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Secrets of a Murder Detective - Season 2 - Episode 05: Fatal Frenzy
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00:03I'm Steve Keogh, a former Scotland Yard murder detective inspector.
00:08I'm going to take you deep inside murder investigations.
00:13Opening my contacts book for the first time.
00:17To reveal the secrets of what it really takes to be a murder detective.
00:21On the front line, exposing how we solve the most heinous of crimes.
00:31Welcome to secrets of a murder detective.
00:40The murder of Kenneth Ford in February 2022 was one of West Midlands most challenging cases.
00:47I'm going to be meeting the senior investigating officer on the case to reveal what really happened.
00:51The pressures, the setbacks and the methods in the investigation that brought the killer to justice.
00:57Michelle Fairgood, retired detective inspector.
01:00I was a police officer for 24 years, all served within West Midlands Police.
01:05I spent 19 years as a detective in the ranks of detective constable, detective sergeant,
01:12and then latterly detective inspector, also known as a senior investigating officer.
01:18Hi, Michelle. Thank you very much for coming in.
01:21Morning.
01:25Michelle, the incident I'm going to be talking about today is from February 2022.
01:30What were you doing back then? What was your role?
01:32So, in February 2022, I was a senior investigating officer within the homicide department of West Midlands Police.
01:38So, a call did come in to West Midlands Police. Tell me about that.
01:44I've been upset. Is the patient breathing?
01:46We can't tell. We're trying to get into the room.
01:49There's blood everywhere.
01:51It looks like the person's been stabbed.
02:18It looks like the person's been stabbed.
02:24They just saw them straight away, that something could go on with inside the premises.
02:28So, they went up to the stairs, and at the top of the stairs, they found a bedroom,
02:32and in that bedroom, the deceased was on the floor of that bedroom.
02:40the victim's name was kenny ford he was 30 years old and kenny was the tenant of those premises
02:49today you've got the luxury of body worn video so those officers when they go in
02:52will turn their videos on and you get to see what is happening yes from the minute they turned up
02:58and spoke to the caller outside all the way through as they walked through the premises
03:03and up the stairs into the room where they found the person i was able to see exactly you know
03:10what
03:10that looked like how much blood was there where he was lying what the yeah what we were going to
03:15be
03:15faced with when i actually attended in reality and for me priority then to go out to the scene myself
03:20and understand because there's nothing better than your own eyes at a scene exactly what might have
03:27gone on because there's no replicating being there and sort of living it breathing it smelling it
03:34being in there and fully understanding what a crime scene is so this premises was a a terraced house
03:41in like a relatively small side street
03:47this happened in a road called coldbrook road this is in the tisley area of birmingham
03:54quite a highly populated residential area but also has some business very close to birmingham city
04:02centre not an area where you routinely i would go to murders or expect a murder to occur
04:09so for me it was to get inside and try and understand what had happened because from what
04:14i'd seen from the body worn there was a lot of blood i'd seen that so you know trying to
04:19think
04:19what on earth has gone on in this address really so you wear full barrier clothing to go in yeah
04:27fully
04:27clothed so literally only your eyes are showing everything else is covered to ensure there's no
04:32contamination of that scene being brought in from you know any of us who've been outside what met you when
04:38you first opened the door was it was very sparse there was a television on this wall that was broken
04:44um not much else there was a um a small settee that was absolutely covered in blood there was some
04:53clothing strewn around the floor a bag of tools very strangely in the middle of the floor strewn around
05:00the floor obvious signs of some sort of struggle had gone on by the fact the television was smashed
05:06initially entering the crime scene obviously in my mind what might have happened was the what was
05:14the murder weapon was the murder weapon still there looking around at what was on the floor was any of
05:20those objects did i think any of those objects would likely link to the murder and what within that
05:28scene could help me identify who was responsible but as you looked up the stairs and up the banister
05:36all the way up what would be the handrail was lots of blood up the handrail got to the top
05:41of the
05:42stair there was a bedroom that was the room that the victim was found in that was heavily heavily
