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Murder Point of Contact Season 1 Episode 1
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#Murder
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FunTranscript
00:00This was a cold and calculated murder.
00:16There's always a breaking point in an investigation.
00:24The timeline of events didn't add up.
00:30It was crucial we supported our family contact.
00:51This case was the saddest case that I have ever dealt with in my whole service.
00:56Jamie was a vulnerable little boy as well as a funny little boy.
01:02In my heart, I was hoping and praying he was OK and he'd come home.
01:08Any murders are very, very serious, but the murder of a child is very emotive.
01:13When I saw the small coffin coming towards me, it was sad to see he had the rest of his life to live and it just was not fair.
01:22I was informed on the 24th of October 1997 that I needed to attend the lavish home address.
01:39I was tasked to inform them the tragic news that the remains of their eight-year-old son, Jamie, had been found.
01:49From that moment, I became their point of contact.
01:53My name is Asif Hussein, I'm a former Greater Manchester police officer and I was assigned as a family liaison officer, also known as a flow, on the Jamie Lavis murder investigation.
02:05Family liaison officer is very, very important.
02:10They need to be in there straight away to advise them because people don't know what to do, they're in such shock.
02:18You've got to gather information from the victim's family and at the same time support them in every way you can.
02:26That's the difference with being a uniformed police officer on patrol and being a flow.
02:31You have to become a friend of the family.
02:35Jamie had been missing for around eight months at this point.
02:39I will never forget delivering what we call a death message and he's stayed with me ever since.
02:45PHONE RINGS
02:52PHONE RINGS
02:54PHONE RINGS
02:56Hello, PCS N. Grey Millen area office.
02:59Yes, sir. I'm aware about the eight-year-old missing boy, Jamie Lavis.
03:03Come to the office?
03:05Yes, of course I will.
03:06On the 24th of October, 1997, a call came in advising us that clothing,
03:14had been found identified as that belonging to Jamie Lavis.
03:18It was two young children and they were friends of Jamie Lavis.
03:23They were approached by this fella,
03:26seeing as though he wanted them to take them into the woods.
03:29The children became frightened and they run off.
03:32My name is Roy Rainford.
03:34I was the senior investigating officer in 1997 on the investigation involving Jamie Lavis.
03:41It was a missing from home at that time.
03:45But it was a missing from home of an eight-year-old child who was very, very vulnerable.
03:51Due to the information given us, we were directed to an area of Reddish Vale.
03:58It's a country park.
04:01Where Reddish Vale is, there's Reddish Vale Golf Club.
04:04It runs parallel with the park.
04:07But off the beaten track of that park, it becomes like a jungle.
04:12You can't walk through certain parts of that area without using two arms,
04:18climbing over broken pottery, over broken trees, pushing your way through bushes.
04:25And Mr Rainford said he was going to get the pulser team, the search team, the police dogs and divers,
04:31to go to that location because there was a big river there.
04:34I can remember that day well because it was raining heavily.
04:40And I knew that area where they were searching was a bit of a quagmire.
04:44And we had specialist search officers there.
04:47We had a system that anything was found, the exhibits officer would go and collect it
04:52to make sure it was dealt with properly, evidential-wise.
04:56We took the top two inches of soil off that area, and they found a number of bones.
05:06The search officers found a milk tooth and scooped up some clothing,
05:13brought it back to the police station, and there was a golf ball in the pocket.
05:21My name is Kim Doyle, and in the 90s, I was in a divisional
05:26Crown Prosecutor in Greater Manchester.
05:28The clothing was taken back to the police station to be bagged and properly looked after
05:34because it had, you know, huge forensic potential.
05:37The exhibits officer came to see me, told me what he'd collected.
05:42It was all in a bag, and I had advised him to lay it out, dry it out,
05:46and we'd go down and examine it.
05:48Within a matter of minutes of him leaving me, he was back up,
05:51said he'd stretched the clothing, and he'd found a jawbone.
06:01I remember him telling me that he was very, very shocked to find it.
06:05I then got in contact with a forensic pathologist,
06:10and he immediately identified it as belonging to a child,
06:13between about seven years and 11 years.
06:17So we'd found clothing which could be described by the family
06:22as similar to what Jamie was wearing when he was missing,
06:26and we found this human jawbone.
06:29A number of bones and a milk tooth.
06:33We were able to use dental records then to identify Jamie.
