FEAR of crime could have driven a jeweller to kill himself as he and his wife were planning to start a new life, an inquest heard yesterday.

Clifford Robson, 63, who worked from his home in Wolsingham, County Durham, shot himself through the head with a 12-bore shotgun last week, days before he was due to start looking for a home in Spain.

His wife, Ann, said he had been upset by an attempted burglary at the bungalow they had recently sold in the village.

There had been a number of break-ins at their previous homes in Allensford, near Consett, and a fire in his office.

Mrs Robson said: "He was nervous of anybody breaking in. He always was on edge.

"The last one, in the summer, someone drilled into his office and that upset him a lot. It shook him up.

"The police were very kind and installed a telephone system and an alarm around his neck, so obviously they thought it was very serious.

"He obviously worried a lot more than I knew. He bottled it up."

Mrs Robson told the hearing in Bishop Auckland Magistrates' Court of her frantic search for her husband after he left their temporary home, a caravan at his brother Jim's mobile home business in Durham Road, Wolsingham, on Monday, November 4.

A few hours later, Mr Robson's body was found in his Land Rover Discovery parked near one of his favourite walks, off Rushy Lea Lane, on a fell south of the village.

He was still holding the shotgun, which he had borrowed from a friend, Terry Forster, the day before.

The couple had been planning to buy homes in Spain and County Durham.

"We were moving on to a new chapter in our lives," said Mrs Robson.

Darlington and South Durham Coroner Colin Penna recorded a verdict that Mr Robson took his own life.

He said: "Clearly he had got worried about the way in which crime was being committed and attempts at obtaining property from his stock. At the same time he was outward looking and planning to go to Spain. It is something of a mystery."