Two homophobic brothers who had a ‘hobby’ of attacking men they believed were gay have been jailed for life for murdering a civil servant ‘for fun’ in 1984.
Michael Stewart, 57, and Anthony Stewart, 60, were just 15 and 18 when they set upon Anthony Littler as he walked home in East Finchley, north London.
Mr Littler, a 45-year-old civil servant, was bludgeoned twice over the head with a blunt weapon and was found mortally wounded half an hour later, still with his briefcase, £80 cash and credit cards.
The Stewarts were finally brought to justice after their younger brother reported them 29 years later, saying his siblings had confessed to the killing and boasted about ‘queer bashing’.
Anthony Stewart, who was likely to have delivered the fatal blow, was handed a minimum term of 15 years in prison and ‘lookout’ Michael Stewart was jailed for at least 10 years.
In a televised sentencing, senior judge Mrs Justice Cutts said: ‘Anthony Littler was in 1984 aged 45.
‘He was, according to those who knew him, a quiet, kind and gentle man. He lived a quiet, decent and honest life. He worked as a civil servant and lived alone in East Finchley.’
She told the defendants: “This was not an impulsive attack, I am quite sure your group was lying in wait for a victim, someone to attack and rob.’
Anthony Stewart, 60, was 18 when he murdered Mr Littler with his brother in 1984. Anthony was a binman at the time and confessed the murder to a girlfriend and his younger brother Daniel who went to police
Michael Stewart, 57, was just 15 at the time of the attack. He called an ambulance anonymously after the attack but hung up before emergency services could find Mr Littler who was bleeding to death in the alleyway nearby
Anthony Littler (pictured) was beaten to death in an alleyway near East Finchley Tube station on May 1, 1984
While there was no evidence Mr Littler was gay, the judge noted the defendants had targeted gay men to rob, saying: ‘1984 was a different time and in many respects a different place.’
In a statement, Mr Littler’s cousin Patricia McClure said: ‘I am particularly angry these murderers have had 42 years of freedom and they picked Anthony at random for fun, while I am glad that people have been found accountable.’
On the night of his murder, real ale enthusiast Mr Littler had been to a pub in Carshalton, Surrey, at a meeting of the Ponds Branch of The Society for the Preservation of Beer from the Wood.
He was ambushed and left for dead as he walked home down a narrow alleyway from East Finchley Tube station at 12.18am.
Michael Stewart called for an ambulance anonymously minutes after the attack from a phone box, but did not give enough information for emergency services to find Mr Littler, so the search was called off after Michael hung up.
A couple, Annalieze and James Hainge, found Mr Littler in a pool of his own blood while walking home from work. He was suffering from ‘catastrophic’ brain injuries.
By the spring of 1984 the Stewart siblings and their friends had made a ‘hobby’ of targeting lone men who they believed to be gay, jurors were told.
But they lied to police during house-to-house enquiries and said they were home at the time of the attack on Mr Littler, with binman Anthony Stewart insisting he never used the alley.
But a breakthrough came on the 29th anniversary of Mr Littler’s death when the thugs’ younger brother Daniel, who was 10 at the time, came forward to police after a family falling out.
He told officers his older brothers had confessed to the killing and boasted about being involved in ‘queer bashing’, jurors were told.
Michael had also admitted killing Mr Littler to his girlfriend and even showed her the scene of the crime down the alleyway at East Finchley Tube station, north London, jurors were told.
Anthony was said to be a man of few words but Michael proved to have a ‘loose tongue’ and bragged about what he did in 1984, the court heard.
The jurors deliberated for less than three hours to deliver their guilty verdict last week after the Old Bailey trial.
Today, Michael and Anthony Stewart have been jailed for life with minimum terms of 10 years and 15 years respectively.
Senior Crown prosecutor Samantha Yelland said investigators had faced ‘challenges’ bringing a case, with the loss of key evidence, including a potential murder weapon.
The ‘unusual’ decision to deploy covert tactics was made in the absence of other evidence to prosecute the historic hate crime, she said.
After sentencing, Ms Yelland said: ‘My deepest condolences go to Anthony’s family and to all those who loved him.
‘They have carried this loss for decades, and sadly many who waited so long for answers have not lived to see this day.
‘Nothing can undo what happened to Anthony that night, but I hope today goes some way to honouring him and giving him the justice he deserved.