05:48blood-stained bed literally to this side of the door which was there wasn't much left of the mattress
05:54that wasn't just a wash with blood there was a wardrobe here there was blood all splattered up the wardrobe
06:00there was a duvet on the floor and behind what was the door which again was absolutely covered in
06:06blood there was blood at the radiator i've been to lots of murder scenes and what struck me about that
06:12scene was the sheer volume of blood and the fact that it was upstairs and downstairs it felt to me
06:19that
06:19it had started downstairs and gone upstairs because that's obviously where the victim was
06:25um when i looked under the the triangle of the stairs where the settee was there were marks strange
06:34marks at that point in the the overhang almost as if something had been hitting it
06:42he had injuries to his head torso his knees his legs i don't think there was any part of his
06:49body
06:49that hadn't suffered some sort of attack with some sort of weapon i personally have never dealt with
06:58such a frenzied killing with so many injuries in so many different areas of the body that's horrific
07:05yeah awful awful injuries the worst that i've seen the level of injury would suggest that this is a
07:12very dangerous person who carried out a very sustained and prolonged attack
07:21when news of kenneth ford's death broke uh the local community was was obviously surprised and in
07:28shock my name is carl jackson i've been a journalist for over 10 years now i've been a court reporter
07:33for
07:33birmingham live for around five years kenneth ford lived in a hml on coldbrook road in tiesley
07:39it's an inner city area it's a it's a short walk or a drive away from the city center it's
07:45very urban
07:46and built up the natural question a lot of them had to ask was why has this happened as the
07:51details
07:51started to emerge of what happened especially the level of violence used uh people's level of
07:58shock and surprise was it was intensified just a lot of unanswered questions
08:08in any murder a post-mortem needs to take place and in a in the case of a murder it
08:14will be a special
08:14post-mortem conducted by a forensic pathologist so it goes into a lot more detail than a standard
08:21post-mortem what was the result of that the forensic pathologist was able to say that kenny's cause of
08:28death was head injuries in the main but significant injuries in his opinion caused by
08:36numerous blows he was able to say in his mind that these injuries have been caused by a hammer
08:44because of the very specific indentation particularly on the injuries to his skull he also had
08:51significant injuries to his kneecaps his knees were completely shattered somebody's knees that's
08:57trying to stop them getting away from you he had 112 altogether that's a lot of injuries 112 112 injuries
09:06i mean i mean that that's that's a lot that's a lot in your career i mean how many times
09:12have you come
09:13across something as like this never generally people might have i don't know six or seven is
09:21is a lot a lot of people have one or two one stab wound two stab wounds one punch one
09:26blow 112 and
09:28i say they were from his head all over his torso in any murder investigation michelle victimology essential
09:35isn't it to get an understanding of who the victim is what's going on in their life is there anything
09:40in
09:41there that can indicate why someone would harm them what were you learning about this victim
09:48he'd come over from ireland some years ago once over in the uk he was quite transient and he lived
09:55in various different places particularly across the birmingham area and he just recently moved
10:02into this as they supported housing association premises and only moved in literally a week or so
10:09before i was really really proud i think of you know having his own house um and coming to live
10:15here and he didn't work at the time of his death um he did have a girlfriend and someone he'd
10:22known
10:22and quite a few friends in the birmingham area that he'd made in the time he'd lived in and around
10:27birmingham he had been homeless at times uh but there was nothing you know of concern in terms of a
10:33policing environment that might lead me to think that's why he's been murdered
10:46in murders the fast time arrest of suspects is important for three reasons firstly it's in order
10:53to obtain evidence from them the longer they evade arrest the more evidence you're going to lose so
10:59for instance forensic evidence they may discard clothing the weapon or even change their description
11:05then they may try and abscond they may try and run away and if they do that ultimately they may
11:11evade
11:12justice completely evade justice for the victim and their family and finally they've already shown that
11:19they have a propensity to violence and there's always that danger that they may do so again
