These are the faces of three thugs who killed a Liverpool dad whose body was found in a burnt out car after hours of brutal torture.

They were today convicted of the gangland killing of Joseph McKeever, said to be linked to £130,000 of missing cannabis.

Firefighters discovered the 54-year-old’s body in the boot of a stolen blue Ford Focus ST after it was set alight in Everton.

He had suffered two broken kneecaps, broken ribs, broken eye sockets, a severe head injury and was strangled with a ligature.

Jamie Grimes was found guilty of murder, while Karl Kelly and Darren Colecozy were convicted of the lesser charge of manslaughter.

Dylan Owen – who torched Mr McKeever’s Renault Megane and Grimes’ Citroen Nemo van – was found guilty of assisting an offender.

They will be sentenced tomorrow in relation to the dad-of-one’s ordeal, which began at a Kensington garage and ended in a Wavertree flat.

Jamie Grimes
Jamie Grimes

But none of them accepted responsibility for taking his body to wasteland off St Domingo Road, where it was found on June 15 last year.

Kelly and Colecozy said men sent by Grimes’ business partner – wanted fugitive Lee Knox – collected the corpse from Colecozy’s home.

Karl Kelly
Karl Kelly

The car left Picton Crescent in Wavertree shortly after 5.26pm and headed towards the city centre, but was not seen again for five hours.

The jury heard it was stolen a week earlier on June 8 in the West Derby area and now sported a cloned and false number plate.

Darren Colecozy
Darren Colecozy

At 10.55pm, CCTV cameras captured the Focus arriving on the field via Wyre Road in Anfield and two minutes later it was set alight.

Emergency services were called and fire crews found Mr McKeever’s charred body inside the smoldering car shortly after 11.10pm.

Ian Unsworth, QC, prosecuting, said those behind the arson intended the victim would never be found and all evidence would be destroyed.

However, he said thankfully because of the expertise of doctors who examined his body, the jury had a glimpse of what happened to him.

He said: “The blue Ford Focus that took him to his final resting place, an undignified end in public lands, his broken and bloody body burnt, that vehicle was destroyed.”

The blue Ford Focus ST

Mr Unsworth told the court a doctor could not tell what height Mr McKeever was, because his limbs would have shrunk in the fire.

Dr Christopher Johnson, a Home Office pathologist, said Mr McKeever’s body was found face up in the back of the burnt-out car.

He said: “There was heavy fire damage to the body, to both arms and the head was charred.”

The Police forensic tent in Everton.

Dr Johnson said “direct forceful blows to the knees” were possibly inflicted with a hammer and he had never seen injuries like this before.

He said “severe application of neck pressure” caused “significant” voice box damage and there was a “deep grooved” ligature mark on the neck.

Dr Johnson also noted “chop damage” to the jawbone, which he said had been caused by a sharp instrument.

Joseph McKeever
Joseph McKeever

He concluded he died from blunt force head injury and strangulation, but the timing was uncertain, given the extensive fire damage to his body.

Another expert, Dr Daniel Du Plessis, found Mr McKeever suffered a bleed on the left-hand side of his brain, leading to a “substantial” blood clot.

The consultant neuropathologist said “there was no doubt whatever” this kind of injury was due to substantial physical force or a “traumatic head injury”.

Dr Du Plessis said this was perhaps delivered by one heavy blow and the injury would have been “substantial and life threatening”.

He concluded Mr McKeever did not die immediately or very rapidly and the head injuries were followed by strangulation more than an hour later.

The scorched earth where Joseph McKeever's body was found in a burnt out car

Grimes, 22, of Breckside Park, Anfield, admitted false imprisonment. Owen, 23, of Paul McCartney Way, Kensington, was cleared of this charge and murder.

Kelly, 32, of Snaefell Avenue, Old Swan, and Colecozy, 23, of no fixed address but from Wavertree, were also found guilty of false imprisonment.

In his closing speech, Mr Unsworth told the jury “who it was who took Mr McKeever to his ultimate resting place still isn’t known”.

He said Mr McKeever was found alone “burnt and broken” in a vehicle, meaning “his story will never be told”.