THE son of a man who took his own life after serving nine years in jail for the murder of a taxi driver, despite corroborated evidence that another man boasted he was the real killer, has himself committed suicide.

The death of 25-year-old Grant Wilson has devastated his family who have been fighting to clear the name of his father, John McIntosh, saying there was a miscarriage of justice.

And they have blamed the double tragedy on the legal system that they say continues to let them down.

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Grant Wilson

John McIntosh was 17 when he was sentenced to life for stabbing Stephen McDermott, 27, outside his home in Nitshill, Glasgow, during a night of violence in February, 1992.

In 2014, he took his own life after he spent nine years in prison for the drug-fuelled killing. Since his release he had fought to clear his name after another man claimed to be the killer.

He shocked other users of the social networking site Twitter with comments shortly before his death at home in Airdrie, North Lanarkshire. His last words were: "The End."

He had previously admitted he had tried to kill himself three times as a result of "the torment of what happened".

His son, Grant, who was just two when his dad was jailed, had been suffering from depression. Following an incident late on Friday night, he died in the early hours of Saturday morning. Police had been called to a flat in Shettleston, in the east end of Glasgow.

He had been on a night out and it is understood he told friends he wanted to be with his dad.

One of Mr Wilson's last social media posts quotes a lyric from the late rap legend Tupac Shakur. It stated: "Behind every sweet smile, there is a bitter sadness that no-one can ever see and feel."

His grandmother, Dorothy Mackay, said that her son and now her grandson "had been taken away through the law telling lies and through the truth not being told".

Mrs Mackay, who hopes to put her grandson's ashes beside her son's at Dalnotter Crematorium, Clydebank, said: "I'm ripped apart. I couldn't stop crying. I was like a mother to Grant.

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 Dorothy McKay (right) and daughter Dorothy Ramsden

"He was petrified of the police because he knew what happened to his dad and he always thought it was going to happen to him.

"So Grant wouldn't open the door when the police arrived.

"He thought the police were coming to get him rather than help him. The police were just doing their job. They didn't know what he would do."

The family took the case to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission in an attempt to get a posthumous pardon last year with support from the Glasgow-based Miscarriages of Justice Organisation, which said Mr McIntosh's death was a scandal.

But the SCRC decided not to refer the case back to the High Court saying it did not believe a miscarriage of justice had taken place, backing the court's view, and saying it was not persuaded that the additional evidence was "significant".

Evidence revealed Mr McIntosh's co-accused, Stephen Harkins, from Johnstone, Renfrewshire, had boasted about being the real murderer before and after the trial but this was deemed inadmissable by appeal judges in 1994.

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A picture of father and son has pride of place at Mrs McKay's home

At the original trial, the jury convicted Mr McIntosh of murder by a majority verdict, and, also by a majority, found the murder charge against Mr Harkins - then 22 - not proven.

Scottish Secretary Donald Dewar intervened in 1997 to refer the case to the Court of Criminal Appeal.

In one earlier dissenting judgement, Lord McCluskey accused his colleagues of failing to attach enough importance to the crucial principle that the court should do everything it could to avoid convicting the innocent and that the 'hearsay' rule should be relaxed.

By the time of the appeal there were seven affidavits, including one from prison officer William Blake, saying that Mr Harkins had boasted about being the real murderer. But the statements came after Mr Harkins died in January 1999.

But Mr McIntosh's family were stunned when appeal judge Lord Coulsfield in 2000, while accepting the evidence may have led a jury to accept Harkins did claim on several occasions that he had committed the murder, felt it was not of such significance to show a miscarriage of justice had occurred. Lord Coulsfield then dismissed the appeal.