11:30any obvious weapons there was hammers they looked too clean and it certainly didn't look like a scene
11:36that somebody had cleaned up after themselves so i guess there were things that for me needed to be
11:42looked at closely by scientists but nothing that was screaming out there's your murder weapon who would
11:47you have called down to carry out that expert assessment of it my view was we needed a blood
11:54pattern analyst needed somebody with that specialism who was able to say well in my view this splatter
12:01these markings has been caused by so when i entered the uh crime scene it was clear to me that
12:10there were
12:10there was actually a quite extensive distribution of blood uh my name is philip field i'm a forensic
12:16scientist at westmillan's police um and so it's clear to me there was a considerable amount of work
12:22to do to unravel an understanding of what all that blood staining meant for instance blows into wet blood
12:30can produce characteristic impacts batter stains two key areas that stood out one of those areas was in the
12:39downstairs of the property on a floor wall pattern settee which was located uh underneath the stairs in
12:47the living room um that settee was really heavily blood stained there were staining and blood drips
12:56around it and there was some spattered blood on the wall behind the settee so it indicated to me that
13:02clearly some measure of activity had occurred in this region and that kenneth ford had been located
13:09in that region whilst bleeding heavily from some injuries that he had already sustained
13:16and the other key area really was the um the blood was the the bedroom at the back
13:23uh of the property where his body had been found the key area uh was uh at a low level
13:32uh in the corner
13:35of the room formed by the window wall and the wardrobe and in this location there was an enormous
13:41amount of um transfer blood staining indicating that heavily heavily blood stained surfaces had been in
13:49contact with with other surfaces in that location and there was some spatter blood distributions there
13:54as well um indicating that blows into wet blood had been um sustained in that location so it suggested
14:04that that was very much a site of attack on on kenneth ford there was some blood on the banister
14:09rail and
14:10the stairs so what i asked at that scene with blood on the handrail you did they think there was
14:17any
14:17fingerprint marking or palm marking was there anything in that area there was some apparent ridge detail
14:23in blood uh which colleague mine attended the scene to conduct some chemical enhancement on to
14:34try and bring out the features of that uh ridge detailing blood um so they could be of sufficient
14:42quality for comparison uh for comparison uh against um other fingerprints the fact that a fingerprint is
14:48in blood can indicate that uh the blood was wet at the time that the fingerprint was deposited
14:53which can indicate that it was um at a time very close to when events were unfolding
15:08having called the police there the landlord was clearly someone that needed to be spoken to to
15:13get an understanding of why he called the police what was going on etc what did he say what the
15:18landlord
15:19told the police was that he'd received a call from somebody by the name of gary who he said was
15:24a friend
15:25of kenny's and he'd asked him to go to the address because kenny needed help he was concerned by the
15:30fact that he was being asked to get kenny help so didn't obviously know why kenny needed help so that
15:36friend that phoned the landlord was clearly someone of significance who was he so having been given some
15:44brief details of gary the intelligence team they were tasked in trying to understand and find out who he
15:50was yeah what his surname was where he might be what was his connection to kenny and how did how
15:56did
15:56him and kenny know each other so what we were able to establish was that gary was in fact gary
16:01o'neill
16:06he was also um from ireland that him and kenny had known each other all their lives really since
16:13they were children and we it transpired that actually gary was a really really good friend of kenny's
16:19in fact without exception everyone we spoke to said they were like brothers when they were
16:25children in ireland they were very close at one point they were both in care together gary was very
16:33much a loner kenny looked out for him in effect was almost a bit of a bodyguard for him when
16:40they were in
16:41care so very much was his protector um that they came they both came over to england
16:49at a similar time uh we found a video when we were going through um kenny's phone and on that
16:57phone
16:57he was talking about how excited he was about the house now it's just my house don't like this
17:05office don't get me wrong live on your milk then carbon's going to be changed
17:11he shows a bedroom that he talks quite proudly about you know this is going to be gary's room
