Messages sent to undercover agents reveal the security guard’s meticulous plan to raid the star’s home with chloroform in the middle of the night and then take her to an abandoned farm to carry out his evil plan

By Tom Cotterill and Rory Tingle, Home Affairs Correspondent

17:16 04 July 2024, updated 19:22 04 July 2024

Chilling voice recordings have revealed the depths of Gavin Plumb’s twisted plan to kidnap, rape and murder TV star Holly Willoughby.

The “obsessed” security guard had carefully planned his brutal attack for more than two years and happily shared details of his plan with his colleagues.

The 37-year-old wanted to attack the former This Morning presenter in her London home and knock Ms Willoughby and her husband Dan Baldwin down with chloroform.

Plumb then planned to take her to an isolated “dungeon” that he described as “death row,” where he would hold the star and rape her repeatedly before slitting her throat and murdering her.

The horrific voice messages were played at Chelmsford Crown Court, where Plumb – who was today convicted by a jury for his nightmarish plan – can be heard describing how he would carry out his twisted attack.

He tells his colleague Marc that he was looking for a place to “hold” Holly after ambushing her in her London home.

He adds: “Nothing is confirmed yet, mate. Don’t celebrate too soon, but it looks like we’re finally back on track.”

“Of course you will find out when everything is planned. Yes, then we will see.”

A breathless Plumb recorded how he planned to break into Mrs Willoughby’s family home late at night to ambush her.

He also says he planned to use chloroform on Holly and her husband Dan Baldwin in the middle of the night.

Plumb adds: “The plan of action is basically that we leave at night when there is less traffic on the road. We drug them both with chloroform so they are easier to subdue. We pick out outfits of hers that we like, take her and the outfits with us and then we are gone.”

Click here to resize this module

“Then we will force her to make a video in which she explains that she came with us of her own free will and that she completely agrees with everything we do with her. So that protects us.”

In another voice message sent via WhatsApp, Plumb tells Marc that he is “warmly invited to be part of this” as the plan “is falling apart.”

Plumb says he was looking for a place where he could “capture” the star, but “my place might be better because there are cameras everywhere.”

He adds: “The chloroform part will be fun, the outfit selection will be fun. So if you can come to the UK, to England, that would be great because then you can be a part of it.”

Plumb also claimed that he had a group of obsessed accomplices around him who wanted to carry out further attacks on other well-known celebrities in order to fill “15 cells”.

“We’ll be about 12 people, so realistically we could take in two (victims) at a time – maybe three,” he said.

“Adam’s primary victim is (redacted), our primary victim is Holly. So realistically we could do both at the same time, meet up, switch vehicles, put them both in the same vehicle and take them to their new location,” he adds.

Jurors heard that Plumb assembled a “restraint kit” and filmed it spread out on his bed.

The items the 37-year-old allegedly collected include handcuffs, leg restraints, a ball gag, a cat-o’-nine-tails, metal cable ties and ropes.

Jurors were told Plumb had communicated with several people online about Ms Willoughby. One man, who turned out to be an undercover police officer, was told he planned to “throw her in a lake at night” after he had finished raping her.

The father of one child told a man named Marc: “We have a place in the country where we can put them… an abandoned stud farm. There are cells there.”

At the start of the trial, the jury heard Plumb, from Harlow in Essex, speak of a “dungeon-like room” big enough for a bed in which the 43-year-old presenter was to be held captive.

He allegedly told another man that he would go to death row for the things he wanted to do to the former This Morning presenter.

On the third day of his trial, he is also said to have sent one of his online contacts a photo of a bottle of chloroform he had purchased and exclaimed: “Look what I found on my doorstep when I got home.”

Click here to resize this module

Plumb planned his break-in at Mrs Willoughby’s London estate with accomplices he met on the Internet.

As Chelmsford Crown Court heard, the defendant sent a possible accomplice a video of items from a bondage kit spread out on a bed as part of his online chats.

In a message Plumb read to the court, he described the masked robbery as follows: “We break in when they are in bed, we hold both of them at gunpoint and tell them both to roll onto their stomachs and have their hands behind their backs. On Dan we use metal cable ties, on Holly we use handcuffs, etc. …”

He had spoken about getting close to Ms Willoughby, he said, the court heard: “I’ll call the (ITV) studio tours tomorrow and ask if they’re still available and if you’re meeting any presenters.”

He also claimed: “I have passed my SIA (Security Industry Authority) license and could therefore try to use them as their security guard.”

Plumb – who already has three previous convictions for the attempted kidnapping and false imprisonment of four women – had “highly sexualised” conversations with his online contacts about Ms Willoughby and other celebrities and had stored “millions” of images, many of them deep fake porn.

In a chat about the presenter of “Dancing on Ice” he wrote: “She wears these things for a reason, namely to annoy us boys – she gets punished for all the annoying.”

A few days after Ms Willougby’s co-host Phillip Schofield left This Morning in controversial circumstances in May last year, Plumb was messaging each other, telling Marc: “I’m so tempted to message Phil and ask him, ‘Listen, do you want revenge?'”

Plumb was arrested on October 4 last year, a day after he began an online relationship with the man, who was actually an undercover police officer in the United States.

Mrs Willoughby was informed of the alleged plot the next day, shortly before the broadcast, and someone stepped in for her. A few days later, she left the show.

The court heard the officer asked Plumb why he had posted a photo of Ms Willoughby in a group of “kidnapping enthusiasts” and was told: “Why do you think?”

The attacker added that he was “definitely” seeking help and wanted to put the plan into action “as soon as possible – he’s been planning it for about two and a half years.”

He added: “Fantasy is no longer enough. I want the real thing.”