Patrick James "Pat" Phelan is a businessman, builder and con artist.
From late 2013 to early 2014 he was involved in a conflict with his business partner Owen Armstrong, along with Owen's partner Anna Windass and her son Gary after Phelan behaved inappropriately towards Anna, resulting in Gary physically assaulting him. After blackmailing Owen and Gary into overworking for a project, Phelan coerced Anna into sleeping with him before leaving.
Phelan returned in early 2016, once again working as a builder. He began a relationship with Eileen Grimshaw while plotting to scam local residents with his friend Vinny Ashford by taking deposits for nonexistent luxury flats. A suspicious Michael Rodwell uncovered evidence of the scam, but collapsed from a heart attack before he could share his findings. Phelan left Michael to die. Soon afterwards, Phelan learned that he himself had been conned by Vinny who had escaped with the money, forcing Phelan to remain in Weatherfield where he eventually married Eileen.
Michael's close friend Andy Carver attacked Phelan, leading to Phelan repeatedly blackmailing him. After Andy burned down Kevin Webster's garage under Phelan's orders, he stole a laptop containing evidence against Phelan, but was overpowered by him. Phelan kidnapped Andy and chained him up in the basement of an abandoned house, as he had been unable to bring himself to kill him.
In June 2017, Phelan met a young woman called Nicola Rubinstein, who he began to suspect was his long lost daughter. A DNA test confirmed his paternity and he quickly formed a close bond with her. Phelan softened with Nicola around and even nearly released Andy after several months of captivity.
Phelan encountered Vinny's mother and used her to threaten Vinny into returning. When Vinny obliged Phelan kidnapped him and chained him in the basement with Andy. Phelan ordered Andy to kill Vinny with a gun in exchange for his freedom. On the same day, Nicola learned from a family friend that she was born as the result of a sexual assault and not an affair as Phelan had claimed. After Nicola ordered Phelan to stay away from her, he reached a sinister turning point and once Andy had killed Vinny, Phelan turned the gun on Andy and shot him dead.
Biography
2013-2014: Feud with the Armstrong/Windass clan
Pat Phelan was a client of Owen Armstrong, and temporarily became his business partner. When he refused to pay Owen for a job, Owen soon discovered that Pat was bankrupt. Owen then attempted to get the money out of Pat's wife Valerie, however she refused to pay. Owen and Gary Windass broke into Pat's home, stole his motorbike and locked it away at the Builder's Yard. Pat eventually decided to pay up what he owed and seemingly called it quits.
A few days before Christmas, Pat turned up at 6 Coronation Street in order to put forward a business proposition to Owen, offering him a flat-conversion contract and wanting Owen to front the project as he was bankrupt. Owen's partner Anna Windass wasn't pleased and didn't want Owen to agree. However, a couple of weeks later Phelan and Owen met up to discuss the deal with Phelan telling Owen that he needed £80,000 upfront for the costs but guaranteed that he would make over £200,000 profit. Owen decided to talk the arrangement over with Anna with Phelan stating that he would give Owen twenty-four hours to think things over. Despite family reservations, the business partnership was agreed.
When Owen realised that Phelan didn't put his share into the account he tried in vain to contact Phelan and believed that Phelan may have conned them. Pat later turned up at the Builder's Yard and revealed that the money was already in the account, much to Owen's embarrassment. Anna then went round to Pat's house to apologise for having a go at him, but later felt uneasy in his presence and left. During numerous meets with Pat and his wife, Anna felt increasingly awkward - especially on one occasion when Pat had stroked her across the back and kept complimenting her appearance.
Anna decided to settle the score and invited Phelan round to No.6 to tell him to back off. However Phelan, seemingly oblivious to her demands, began to accuse her of trying to come onto him. He appeared to try and make a move on her, but soon left leaving Anna worried. That night she backed out of another meeting with the Phelans at Nick's Bistro, feigning illness. When Gary found out about Phelan's inappropriate advances towards his mother, he approached Pat at the building site after all the other staff working on the project had left and began questioning him about what went on. Pat then began goading Gary, accused Anna of being a tart and the pair got into a fight; Gary hit Phelan over the head with a plank of wood and knocked him out unconscious. Believing that he had killed Pat, Gary summoned Owen to the site but they quickly discovered there was no sign of him.
Phelan turned up again a few of days later, proving that he was alive and well. At the building site the following day, he took Gary and Owen into the site office and revealed the CCTV footage which showed Gary attacking him. Phelan assured both Gary and Owen that he had further copies, and then demanded that they either completed the work for a minimum wage gleaning no profit or he would hand the the CCTV footage in to the police. Owen complied to Phelan's orders despite Gary's reluctance, as Owen didn't want his grandson Jake to grow up without a father figure if Gary were to be sent to prison.
Phelan delighted in overworking Owen and Gary, who began to take their frustrations out on their family. Gary, deciding to get a measure of revenge on Phelan and to try and make a bit of money back, stole a shipment of tiles from him. However Phelan found out it was Gary due to his poor attempt to cover his tracks and told Owen that, in exchange for him not going to the police, he had to agree to forfeit the £80,000 he invested in the job. Owen was furious, but felt he had no choice to agree. Phelan then twisted the knife by arranging for Owen to be removed from the council's list of approved builders, effectively blacklisting him which meant he could no longer get any independent work. Anna visited Phelan after realising what strain his actions were causing to her family, and he gave her proposition: to have sex with him and he would let Gary and Owen go from the project. Although disgusted, Anna went along with Phelan's plans out of desperation and met him at the Dunford Hall Hotel where the pair slept together. After spending some time with him, a dirty and angry Anna left after Phelan laughed and teased her. The next day he told Owen and Gary to go home, and got Owen to sign a form releasing him from the project. However he refused to pay back Owen's investment, leaving him with a loan he was going to struggle to pay back.
