The heartbroken family of Paula Leeson want police to reopen the murder case against Donald McPherson and say they will not rest until he is back behind bars.

“Serial liar” McPherson, 51, was ordered to be found not guilty of the 2017 murder of his wife Ms Leeson, 47, on a judge’s direction to the jury halfway through his trial in 2021.

But Ms Leeson’s family successfully blocked his bid to inherit her £4.4 million estate by bringing legal proceedings against McPherson at Manchester Civil Courts of Justice.

On Friday, Mr Justice Richard Smith emphatically ruled that McPherson had unlawfully killed his wife by compressing her neck in an arm lock then putting her in a swimming pool leaving her to drown.

And he said the motive was clear – money.

The judgment means McPherson will not get his hands on her cash.

But her family want the case to be reopened.

Ms Leeson oversaw the skip hire part of her family’s successful civil engineering business that her father, Willy, 80, had built up in Sale, Greater Manchester, after emigrating from County Wicklow, Ireland, in the 1960s.

Ms Leeson, a mother-of-one, and her brother, Neville, stood to inherit the business.

Outside court, the Leeson family said today’s ruling confirmed what they had known all along: that Donald McPherson killed Paula.

“Today is bittersweet. It has been very difficult for us to hear this outcome without it being followed by the sentencing of Donald McPherson to prison,” their statement said.

“This was a pre-meditated, cold-blooded murder, entirely motivated by Donald McPherson’s wicked greed, to seek to benefit from insurance policies totalling £3.9 million, the majority of which he had incepted dishonestly, deceptively and without Paula’s knowledge.”

They called on Greater Manchester Police and the Crown Prosecution Service to re-open the murder investigation.

They added: “As the judgment demonstrates, Donald McPherson is an evil, dangerous man and a long-standing fraudster. He has convictions worldwide for dishonesty offences.

“We hope the judgment also serves as a warning to all who unwisely chose to associate with Donald McPherson or whatever he may now call himself. He is an extremely dangerous individual.”

The family said they will not rest until McPherson is behind bars for killing their loved one.