06:36To tell somebody that their eight-year-old son is not coming home
06:48is the saddest thing you could ever tell anybody.
06:56Death messages are the worst message that any police officer
07:00can give to a member of a family.
07:04It's awful, but somebody has to tell them,
07:07whether it be a murder, whether it be an accident,
07:09whether it be a sudden death.
07:11As an FLO, that's your job,
07:13to make sure they're aware of everything.
07:15Before the newspapers or the television report anything,
07:19they need to be made aware of it.
07:22I got a phone call.
07:27I went to tell them that we had recovered
07:32some remains and some clothing
07:36identical of that worn by their son,
07:39and that made me feel very sad
07:41because all the hope that they had disappeared.
07:47I said, what is it?
07:48He said, we've found remains.
07:50Human remains.
07:52Human remains.
07:53A wax jacket.
07:54A Reebok tracksuit.
07:55And one boot.
07:56I identified the clothes.
07:58Jamie's.
08:03We showed Karen Labies the remains
08:06in a white shoebox in the presence of Roy Rainford.
08:09That was very difficult.
08:11She said, where's the rest of him?
08:13I think she said, that's what she said.
08:16And I said, I'm sorry.
08:19I don't know.
08:20We've searched everywhere.
08:22Really heartbreaking.
08:23Really, really heartbreaking.
08:25A couple of weeks before we went missing,
08:29me and Jamie actually went to the dentist
08:32and our teeth out.
08:33I'm Jamie Labies and I'm Jamie Labies' sister.
08:37That was the only identifier that really they could find,
08:41that was Jamie.
08:42It was his jawbone.
08:48I just collapsed.
08:49I never got to say goodbye.
08:51I never got...
08:54Sorry.
08:55There was no old way.
09:07Once my mum and my nana came back from identifying the clothes
09:11and Jamie's jawbone, we all just cumbled.
09:16They were devastated.
09:18Broken hearted.
09:20And I was broken hearted.
09:22I don't know how a parent ever comes to terms
09:26with the murder of the child.
09:30This has now turned into a murder inquiry.
09:42I first met the Labies family on the 5th of May, 1997,
09:46when I was notified that their eight-year-old son had gone missing.
09:50In cases of people going missing,
09:52the family liaison officer is a supportive post
09:56and an informative post.
09:59Jamie lived with his mother and his father.
10:02He'd got two older sisters, an elder brother
10:05and a younger brother at that time.
10:08There was Nicholas, who was 16.
10:10Jane, who was about 13.
10:12John was about 11.
10:14and Scott was four.
10:18It was...
10:205th of May, 1997, Bank Holiday Monday.
10:24And Jamie went out with his brother, John.
10:26It was about...
10:27I'd say about half past eight, nine o'clock.
10:30I shouted to say, your breakfast.
10:31John come in.
10:32I said, where's Jamie?
10:34He's over at Quicksave.
10:35I said, will we go and get him?
10:37He said, he's not coming in.
10:38Jamie used to play out every day
10:41and used to go to Quicksave Ashton Hall Road
10:45in Openshaw, Manchester,
10:47where he would help elderly people with the shopping baskets
10:50and, in return, he would receive a pound.
10:53That was Jamie.
10:55He'd help anybody.
10:57He was so lovable.
10:58He constantly put his arms around me, kissed me on my cheek.
11:01I didn't get concerned or anything.
11:05I did at the night time when it got tea-timish
11:08and he weren't in.
11:10So I just knew something wasn't right.
11:13Jamie wasn't a child who liked the dark.
11:16And this is what I couldn't understand.
11:18Where was he?
11:19Why didn't he come home?
11:24Me and Nicola and Jane, John,
11:26we were locking on Jamie's friend's doors,
11:29walking on the streets.
11:31We couldn't find him anywhere.
11:32It was like he'd disappeared off the base of the earth.
11:35We just didn't know what to do.
11:37So we rang the police at 10 o'clock.
11:40I was a police officer on the beat
11:43as a community beat officer
11:45dealing with members of the community and Home Watch.
11:48I was involved with a lot of families on my beat
11:51and I used to help them out on a regular basis
11:54with domestic disputes and missing children.
11:57The day I got the call to be a family liaison officer,
12:00I was on patrol in police uniform.
12:03So I attended the police station,
12:05spoke to Superintendent Roy Rainford
12:07who advised me to go home, get a suit and tie on
12:11and attend the address of the Lavish family.
