WEBVTT

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Dad?

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[man] Yeah?

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Are you up here?

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[man] Mm-hmm.

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Dadda, can you help me draw Mummy
on this piece of paper?

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Alex, look at me.

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When you saw the bad man,
was he in front of you like I am?

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Or was he on this side,
or was he on that side?

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-He was in front of me.
-He was right in front of you?

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-Mm-hmm.
-Did Mummy see him?

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I don't think she did.

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No? Did you see him first?

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Yeah, I saw him first.

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Did he have a bag?

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Yeah.

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And did he open it,
or was it already open?

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He opened it.

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And what did he get out?

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A knife.

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-What did he do to you?
-Knocked me over!

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-He knocked you over?
-Yeah.

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The bad man was
sticking his things in her.

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What was he sticking in her?

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A knife. There's his knife.

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Did you see it?

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Yeah, I saw the knife.

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Did you see all the times?

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I saw it… Yeah, I saw it all.

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[ominous music playing]

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[man] My son witnessed
his mother's murder.

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But nobody could have possibly known

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how long it was gonna take
to find the person who did this.

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[ominous music continues]

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[music fades]

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[birds calling]

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[gentle instrumental music playing]

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[woman] Oh!

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What… What have you got?

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-[man] I've got a camera.
-What for?

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[man] Take pictures of you.

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[Rachel] Cuddles.

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Hmm?

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[indistinct speech]

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We don't like those much, do we, Alex?

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-Oh! [chuckles]
-[Alex giggles]

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[man] Rachel and Alex were,
you know, they were a unit.

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He was the center of Rachel's attention
every day.

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She wasn't at all
drawn to the sparkly things.

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She just really enjoyed
the simple things of life.

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Enjoying the company
of the people she really cared about.

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This was someone
who could really squeeze fun

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out of the simplest of things.

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[character on TV] Can't wait.

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[character sighs, yawns]

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Sleep. Need…

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[Rachel] Give Molly a nice stroke.
Lie down and give her a nice stroke.

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[André] At the time, I went to work
five days a week as a dispatch rider

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and travelled all over the country.

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So I was down getting my bike out,
ready for the day.

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And, uh, even though
we'd already said goodbye,

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they both appeared.

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Came down the stairs
and, uh, waved me off.

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That's my lasting memory,
yeah, of them smiling.

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Standing on the steps, hand in hand.

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You know, Alex completely relaxed
and Rachel looking lovely.

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[birds singing]

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It was their routine
to visit Wimbledon Common.

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It's always had
a reputation of being a safe place.

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And, uh, Alex, he needed
as much exercise as the dog did.

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Otherwise,
they'd both be bouncing off the walls.

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[ominous string music playing]

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That day, I happened to be in London,

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and I was sent to the outskirts.

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It's pre-mobile phone.

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So a couple of times a day, I'd phone in
to make sure everything was all right.

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[ominous music intensifies]

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Late in the morning, I stopped,

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found a phone that was working.

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-Rang the number.
-[phone rings out]

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[music continues]

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[phone ringing]

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[music intensifies]

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[phone ringing]

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[music stops]

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A man's voice answered the phone.

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And my blood ran cold.

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I just knew immediately
that something was seriously wrong.

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[poignant music playing]

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He said, "I'm a policeman."

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So I said, "Where's Rachel?"

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And he said, "There's been an accident."

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I said, "Is she dead?"
He said, "I can't tell you that."

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I said, "You just did."

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And I asked, "Where's Alex?"

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He said, "Alex is safe.
He's at the hospital."

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He said, "Stay where you are.
We'll send a police car to you."

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The moment I put the phone down,
I collapsed to the floor and broke down.

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[Rachel laughs] André,
I'm right up on your stomach.

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Press pause.

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[Alex] Hey, I don't…

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I don't know what you say.

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[André] We like that bit.

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-You like that bit?
-[André] Yeah.

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Every belief I had about, you know,
the firmness of reality disappeared.

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I was in a state

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which you can only describe
as bordering on the edge of insanity.

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[tense music playing]

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[man] 15th July '92,

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I was informed that a body has been found
on the common by a… a dog walker.

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It… it's our job, um,

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to, to deal with these situations
as, as a professional.

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To stand back
from what you see as a fellow human being.

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I was walking through grass,

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and then I sort of turned right
into a small, um, glade.

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It really was the worst crime scene.

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It… it just looked like a frenzied attack.

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The victim had been attacked, dragged,

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stabbed 49 times
in and around the neck and chest area.

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And she lay with her hands
sort of up in front of her face,

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as if she was
still trying to protect herself.

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It was monstrous.

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The detectives told me
that Rachel had been attacked from behind.

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She'd been… [hesitates]
…stabbed multiple times

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and that she'd been assaulted.

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That Alex had been found
clinging to his mother's body.

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And that they had to
basically prize him away

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to attend to him.

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Alex had been taken to this hospital.

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When I got there,

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they said that they would like me
to speak to a psychologist before…

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before I saw Alex.

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[Alex chatters]

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[André] The psychologist said,
first of all, children are resilient.

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They can get through the worst of things.

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He said they need to know

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that this is definitive,
that this person is not coming back.

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[poignant music playing]

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Alex came out in the arms of a nurse,
and he looked incredibly subdued.

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He had cuts under his eyes.
He had bruises on his cheeks.

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And, uh, he had
an intense look in his eyes, you know,

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like a… a very old person
in a very young body.

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And I picked him up and basically recited
what the psychologist said.

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There's been an accident,

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that Mummy's dead,
that she's not coming back.

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And he just kept staring.
He didn't ask any questions.

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But it was clear that he was telling me,
"I already know that."

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You know? "That's something
you really don't have to explain to me."

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[Rachel] Alex, turn around and wave to me.

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Wave.

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He never asked again
where his mother was. Not once.

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-[music fades]
-[birds singing]

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[indistinct chatter on police radio]

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[reporter] Police sealed off
Wimbledon Common

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moments after the woman's
half-naked body was found by a passer-by.

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Detectives say she'd been murdered
in a frenzied attack,

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which was witnessed
by her two-year-old son.

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[woman] The news editor called and said,

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"We've just read on the wires

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there's been some sort of fatal stabbing
on Wimbledon Common."

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"We need you to go with a crew now."

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Wimbledon as a place,

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it's very affluent, very beautiful houses.

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Wimbledon Common is
something like 1,100 acres of parkland,

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literally right on the edge
of Central London.

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The murder happened in broad daylight,

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and police say they're certain the killer
would have been heavily bloodstained.

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Eve Richings, Sky News.

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It was palpable how shaken
the police officers on the scene were.

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A passer-by found her half-naked,

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and clinging to the body was a small boy.

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Superintendent Bassett,

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who was, um, the lead officer
in charge of the investigation,

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he was the one
that gave the first briefing.

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The small boy was caked in mud and blood,

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the blood possibly coming from the mother.

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I was a detective sergeant
and, at the time of the inquiry,

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was John Bassett's right-hand man.

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When we arrived at the scene,

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I could see
that she had suffered horrendously

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during this attack.

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When we looked closely at her body,
her body was in a not-natural position.

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Her clothing had been ripped from her.

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There was moistness
in and around her body.

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That indicated there's possibly
a sexual connotation to this.

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It was frightening to think that somebody
who could commit that sort of crime

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was on the loose.