17:17that's good two beds this is what gary was used as you can see it's a big real love guy
17:24then
17:26they had lost contact for a while but shortly before
17:30the instance happened gary o'neill had moved into the same bedsit as kenneth ford
17:38on the face of it this is someone who knows a lot more about what went on in that premises
17:44what decision was made around him the decision is to raise gary to a suspect and what comes with
17:51raising somebody to a suspect is putting them onto the police national computer as wanted on suspicion
17:57of murder the reason the rationale for that is should they get stopped by police officers anywhere in
18:03the country that would flag up immediately that this is somebody that the police want to talk to
18:08but we had no idea where gary was we literally had no idea where we'd gone or how to locate
18:14him
18:15what sort of steps were taken to try and locate him so what i then tasked my officers with was
18:21house
18:21to house just to see if anyone has seen or heard from him and anyone we knew that knew him
18:26close friends
18:27he had an ex-partner starting to speak to those people to say have you heard from gary in the
18:32last 24
18:33hours on the day that this happened the 28th of february kenny and gary been out during the day so
18:39they've been out with these two particular friends and their child and they'd gone back to the house
18:44together on that evening friends who went to the address with them will say that gary was agitated
18:53he was agitated over a playstation there was some suggestion that in recent weeks
18:59something could happen between kenny and gary's ex-girlfriend she disclosed to them and was gary not
19:08happy about that um and during the evening when the friends were there gary actually came downstairs and
19:15and started to attack kenny and the friend intervened physically yeah physically attacking friend
19:24intervened and removed um a hammer from him at that point he then all calmed down and went back to
19:31normal kenny for didn't seem too concerned about the attack he reassured the friends that everything
19:37would be fine and he would put gary o'neill to bed so the two friends left around 11 25
19:43pm that night
19:48they were devastated absolutely devastated that they'd left and then you know such a thing had
19:54happened to kenny now you must have had gary's phone number from the fact he'd called the landlord
20:01what was that telling you and what that data was telling us was it looked as if he was moving
20:06up the
20:07country specifically along the motorway called the m6 that takes you from birmingham essentially anywhere
20:15up north on the face of it appears like he's gone on the run for me he's trying to escape
20:20the police
20:24when your intelligence cell built up the picture the profile of gary did he have a car
20:30gary had no access to his own transport no so the fact that he was traveling up the m6 suggested
20:36he
20:37was on some mode of transport which you needed to try and find out what yeah obviously we had to
20:42then try and work out what that could be which the next step of that is what can my cctv
20:48trackers tell us
20:51people might mistakenly think quite easy is it just follow someone on cctv not that simple is it
20:59no it's really difficult this is a residential area so likelihood is there's not street cameras
21:07luckily today people have all sorts of security on their own addresses which can be really useful
21:13to a police investigation so the starting point is that street specifically overlooking kenny's address
21:20and then just trying to piece together if we can pick gary up on cctv where does he walk and
21:27at each
21:27point we lose him off a camera is there another camera street cameras commercial cameras house cameras
21:35getting hold of that footage picking it up and just keep following someone the male and female with
21:42their child who are friends of both gary and kenny but when they're left as the cctv shows
21:48gary and kenny are back smiling on the doorstep together
21:54gary o'neill left ken ford's home shortly before 2am he actually walked past an ambulance which was
22:01there by coincidence having attended another address but the suspect didn't flag the attention of the
22:06ambulance he just walked straight past it he was captured on camera carrying a carrier bag and what
22:11looked like to be a hammer from there the suspect went to a mcdonald's in cape in cape hill uh
22:15staff
22:16uh noticed that there was some blood on him at the time and we didn't lose him a few times
22:24but we
22:25managed to track him all the way to what's called dig the coach station so that's in the city centre
22:31of birmingham we then got him in the coach station asleep so it's kind of a case of working out
22:38which
22:38coach where are the stops um so you're on his trail but you're not quite there yet yeah so we're
22:46on his
