The wife of former Bermuda prosecutor Lloyd Rayney has been murdered in Perth, Australia.

The body of mother-of-two Corryn Rayney was discovered by detectives early yesterday in a makeshift grave in a park in the western Australian city. She had been missing for nine days after failing to come home after an evening class.

Members of Bermuda's legal community last night expressed their horror at the news. Lawyer Kulandra Ratneser was acting Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) when Mr. Rayney worked here as a Senior Crown counsel from 2003 to 2004.

"I knew his wife very well," Mr. Ratneser told The Royal Gazette. "She lived here for a short time. She was an extremely nice lady and a very, very popular lawyer. She had an enormous career in front of her and would have become a judge. She was likely to have become one of the first coloured judges that Australia has had."

Mr. Ratneser, who also worked with Mr. Rayney in western Australia prior to both coming to the Island, said Mrs. Rayney, 44, was originally from Goa, India.

"It's very sad news," he added. "I spoke to Mr. Rayney this morning and he was completely distraught. They were estranged but they were living together in the same house."

Mr. Rayney, who worked at the Office of the DPP in Bermuda for just over a year, was mentor to former Crown counsel Graveney Bannister.

"When he left Bermuda we had developed a close friendship," said Mr. Bannister. "His family came out here, his wife and children, and then we all went off to Disney World together.

"His wife was a perfect lady. Very quiet, very unassuming. She more or less befriended my wife when she came over."

He added: "It's very sad and it was very shocking to hear the news. I can only have them in my prayers. I will be calling him."

Mr. Bannister's wife Deeanda said: "My heart goes out so deeply to the children because her and I both have two girls around the same age and they did spend time together.

"I enjoyed my time with the family tremendously and it's really, really depressing to me to find out what has happened."

The West Australian newspaper reported yesterday that Mrs. Rayney was identified by DNA analysis after detectives found a body buried beside a track in Perth's Kings Park, near to where her car had been discovered.

Investigators followed an oil leak from the vehicle to the grave site, less than a kilometre away.

Detective Senior Sergeant Jack Lee told the West Australian that it was too early to say how she was killed.

"We don't know what injuries she has got, this is way too early," he said. "We haven't completed our examination of the scene yet, this is a very painstaking forensic procedure."

Mrs. Rayney, a West Australian Supreme Court registrar, had two daughters, aged ten and 12, with her husband, who was described by the newspaper as a prominent Perth lawyer.

Mr. Rayney came to Bermuda in May 2003 and left the following June. While here, he successfully prosecuted Justis Smith — the man accused but never convicted of murdering Canadian teen Rebecca Middleton in 1996 — for stabbing a girl at Dockyard.