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Obviously, if you've got
somebody who's gonna do this,

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then that's likely to happen again,

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and the pressure is on to get this man,
uh, before he does it again.

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[reporter] Police teams spent a second day
combing 1,000 acres of Wimbledon Common

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for clues to the savage killing.

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[Paul] The size of Wimbledon Common,

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straight away, I realized
that we had a difficult job on.

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Normally when a murder breaks,

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you probably get 10, 15 officers.

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On this, I think we had about 40.

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And it was quite obvious from the start
that this was gonna be a big one.

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[reporter] They officially named
the murdered mother as Rachel Nickell.

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Her body was identified today
by the father of her small son.

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[Eve] To see pictures of Rachel Nickell,

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to see what she looked like,

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she sort of shone with vitality.

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People could project… themselves
into that life.

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They could remember being 23

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or remember being a new parent.

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We were getting a love story
in the pictures that they released.

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[poignant music playing]

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[André] It was an instant connection.

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It was… You know,
I'd never had that experience before,

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and I've never had it since.

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We were inseparable. We did feel
that we just bonded completely.

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This is the experience that people,
you know, they… they dream of having.

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You know, falling head over heels in love
and feeling so complete with someone.

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So we both felt blessed to have that.

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When Rachel became pregnant,
it was a shock.

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I was 25, and Rachel was 19.

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She was very much on the track
of, you know, getting studies finished,

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getting a career, getting a good job.

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But the moment
that Rachel could see I was committed,

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she could see
that we could make this work.

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So we just went for it.

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That first time
that you pick up… pick up a child

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and see them breathing,

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it's… it's supernatural.

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It's absolutely supernatural.

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You can't not believe in magic
if you've seen a child being born.

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Rachel was a natural mother.

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She was… She was, uh, breathtaking.

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The two of them
were so passionate about each other.

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They were so fulfilled with each other.

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I think it's a human reaction.

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You wish it had happened to you
rather than it happened to them.

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The detective suggested
we pop back to the flat

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and pick up a few things.

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I was throwing Alex's favorite stuff
into a bag, you know.

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His favorite teddy bear, you know,
shorts and T-shirts, his pajamas,

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and the sheepskin that they slept on
since he was, uh… since he was first born.

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We never lived there again.

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It felt like
a space that had been violated.

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The boyfriend of Rachel Nickell,

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the young mother murdered
on Wimbledon Common

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in South London yesterday,

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has appealed for help
to track down her killer.

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-[cameras clicking]
-[indistinct chatter]

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[André] I wasn't prepared when I walked
through the door into that room.

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There must have been
a hundred press present.

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So it was cameras, telephoto lenses,

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TV cameras all pointed towards you
like a… an enemy battalion.

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Everyone wanted to see
what Rachel's partner was like.

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Somebody must know something,

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um, from the ferocity of the attack.

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They couldn't have walked down the road
and not be noticed.

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And I would say to anybody
who does know this person,

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no matter how they feel about them,

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please come forward
before he destroys anybody else's life.

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But also everyone really wanted to know
what had happened to Rachel's son.

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It was just so shocking.

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He hasn't said anything. Um…

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I don't know how he's gonna be
in the future, but… he's not too bad.

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He wasn't injured, thank God.

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And the most fortunate thing
is that they tell me

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he's small enough
that he won't remember much.

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We went back to the common
to leave the rose for Rachel

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to say our farewell,

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and we were now front-page news.

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There was a full color picture printed
of Alex in my arms,

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completely identifiable.

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They were identifying
the only witness to his mother's murder,

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and there was a possibility
that some deranged person may come back

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to try and dispose of
the only witness to his crime.

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I knew from now on,

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if we weren't in danger before,
now we were in the gravest of danger.

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Two-year-old Alex Nickell
is said to be bearing up,

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but in a state of deep shock
after his ordeal.

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[woman] I think a two-year-old would have
no concept of death at all.

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[man] How long could this trauma last?

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Well, it could last a lifetime.

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[Rachel] Down came the rain
And washed the spider out…

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[André] We were able to find
some sanctuary at my mother's home.

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Alex, he's had nightmares,
terrible nightmares.

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If he could sleep soundly
through the night, for the last hour,

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he'd be… you know,
he'd be in a difficult place.

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So whatever I was feeling,
I had to swallow it, put it away.

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You deal with it later.
You can't deal with it now.

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No matter how, you know,

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how terrible my circumstances were
in that particular moment,

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our child's needs came first.

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[siren wailing]

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[reporter] The police effort to hunt down
the murderer involves 54 detectives.

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What name is that, then?

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[reporter] This is one
of three special incident rooms.

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There have already been
1,500 calls from the public.

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Every one has to be assessed and acted on.

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It was a very complex case
to… to put together.

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[phone ringing]

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Morning, incident room.

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We had to go through this chaos of
getting as much information as possible.

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The telephones are ringing.

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[officer] You've seen
the photographs of Rachel.

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-[man] Yeah.
-Yeah?

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-Had you seen her before up here?
-[man] No.

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[Paul] On the common,
we were taking statements.

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Surely somebody must have seen the person

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coming towards the murder scene
or going away from the murder scene.

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[indistinct speech]

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Lots of pressure was on to find a witness.

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That's the Rachel Nickell murder squad
at Wimbledon. You've already been stopped?

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[John] We are responding
as quickly as we can.

18:26.960 --> 18:30.080
We do have a backlog.
I will not deny that.

18:30.159 --> 18:32.360
But we eventually
will get round to see everyone.

18:32.960 --> 18:36.360
It's left to me and it's left
to the officers I have working for me.

18:36.440 --> 18:37.600
We will catch him.

18:38.760 --> 18:41.040
[Ron] Samples were taken
from the crime scene

18:41.560 --> 18:44.960
and submitted to the lab for DNA analysis.

18:45.040 --> 18:46.760
And I just kept hitting a wall.

18:47.800 --> 18:50.480
The biologist was saying,
"We're getting nothing."

18:51.000 --> 18:54.480
And I thought, "What do you mean nothing?
What about her DNA?"

18:54.560 --> 18:56.360
"No, we're getting nothing."

18:56.440 --> 18:59.640
And I'd never encountered that before.
That was kind of strange.

19:00.159 --> 19:02.080
And so the scientist was saying,

19:02.159 --> 19:04.960
"Well, we'll look at it again
from a different aspect."

19:05.520 --> 19:07.159
But still nothing.

19:07.760 --> 19:13.360
There's a feeling of hopelessness
because this person had to be traced ASAP.

19:13.440 --> 19:15.760
And here we were
two or three weeks down the road

19:15.840 --> 19:20.120
and no nearer that
than we had been on the day.

19:21.480 --> 19:24.520
There we had a murder scene
with no witnesses,

19:25.040 --> 19:26.800
with no forensic evidence.

19:26.880 --> 19:31.360
And that was it.
Where do you go from there?

19:32.080 --> 19:33.840
[pensive music playing]

19:34.960 --> 19:37.360
[André] The situation
being as dire as it was,

19:37.440 --> 19:41.840
the police then wanted to talk to Alex
about what he'd seen.

19:44.399 --> 19:45.800
Because our greatest concern

19:45.880 --> 19:48.240
is that we find this person,
but more than anything,

19:48.320 --> 19:51.520
that we stop it from happening
to anybody else if we possibly could.

19:51.600 --> 19:55.440
We had to be very careful
how we dealt with young Alex

19:55.520 --> 20:00.280
because this was obviously
a traumatic incident that he witnessed.

