Man gunned down two innocent clubbers before vanishing for seven years

Wayne McDonald was jailed for life after gunning down two clubbers and disappearing, with his return to public life seeing the professional criminal and an accomplice hold up a Hospital Inn

A man who gunned down two innocent clubbers vanished into the night, and was later jailed for life for the attempted murders.

Wayne McDonald, the brother-in-law and enforcer of major league drug smuggler Gerald Deaffern, was seen rummaging around in the boot of his 5-Series BMW with a "wild glare in his eye". Passing pedestrians were concerned something was going to "kick off" as across the road a woman was hurling racial abuse at a group of Asian men after being slapped in the face.

The scene outside of Atlantis in Bolton at 2am could not have gotten much worse, but then McDonald entered the scene with his right arm pressed against his jacket. Those nearby told the court they heard "four, five bangs that sounded like firecrackers going off," and saw "a lad in an orange shirt fall to the floor."

Professional criminal McDonald was reportedly furious over his friend being bested in a fight earlier in the evening and so raked through the crowd with a .22 semi-automatic handgun. One victim, then just a teenager, was shot in the the right hand, left wrist and right hip. Another victim was hit in the side and his left forearm while one bullet shattered a finger. Both were lucky to survive.

McDonald then fled on foot with a friend but had made an amateur mistake with his run and gun attempt. The keys to his BMW were locked in the boot after reaching for his gun. His friend, who was later jailed for two years for assisting an offender, returned with a spare set of keys but was captured on CCTV and arrested at 3.20am when he went to unlock the car.

A search of the car revealed a Czech Ceska pistol wrapped in a sock, 92 rounds of bullets and a bag of amphetamines. Police also found an Asda carrier containing a tissue. At the time it did not have enough material to get a DNA sample, Manchester Evening News reported. As a huge police investigation got underway, on the morning of November 24, 2000 McDonald left his home in Didsbury and vanished. For the next seven years rumours swirled as to his whereabouts.

Some assumed he had fled to Amsterdam while others believed he was living as close by as Stockport, just down the road from where the shooting had taken place. On New Year's Eve 2007 he made a grand reappearance, holding up staff at the Hospital Inn in Preston where they were expecting to get away with £12,000. Their balaclava-clad attempt was rumbled by police however, who were called to the property. McDonald and his accomplices pistol-whipped the landlord and tied up his wife.

They fled the property but McDonald bumped into officers in his escape, shooting one of them in the leg and turning himself in a day later, telling officers "I just shot one of your women." In April 2009, following a trial in Preston, McDonald was found guilty of wounding with intent to resist arrest, robbery and firearms offences, but was cleared of attempted murder. He was jailed for life, a sentence later reduced to an indeterminate length for the public protection on appeal.

His accomplice was convicted of wounding and was also given an indeterminate jail term. As McDonald began his sentence, officers took another look at the Atlantis shooting. In December 2010 - a decade after the shooting - he went on trial at Manchester Crown Court accused of firearms offences and two counts of attempted murder.

The then 49-year-old declined to give evidence in his own defence, claiming through his barrister to have been the victim of an 'old fashioned fit-up like Life On Mars'. The jury disagreed and found him guilty. McDonald refused to come out of his cell for sentencing and in his absence, Judge Andrew Gilbart QC jailed him for life and warned he would not be released until he was 'an elderly man, if at all'.

The judge added: "He is, in my judgement, a ruthless, professional criminal who regards firearms as one of the tools of his trade. On this occasion he resorted to using them to get his own way even though that meant firing eight rounds into a perfectly innocent group of people.

"He has shown not a glimmer of remorse for the damage done to his innocent victims. These offences were crimes of the utmost gravity, carried out with a callous disregard for the safety or lives of others. I'm convinced that the defendant presents a very real danger to the public."