22:46trail obviously at a coach station if someone's paid with a credit card or something it's easy to be
22:51100 where they've gone somebody pays with cash then not so easy because there's no trace of that ticket
22:57being bought and there's certainly no name on the ticket so for me top top priority now is to locate
23:03gary
23:03and arrest him as soon as possible when i was talking to michelle it was clear that there was no
23:16obvious motive for why that level of violence would be used against kenneth there was some suggestion of
23:25an argument over a playstation but would that be enough to have led on to the type of death that
23:32he
23:32suffered well the simple answer is yes it could be what i saw throughout my career was that the
23:39most horrific crimes can be committed due to the most minor event sometimes in an investigation you get
23:54a lucky break but what's happening unbeknownst to us is that gary gets to carlisle and then gets off the
24:01coach and onto a normal bus just a normal double-decker bus the bus travels into scotland he's gone and
24:10sat initially on the upstairs he starts to behave very strangely he's on the phone and he's overheard
24:16by a member of the public in a conversation where he talks about a hammer that conversation worries the
24:25person that overhears it they overheard him saying he'd straightened ken out they also heard him talking
24:31to a woman it sounded like saying he'd left someone in a bad way um during one of the calls
24:38that was
24:38overheard the suspect said they needed to call an ambulance uh they're throwing away the key gary is
24:45he's wandering around the bus harassing passengers on the bus you know wandering up to people talking
24:53to them wandering back sitting down getting back up he had been harassing them for a phone charger on
24:58the way um he was also observed to be staring through people like they were a piece of glass
25:04one passenger commented so various people on the bus actually make a call to the scottish police and say
25:10they're concerned about a person on the bus and and his demeanor and behaviors so what that prompts
25:17is the scottish police to meet the bus at a bus stop they get on the bus identify the passenger
25:25that
25:25people are concerned about they take him off the bus and speak to him obviously and part of that is
25:31asking
25:31him for his name and his details and it's at the point that they then check on the police national
25:37computer
25:39that they realize that he's wanted in england for the offense of murder
25:48one of the real complexities for this investigation was scottish law and english law are very different
25:56so the law of england does not stand in scotland so the officers in scotland were not able to arrest
26:03gary for murder so they arrest him for a public order offense in effect an offense relating to
26:09him harassing people his demeanor his behavior on a bus they take him to custody in glasgow
26:18it isn't as simple as they can't arrest him for murder what they also can't do because actually
26:25a public order offense is a very low level offense that he's in custody for is they are unable to
26:30take
26:31any of the forensic samples forensic swabbing that had he been arrested in england would have been
26:38done straight away to ensure that we were securing and preserving any evidence that he might have such
26:43as his hands for instance uh but also in terms of you know samples blood samples that might show
26:50you know was he drunk at the time was he taking any form of drugs at the time none of
26:55that can be done
26:55either because of the difference between english law and scottish law
27:04when the suspect was being detained in glasgow he made a comment to the police asking whether the
27:10man in the west midlands had died and then he started crying he then asked how long do i get
27:15for
27:15murder and then he made the comments i wouldn't get done for murder if it was an accident and at
27:20that
27:20point obviously make a call to us in the west midlands to say we think this person's wanted by
27:26you so in essence you need to send officers up to scotland and bring it back so yeah the next
27:32step is to
27:32get officers to go from the west midlands to glasgow his clothing and phone and everything had been
27:37seized by the scottish police so obviously brought all those back with us that was initially taken
27:42locally for initial screening to understand was there likely any blood on his clothing that showed
27:49that there was blood on the sort of hoodie that he was wearing that was then transferred to the
27:54specialist scientists at the crime forensic laboratory for testing as to understand who did that blood
28:02belong to was it his blood was it kenny's blood whose blood was it and the distribution on it would
28:08be
28:08important to understand how that blood got there yeah again a blood pattern analyst would have a look
28:15at his hoodie and they would try and understand how is it transferred it was his opinion that it was