20:01.560 --> 20:05.000
Therefore, we were obviously
taking advice as to how to do that.

20:05.080 --> 20:07.320
[indistinct chatter]

20:07.399 --> 20:08.480
[man] How's it going?

20:10.200 --> 20:12.720
[Paul] The advice was
that we should deal with that

20:12.800 --> 20:14.760
through a child psychologist.

20:16.399 --> 20:18.679
[André] Will you show Jean
your dinosaur book?

20:18.760 --> 20:19.960
[indistinct speech]

20:20.040 --> 20:21.800
[man] I like the pterodactyls.

20:22.440 --> 20:23.280
[Alex] Yeah.

20:23.880 --> 20:27.720
[woman] I was a child
and adolescent psychiatrist.

20:29.600 --> 20:32.280
And this was unique in our experience.

20:32.360 --> 20:35.320
This is the only case
I've ever worked with

20:35.399 --> 20:39.520
where the child was the only witness
to a crime of violence.

20:39.600 --> 20:42.080
[Alex] Look, my dinosaur book.

20:42.159 --> 20:44.520
[man] Yes, I like these ones,
the flying ones.

20:44.600 --> 20:46.120
[Alex] But I like all of them.

20:46.200 --> 20:47.520
[man] You like all of them, yeah.

20:47.600 --> 20:49.840
[Jean] I said we could use my home.

20:49.919 --> 20:53.840
And, uh, the first interview,
there was a policeman there,

20:53.919 --> 20:57.800
André and myself and the little boy.

20:58.320 --> 21:01.480
The police were intensely hopeful

21:01.560 --> 21:05.600
that this child, young as he was,
could give them more information.

21:05.679 --> 21:09.360
I had no experience
of how this piece of very intensive work

21:09.440 --> 21:11.399
could affect a small child.

21:11.480 --> 21:15.480
And yet the rational part of my brain
fully agreed that it was important

21:15.560 --> 21:17.600
to try and prevent further killings.

21:17.679 --> 21:19.159
So there was a dilemma there.

21:19.240 --> 21:21.320
It was a very, very hard call to make.

21:21.399 --> 21:23.960
So I was just trying to be
as vigilant as possible.

21:24.040 --> 21:26.760
If I felt we'd crossed a line,
we just had to stop.

21:27.280 --> 21:29.600
[André] There was a scary bit yesterday,
wasn't there?

21:29.679 --> 21:30.679
[Alex] Mmm.

21:30.760 --> 21:32.120
[André] What was that like?

21:32.720 --> 21:36.960
[Alex] The dinosaur was that big one.

21:37.040 --> 21:39.080
[André] There was
this huge dinosaur on the ground.

21:39.159 --> 21:41.480
The three little ones
were eating it, weren't they?

21:41.560 --> 21:44.000
-[Alex] Yeah.
-They were covered in blood, weren't they?

21:44.080 --> 21:47.040
[Jean] Covered in blood?
That must have been difficult.

21:47.679 --> 21:49.880
[indistinct speech]

21:49.960 --> 21:51.880
[Alex] They're not going to see that.

21:51.960 --> 21:53.960
The decision was made
that it would be best

21:54.040 --> 21:56.120
if her questions came through me

21:56.200 --> 21:58.720
to get Alex to respond
as naturally as possible.

21:59.480 --> 22:02.439
[Jean] Alex had blood on him, didn't you?
You had blood on you.

22:03.000 --> 22:05.720
[André] All your clothes were
covered in blood, weren't they?

22:05.800 --> 22:06.800
[Alex] Yeah.

22:06.880 --> 22:08.640
[André] When you were with Mummy that day.

22:09.960 --> 22:11.080
Hmm?

22:13.520 --> 22:17.840
[Jean] Mostly, I was just trying to focus
only on Alex and to observe him.

22:20.480 --> 22:22.640
He'd had few words at this point.

22:22.720 --> 22:25.240
He was reluctant to look at people.

22:25.320 --> 22:29.800
But… I think he was… he was showing stress

22:29.880 --> 22:32.800
after a very, very extreme trauma.

22:33.679 --> 22:36.360
His whole body language,
every movement he made showed that.

22:37.480 --> 22:41.760
I think you know now
that terrible things suddenly happen.

22:42.280 --> 22:44.320
I think you're very frightened.

22:44.399 --> 22:47.960
From Jean's point of view,
she thought it was better to push.

22:49.080 --> 22:51.000
So when you saw the man standing there,

22:51.080 --> 22:53.320
was he looking at you,
or was he looking at Mummy?

22:53.399 --> 22:54.600
[Alex] Mummy.

22:55.480 --> 22:58.159
-[André] So he didn't say anything to you?
-[Alex] No.

22:58.240 --> 22:59.840
[André] He didn't shout at you?

23:01.840 --> 23:04.159
-Did he shout at you or not, Alex?
-[Alex] No.

23:04.679 --> 23:07.120
[André] As my questions
led more towards the incident,

23:07.200 --> 23:10.439
you could see there was a change in him.
He was tensing up.

23:11.320 --> 23:13.679
-Alex, did he hit you?
-[Alex] No.

23:13.760 --> 23:15.880
-[André] With his hand?
-[Alex] No.

23:16.439 --> 23:20.240
My concern wasn't how much information
we could get out of a small child.

23:20.320 --> 23:23.919
It was, you know, what sessions like this,
what distress they were gonna cause

23:24.000 --> 23:26.960
and what damage
they were gonna do to his recovery.

23:27.560 --> 23:29.640
[Alex] Well, I can't tell you that bit.

23:29.720 --> 23:31.960
[André] No, it's really painful
to remember it, isn't it?

23:32.040 --> 23:33.960
[Jean] You're saying,
"I can't tell you that bit"?

23:34.040 --> 23:37.560
-[Alex] I can't tell you that bit.
-[André] No?

23:37.640 --> 23:41.640
There was a mystery
about just how much he might have seen.

23:41.720 --> 23:44.200
I wish that he hadn't seen any of it,
you know?

23:44.280 --> 23:45.399
That was a hope,

23:45.480 --> 23:49.960
that he'd been pushed away
and all this had taken place out of,

23:50.040 --> 23:51.600
you know, out of his, uh,

23:53.159 --> 23:54.679
recognition and understanding.

23:54.760 --> 23:58.040
You know when Mummy was lying
on the ground and the man had gone?

23:58.120 --> 24:00.439
-Did you say anything to her?
-[Alex] No.

24:00.520 --> 24:02.600
-[André] Did you talk to her at all?
-[Alex] No.

24:02.679 --> 24:04.040
[André] Were you scared?

24:04.120 --> 24:05.080
[Alex] Mmm.

24:06.120 --> 24:09.000
-[André] Did you think she was asleep?
-[Alex] Mmm.

24:09.080 --> 24:10.480
-[André] Did you?
-[Alex] Mmm.

24:10.560 --> 24:12.120
[André] Did you want her to wake up?

24:12.760 --> 24:14.040
Did you want her to wake up?

24:14.120 --> 24:15.000
[Alex] Mmm.

24:15.520 --> 24:16.800
[André] Did she wake up?

24:18.760 --> 24:19.760
[Alex] No.

24:23.040 --> 24:24.560
[André] It was pretty intense.

24:25.439 --> 24:29.159
Every few days, there was another session.
This was going on over several weeks.

