A MEDIUM who claims her family was stalked by the ghost of a notorious highwayman says the outlaw asked for his name to be cleared as his immortal soul was finally laid to rest.

Bill Saunders was part of Dick Turpin’s Gregory Gang which terrorised travellers through Epping Forest during the early 18th century before being executed for his crimes.

The Coughlan family, of Roding Lane North, Woodford Bridge, took the supposed stalking so seriously they called in exorcists.

Helen Coughlan insists the ghost claims he was an innocent party in the gang murder and so has refused to pass over to the other side while known as a killer.

Mrs Coughlan said she was delighted to help what she believes is a tortured soul finally leave her family home.

She said: “There was a stench of rotting flesh whenever he was close as, while highwaymen were buried in consecrated ground, murderers were hung and their corpses allowed to decompose until they were nothing but bone.

“He spoke to me and said that he had been staying around the place as he didn’t want to cross over as a murderer as he was innocent of the crime.

“Now I can go to my brother Matthew’s room and it’s warm when before it would always be icy even if you turned on all the radiators and plug-in heaters.

“We performed an exorcism which involves the last rites so now his soul has been commended to God and he seems feels a lot freer now.”

Epping Forest historian Peter Lawrence told the Guardian that Saunders was captured after a raid on a farm with other members of the Gregory Gang.

He added: “Saunders was hanged at Tyburn - where Marble Arch is today - and then hung in chains in Edgware where his most heinous crimes were committed.”

Rev Spencer Hayward performed the exorcism with his wife Janet.

He said: “We use traditional methods of prayer with bibles and candles. Hopefully we managed to clear whatever the entity was and he will be at rest now.”