28:21transfer blood and that the patterns of it again suggested potentially wet blood flicking off something
28:30so if you can imagine a hammer or such an implement being consistently used the splatter actually come in
28:37spraying off that article onto gary's clothing and obviously dna analysis confirmed it was kenny's blood
28:49because gary was a frequent visitor of the address any normal dna you would expect to find
28:54you know so if you found his fingerprints if you found his dna anywhere in the house well you'd expect
29:00to find that so it was critical that any dna was actually related to the blood related to the attack
29:08hence why the blood on the hoodie was so crucial because it showed at the time that kenny was attacked
29:16that hoodie at very least was in the address and obviously as we know nobody else was in the address
29:21then gary must have been wearing that hoodie at the time of the attack
29:26so when he's brought into the custody block he's actually quite calm in his demeanor quite
29:34doesn't say a lot looks at the floor a lot very yeah answers when he's spoken to but doesn't
29:40say any more than that
29:49and at some point then he's going to be interviewed that's correct he actually replied no comment to
29:55all questions put to him you have gary in custody and you're confident that he's the person that killed
30:02kenny but you need to build a case against him what evidence were you able to obtain whilst he was
30:07in
30:07custody we did a lot of work in terms of cctv on the address and what we were able to
30:14categorically say
30:15is at the time we can say the last people not gary or kenny left the address to when gary
30:24left the
30:25address nobody else went in nobody else came out to categorically say the only two people in the
30:32address at the time of kenny's death were him and gary what you're building up now is a strong case
30:39against him that is gary that has killed kenny you go to the cps with this to seek an authority
30:47for
30:47charge what do they say they authorize charge for murder and he's charged in the early hours of the
30:53morning how does he respond to that when he's told he's being charged with his friend's murder
30:57he makes no response he charges for murder so between the 27th of the second 22 and the 28th of
31:03the second 22 in the county of birmingham and murdered kenny for your country's common law
31:08look how you've got any replies to that charge
31:12getting someone charged is just one stage of a prosecution there's a lot more work that needs
31:17to be done to get a case ready for trial in terms of the forensics that takes a lot of
31:21time to
31:22for the scientists to bring that all together what evidence were they able to give you they're able
31:29to ascertain that that blood was in fact kenny's blood and actually the palm prints in it was also
31:35kenny's what they were able to tell us about the house was the marking in the top of the stairs
31:40was
31:41consistent with an implement probably a hammer being swung and that's what it caused the marks in the
31:47plaster it was confirmed that the blood on gary's clothing was kenny's and what the blood pattern
31:53analyst was able to say was the way it was spread around his clothing was consistent with a sustained
32:00attack likely with a weapon so somebody's swinging something and that transfer of splattering small
32:06particles as opposed to you know a knife wound which might be a gushing wound and create a lot of
32:15blood
32:15when we combine that with the results of the forensic post-mortem it showed that kenny had suffered 112
32:23injuries all over his body the scientists or the pathologist again was able to say that the
32:31some of the marks on his skull his head were consistent with that claw of a hammer having
32:39carried out those injuries so all of that evidence together was really strong evidence of some sort of
32:45you know frenzied attack happening in that address when somebody's going to trial what they are
32:51supposed to do they're obliged to do is serve what's known as a defense case statement where essentially
32:55they outline what their defense is going to be to the prosecution did that happen in this case it did
33:03when we received the defense case statement from gary he said from the offset that he was responsible for the
33:10death of kenny but he said he'd acted in self-defense because kenny had attacked him first
33:21he said they'd had an argument and kenneth ford had asked him to leave the house
33:25uh but he said before he wanted to go he wanted to get his playstation but kenneth
33:29ford wouldn't let him have it uh at that point he said kenneth ford attacked him and struck him to
33:34the head at that point he said he picked up the hammer from a toolbox and started striking kenneth
33:39ford with it he apologized for killing kenneth ford he said it was never his intention that night