24:34.159 --> 24:37.760
Alex was able to again show
the incredible recall,

24:37.840 --> 24:39.520
you know, of a small child.

24:41.399 --> 24:43.480
The events, how they unfolded,

24:43.560 --> 24:46.960
where, you know,
the bad man came out from,

24:47.040 --> 24:49.080
you know, from behind them

24:49.159 --> 24:53.040
and, uh… how afterwards, he moved away,

24:53.120 --> 24:55.880
washed his hands in a stream,
and then disappeared.

24:56.600 --> 25:02.159
[man] Alex, the man who hurt your mummy,
what type of trousers did he have?

25:03.800 --> 25:06.120
-[Alex] This one.
-[man] That one?

25:06.640 --> 25:09.640
[André] And then
Alex started to describe this person.

25:09.720 --> 25:12.000
-[man] What color were they?
-[Alex] Blue.

25:12.720 --> 25:14.600
[man] What color were his shoes?

25:14.679 --> 25:15.960
[Alex] That color.

25:16.679 --> 25:19.840
We got a description from him
of a younger white man,

25:19.919 --> 25:23.080
white shirt over blue trousers,

25:23.159 --> 25:24.800
brown shoes.

25:24.880 --> 25:27.560
But the most significant item of all

25:27.640 --> 25:30.520
was Alex remembering he was wearing
a belt over his white shirt,

25:30.600 --> 25:32.280
almost like a butcher's apron.

25:34.360 --> 25:38.159
[Paul] Alex's description
was similar to one from a woman

25:38.240 --> 25:41.240
who'd seen a man
walking towards the murder scene

25:41.840 --> 25:44.120
ten minutes before the murder,

25:45.919 --> 25:48.760
wearing a white top, dark trousers,

25:48.840 --> 25:50.320
carrying a sort of bag.

25:50.399 --> 25:54.840
So we… we came to the conclusion
that of all the people on the common,

25:54.919 --> 25:58.320
that was most likely to be the suspect.

25:59.760 --> 26:02.439
Now we just had to find him.

26:02.520 --> 26:04.360
Superintendent, would it be fair to say

26:04.439 --> 26:07.240
you've made very little progress
in reality so far?

26:07.760 --> 26:09.720
Yes, uh, that is a fair assessment.

26:09.800 --> 26:13.560
Uh, I'd have hoped by now
that we'd have had the man in custody,

26:13.640 --> 26:17.439
uh, but when you see the enormity
of my problem here on the common,

26:17.520 --> 26:19.919
you'll understand why.

26:20.600 --> 26:23.679
[reporter 1] In the absence of evidence,
police turned to criminal psychologists

26:23.760 --> 26:26.040
to help build up
a profile of the attacker.

26:26.640 --> 26:30.439
At the time, we're seeing films
such as Silence of the Lambs…

26:31.199 --> 26:33.880
We're interviewing
all the serial killers now in custody

26:33.960 --> 26:35.880
for a psycho-behavioral profile.

26:35.960 --> 26:39.600
…where criminal psychologists work out
who their suspect was

26:39.679 --> 26:41.360
through offender profiling.

26:41.439 --> 26:43.080
I'm interested in it.

26:43.159 --> 26:46.600
Uh, as I say,
the Americans have a lot of success.

26:47.199 --> 26:52.240
[reporter 2] One expert they've consulted
is Robert Ressler, a retired FBI agent.

26:52.760 --> 26:56.720
Ressler has interviewed many
of America's most notorious sex killers,

26:56.800 --> 26:58.000
like Jeffrey Dahmer.

26:58.840 --> 27:02.840
He says the man who murdered
Rachel Nickell is disorganized.

27:02.919 --> 27:05.280
The first thing people think about
is this is a serial killer.

27:05.360 --> 27:08.640
Are we gonna see this again,
uh, within days or weeks?

27:08.720 --> 27:12.480
We're dealing with
a disorganized, uh, frenzied,

27:12.560 --> 27:15.120
possibly mentally disordered individual.

27:15.640 --> 27:17.800
[Paul] Although John Bassett
had met Bob Ressler,

27:17.880 --> 27:20.080
that was basically a flying visit.

27:20.159 --> 27:25.360
But it was thought that we probably should
progress the offender profiling idea.

27:26.159 --> 27:30.000
And so
the most important offender profiler,

27:30.080 --> 27:32.000
who'd worked with the police before,

27:32.080 --> 27:36.320
became involved in this inquiry
as an advisor.

27:38.439 --> 27:41.080
When the police ask me to come and help,

27:41.159 --> 27:45.080
it's usually because things have stuck
in some way.

27:45.159 --> 27:48.679
And I'm quite sure this was true
with the murder of Rachel Nickell.

27:50.520 --> 27:52.399
[reporter 3]
Leicester University's Paul Britton

27:52.480 --> 27:55.760
has worked on some of the country's
most notorious crime cases.

27:55.840 --> 27:59.080
[Paul Britton] In each case,
the police, they say,

27:59.159 --> 28:00.120
"What I want from you

28:00.199 --> 28:04.280
is something that will help me
to identify a perpetrator."

28:04.360 --> 28:08.320
[reporter 4] Dennis Nilsen, interviewed
in prison by psychologist Paul Britton,

28:08.399 --> 28:10.199
preyed on homeless young men.

28:10.280 --> 28:15.120
"Something that will take me closer
to preventing this person doing it again."

28:15.199 --> 28:17.159
[reporter 5] Paul Britton,
a forensic psychologist,

28:17.240 --> 28:20.360
says the Wests aren't as unique
as people might believe.

28:20.439 --> 28:23.520
He's certain
there are other mass murderers at large.

28:24.919 --> 28:28.320
I was asked to come along
and look at this case

28:28.399 --> 28:32.360
between three and four weeks
after Rachel had been killed.

28:35.399 --> 28:39.240
And what they wanted from me
was my opinion,

28:39.320 --> 28:42.880
a psychological analysis
of who might have done this.

28:45.080 --> 28:46.760
[ominous music playing]

28:46.840 --> 28:48.840
I have the crime scene materials.

28:49.480 --> 28:52.159
I have the video.
I have the maps of the common.

28:53.240 --> 28:54.760
But what I need to do

28:54.840 --> 28:57.720
is to actually make a visit
to the scene itself.

29:00.120 --> 29:03.600
There's a car park by a windmill
on Wimbledon Common.

29:03.679 --> 29:04.720
We parked there,

29:04.800 --> 29:08.800
and we walked across to the crime scene.

29:08.879 --> 29:10.879
[ominous music continues]

29:12.240 --> 29:14.320
What the offender would be looking at

29:14.399 --> 29:17.760
is a place where he can find
a victim of opportunity.

29:20.000 --> 29:22.639
It's somewhere
where he would be able to observe,

29:23.760 --> 29:25.080
to monitor.

29:25.800 --> 29:30.159
He waits to find whoever it is
that's closest to his preference,

29:30.240 --> 29:32.959
and it happens to be poor Rachel Nickell.

29:33.480 --> 29:36.320
He was able to look and watch

29:37.280 --> 29:39.560
because he's a watcher. He's a surveiller.

29:40.439 --> 29:42.879
[music intensifies, ends]

29:43.480 --> 29:45.399
And so very often,

29:45.480 --> 29:48.080
and I speak plainly, if you don't mind,

29:48.679 --> 29:50.480
you would have this…

29:52.679 --> 29:55.280
"That bitch
would look down her nose at me."