12:14It was a missing from home of an eight-year-old child
12:17who was very, very vulnerable.
12:19Jamie was hyperactive and he couldn't sense danger.
12:25Everybody assumed he was naughty, but he wasn't.
12:27He'd had assessments, he had ADHD.
12:31We had to have eyes all over your body to keep an eye on him
12:34because if he moved one minute, he'd be gone
12:36because that's the kid that he was.
12:38The slightest thing has distracted him and he was off.
12:41We needed to ensure that child's safety
12:44because at that time everybody believed that Jamie was alive.
12:50Jamie Lavish lived in the Open Shore area of Manchester
13:02on a main arterial road between a town called Ashton Underline
13:06and the Manchester city centre.
13:09He was on a major bus route.
13:11When I turned up at the Lavish's house the first day,
13:16I paused, drove round the block several times,
13:21thinking, what's the first thing I'm going to say?
13:23What would I say to my wife if my son was missing?
13:28Knocked on the door, I just said,
13:30I'm really sorry about the disappearance of your eight-year-old son
13:34and I will do everything to help you find him.
13:37From that moment, he was, like, helping us
13:41and do whatever we needed to do.
13:44The reaction from Mum and Dad was tears
13:47and also relief. I could see it in their faces.
13:56For the next nine days,
13:58there was intensive searching by the uniform staff.
14:01There was dogs used, horses used, helicopter used.
14:06Line searches.
14:09The searching, like, disused sheds and things like that
14:13was heart-wrenching.
14:15Wondering, was he cold? Was he hungry?
14:19Did he have clothes?
14:22You block it out because you don't want to remember.
14:25They couldn't speak because they were crying constantly.
14:28It was scary. It was horrible
14:30because I just had this feeling that something could happen to him.
14:34When I see a family struggling, it obviously affects me.
14:38It's upsetting to see them going through a difficult time.
14:41At first, I felt a bit wary of him, of us,
14:45because the police was there, but then I got to know him
14:48and I felt more comfortable for him to be there.
14:51And I told them, even though I'm a police officer,
14:54I'm their friend as well.
14:57From that moment, obviously, that's how we got attached to Asif
15:01because he was the only one that I really spoke to
15:04out of everybody that got uncomfortable with anything.
15:06He was there for us all the time.
15:10With you being there constantly,
15:12you're constantly receiving information
15:14and then you're passing it back to the information room
15:17who are dealing with the missing from home.
15:19The FLO will go out
15:21and hopefully bring back pieces of the jigsaw puzzle,
15:24and it's down to the SIO
15:26and his management team to put them together
15:29and get the full story.
15:31At that time, I was becoming more and more concerned.
15:36He could have been injured,
15:38he could have been involved in an accident,
15:40or he could have died, basically.
15:44This child still hadn't materialised.
15:46The police decided they needed to begin
15:49a much more thorough investigation to his disappearance.
15:52We needed to make sure that everything was being done
15:56to return him to his family safely.
16:00As a family liaison officer,
16:03I kept the Lavis family involved in the investigation
16:06of their son being missing.
16:09I would tell them on the progression of the incident room
16:13who were looking for Jamie Lavis,
16:15especially that we were now making posters
16:18and distributing them to local shops.
16:20I became the point of contact for that family
16:23and for dealing with members of the press
16:25who were constantly knocking at the door.
16:27I also told the family
16:29that there were going to be news bulletins
16:31on the local television.
16:32I said,
16:33we're speaking to the TV people,
16:35Grenada reports,
16:37and we're hoping to do a TV appeal.
16:40Would you and John mind coming with me?
16:43I'll take you and I'll stay with you.
16:45And then if whoever may have Jamie sees you on the TV,
16:51it might help them when they see how distressed you are
16:56to release him and let him come home.
16:59And they both agreed to do that.
17:01And Jamie's described as being small for his age.
17:04He's about four foot tall,
17:06and he wears clothes that are made to fit a five- to six-year-old.
17:11Please, just get in touch with the police.
17:13Everybody's waiting for him to come home.
17:16Roy Rainford didn't leave any stone unturned,
17:19and I told them that.
17:20They were happy that the police were doing everything they could.
17:24We was looked after.
17:25We knew he was comfortable.
17:27And if we needed anything,
17:29could I speak to anybody?
