An alcoholic was today convicted of murdering a head chef who worked at top London restaurants including Claridge’s.
Alexis De Naray, 45, trained at the Prue Leith Cooking School and worked in several high-end kitchens in the capital, jurors were told.
But he began drinking ‘due to the stressful nature of the job’ and was also an alcoholic at the time of his death last June.
A court heard the talented chef ended up homeless and was found dead under a sleeping bag in the attic room of an abandoned building in Shrewsbury, Shropshire.
This afternoon, a jury unanimously convicted Adam Rowson, 26, who was also homeless, of killing Mr De Naray.
Judge Avik Mukarjee adjourned sentencing until May 6 and remanded Rowson into custody.
The judge thanked the jury for their ‘impressive commitment’ to the ‘distressing’ case and excused them from any future jury service.
During the two-week trial, Stafford Crown Court heard a post-mortem examination revealed Mr De Naray suffered 17 fractured ribs and injuries to his head and arms.
A forensic pathologist found the chef had been subjected to a significant blunt force assault before his death last June.
Opening the trial last month, prosecutor Sally Howes KC, said Mr De Naray was a ‘well-educated man’ from a Greek family.
‘Having attended the Prue Leith Cooking School, he worked as a head chef in a number of restaurants in London,’ she said.
‘Unfortunately, due to the stressful nature of that job, drinking became a way of life and his alcohol problems began.
‘By the time of his death he had become a chronic alcoholic.’
Jurors were told Mr De Naray, who was classically trained in French cuisine, nearly died from seizures caused by alcohol withdrawal during the Covid lockdown.
‘As a result, his father arranged housing for him in Shrewsbury – near to the family home,’ said Miss Howes.
‘However, despite the help of his father and a number of local agencies, at the time of his death, he was a homeless alcoholic.’
Mr De Naray’s father paid for his son to stay in local hotels, including a Travelodge and Premier Inn, the court heard.
After leaving London, the chef had a stint working at a Worcestershire pub before moving on to a restaurant and guest house in Ironbridge, Shropshire.
He has previously told the Private Dining Rooms website that Claridge’s, where Gordon Ramsay ran a restaurant, was the first restaurant he worked in. His signature dish was Filet mignon of beef with pan fried fois gras, reduced pan drippings and chanterelle mushrooms.
Jurors were told Mr De Naray met Rowson at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and the pair were seen on CCTV shortly before 4am the next morning walking towards the derelict building, it is claimed.
Miss Howes said it was the last time Mr De Naray was seen alive.
Prosecutors claim he was then subjected to a violent attack inside the abandoned property.
Rowson told jurors he invited a former high-flying chef back to his squat while collecting half-finished cigarette butts outside a hospital – before killing him in a fight.
The moment the fight broke out, Rowson said, was when Mr De Naray, while naked, “leaned” on Rowson as he was looking out of a window.
He told jurors he punched Mr De Naray to the chest. “I was anxious. I was freaked out,” he said.
Mr De Naray got on top of Rowson, the defendant told the court, and put “pressure” on his stomach.
“I didn’t want him on top of me at all,” Rowson said. “It was a horrible situation.”
Rowson claimed the chef was still alive when he left him.
Before the prosecutors closed their case, the jury heard from Jessica Kirk, who worked at the Shropshire Recovery Partnership drug and alcohol support service in Castle Gates, Shrewsbury.
She told how, at a scheduled appointment with Rowson, he asked her if he was going to be arrested, and told her he had “done something bad”.
Rowson claimed this related to his subsequent use of the victim’s bank cards at several shops.
But the killer was also heard on CCTV cameras outside a supermarket on June 25 telling friends he had ‘killed someone’.
Mr De Naray’s father raised the alarm and reported his son as missing on June 24 after not hearing from him.
Three days later, police received a 101 call from Rowson saying he had found a body in the abandoned house.
Miss Howes said as well as the rib fractures, Mr De Naray suffered other multiple injuries, including a bleed on the brain.
The pathologist, Dr Alexander Kolar, gave a cause of death as multiple injuries compounded by complications of long-standing use of alcohol to excess and acute alcohol intoxication.
The court heard Mr De Naray also had cirrhosis of the liver and was more than five times the legal drink drive limit when he died.