29:56.480 --> 29:57.879
"I'm not having that."

29:58.679 --> 29:59.959
"I'm gonna have her."

30:02.240 --> 30:08.280
What you have is a very focused intention
to obliterate this young woman.

30:09.199 --> 30:11.080
[poignant music playing]

30:11.159 --> 30:16.120
But Rachel Nickell, she would not likely
just give herself up to death…

30:18.240 --> 30:20.840
without there being some response.

30:22.959 --> 30:25.080
But if someone is basically saying,

30:25.159 --> 30:28.600
"You do what I want now
or I'll hurt the child,"

30:28.679 --> 30:30.159
that changes everything.

30:32.919 --> 30:34.959
The child is there as a hostage.

30:35.040 --> 30:39.560
The child is there
as a bargaining counter.

30:39.639 --> 30:44.919
She knows that she's giving up her life
for her child's.

30:45.000 --> 30:47.000
[poignant music continues]

30:53.240 --> 30:55.320
I was able to be absolutely clear.

30:55.399 --> 30:57.040
He will kill other people.

30:57.120 --> 31:00.040
This is just not a static picture.

31:00.120 --> 31:04.080
This is just a frame
in a film that's carrying on.

31:05.080 --> 31:07.080
[soft, sorrowful music playing]

31:09.480 --> 31:13.120
When you got back to Mummy,
was she standing, or was she lying down?

31:13.639 --> 31:17.080
[Alex] Huh. I can't remember that bit.

31:17.159 --> 31:20.480
Don't keep asking me
these questions, Daddy.

31:20.560 --> 31:24.280
[André] You're doing very well, Alex.
You're doing very well.

31:25.120 --> 31:28.040
The days are turning into weeks.
Weeks are turning into months.

31:28.120 --> 31:29.159
And we reached a point

31:29.240 --> 31:31.520
where it was just becoming
heavy and repetitive.

31:32.040 --> 31:34.120
And that was a point
where I felt, "This is…"

31:34.199 --> 31:37.879
"We're playing for diminishing returns.
What more can he possibly give?"

31:37.959 --> 31:40.480
-When you got back to Mummy…
-[Alex] I'm fed up.

31:40.560 --> 31:41.919
-You're fed up?
-[Alex] Yes.

31:42.000 --> 31:45.159
-One last question, Alex.
-[Alex] No. No more.

31:45.240 --> 31:47.280
Okay, all right, that's fine. Come here.

31:47.360 --> 31:49.760
[man] You've done well.
You've done really well.

31:53.120 --> 31:54.600
[André mutters reassuringly]

31:57.080 --> 31:59.000
Talk another time about the rest, huh?

31:59.080 --> 32:00.159
[Alex] No.

32:00.679 --> 32:03.919
No, I… I would be still fed up.

32:04.000 --> 32:05.879
-[André] You'll still be fed up?
-Yes.

32:05.959 --> 32:07.600
[André] We won't talk anymore.

32:08.120 --> 32:11.280
[Jean] The police wanted to try
one last throw of the dice.

32:12.040 --> 32:14.919
Came up with
this still more desperate idea

32:15.000 --> 32:17.760
that perhaps we could go
to Wimbledon Common and relive that.

32:20.120 --> 32:21.120
They hoped, I think,

32:21.199 --> 32:25.879
that seeing the actual site of the killing
would trigger yet more memories.

32:25.959 --> 32:28.120
I thought it was a very long shot,

32:28.639 --> 32:30.760
but I didn't feel
I could forbid them to do it.

32:30.840 --> 32:31.959
[man] All right.

32:34.480 --> 32:37.760
[André] So now, okay,
it's not another repetitive session

32:37.840 --> 32:40.040
in the same… in the same environment.

32:40.120 --> 32:42.040
Maybe there is some value in it.

32:44.600 --> 32:47.840
And when we got there, he was
actually reluctant to get out of the car.

32:51.199 --> 32:56.439
The thing that was bothering him was
the presence of all these unknown adults,

32:56.520 --> 32:58.240
because the police had turned up.

32:58.760 --> 33:00.760
It wasn't just the detectives
he was used to.

33:00.840 --> 33:02.879
There were several other officers.

33:04.360 --> 33:07.159
We eventually got out of the car,
and we started walking.

33:08.840 --> 33:10.719
Once we started walking, he was happy.

33:12.360 --> 33:13.919
We were walking down that path.

33:14.959 --> 33:17.840
We just started running,
Alex and I, for the fun of it.

33:21.320 --> 33:24.679
He was having a good time. But we had
a bunch of coppers running behind us

33:24.760 --> 33:26.719
and a psychologist running behind us.

33:30.199 --> 33:31.679
[Jean] The police were taking us,

33:31.760 --> 33:34.639
but I could see that the little boy knew
where we were going…

33:36.919 --> 33:38.639
and was remembering things.

33:48.439 --> 33:51.360
We were getting nearer and nearer
to the site of the crime.

33:55.000 --> 33:57.919
I was aware
the child was stiffening and stiffening,

33:58.000 --> 34:00.320
and I'm pretty sure he was remembering.

34:01.120 --> 34:01.959
[André] Alex?

34:02.480 --> 34:04.800
The man who killed Mummy, where was he?

34:07.399 --> 34:08.480
Was it here?

34:11.080 --> 34:13.000
When did he start talking to Mummy?

34:13.920 --> 34:14.960
Do you remember?

34:17.920 --> 34:18.920
You said to me once

34:19.000 --> 34:22.000
that he was talking to Mummy
before he killed Mummy.

34:22.080 --> 34:25.520
Do you remember
where he was talking to Mummy?

34:26.360 --> 34:28.120
Hmm? Down by the pond?

34:31.960 --> 34:33.319
[Alex cries]

34:33.400 --> 34:37.360
And then there came a point
when he stumbled and fell forwards.

34:38.280 --> 34:40.159
[Alex sobs]

34:40.239 --> 34:42.199
[Jean] And he howled and sobbed.

34:42.839 --> 34:44.600
[Alex wails]

34:44.679 --> 34:47.400
[Jean] And that's the point
when André had had enough.

34:47.480 --> 34:49.199
[André] This is fucking stupid.

34:49.280 --> 34:51.159
[Alex cries]

34:51.679 --> 34:54.960
He was crying, and, uh, I snapped.

34:55.040 --> 34:56.920
That was enough for me. I had enough.

34:57.000 --> 35:01.440
This was… This was, uh,
taking too heavy a toll on… on… on him

35:01.520 --> 35:03.440
and too heavy a toll on me as well.

35:03.520 --> 35:05.480
[André shouts] Go! Let's fucking go!

35:07.799 --> 35:10.799
So I picked him up
and just headed back to the car.

35:12.280 --> 35:14.360
[Alex cries loudly]

35:23.480 --> 35:28.120
We, you know, we drove off at full speed,
left them in our dust, basically.

35:28.640 --> 35:30.240
But, uh, I was in no fit state,

35:30.319 --> 35:33.839
so I pulled up as soon as I could,
found a quiet spot.

35:34.360 --> 35:36.360
And, uh, I really burst into tears,

35:36.440 --> 35:39.120
and I just… I just couldn't stop.

35:39.640 --> 35:42.319
I just couldn't, uh… prevent myself.

35:42.400 --> 35:44.640
I couldn't be strong at that point.

35:44.720 --> 35:47.760
And I knew he was watching me.
He was calm by then.