17:30We knew he was there to help us.
17:34We kept getting sightings, daily sightings.
17:37They were saying,
17:38yes, I know Jamie, that's him.
17:41All the sightings are being investigated.
17:43Other people are being interviewed.
17:45We did not, at that stage,
17:47believe that he'd come to any harm.
17:51As longer Jamie was missing,
17:53the more I was finding things out from his family,
17:57from his friends.
17:58Once you get to know the family,
18:00it helps a lot,
18:01because they start to trust you and tell you things
18:05which they may not have told the police that first came.
18:09The family telling me
18:13that a stranger had knocked on their door
18:16after seeing me drive off.
18:24We got a knock on the door,
18:26and it was my sister-in-law
18:28who answered the door.
18:30And she said,
18:32who are you?
18:33He said, I'm just wondering,
18:34is it you what's got a little boy, what's got missing?
18:37He happened to be wearing a dark blue Reebok tracksuit
18:40and a little wax jacket.
18:42So, she brought him in the house.
18:45Said he'd had him on the bus that day.
18:49Darren Vickers was a bus driver.
18:52He'd been employed by the bus company for about one month.
18:55He drove the 219 Dennis bus along Ashton Hall Road to Ashton.
19:01He told Karen that Jamie had been on the bus
19:04and that he may have been the last person to have seen him.
19:07And he said, yeah, he was on my bus for seven hours.
19:10Karen and John, absolutely delighted with that information.
19:15It gives them hope.
19:17Karen Labies told me that Darren Vickers
19:20was going to come back the next day.
19:22I spoke to the SIO and said,
19:25what would you like me to do?
19:27He said, get as much information off this man as you can.
19:30I got to the house at half eleven in the morning at twelve o'clock.
19:45Darren Vickers walked in.
19:47He was about five foot seven, medium build.
19:53He was renting a terraced house round the corner
19:57from the Labies family.
19:59He lived there with his wife and two small children.
20:02He said he'd worked on the buses around a month.
20:06He said that Jamie Labies got onto his bus,
20:10Ashton Hall Road, near to Quick Save Supermarket,
20:16and that he drove him to Ashton.
20:19And he remembers him because he was only small.
20:22He said he then got off the bus at Ashton Bus Station,
20:26and that's where the bus turned round,
20:28and then he said he didn't see him after that.
20:30So I recorded his details, told him I'd be in touch.
20:35Darren Vickers was visiting the family home
20:38two or three times a week,
20:40and as the investigation progressed, it increased.
20:44He was there most days.
20:46He was there every day.
20:47There wasn't a day where he wasn't there.
20:49Vickers was in and out of the house,
20:52always out searching for Jamie,
20:55taking the family with him.
20:57Darren was telling me where they were going
20:59and what locations they'd been visiting.
21:02Thought he was giving us some information we needed,
21:06but my daughters, my two daughters,
21:08they had a feeling something wasn't right.
21:11Family became so close to Darren Vickers
21:16You know, he'd turn up, he'd have dinners with them.
21:20Sometimes he'd have, you know, cups of tea with them.
21:23I mean, they just loved him.
21:26He was like a hero to them.
21:28That became a real challenge.
21:30I know for the family liaison officers
21:32who were working with the family to deal with.
21:35I felt let down that they trusted this stranger more than me.
21:40I just kept on watching Darren Vickers.
21:43I wanted to know where he was going
21:45and the reasons for where he was going.
21:47It wasn't just one thing that Vickers was doing.
21:50It was a multitude of things that was attracting our attention.
21:55If you had any respect,
21:56we'd just hand him over to the nearest police station,
21:58just let the child go in, just let him come home.
22:00He's not in trouble.
22:01It's not nothing.
22:02He's just wanted.
22:03Including the press releases that he was giving,
22:06the press interviews he was giving,
22:09without any notice to us.
22:12And, of course, the press doing the job, they loved it.
22:15But it wasn't helping the investigation.
22:17Somebody somewhere knows where Jamie is.
22:20He was always trying to control our investigation and the press,
22:24and he was certainly controlling the family.
22:27Well, my dad wasn't very comfortable with him.
22:31My mum, she was trying to be nice like she is,
22:34and making me sure that he was to thank him
22:38for what he was doing with us.
22:40I felt that Darren Vickers was manipulating the Lavis family.
22:44He was using them to gather this information
22:47for his own purpose.
