Grandma, 96, relied on her grandson for weekly visits, then investigators discovered what he did while she slept

A man from England is going to spend the rest of his life in prison for murdering his grandmother. Joshua Powell, who is 27 years old, got sentenced to life with a minimum of 26 years in jail for killing 96-year-old Emma Finch.

Firefighters went to Finch’s home in the village of Liss on May 17, 2024, after a carbon monoxide alarm started going off, as per People. When they got there, they found her body on the bedroom floor. Police saw that a fire had been set on her bed, and the matches used to start it were not the same as the ones in a matchbox they found in another part of the house.

Powell had a good relationship with his grandmother and they spent time together regularly. Every week, he would come over to help her buy groceries and they would sit down to play Scrabble together. However, police later found out what he actually did while she was sleeping. Security camera footage showed his car leaving his house at about 2 a.m. on the morning she died and driving to the Liss area, even though he insisted to police that he never left home and was asleep the whole time.

Things quickly fell apart for him

Police kept digging and found even more evidence linking Powell to what happened. His phone records showed his device was turned on during that time and was connected to his car. They also discovered something interesting on his phone. He had saved the code to get into his grandmother’s key safe weeks before she died, but he told investigators he had no idea what the code was.

Doctors who examined Finch’s body figured out that someone strangled her to death before the fire even started. They could tell she was already dead when the fire began because there was no carbon monoxide in her blood. Lab tests connected Powell to the marks on his grandmother’s neck, fingerprints on the key safe, and a belt that was found close to the house with her blood on it. Police also picked up a knife nearby that was the same as one that had gone missing from her kitchen.

Two days after his grandmother died, police arrested Powell on May 19, 2024. They officially charged him with murder on May 22, 2024, and he confessed to doing it on May 16, 2025. At the time everything happened, Powell owed people money.

He had been talking to his friends about hoping his grandmother would die soon so he could get her money and belongings. He even mentioned having a bad dream where he killed her. This reminds me of another case where a teen who lost his life at Walmart after an argument over a shopping cart

The lead detective on the case, Howard Broadribb, talked about what Powell did. He said Powell used the fact that his grandmother trusted him completely and turned it against her. Broadribb also pointed out that Powell kept lying even when all the proof was right in front of him, showing he did not care about Emma or anyone else in the family. He said he hopes the punishment will help Emma’s family members start to heal and move forward knowing Powell is locked up.

Powell got his sentence at Portsmouth Crown Court on Friday, November 14. This tragedy is one of several violent deaths that have shocked communities recently, including a teenager who was killed in Bury.