35:47.839 --> 35:50.080
But, uh, I just had to let it out.

35:50.600 --> 35:53.760
And then, you know,
once I got myself together,

35:54.640 --> 35:57.400
I said that… I said that I was sorry,

35:57.480 --> 36:00.760
and, uh, we head back to Grandma's house.

36:00.839 --> 36:02.760
So we pulled away.

36:06.120 --> 36:08.240
[Jean] That was
the last time I ever saw them.

36:09.080 --> 36:10.799
I'd done what I could.

36:10.880 --> 36:14.480
I wasn't very happy with what I'd done,
but I'd tried and, um…

36:15.520 --> 36:18.200
Sadness. And…

36:22.280 --> 36:25.520
just awareness that it was an attempt
that hadn't worked.

36:28.200 --> 36:30.960
First, a notorious crime

36:31.040 --> 36:33.640
that, two months ago,
made headlines all over Britain.

36:33.720 --> 36:35.799
On Wimbledon Common in Southwest London,

36:35.880 --> 36:40.040
a young mother, Rachel Nickell,
was waylaid and repeatedly stabbed.

36:40.120 --> 36:42.360
It appears to be a random killing,

36:42.440 --> 36:45.319
which, of course,
makes it extremely hard to solve.

36:45.400 --> 36:48.120
Tonight, detectives are putting
all their cards on the table,

36:48.200 --> 36:51.520
and they're appealing
for the nation's help to name the killer.

36:51.600 --> 36:53.359
We came to a stage in the inquiry

36:53.440 --> 36:58.799
when we were quite satisfied
that the description we had,

36:58.880 --> 37:00.920
there's a good chance he was the murderer.

37:01.000 --> 37:03.640
So that was time now to go to the media

37:03.720 --> 37:06.640
to see if anybody
could come up with any names

37:07.160 --> 37:09.440
as to who that person might be.

37:10.359 --> 37:12.319
[host] The man
was in his twenties or thirties.

37:12.400 --> 37:15.600
He was tall, more than five feet ten,
and had short brown hair.

37:15.680 --> 37:19.480
He had a white shirt with buttons
and dark trousers, possibly blue,

37:19.560 --> 37:21.839
and was carrying a small, dark bag.

37:21.920 --> 37:25.720
Curiously, his belt was over his shirt
rather than round his trousers.

37:26.400 --> 37:29.520
Now, from this point,
let's add some informed conjecture.

37:30.480 --> 37:35.520
A consultant clinical psychologist is
drawing up a likely profile of the killer.

37:37.319 --> 37:39.160
[Paul Britton] What they got from me

37:39.240 --> 37:43.920
was a point-by-point
psychological analysis of the killer,

37:44.000 --> 37:45.000
in my view.

37:45.080 --> 37:48.319
[host] The killer is under the age of 30.
He lives locally.

37:48.400 --> 37:51.440
He has few friends
and has solitary hobbies.

37:51.520 --> 37:53.720
He may have an interest in martial arts.

37:53.799 --> 37:55.200
He likes pornography.

37:55.280 --> 37:57.120
He doesn't have a steady girlfriend.

37:57.200 --> 37:58.720
If he's had previous girlfriends,

37:58.799 --> 38:01.640
they'll have found him unsatisfying,
sexually inexperienced…

38:02.280 --> 38:07.560
[Britton] I told them this is an offender
who wouldn't live very far away.

38:07.640 --> 38:11.160
This is someone who knew the common,
who knew his way around.

38:11.240 --> 38:13.280
He would have been travelling on foot.

38:13.359 --> 38:15.319
The telephone number to ring…

38:15.400 --> 38:17.040
[Paul Penrose] After Crimewatch,

38:17.560 --> 38:19.440
a lot of telephone calls came in.

38:19.520 --> 38:21.880
As far as the Rachel Nickell murder
is concerned,

38:21.960 --> 38:25.040
90 calls here to the studio
the last time I spoke to the team.

38:25.120 --> 38:27.240
Ten of them are very interesting.

38:27.319 --> 38:30.799
One man has gone straight to the top
of their priority list.

38:32.680 --> 38:36.480
[Penrose] We were getting phone calls
from two or more local people,

38:36.560 --> 38:38.920
saying that the artist's impression…

38:41.240 --> 38:44.920
looked like a man called Colin Stagg.

38:45.000 --> 38:47.000
[tense music playing]

38:47.080 --> 38:49.640
And they indicated that they thought

38:49.720 --> 38:53.280
he was the type of individual
that could have carried out this killing.

38:53.359 --> 38:55.799
And he admitted having been on the common

38:55.880 --> 38:58.799
around about the same time
as Rachel was found.

39:01.120 --> 39:04.960
The lady who saw
a man walking towards the murder scene

39:05.040 --> 39:09.160
then later picked Stagg out
of an identification parade

39:09.240 --> 39:10.319
as that person.

39:10.880 --> 39:14.319
[reporter] Police say the man was arrested
around midday yesterday.

39:14.400 --> 39:15.960
He's still being questioned.

39:17.480 --> 39:19.720
[Penrose] Stagg lived near to the common,

39:20.319 --> 39:23.480
so when he was arrested,
his flat was searched.

39:24.000 --> 39:27.600
It was a very strange set-up in that flat.

39:28.560 --> 39:32.680
I remember when we arrived,
there was something on the front door.

39:36.600 --> 39:39.799
It said, "Christians beware,"
or words to that effect.

39:40.720 --> 39:42.040
And there was one room

39:42.120 --> 39:45.880
where the sort of signs of the Zodiac
were painted on the floor,

39:45.960 --> 39:48.440
and there was gothic images
all around the place.

39:48.520 --> 39:50.200
It was just a bizarre place.

39:50.280 --> 39:52.160
One of the officers found a cupboard,

39:52.240 --> 39:55.640
and in the cupboard,
there was some survivalist equipment.

39:55.720 --> 39:56.960
There were knives.

39:57.640 --> 40:00.600
There was also a club
with a ball on the end of it.

40:00.680 --> 40:05.640
And it certainly indicated that this just
wasn't a normal member of the public,

40:05.720 --> 40:08.120
that there was something odd about him.

40:08.200 --> 40:12.000
Plus, of course,
he fitted to a tee the offender profile.

40:13.720 --> 40:15.680
But there was a problem.

40:16.560 --> 40:20.120
Despite the fact
that he fitted the offender profile,

40:20.640 --> 40:23.600
we just didn't have enough evidence
to link him with the murder.

40:24.520 --> 40:28.440
He admitted that he would sunbathe naked
on the common,

40:28.520 --> 40:31.040
and he was charged with indecent exposure.

40:31.120 --> 40:33.560
But then he was released.

40:33.640 --> 40:35.400
[music fades]

40:35.480 --> 40:40.319
It was obviously disappointing,
because not only was he a good suspect,

40:40.400 --> 40:44.120
but he was the only suspect
from the whole inquiry.

40:44.200 --> 40:48.520
So we needed to work out, "Is he our man?"

40:48.600 --> 40:50.560
And without forensic evidence,

40:51.280 --> 40:52.400
we didn't know.

40:54.880 --> 40:56.880
[soft, sorrowful music playing]

40:57.480 --> 41:01.280
[André] After they released Colin Stagg,
the press were on our doorstep.

41:04.359 --> 41:07.400
Alex was the only witness
to his mother's murder,

41:07.960 --> 41:11.200
and whoever had perpetrated that
was still on the loose.