‘Anthony was walking home alone at night when he was ambushed from behind in what was an unprovoked and cowardly attack.
‘It is devastating that he was targeted and killed, in part, because of his perceived sexuality.
‘This was recognised by the court and reflected in the sentences handed down to Michael and Anthony Stewart.
‘This was not a straightforward case. Despite the passage of time and the defendants’ repeated denials, we worked in close collaboration with the Metropolitan Police to piece together decades of admissions, historic evidence, and new material from a reopened investigation, to robustly pursue a prosecution.
‘No matter how much time has passed, the Crown Prosecution Service will always seek to prosecute perpetrators of these horrific crimes and ensure they face the consequences of their actions.’
Detective Chief Inspector Neil John, of Scotland Yard, said: ‘Anthony’s life was suddenly cut short when he was killed in a brutal attack by two teenagers who we now know had a clear propensity for the most sickening kind of violence.
‘They targeted Anthony because he was alone, defenceless and walking down a dark alley in which they knew no one would see them carrying out their horrendous assault.
‘They lay in wait for someone to cross their path, and tragically for Anthony he became their unsuspecting victim.
‘We know Anthony’s murder has continued to cause his family pain all these years later, and we are pleased that they now know who was responsible for his death.’
Mr Littler was murdered by the homophobic Stewart brothers in this alleyway. This is a handout photo issued by the Metropolitan police in 1984
During the trial, prosecuting barrister John Price KC described the events leading up to Mr Littler’s death.
He had taken a train to a pub in Carshalton, Surrey, after work to attend a meeting with a real ale group, Ponds Branch of The Society for the Preservation of Beer from the Wood.
He took the train back home and got off at East Finchley Tube station at 12.18am on May 1, then walked down a narrow alleyway towards his house.
It was there the Stewart brothers ‘ambushed’ him.
Mr Price said the assailants lay in wait and attacked Mr Littler, immediately striking him over the head, even though there was no evidence they knew their victim.
He suggested they may have panicked and fled the scene without going through his pockets when it became clear from the amount of blood that they had killed him.
Late resident Edward Dyer had been walking his dog and heard a loud shout which ‘sounded like a cry of pain’, jurors were told.
About half an hour later, Annalieze and James Hainge found Mr Littler lying injured in the alleyway as they walked home from the station.
Mrs Hainge ran to call emergency services from a phone box while her husband stayed with Mr Littler.
But he died at the scene.
Medics found him with two skull fractures and a ‘catastrophic brain injury’ which proved fatal.
Mrs Hainge’s call to emergency services had been the second 999 alert from a public phone kiosk, jurors were told.
At 12.22am, an unknown person had called an operator and asked for an ‘ambulance – quick’.
He told her: ‘I can’t stop, just get an ambulance to East Finchley station, there’s a man hurt outside the station.’
London Ambulance Service recorded the caller saying the casualty was ‘bleeding heavily’ before putting the phone down.
The call handler had noted the male seemed ‘abnormally concerned over the matter’, was ‘well spoken’ and had a ‘young sounding voice’.
Station staff searched the area and found no trace of a bleeding man so the incident was stood down, the court was told.
Mr Price told jurors that given the timing of the call, the unknown person must have been there when Mr Littler was attacked but gave ‘wholly inaccurate information’.
He said: ‘The prosecution submits that 42 years later, the evidence now available shows that it was Michael Stewart who had made that first 999 call at 12.22am and then hung up without giving the operator his name or the information she needed.’
Met Police reopened Mr Littler’s case in 2022 and employed covert investigative techniques before arresting the brothers
Staff at the station were told to check for signs of a bleeding or injured man in the ‘immediate vicinity’ of the station.
‘Of course, none could be found. That is not where Mr Littler was,’ Mr Price said.
The call was stood down as a false alarm at 00.40am.
‘Then, within about two minutes, an unknown caller using a phone in a public call box was telling Ms Rogers [the telephone operator] something of what had happened to leave him lying bleeding and dead in the alley,’ said Mr Price.
‘Anthony Littler had been alive and well and entering the alley at 00.20 and before 00.22 was dead or dying where he was later found by Mr and Mrs Hainge [who called the ambulance].
‘Given the time of that first call and the distance between where Anthony Littler was found in the alley and the nearest local phone kiosks from which it could have been made, is it not established that the caller could only have been able to report the fate of Mr Littler just seconds after it will have occurred, because he had been there to see it happen for himself?
