A hired assassin who strangled a frail housewife for a share of her £475,000 legacy while on bail for murder in Thailand has been jailed for at least 281D2 years.

Former teignmouth resident Paul Cryne, 62, flew 3,000 miles to the UK to kill ME sufferer Sharon Birchwood, 52, on the orders of her debt-ridden ex-husband.

Cryne, strangled Mrs Birchwood in her bungalow for a share of her estate valued at £475,000.

Her ex-husband Graham George Birchwood, 56, is already serving a life sentence for masterminding the plot to carry out the perfect murder.

Cryne, who holds the Guinness world record for swimming the longest distance underwater in 24 hours, met Birchwood through the Thai ex-pat community.

He became a hitman after blowing a £500,000 insurance payout on a flamboyant lifestyle and was suspected of carrying out another contract killing in 2003.

Cryne was still on bail for that murder when he flew to the UK to kill Sharon Birchwood in Ashtead, Surrey, in December 2007.

Judge Jeremy Roberts, QC, jailed Cryne for life but reduced his minimum term from 32 years to 281D2 because of the time he spent in a Thai prison.

He said: It was a contract killing carried out for financial gain. It was a carefully-planned execution.

The victim Sharon Birchwood was a vulnerable lady who was devoted to George and hero-worshipped him despite his callous behaviour.

George repaid that trust by paying for her to be murdered by you.

Sharon was murdered in a particularly unpleasant and personal way in what should have been the safety and security of her own home.

You had either crept into her home or lain in wait for her in the house. One can only imagine the mental and physical suffering she must have undergone in the last few moments of her life.

Judge Roberts criticised Cryne for his hypocrisy in claiming that he would have taken a bullet for Sharon Birchwood.

The judge also suggested he was lucky to be acquitted of the 2003 murder despite strong circumstantial evidence.

Birchwood was jailed for a minimum of 32 years after a separate trial last year.

Judge Roberts told Cryne: I am also prepared to make some allowance for the fact the conditions you were held in Thailand were exceptionally harsh compared with prisons in this country and that your health undoubtedly suffered as a result.

You may well spend the rest of your life behind bars. If you do that will be the consequence of your own actions.

Cryne told the jury: I'm an innocent man as he was led down to the cells.

He had already left the country by the time Birchwood pretended to discover the body of his wife at her bungalow in Ashtead, Surrey.

Birchwood, who was £150,000 in debt, was the obvious suspect but had a cast-iron alibi.

Detectives were at first unable to identify the killer even after discovering a tiny trace of DNA left on the victims hand during her desperate struggle for life.

Cryne only emerged as a suspect after his fingerprint was found on a glass at the home of Birchwoods mother.

Police then tracked him to Thailand and got a DNA profile from a cup he drank from at a cafe.

Once the match was confirmed police were able to unravel the plot to carry out the perfect murder.

Birchwood was convicted of murder at Croydon Crown Court in June last year and jailed for a minimum of 22 years behind bars.

Three months later Cryne who had been acquitted of a murder in Thailand in 2003 was extradited to stand trial.

An Old Bailey jury unanimously convicted him of murder after deliberating for about four-and-a-half hours.

The court heard Graham Birchwood and his wife had met as teenagers and eloped to Gretna Green three years later.

Mrs Birchwood doted on her ex-husband until she died and thought of him as her hero.

The couple divorced in secret after Birchwood persuaded his wife to separate for financial reasons.

He then married his Malaysian secretary Katherine Kang and fathered two children even though he had told his first wife he did not want to have children because of his diabetes.

Mrs Birchwood allowed her ex-husband to stay overnight regularly and in 2001 made him the sole beneficiary to his will.

She believed her ex-husband was trying to make a better life for them both but in fact he was planning her murder.

Mrs Birchwood was last seen alive at around 5.30pm on December 4, 2007, when she got off a bus near her home in Harriotts Lane, Ashtead.

At that time her husband was hanging around Epsom trying to get himself captured on CCTV to establish an alibi.

Two hours later at 7.50pm that night Cryne made a 25-second call to Birchwood to confirm the killing before travelling to Heathrow airport for a flight at 9am the next morning.

To cover his tracks Birchwood sent the victim two text messages on December 5 and 6.

The second read: Still trying to contact you. What is happening?

Cryne told the court: Someone has got my DNA on that tape. I dont know how they did it, but I think I have been the victim of a DNA transfer.

During his trial, he claimed he only came to the UK for a holiday and to try to sell his paintings.

He admitted staying at the home of Birchwoods mother but denied any involvement in a murder plot.

But during his evidence he changed his story and confessed that Birchwood had asked him to kill someone.

Cryne claimed Birchwood offered him £30,000 to murder his second wife Katherine Kang.

He said he never intended to kill anyone and was planning to get cash up front and then leave the country.

Cryne, of no fixed address but originally from Manchester and later Torquay, denied murder.

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