22:48And I told Roy Rainford my thoughts.
22:52I said, I think he's number one suspect, sir.
22:57That's really his motive.
23:00Well, how could it be me?
23:02How could it be me involved in this
23:05when I'm trying to help the family?
23:07I'm the hero.
23:09It's not me.
23:19I've got nothing to do with the abduction of James Lavis.
23:22And I've got the backing of the Lavis family,
23:24relations, everybody.
23:28Darren Vickers became our prime suspect.
23:32He was arrested on the 27th of May,
23:35and we interviewed him over a period of about two days.
23:41We look back when he first got arrested and think,
23:44why didn't we think like the police thought?
23:47You don't. You don't think like that.
23:50Any help when you've lost a child, you'll accept it.
23:53He told us that Jamie had been on his bus up and down
23:58the arterial road from Ashton Underline to Piccadilly
24:02and back again.
24:03I was coming back from Manchester,
24:05and they said to him that I'm going to have to
24:07start you back off now because it's my last run off.
24:10But he was adamant that he'd dropped him off at the bus stop
24:15near to his home in Oakenshaw that same day.
24:19He then clarified.
24:21He'd just got frightened that he was going to become involved
24:25in the inquiry as some sort of suspect,
24:28that we did believe that he had something to do
24:31with Jamie going missing.
24:34They call it the policeman's nose or whatever.
24:37They just have that feeling that he's not telling the truth.
24:42We didn't have enough evidence to bring charges,
24:45so we released him back into the arms of John and Karen,
24:50and they threw a party for him.
24:55And we were vilified within the press for arresting the wrong person,
25:00but we were getting stronger and stronger suspicions
25:03that he had something to do with Jamie's disappearance.
25:07We never, throughout the inquiry, relieved Asif from his duties as a floor.
25:16Asif was always, as far as I was concerned, at the centre
25:21because he knew the family, he'd got some sort of liaison with the family,
25:26even though they were not happy at that time with the police investigation.
25:32Yes, he was still a missing from home inquiry,
25:37but more and more we were leaning towards
25:40whether they were going to get this child back alive.
25:48Darren Vickers arranged with Karen Leavis and John
25:51to move into the house.
25:53I thought it was astonishing.
25:55How weird for a grown man to leave his wife and two children,
26:00moving with another family round the corner.
26:03I was concerned.
26:08We moved him into our house because we thought he was a friend.
26:11It changed my role because they didn't want my support as much.
26:16Darren Vickers had now taken over control of the searches,
26:20and the children and John and Karen found him more important at that time,
26:27which made it difficult.
26:28I tried to stay professional at all times,
26:31so they could see I'm a strong person.
26:33Around June 1997,
26:36John and Karen were expecting another baby,
26:39and in fact they asked Darren Vickers would he be the godfather.
26:43It just showed how much he'd manipulated that family into trusting him.
26:48I didn't tell Karen and John that I suspected Darren Vickers
26:53had been involved with the disappearance of their son
26:55because I didn't want to upset them or frighten them or their children,
26:59and I just kept on watching what Darren Vickers was doing.
27:04One of the younger members of the team suggested to us
27:08that Darren Vickers had a number of outstanding warrants
27:11on driving offences.
27:14I instructed him to find out where he was
27:16and arrest him on those warrants.
27:19He went to prison, I believe, for ten weeks,
27:21which assisted our investigation.
27:24It put him out of circulation
27:27so he couldn't interfere within the family
27:30and couldn't interfere with our investigation
27:34to try and manipulate the press.
27:36A friend of Darren Vickers informed us
27:43that Darren had told him
27:47that he hadn't dropped Jamie off at the bus stop
27:51near to Jamie's home
27:53on that day of the 5th of May.
27:56Darren Vickers had, in fact,
27:59taken Jamie on the bus
28:02back to the bus depot at Hyde.
28:07He'd then put Jamie in his own car
28:11and then taken him back to Openshaw
28:14and dropped him off near his home address.
28:20So, again, that pointed us in the direction
28:25that Darren Vickers wasn't telling us the whole truth.
28:29The family were concerned that we couldn't find Jamie.
28:47They were coming to suspect Vickers wasn't the champion
28:53that they believed him to be.
28:55Asifah saying, Jessica said,
28:58Karen, please just listen to us.
29:00Don't say anything around Darren Vickers.
29:04Always keep your phone where we can get to you.
