The mother of a British hotelier found dead in a torched car in St Lucia two days before he was due to visit England hopes "whoever’s behind it will be properly dealt with".

Both Oliver Gobat’s parents and his two older brothers, Rufus and Adam, attended the inquest at Woking Coroner's Court this morning.

The parents of the 38-year-old, Theo and Helen Gobat, who own a multimillion pound home in Esher, have been trying to find answers since their son was found dead on April 25 last year.

His mother told the inquest: "He [Oliver] was always smiling and his phrase was ‘happy days’."

His body was found in the passenger seat of his Range Rover in the Cap Estate on the north-east tip of the island, at about 10pm.

He had been shot twice in the head, before his body was torched in the car.

Two postmortem examinations were carried out in St Lucia. One found the cause of death to be from head wounds, the other offered no cause of death but suggested it was due to bullets to the head.

As a sales consultant working in St Lucia for 10 years before he died, Mr Gobat had become well integrated within the local community, especially while working on a multimillion dollar deal to acquire a hotel.

He reported to a friend he had received death threats a few years before he died.

Both parents and his brother Adam had seen him within a month-and-a-half of to his death and said he seemed stressed, but he was dealing with a large amount of people and money so this was not a surprise.

Adam Gobat, who spoke to his brother almost every day, said: "He wasn’t in the habit of making enemies. He was a very likeable person."

He never voiced any worries or told them about the threats.

Adam Gobat said: "I still ask myself that question a thousand times a day. Why he wouldn’t have told us."

Mrs Gobat said: "He was very determined. He like to succeed, everything he did he liked to succeed, and he was very close to achieving it [closing the deal], very close."

She said the St Lucian police did not deal with the death properly, moving the car on the day he was found and not cordoning off the scene, which she believed "somebody must have ordered".

She said: "He was coming to England two days after he was murdered and was trying to plan to spend more time in England, if not base himself here."

Mr Gobat lived in St Lucia for the first three years of his life before growing up in Esher. He went to Esher Church School and Danes Hill School and later, Kings College School, Wimbledon.

Mr and Mrs Gobat launched their own private investigation after the one in St Lucia stalled late last year.. The family offered a £60,000 reward, which was then raised to £120,000, for information. Surrey Police said it was aware of the Home Secretary’s decision regarding the agreement that UK police could, in principle, assist the St Lucian police with the investigation into the murder of Oliver Gobat.

It said: "No request for assistance has yet been made. However, the force will carefully consider any such request."

In December, Dominic Raab, MP for Esher and Walton, spoke in Parliament to urge the Foreign Secretary to take action.

Mrs Gobat said they had been told the British Government intended to become involved in the investigation.

Assistant coroner Karen Henderson said Mr Gobat had everything to live for and was satisfied his death was "unlawful killing".

She expressed her sympathy to his family and added she hoped his killer would be found.

Ms Henderson said: "The manner of Ollie's death is a terrible terrible tragedy that no family should ever have to endure.

"Not just that a child, and although he was an adult he was still a child to his parents, but also a brother and clearly a friend to many, no one should have to die in this way."