the Rugby Club by fellow ex-professional Marty Flynn. With time and money on his hands, he formed a business partnership with local financial advisor Richard Hillman (Brian Capron). Together, the pair worked in converting an old house – "Oakhill" into luxury flats. Duggie was determined to cut corners, preferably without Richard's knowledge. However, Richard deduced Duggie's ulterior motives and confronted him at the building – where the two argued over the project's development. Duggie is unable to assuage Richard of his suspicions, and in response Richard declares their partnership to be over. As Richard begins to leave amid ignoring Duggie's desperate attempts to make him reconsider, telling his business partner "Get lost Duggie. You had the chance, and you blew it!!", Duggie unwittingly leans over a bannister – which collapsed and he plunged two floors. Duggie was critically injured and unconscious from the fall. Richard started to phone an ambulance, but then stopped upon dialing "99" on his phone. It was then that Richard, reflecting on Duggie's dodgy intentions and the fact that he made a fool of him by forging their business partnership in the first place, decided to instead get rid of his unwanted business partner for good – by leaving Duggie to die rather than help him. Putting his phone away, Richard professionally rifled through Duggie's pockets, and took his keys to infiltrate his house – where he managed to decode his safe and steel his cash from the sale of The Rovers. Richard then left the house discreetly, and returned to the house to put the keys back in Duggie's pocket. There, Duggie is confirmed dead; Richard noticed that he had crawled to another room and died of his injuries. After leaving his body at the house for the night, Richard returned the following morning with his fiancé Gail Platt (Helen Worth) – who has requested Richard to give her a tour around the house to see how his development is coming on. With reluctance, Richard complies and leads Gail to discover Duggie's body – where she discovers that he has already passed away. The couple subsequently phone the police, and Duggie's body is taken away in a private ambulance. It is then that Duggie's death becomes public knowledge around Weatherfield, and they arrange for his funeral a couple of weeks later; however, his son Tom never attended – as he was ostensibly too busy cutting