33:44he also said that he suffers from mental health issues and he blamed those mental health issues
33:51on some 10 years ago he tried to commit suicide which had resulted in a severe head injury he suffered
33:58with some various different mental health issues and attributed that as well to what happened on
34:05that night so essentially what he's putting across isn't just one defense it's two so self-defense
34:11if believed would mean that he would not be found guilty of anything he's then putting forward
34:18a case of diminished responsibility which if believed wouldn't be murder would be dropped down
34:24to manslaughter so he's edging his bets yeah and that's exactly how it felt i mean luckily for us
34:31in terms of kenny attacked me first kenny was a much bigger person than gary taller wider generally much
34:39much bigger than gary kenny we've already talked about 112 horrific injuries gary didn't have a single injury
34:48so kenny attacking him didn't make any sense whatsoever
35:03under english law there are certain defenses to murder there are full defenses such as self-defense
35:11and if accepted the killer won't be convicted of anything and there are what's known as partial defenses
35:17and one of these is diminished responsibility so if somebody pleads guilty to manslaughter by
35:23diminished responsibility essentially they're accepting the act i.e yes i did kill the person
35:29but at the time of doing so i was suffering from what's known as a defect of the mind essentially
35:35saying i was suffering from a mental illness that affected my reasoning and decision making and if
35:41accepted it will be a far lesser sentence than it would be for murder
35:51and then once someone puts forward a defense of diminished responsibility some processes then kick
35:56in don't they they do that's right so what happens initially is both the defense and the prosecution
36:02have their own forensic psychologists they will write a report for the court or for the crown prosecution
36:09service or for the defense those reports are reviewed and sometimes our prosecution expert will say
36:17need to accept this because categorically every part of diminished responsibility is met
36:22in this case it went before the judge and both parties defense and prosecution put forward
36:28that we needed to understand better could that head injury from 10 years ago have any impact
36:37on his on his mental health so a specialist neuro forensic psychiatrist
36:45was asked to write a report and he was purely focused on brain injury
36:51and what did this expert say so having done all of his tests he said as a result of
36:59the head injury his belief was that gary functioned in terms of his ability to understand what he was
37:08doing react to right or wrong he was in a very small percentage of not being able to do that
37:15so 99 of
37:16the population would know exactly what they were doing and understand the ramifications of it he sat in
37:23that one percent that potentially might not what happened then my view at this point was a jury should
37:33decide a jury should be faced with all the evidence because sometimes you'll get to a position where all the
37:40forensic psychologists will say they agree but in this occasion that wasn't the case there was a
37:46disagreement so i felt it was right that a jury should hear what all those experts said and formulate
37:53that and based on the evidence and what gary may or not may or may not say during trial as
38:00to whether
38:00he was guilty or not so the decision was we're going to go to trial absolutely and i suppose in
38:12many
38:13ways what you're looking at is is more than just this brain injury and you want to look at that
38:20bigger
38:20picture and not just that snapshot of that moment and that's exactly it i felt it was right it was
38:25right
38:26for kenny it was right for kenny's family to let the jury have that picture and let a jury decide
38:32what
38:33their view was so then we come to the trial uh so it took place at birmingham crown court and
38:44it was
38:44about 18 months after kenny's death that the trial actually took place obviously his mum's there so
38:51family you know for them they've come over from ireland so it's you know a very tense time for them
38:58essentially that's what we're doing the job for as well isn't it it's all about the families
39:02yeah family are always your priority you can't do anything for the victim
39:05but what you can hopefully do is get some justice and closure for the family
39:14kenny's mom was obviously extremely upset she couldn't understand why gary would murder him
39:20she too saw them as friends and close friends that probably added to her anger and upset because
39:28you know kenny as far as everybody was concerned had been nothing but kind to gary throughout his life
39:36any murder victims family always want you know a murder conviction and the longest possible sentence
39:45which is life for murder but as the prosecution opened the case the full details were revealed