29:08Keep it plugged in.
29:10And I said, right, no problem.
29:12We're heading deeper and deeper into this
29:14and it's becoming more and more apparent
29:18that we're not going to find the boy alive.
29:20When I first went in for the role as FLO,
29:25the SIO, Senior Investigation Officer,
29:28said it shouldn't be for too long
29:30because I thought we'd find Jamie safe and well
29:33within a very short period of time.
29:36We've still got other lines of enquiry running.
29:39On the major line of enquiry was what was happening
29:42when Darren Vickers was driving his bus.
29:46They were able to go back and recover footage
29:49from the bus station where the bus had been,
29:53to look for witnesses who'd been on the bus.
29:56They were all giving us the same picture.
29:58Jamie was being allowed to run fair a lot on that bus.
30:04They believed that the bus driver was his father.
30:08The way he was allowed to count money,
30:11he was allowed to squeeze into the driver's cab
30:15and at the side of the driver while he's driving the bus.
30:19We'd even got a bus driver who worked at the same firm
30:24and informed us that he'd seen this young lad
30:28at the side of Darren Vickers
30:30and said the boy should never have been in that position.
30:34It led us then to believe he's grooming, at that stage, Jamie.
30:39Confirmation we got of Jamie on CCTV
30:43was at Ashton bus station where he was talking
30:47on the 5th of May, the day he went missing,
30:50to Darren Vickers, the bus driver.
30:53BIRDS CHIRP
31:00Two young children were approached by Vickers
31:03to come and look for Jamie,
31:06who he then was still insisting that was missing from home.
31:10They were playing in an area at the side of the River Tame,
31:15and Darren Vickers showed them a photograph of Jamie
31:19and said he was looking for this missing boy.
31:22He pointed and said,
31:23oh, look, I've seen him up in that area
31:25and he was pointing to an area up in Reddish Vale
31:28and then said to them, oh, look, he's there.
31:31In fact, he was trying to get them to go into the undergrowth there,
31:35the jungle there.
31:36These two young people knew something wasn't right and they run off.
31:42But they luckily told the parents.
31:46They allowed us to speak to the children.
31:48So that gave us another area to search for Jamie.
31:54A number of Darren Vickers family members give us alibi
31:58to say that Darren Vickers was a different part of Greater Manchester
32:03than where we suspected the area that he killed Jamie Lovis.
32:09The city was at his mother's, this was untrue.
32:12We started to disprove the alibi
32:15and eventually finished up charging a number of them
32:18with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
32:22Now we've got enough evidence to charge him.
32:25His attitude on the bus and allowing Jamie to run feral on that bus
32:32gave us enough evidence, circumstantial evidence,
32:35to charge him with abduction,
32:39which doesn't mean that you have to grip the child and take him away.
32:44It's all to do without controlling the child.
32:47On the 14th of October, we arrested Darren Vickers
32:52for the offence of child abduction.
32:54And he was remanded in custody.
32:58We didn't know why he'd been arrested
33:00and what he'd been arrested for.
33:01We just knew that Darren Vickers had been arrested.
33:04Jamie still wasn't being found.
33:06Jamie was obviously still missing.
33:09I remember that we were going to take further advice about possibility of considering a murder case without a body.
33:19My memory tells me that there had been one case where there had been a potential prosecution for a murder without a body.
33:33And so it's incredibly difficult, but it wasn't long after that the remains of Jamie were found in Reddish Vale.
33:51I remember that from a prosecution perspective that changed things completely.
33:55Because all of a sudden we could now prove that in fact this child was dead.
34:00A call came in that remains had been found along with clothing identified as that belonging to Jamie Lavis.
34:14Because we had a suspect in custody, I wasn't concerned for the family welfare as the danger side of it from Vickers.
34:22I was concerned for their welfare in a mental capacity and the distressful situation they were now under.
34:28I offered them advice on victim support, counselling for the children if they needed it.
34:34And if they needed to speak to me at any time, I was always available to support them for that.
34:41We interviewed him again.
34:43He said initially it was an accident. He'd had Jamie on his bus.
34:46He'd stamped on the brakes when he was taking him back up to Hyde.
34:51And Jamie was stood up and he was knocked to the floor and he banged his head and he panicked.
34:58We could disprove that. The bus was examined. There was no damage.
35:03It was obviously false. We knew that that was not the case.