In June 2014, Phelan sent the Windasses a postcard from Dubai in an attempt to rub his glory in further. Around this time, Anna admitted to Owen that she had slept with Pat in order for him to leave the Windass family alone. The revelation drove the couple apart as Owen was disgusted by her behaviour. However things didn't work out for Phelan either as Valerie had finally saw him for what he really was and divorced him. As he was bankrupt and she had all the money and assets in her name, he was left with nothing.
2016: Return and relationship with Eileen Grimshaw
Phelan had returned to Weatherfield by January 2016, working as a labourer on the conversion project for Kevin Webster's new garage. Having witnessed the getaway from the bungled robbery at Nick's Bistro, Phelan stood in front of the car but Kevin, realising that the vehicle wasn't going to stop, pulled him to safety- not knowing his true identity. As a concerned Anna went to check on Kevin, she was stunned to see Phelan.
Phelan became close friends with Vinny Ashford. Phelan and Vinny built a scam project together, and then began a relationship with Eileen Grimshaw. After Eileen's son Todd discovered the deception, he also went along with the scam. Eileen's ex-partner, Michael Rodwell, attempted to bring him down permanently. Michael broke into Phelan's office and discovered fake passports, but when Phelan arrived unexpectedly and noticed he was there; Michael threw a chair at him in desperation and ran out of the office. Outside, as Michael collapsed from a heart attack, Phelan looked on as Michael lay dying instead of calling for an ambulance. He then walked away from the scene, leaving Michael to succumb to his heart attack. Todd found Michael dead the following morning and Vinny did a runner with the money.
2017-: Feud with Andy Carver and discovery of Nicola Rubenstein
In December 2016, Andy Carver wanted revenge on Phelan for what he had done. After trying to kill him, Phelan blackmailed Andy into doing what he wanted, threatening to go to the police and send him down for attempted murder. Firstly, Andy was ordered to steal the new iPads that Nick had bought for the Bistro; where Andy worked at. When Anna had fallen downstairs on New Year's Eve, Kevin's six-year-old son, Jack, ran off to get help and Phelan offered to help. He had to kick the door in to rescue Anna. After fixing the door, Phelan stole the receipt for Kevin's new pick-up truck. A few days later, Phelan called the retailer and changed the delivery address for the new truck. Andy was ordered to sell it. Andy and his girlfriend, Steph Britton, had planned to move to Portugal. A couple of days before they left, Phelan noticed that Kevin was filming him on CCTV and demanded that Andy set fire to the garage. Andy agreed. That night, Phelan poured vodka into Kevin's drink. Kevin went to sleep in a car at the garage. After Luke Britton and Tracy Barlow had sex the previous night, they also wanted CCTV footage deleted as it had been filming during the night. Afterwards, Andy poured petrol onto the floor, set fire to a bag and threw it down on the ground. Andy made off with Kevin's laptop containing the CCTV footage. On Phelan's wedding day, Phelan noticed Andy with the laptop with the footage playing. Phelan's last demand was to break the laptop. Andy hit him with it and Phelan pretended to be unconscious. He was able to grab Andy, who fought back, taking the struggle to the floor, Phelan gained the upper hand and grabbed Kevin's laptop and hit Andy with it. Phelan texted Steph using Andy's phone, leading her to believe that Andy had broken up with her and left for Bristol. Phelan then rushed to his wedding, where he married Eileen. Phelan later returned to 19a Victoria Street and attempted to clean the blood stains from the carpet with a wide assortment of cleaning products. With no progress being made, Phelan flooded the flat by breaking open the radiator.
Phelan had been gathering documents about Nicola Rubinstein who had been made Seb Franklin's case manager after he was granted parole from youth detention centre for assault. When she found out about this she reacted badly, claiming that the builder was stalking her. Phelan claimed that she had known her parents and while trying to prove his innocence, said that if he met up with them, he would be able to prove he had no bad intentions. Nicola told him to go to a bench by the lake at Greenfield Park. When Phelan got to the park, he noticed that the bench had been engraved with a plaque dedicated to the memory of her deceased parents. He revealed that he thought he might be her father. Nicola was unhappy to discover that her mother had ended the affair nine months before she was born and told Phelan that she'd rather not know whether or not he was her father.
When Eileen saw how much Nicola was affecting her husband, she decided to interfere by showing her a picture of Phelan dancing with Annabel Rubinstein. Annoyed by the thought of their affair, Nicola told Eileen to leave her alone and that if she or Phelan contacted her again, she would phone the police.
After discovering about Phelan and Nicola, Seb decided to try and get his case manager to talk to his boss again by telling Nicola that he had lost his job because Phelan was dying. Although she found out Seb was lying, Nicola decided to go to 11 Coronation Street and give Eileen a DNA test for Phelan to take. Two weeks later, she returned with the results and announced to Phelan that she was his daughter.
By August of the same year, Phelan's spare time was taken up by frequently visiting an old derelict house with supplies such as food and drink and using them to care for a chained-up Andy Carver. For at least seven months, Phelan had been holding Carver captive in the house's cellar. After Andy attempted to kill Phelan with a cord from a mattress, Phelan threatened to kill Andy - before taking the mattress and burning it.
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First and last lines
"Well... Owen!" (First line).