‘Occurring at that time of night, in this enclosed alley, nobody would have been able to see what had happened to him unless they had been there, in the alley, and nearby.
‘Though asked to do so, he did not give the number of the call box he was using to make the call.
‘He gave imprecise, if not wholly inaccurate information about where Anthony Littler was, and then he put the phone down rather than giving the operator the detail she needed.’
The prosecutor said, 42 years later, the evidence now available shows it was Michael Stewart who made that first 999 call at 00.22 and then hung up without giving the operator the information she needed.
‘He has confessed to someone that it was he who made a phone call on this occasion, as he put it, “I called the old bill”, and to much more besides. Now 57 years of age, he was then a schoolboy aged just fifteen.
Mr Price explained the difficulties faced by the police in the original investigation: there was no CCTV, no eyewitnesses, no weapons.
The court was shown stills from a BBC Crimewatch episode about the murder on 1 October 1984.
A serving police officer played Mr Littler in the TV programme because he looked like the murder victim.
He reenacted his journey from the Tube carriage, out of the station to where his body was found.
‘No meaningful leads were generated by any of the publicity,’ Mr Price said.
Police went ‘house to house’ in 1984 asking local people where they were on the night of 30 April 1984.
They went to the Stewarts’ home at 1 Prospect Ring, where Michael and Anthony were living with their mother Gloria and brother Daniel.
Both brothers claimed they were at home on the night of the murder.
They were not arrested until Daniel reported them to police in 2013.
He described how Michael had threatened to burn down his home and kill him.
‘He said that Anthony Stewart and the two sons of Anthony Stewart had then become involved in this dispute.
‘He, Daniel, had told them he would go to the police to tell them what he knew about the murder in the alley many years ago, when he was a child living in Prospect Ring. And now, in the spring of 2013, he did so.’
When he was arrested in 2025, Michael Stewart said, referring to where Daniel was living: ‘If you want a murder let me out and I’ll go and kill that little **** in Cheshunt.’
Daniel said his older brothers were always talking about going out and doing what they called ‘queer bashing’.
Their sister, Gaynor Stewart, who was 16 at the time of the murder, said she also remembered them talking about going out ‘gay bashing’.
Daniel told police in May 2013: ‘[Michael] told me that they had robbed a bloke and that he had died. I don’t think they meant to kill him, they just wanted to rob him but he died so it was a robbery gone wrong.
‘He said they bashed his head in with a wooden object, like a rounder’s bat and that Tony was the one who actually had the weapon and that he was the one that hit the bloke.’
Daniel also recalled a conversation with Anthony Stewart in 1992 or 1993, in which Anthony also confessed to him over a drink in a pub.
Daniel said: ‘It wasn’t until several years later that Tony confessed to me that he was involved in the murder. I think I was about 18 or 19 at the time and we were in a pub somewhere in Finchley.
‘I remember we talked about the murder, and he broke down and started crying. Tony admitted to me that he was involved in the chap’s murder and so was Mick.’
‘I never told anyone about it until 2013 when I spoke to the police.’
Daniel Stewart contacted Herefordshire Police and explained that he was coming forward with this information now ‘because recently they had threatened him’.
Jurors had heard how Michael told a girlfriend years later ‘that’s where we killed that bloke!’
But in his police interview he insisted he never took her to East Finchley.
He claimed that Daniel had told him that ‘Tony and his mates hurt someone in an alleyway.’
He said: ‘The story goes Tony got grabbed by this guy and one of the others hit him on the head with a crash helmet.’
He said he did not know the man had died.
Michael said he knew someone had been killed in the alleyway but never made the connection.
He said he was not aware of Anthony going ‘robbing’ or ‘gay bashing’.
Asked why he did not tell police what Daniel had said earlier, Michael said: ‘Because the way I look at it even though I’ve got a f***** up family they’re my brothers and they, you know what I mean, you don’t f****** grass on your own.’
He said he decided to tell police because he did not want to go to prison while his mother was ill.
Referring to Daniel, he said in his police interview: ‘My brother can manipulate people.’
He said his brother had repeatedly got him into trouble with the police for no reason.
‘My brother was jealous of me,’ he said.
‘It’s bad having a s**** family sometimes you want to curl up in corner and cry about it but you can’t pick your family can you.’
Michael said he slept rough and went into care as a teenager before getting a council flat with his brother.
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