35:08We never found a skull of Jamie.
35:12He just said his remains, it was his jawbone.
35:14When we'd found the jawbone, because of the weather
35:18and the way that the jawbone had been exposed to the elements,
35:23they had grave difficulty in extracting the DNA.
35:27And it took till the 23rd of February 1998
35:33before we got that final confirmation.
35:37Confirmation. Definite positive proof that it was Jamie Lavis.
35:44The cause of death could not be ascertained at that time
35:49because of the state of the remains.
35:52So we just had to carry on without that information.
35:56We were able to now gather everything in and present the case.
36:03Evidence that came to light during the course of the investigation
36:06include the interviews with the police, CCTV and then forensics.
36:11Mr. Rainford and the team and the Crown Prosecution Service
36:16all examined all the documents and everything
36:18and decided that there was enough to charge Darren Vickers
36:22with the abduction and murder of Jamie Lavis.
36:29On the 19th of June 1998,
36:32poor little Jamie Lavis was put to rest.
36:36I'd been with that family for at least eight months.
36:41This was the first time I've ever attended a victim's funeral
36:44in 30 years police service.
36:50The small coffin coming towards me.
36:52I felt genuine sadness that poor little boy
36:55had lost his life at such a young age.
36:58What I can remember of the funeral is not very much.
37:03I've blocked it out because I don't want it to be real.
37:07My mum didn't even realise it was Jamie.
37:10She kept saying, it's not Jamie, it's Lucifer's reassuring our minds,
37:13saying that we'll get through it together,
37:15we'll all be there together.
37:17The funeral was massive.
37:19The streets were lined going up to the church.
37:23I've never done it before, but I started writing poetry.
37:26One of the poems was read out.
37:28I think it was my oldest daughter what read it out for me.
37:32I'm not sure.
37:50The trial of Darren Vickers began on 2 March 1999.
37:54It was a feeding frenzy for the press.
37:57Not only did it go national, it went international.
38:02You're always nervous because you want the trial to go well.
38:06I didn't understand what a trial was at that age, obviously,
38:10but then it made us understand what was going on
38:13and why this was happening,
38:15to get justice for us and stuff like that.
38:17I would attend court with them, pick them up every day,
38:20make sure they got there on time,
38:22and took them into a witness protection office,
38:26which keeps them away from Darren Vickers' family and friends.
38:30I was trying to be strong for my mum.
38:32My mum was worse than my dad.
38:34She was that upset and distraught,
38:36wondering why he'd done it to my brother.
38:39We wouldn't have even got through the trial the way we were
38:42without a thief or, to be fair,
38:44without any of the police officers.
38:46They were posed various questions,
38:48some which were difficult.
38:50I must have been on the stand for two days.
38:54It was like I was guilty,
38:56the things they were saying to me.
38:58But I remember me being accused
39:02of sleeping with Darren Vickers.
39:05They said, no, no, no, he was tricking us.
39:08John Labus was accused by Darren Vickers
39:10that he was responsible for the murder of Jamie,
39:14which was absolute nonsense.
39:16The main thrust came from Vickers
39:18who said it was everybody except him.
39:20They've gone through hell.
39:21They've gone through hell by losing the child
39:23and then through being lambasted
39:25and lied about in open court.
39:28I was very proud of the family when they gave evidence.
39:31They gave it clear and concise.
39:33I spoke to Karen and John and said,
39:35listen, everything that's been said has been perfect.
39:40As the prosecutor, you don't present the case.
39:43You're handing that over to the barristers
39:45who are going to present the case for you.
39:47Jamie Lavus was on that bus for most of the day.
39:56And I think that Darren Vickers was supplying him with sweets.
40:01He was letting him play around with the gear stick
40:04while the bus was moving.
40:06He planned it to keep Jamie on that bus until it got dark,
40:12knowing that Jamie was scared of the dark.
40:15He then offered to give Jamie a lift home in his own car
40:20after he'd parked the bus at the bus depot.
40:23Jamie said, why are you going there?
40:25I live down there.
40:26He said, I've just got to do something.
40:28This is what I think has been going on.
40:31And when he gets to the golf club,
40:33him and Jamie walk across the golf course
40:36and he would probably have picked a golf ball up,
40:39as a child does, and popped it in his pocket.
40:42They get to the forest area and Jamie's scared.
40:47And then Darren Vickers starts to sexually assault him.
