A WEALTHY businessman from North Yorkshire was brutally murdered on a Caribbean island, Venezuelan officials said today.

Police in Venezuela said Kenneth Todd was bludgeoned to death with the butt of a pistol on the island of Margarita.

Mr Todd, a director of a waste management company in Thirsk, was robbed and killed in his hotel room.

Detectives from the local equivalent of Britain's CID, the Cuerpo de Investigaciones Cientficas Penales y Criminalsticas (CICPC), were today continuing to investigate the murder.

Meanwhile, the island's governor Morel Rodrguez Avila was due to meet Margarita's Consejo de Seguridad (Security Council) today to discuss the incident.

CICPC regional director Obdulio Moreno told the Evening Press that Mr Todd was attacked in his room in the Hotel La Posada, in the small community of San Juan Bautista, north-west of the island's main city, Porlamar.

Seor Moreno said: "Cash, jewellery and a camera were taken from rooms D6 and D7 in the hotel, which had been reserved by the businessman.

"We do not yet have any information about who or how many people committed the murder.

"Investigations are continuing to identify and capture the murderers."

A spokesman for the Hospital Luis Ortega in Porlamar confirmed that Mr Todd's body was brought to the hospital's morgue at about 5.30pm on Sunday - 10.30pm UK time.

The spokesman said: "According to the forensic report, the body showed multiple head wounds, probably caused by blows from the butt of a pistol."

Margarita is a mountainous tropical island off the north coast of Venezuela.

The island has seen a tourist boom in recent years, following the introduction of direct flights from Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands.

In Britain, a spokesman for FD Todd & Sons, one of the leading waste management companies in North Yorkshire, said the family would release a statement in due course.

The Evening Press reported yesterday that the Foreign and Commonwealth office were providing "consular assistance" to the family.

Founded more than 100 years ago, FD Todd & Sons is North Yorkshire's largest independent waste management company.

It operates at six sites across the region, including its headquarters in Thirsk, a depot in Rufforth and a stone quarry at Knapton, near Malton.

The company is responsible for the kerbside collection of newspapers and magazines from 40,000 households across North Yorkshire and also offers skip hire, recycling services and the supply of building tools and materials.

Updated: 09:41 Thursday, October 20, 2005