Police to question Olivia Pratt-Korbel's killer Thomas Cashman about 2013 cold ... trends now
A cold case murder previously linked to Olivia Pratt-Korbel's killer Thomas Cashman is to be reopened by police, it has been reported.
Cashman, 34, was last week found guilty of shooting the nine-year-old dead inside her Liverpool home on August 22 last year and will be sentenced tomorrow.
The killer is being investigated over three other unsolved gangland shootings in Liverpool, as police reopen the 2013 cold case murder of Karl Bradley, The Mirror reports.
Bradley was the brother of notorious Liverpool gangster Kirk Bradley and was found dead in a garden in West Derby with four gunshot wounds.
No one was every brought to justice over the killing, but Cashman was interviewed by officers on suspicion of murder. His alleged involvement will now we re-examined by officers.
Thomas Cashman, 34, was found guilty of murdering nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel last Thursday
A police cordon outside the West Derby home where Karl Bradley was killed in 2013
One source said: 'Cashman was a prime suspect but police struggled to break a wall of silence. Now a convicted child killer, Cashman has no allies in the city. There is a feeling they won’t protect him.'
After the murder, Cashman fled to Spain where sources described him as a 'gun for hire' who was nicknamed 'the crazy Scouser'. A number of killings in Spain during this period remain unsolved.
The source added: 'He operated like a ghost. There will be fresh questions about what he got up to.'
Cashman fatally shot Olivia and injured her mother Cheryl Korbel, while chasing a rival gangster Joseph Nee, 36, who burst into their home after Ms Korbel opened the door having heard gunshots. Police have theorised that Cashman may have been hired to kill Nee, but his exact motive is unknown.
Cashman was feared in Liverpool's Dovecot area as a £5,000 a week cannabis dealer and a suspected hitman - so much so, that within days of Olivia’s murder his name was being openly mentioned on a YouTube podcast as likely suspect, leading to Merseyside Police writing a cease and desist letter to the vlogger, The Express reports.
Cashman may never leave prison as his former underworld contacts could become informants against him.
Bradley, 31, who was the brother of notorious Liverpool gangster Kirk Bradley, was shot four times in his garden (Pictured: police at the scene of the 2013 murder)
It is thought most of the top tier of Cashman's crime circuit in Liverpool are already in custody, and he may have little information to offer police.
A source said: 'It is more likely that now he is banged up for good, people will be grassing on him, not the other way round. There’s a few other murders they say he is connected to and they will be less scared to give him up.'
He wept in the dock as he was sentenced to life in prison last Thursday and has since received taunting letters from other inmates at HMP Strangeways amid widespread disgust at his murder of the little girl.
One letter, which was picked up by prison staff, stated: 'When some loon throws chip fat on your face for killing a little girl you will end up on high protection with sex monsters and other child killers like yourself.'
Another source adds that Cashman is seen by his former associates as a 'rat' for killing a child.
The killer wept in the dock as he was convicted last Thursday amid courageous testimony from his