40:51He strangled him to death and left him.
40:55His motive was sexual gratification.
40:59That little boy must have gone through hell.
41:08I found out in court that he was abducted,
41:12sexually assaulted, murdered and dismembered.
41:17Going through what my Jamie went through.
41:20He had his own children.
41:21Why do it?
41:24He's got to be sick.
41:26When the jury went out, part of me thought
41:29he was going to get away with it.
41:39The family's there in the courtroom
41:41on the day of the verdict.
41:43And Vickers is brought up.
41:45It was packed out.
41:46There was press outside, television cameras, radio.
41:50This tense atmosphere.
41:51There's always a tense atmosphere.
41:53When the jury said we find him guilty, it was just elation.
41:59We got found guilty.
42:01It was like whole new relief.
42:03There's an audible gasp from the family,
42:06from people in the public gallery.
42:09And it's like a release.
42:14And I looked towards them and smiled.
42:17I said, justice has been done.
42:20Part of us felt happy because we knew we were safe, for one.
42:23And part of us felt like, obviously,
42:26we had to understand then that Jamie wasn't coming back.
42:29They just made us all reassured and that it was all over now
42:33and we can put Jamie to rest.
42:35Mr. Justice Forbes gave the sentence as life imprisonment, murder,
42:39with a minimum of 25 years.
42:41Absolutely delighted with that sentence.
42:4625 years without parole.
42:48That means no matter how well behaved he is,
42:51his sentence wouldn't be reduced.
42:53And then there is a huge sense of relief
42:57that you know you've done your job.
43:00I just want him kept inside.
43:02That's my wish.
43:03I want him kept inside.
43:05I'll know then he's never going to get out
43:07and hurt anyone, anybody else's family.
43:10This case will stay with me the most
43:23because I have never dealt with such a case
43:29that the murderer of a young child
43:34moves in with the family
43:36and tries to take control
43:39and steal the limelight, if you like.
43:42Never seen anything like it.
43:44It impacted on me personally
43:47because it made me sad
43:49because I cared
43:51and I wasn't able to help them find their son alive.
43:56And I'll never forget any of the family.
44:03I'm with my mum today,
44:04hopefully to see Asif again.
44:09My mum's been diagnosed with cancer.
44:11My mum can't talk.
44:12I have to be her voice.
44:16Hi, Charlie.
44:18It's kind of lovely.
44:21How are you doing?
44:23James. Hello.
44:24Hiya.
44:25I couldn't enjoy you.
44:30How are you?
44:32Getting there?
44:33Yeah, getting there to be honest.
44:35Never changed though, have you?
44:37Nothing?
44:38No.
44:40Never changed.
44:41When I first came to the house as the FLO,
44:44I told you I was a family liaison officer
44:46and I was going to support your family
44:48throughout the whole of the inquiry.
44:51How did that make you feel?
44:53Well, I was anxious and shy at first,
44:56but then we got used to you being there
44:58and we felt safe and secure with you being around us.
45:01Good.
45:02It's because I cared for you.
45:03All of you.
45:05This is from us all.
45:07These are my mum's words.
45:09Asif, we are very appreciative
45:10for everything you have done
45:12over the years as a family.
45:14Thank you for everything you have done
45:16all for us getting justice for Jamie.
45:20We'll always be an uncle to us asif.
45:23Lots of love from Jane, Karen, Scott and Derek.
45:26That definitely deserves a hug.
45:30Thanks, Mum.
45:32Thank you for that lovely card and lovely work.
45:34Thank you, Annie.
45:44After ten years,
45:46I'm really, really proud
45:48and really, really pleased
45:50to see you doing well.
45:52Thank you
45:54for letting me see you again.
45:57And I'll always remember your family.
46:04I'm really proud
46:05that I was part of that investigation team
46:08and honoured to have met the family
46:11of Jamie Lavis.
46:13the family of David
46:15and the family.
46:17So I saw this round
46:18and we, really, really Bakhti.
46:20I'm really proud
46:22I'm very proud
46:23to have met the family
46:24and a brother's family
46:25to have met the family
46:26so,
46:27to have you Galileo.
46:28To have you here
46:30andでしょう.
46:31And I will have to tell you
46:32how many people
46:34are interested
46:35that you know
46:36who is a family
46:37and who is a family
46:38and who is a family
46:39and who is a family
46:40and who is a family
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