41:11.280 --> 41:12.760
So he was in danger.

41:13.400 --> 41:15.839
That's when I knew
we really weren't safe here,

41:15.920 --> 41:17.640
and I had to take him away.

41:18.200 --> 41:20.200
[tense music playing]

41:21.319 --> 41:23.920
We didn't have a lot of trust in anybody.

41:25.560 --> 41:30.280
So we just took every precaution possible
not to be followed, not to be tracked…

41:33.440 --> 41:35.760
and head off into the dark.

41:40.080 --> 41:43.080
And we, you know, headed to the coast

41:43.160 --> 41:45.560
to put as much distance between us and…

41:45.640 --> 41:47.760
and a killer on the loose

41:47.839 --> 41:50.560
and a press pack
that was willing to stop at nothing.

41:51.440 --> 41:55.160
And we left friends and family.
We left everything material behind.

41:55.240 --> 41:56.960
We left the home that we'd shared.

41:57.040 --> 42:00.240
It was only what we could literally carry
with us that we took forward.

42:00.760 --> 42:04.480
We crossed the frontier
and, uh, entered a new world.

42:04.560 --> 42:06.000
[music softens]

42:06.080 --> 42:08.480
[birds singing]

42:08.560 --> 42:10.640
[music fades]

42:13.280 --> 42:15.200
[Alex babbles]

42:15.720 --> 42:17.720
[gentle music playing]

42:23.839 --> 42:27.000
Rachel and I had always talked
about moving to France.

42:32.760 --> 42:35.839
I'd spent a lot of time in France
when I was a teenager.

42:36.640 --> 42:38.000
Played a lot of tennis

42:38.560 --> 42:42.319
and, uh, hitchhiked around,
so I knew the country pretty well.

42:44.120 --> 42:47.799
We were in a small village,
just a few miles from the coast.

42:48.680 --> 42:50.960
Pulled up outside the front door
for the first time

42:51.040 --> 42:53.560
with the keys in our hand,
opened the door,

42:55.080 --> 42:58.240
just had a wonderful feeling
of something new starting.

42:58.319 --> 43:00.640
[indistinct speech]

43:00.720 --> 43:03.400
I've only got two.
You've got about 50 over there.

43:03.480 --> 43:04.640
Look under…

43:04.720 --> 43:06.720
It was absolutely idyllic.

43:07.960 --> 43:09.480
A lovely little house.

43:10.440 --> 43:12.160
A view out of the courtyard.

43:12.240 --> 43:15.520
There were chickens in the run.
There were puppies running around.

43:16.120 --> 43:19.720
And, uh, we really could finally stop

43:19.799 --> 43:24.080
and… and take stock
and feel some peace and quiet around us.

43:26.960 --> 43:28.440
Alex, calm down.

43:29.200 --> 43:30.839
-Calm down.
-[Alex giggles]

43:30.920 --> 43:33.480
You're gonna get a tummy ache
if you eat like that.

43:33.560 --> 43:37.879
What it felt like is that we'd left
a great deal of the evil behind us.

43:37.960 --> 43:40.640
You know, it felt like
we were in a place of peace.

43:40.720 --> 43:42.359
[indistinct speech]

43:42.440 --> 43:46.480
Finally, it seemed like things were…
things were going in our direction.

43:47.000 --> 43:49.480
It was, uh, absolute bliss.

43:51.319 --> 43:54.080
You know?
Just to have that anonymity again.

44:04.000 --> 44:07.680
Good evening. The detective leading
the hunt for the killer of Rachel Nickell,

44:07.760 --> 44:10.560
the young woman murdered
on Wimbledon Common a year ago,

44:10.640 --> 44:13.080
says the inquiry may be
scaled down within weeks,

44:13.160 --> 44:14.799
unless there's a major development.

44:14.879 --> 44:20.560
I would think if nothing crucial
comes to light within the next two months,

44:20.640 --> 44:23.560
then I would say that will be
the end of the investigation.

44:23.640 --> 44:26.760
John Bassett was telling the press
that there were no new leads,

44:27.280 --> 44:29.960
that the inquiry,
we'd gone as far as you could,

44:30.040 --> 44:31.400
and it was winding down,

44:32.280 --> 44:34.920
whereas all the time
there was something going on.

44:35.000 --> 44:37.000
[intriguing music playing]

44:39.879 --> 44:42.839
[woman] It said, um,
"I've enclosed a fancy letter,

44:42.920 --> 44:45.799
and if you don't want to read it,
then you don't have to."

44:46.440 --> 44:50.000
Um, but curiosity got the better of me,
and I had to read the letter.

44:50.080 --> 44:52.799
[Paul Penrose] We received a phone call
from a woman

44:52.879 --> 44:56.520
who'd seen Colin Stagg on the television,

44:56.600 --> 44:57.920
and she said, "That man

44:58.000 --> 45:03.440
is a man who I've had
a lonely hearts club exchange of letters."

45:04.920 --> 45:06.920
"And they're very strange letters."

45:08.200 --> 45:09.200
[woman] Every word,

45:09.280 --> 45:12.080
he uses the most filthiest,
vulgar words you can use.

45:12.879 --> 45:15.680
He asked if I liked the letter
that he'd written to me.

45:15.760 --> 45:18.560
Um, I said
I wasn't impressed by it, basically,

45:18.640 --> 45:20.799
and that he said
he'd written me another one

45:21.319 --> 45:24.000
and would I like him to send it to me,
and I said no.

45:24.080 --> 45:27.520
If I did get another letter from him,
I was gonna give them to the police.

45:28.120 --> 45:30.839
[Penrose] She sent those letters to us,

45:30.920 --> 45:35.480
which gave us some insight into the way
that Colin Stagg was thinking.

45:37.080 --> 45:41.200
Then John Bassett asked me
to go upstairs to his office,

45:41.720 --> 45:44.359
and I was introduced to
this female police officer.

45:44.440 --> 45:46.839
Bassett said,
"This is my detective sergeant,

45:46.920 --> 45:49.359
and I want him to know what's happening."

45:50.240 --> 45:52.440
And then it was explained to me

45:52.520 --> 45:54.839
that there was gonna be
an undercover operation

45:55.640 --> 45:59.799
to discover
if Colin Stagg's sexual fantasies

45:59.879 --> 46:02.960
would reveal some information
about the murder

46:03.040 --> 46:05.400
that only the murderer would know.

46:05.480 --> 46:06.640
The police came to me

46:06.720 --> 46:10.000
and asked if I could help them
with an undercover operation.

46:11.160 --> 46:12.879
The way that it would work

46:12.960 --> 46:18.319
is that the undercover police officer
would write a letter to Colin Stagg

46:18.400 --> 46:21.280
with the fake name Lizzie James.

46:21.359 --> 46:25.760
She's trying to get him to write to her
about his sexual fantasies

46:25.839 --> 46:30.120
so that if he wrote back

46:30.200 --> 46:32.920
in a way that was similar

46:33.000 --> 46:38.240
to the way that the killer
of Rachel Nickell might write back,

46:38.319 --> 46:41.799
then you had the basis
for further investigation.

46:43.319 --> 46:45.440
And Colin Stagg did write back.

46:46.440 --> 46:49.560
[Colin] Dear Lizzie,
I'm so glad you like my letters

46:49.640 --> 46:54.040
and that you are as broad-minded
and uninhibited as me.

