned to the Gulf state three days later, when he was arrested.

Kurt Winter and his team of 2,000 volunteers have produced hundreds of T-shirts and banners to raise awareness of the search for Kerry.

Family and friends are holding vigils across South Africa and the Middle East to pray for her.

The body of a woman was found near where Mr Arnold claimed to have left Kerry, but police have confirmed it is not hers.