39:54in all the years i've been covering uh murder cases and serious violence cases in the west midlands
40:00this was one of the most brutal that i've ever seen
40:05the prosecutor said they'd had some sort of falling out the previous night and that gary o'neil had
40:10accused him of being a pervert and having done something to his girlfriend in the past he also
40:14accused him of smoking his cannabis so a real mixed picture of was it to do with the playstation was
40:23it
40:23to do with the next girlfriend was it to do with nothing what was it and really we've never got
40:29to the
40:29bottom of what was the cause did gary give evidence he did give evidence yeah what did he say
40:37he maintained that actually in that the window of the assault attack murder that he didn't remember
40:46what happened he could remember what happened beforehand to a degree but that window uh he never
40:52really gave an account for what happened in that window but really from the point where the friends
40:57left didn't have any recollection so he said of what had happened or gone on or how kenny had ended
41:04up so
41:05severely injured throughout this whole investigation the court trial etc had gary ever shown remorse for
41:12what he did to kenny not that i saw so particularly if i put myself in kenny's mom's shoes she
41:21was never
41:22given any understanding or never given any sort of remorse apology for what had happened to her son
41:29having seen all the evidence heard all the witness testimony why do you think gary the best friend of kenny
41:43went on to kill him in the way that he did i've never been able to reconcile
41:49what could have happened for him to react in such a violent manner so i don't know is the honest
41:56answer
41:57i really don't in the uk around 100 murders a year are directly attributed to severe mental illness
42:06on behalf of the killer the sad thing for me in my experience when you're dealing with these crimes is
42:12that it's normally those closest to the killer that become victims friends families loved ones all around
42:20they're just such tragic cases the most tense part of any trial is when the jury are about to come
42:26back
42:26with their verdict given the overwhelming evidence in this case i think a lot of people that had
42:32overheard it certainly myself were were certain that gary o'neill was going to get convicted of murder
42:47they decided not guilty murder which by default meant he was guilty of manslaughter to diminish
42:53responsibility they didn't have to decide on that obviously that was already admitted to so they only
42:59had to decide on was he guilty or not guilty of murder how did that feel it was it's devastating
43:06you
43:07always want the result that you believe to be the right result and i always believed that gary was guilty
43:15of murder and there was visible surprise and shock when the jury delivered the verdict of not guilty to murder
43:26kenny's mother was extremely upset and angry yeah in her mind gary had quite literally got away with
43:35murder she she knew gary she'd known gary all his life as well so she didn't believe this was diminished
43:43responsibility he actually got 15 years so in the grand scheme of manslaughter was a better sentence than
43:54i expected
43:58but would never be enough for a family it doesn't equate to life it doesn't equate to 27 28 years
44:04which
44:04he probably would have got had he been found guilty of murder so when you say 15 years to me
44:13i know through through my experience that a judge's sentence often reflects what they believe
44:20a verdict should have been 15 years is a lot for manslaughter by diminished responsibility
44:29as you've been sat talking michelle what you've described to me is
44:33up there with one of the most horrific murders i've heard of i can see that you are personally invested
44:39and you're invested for kenny's family and that comes down to your dedication your professionalism
44:46and your thoughts for the family so on behalf of kenny i want to say thank you michelle for the
44:55professionalism you showed in this investigation and and just literally the care for his family thank you
45:03thank you
45:15in modern murder investigations wrongly in my opinion pressure can be put on an sio to make decisions
45:24that aren't in the interest of justice but they're in the interest of convenience or budgets michelle was
45:31presented with the opportunity to take a plea for manslaughter she was presented with what was
45:40essentially an easy out except to plea for diminished responsibility but would that have been justice
45:49her determination to do what was right for kenneth and his family ultimately led to the same result
45:57but she was absolutely right that this had to go before a jury i was so impressed that michelle
46:03stood up for what was right and not what was easy
46:29so
46:31so
46:32so
46:40so
46:41so
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