46:54.120 --> 46:55.839
I want to dominate you.

46:55.920 --> 46:59.440
The things I'm going to do to you
will literally make your eyes water.

47:00.160 --> 47:03.040
You will be left humiliated and dirty.

47:03.120 --> 47:04.839
[Britton] The police were very excited

47:05.440 --> 47:10.240
at the first sexual elements
that came back from Colin Stagg.

47:11.160 --> 47:15.280
They're now feeling justified
in their operation,

47:15.359 --> 47:17.120
that there was more to know,

47:17.200 --> 47:20.240
and that they hadn't wasted their time.

47:23.920 --> 47:25.319
[church bells ring]

47:35.359 --> 47:38.520
[André] One day,
after we'd been there for maybe a year,

47:38.600 --> 47:41.440
Alex and I were doing
pretend sword fighting.

47:42.040 --> 47:44.400
[indistinct chatter]

47:45.799 --> 47:49.400
And, uh, he said,
"This is like when the bad man came."

47:50.560 --> 47:52.319
And I tried…

47:52.400 --> 47:53.480
I caught myself,

47:53.560 --> 47:55.960
and I tried to carry on
as naturally as possible.

48:00.000 --> 48:04.280
So, um, one morning,
I just sat down at the little red table,

48:04.359 --> 48:06.960
put the… put the…
put the camera up, and, uh….

48:08.000 --> 48:11.480
and, uh, just attempted
to talk about what happened.

48:17.480 --> 48:18.920
Alex wanted to draw,

48:19.000 --> 48:21.480
and he wanted me to help him
with the drawing.

48:22.879 --> 48:28.720
Dadda, can you help me draw Mummy
on this piece of paper?

48:29.440 --> 48:32.920
[André] As we continued with the drawing,
Alex came up with information

48:33.000 --> 48:35.839
which made it absolutely clear
what he'd seen.

48:36.640 --> 48:38.000
Did Mummy see him?

48:39.319 --> 48:41.000
I don't think she did.

48:41.080 --> 48:42.960
No? Did you see him first?

48:44.120 --> 48:46.040
Yeah, I saw him first.

48:47.160 --> 48:49.120
Did he have a bag?

48:49.839 --> 48:50.680
Yeah.

48:50.760 --> 48:53.000
And did he open it,
or was it already open?

48:53.080 --> 48:54.040
He opened it.

48:54.120 --> 48:55.440
And what did he get out?

48:55.520 --> 48:56.480
A knife.

48:58.200 --> 49:01.000
There's Mummy. There's the bad man.

49:01.520 --> 49:02.839
[André] Where's the knife?

49:10.680 --> 49:12.920
-What did he do to you?
-Knocked me over!

49:13.000 --> 49:14.560
-He knocked you over?
-Yeah.

49:15.080 --> 49:17.920
The bad man
was sticking his things in her.

49:18.000 --> 49:21.480
-What was he sticking in her?
-A knife. There's his knife.

49:22.000 --> 49:23.200
Did you see it?

49:23.920 --> 49:25.280
Yeah, I saw the knife.

49:25.359 --> 49:26.920
Did you see all the times?

49:28.040 --> 49:30.319
I saw it… Yeah, I saw it all.

49:30.839 --> 49:32.200
All of it.

49:33.200 --> 49:35.680
[André] He'd been there,
seen it all, had… had…

49:36.319 --> 49:39.680
assimilated all of this, you know,
survived nearly a year,

49:39.760 --> 49:42.040
basically withholding this in his head
on his own.

49:42.920 --> 49:45.920
-Did you see everything pretty much?
-Yeah, I saw everything.

49:46.000 --> 49:47.440
Did you look the other way?

49:48.520 --> 49:51.200
Yeah, I looked that way.

49:51.920 --> 49:55.560
I looked that way to see
if anything else was happening.

49:55.640 --> 49:56.960
-Did you?
-Yeah.

49:57.040 --> 49:58.240
Was it really horrible?

49:58.760 --> 50:01.040
Yes, it was really horrible.

50:03.879 --> 50:05.560
[André] It was very hard to hear.

50:05.640 --> 50:08.400
You know, this is your child.
This is your baby.

50:09.120 --> 50:11.600
He was there.
Rachel was there. I wasn't there.

50:11.680 --> 50:14.200
I tried to imagine that
all the way through that year,

50:14.280 --> 50:17.680
over and over, night after night.
I wanted to know what they'd been through,

50:17.760 --> 50:20.200
because I wanted to be able
to do something about it

50:20.280 --> 50:22.160
or share in some way.

50:22.240 --> 50:25.240
And here, you know,
I was getting confirmation

50:25.319 --> 50:29.440
of exactly what, you know,
what took place, what Alex had seen,

50:29.520 --> 50:33.879
and, uh… it put me right back
in a state of imagining

50:33.960 --> 50:36.920
what that must have been like
for… for… for both of them.

50:39.920 --> 50:42.280
And then a couple of weeks later,

50:42.359 --> 50:43.879
well, the news came

50:43.960 --> 50:47.799
that they were gonna charge Colin Stagg
for Rachel's murder.

50:48.359 --> 50:52.879
Scotland Yard says Colin Francis Stagg
was arrested at 5:30 this morning

50:52.960 --> 50:55.399
at his home in Roehampton
in Southwest London.

50:55.480 --> 50:57.399
[reporter 1] The address
where the arrest was made

50:57.480 --> 51:00.319
is within a mile or so of the spot
on Wimbledon Common

51:00.399 --> 51:02.680
where Rachel was killed
just over a year ago.

51:02.760 --> 51:04.879
[reporter 2] Police spent the day
digging up his garden

51:04.960 --> 51:07.040
and scanning the ground
with metal detectors.

51:07.120 --> 51:12.240
Colin Stagg was arrested, uh,
and brought to Wimbledon Police Station,

51:12.920 --> 51:14.560
uh, as a suspect for murder.

51:15.600 --> 51:18.359
[reporter 3] His detention followed
an undercover operation

51:18.440 --> 51:20.440
involving a woman police constable.

51:20.520 --> 51:23.280
She struck up
a close relationship with Stagg.

51:23.359 --> 51:25.879
[man 1] Would you like
to introduce yourself formally?

51:26.399 --> 51:28.640
[woman] Yes, I'm a serving police officer.

51:28.720 --> 51:31.920
For the purpose of this interview,
I'm known as Lizzie James.

51:32.000 --> 51:35.799
[man 2] If I were to show you
some 30 or 40 letters

51:36.920 --> 51:39.040
that you've exchanged with Lizzie James,

51:40.399 --> 51:43.160
would you have anything to say
concerning your desire

51:43.240 --> 51:46.480
to have sexual intercourse
and sexual practices

51:47.359 --> 51:50.680
on Wimbledon Common and in open woodland

51:50.760 --> 51:52.480
involving the use of knives…

51:52.560 --> 51:53.560
No comment.

51:53.640 --> 51:56.440
…where blood is caused to flow?

51:56.520 --> 51:57.480
No comment.

51:57.560 --> 52:00.280
[Paul Britton]
During the undercover operation,

52:00.359 --> 52:03.200
Colin Stagg met
with the undercover policewoman,

52:03.280 --> 52:06.280
and what he did was hand her a letter

52:06.879 --> 52:10.440
which introduced the notion of knives
and all sorts of other things

52:10.520 --> 52:12.760
that were present
in the fantasies of the killer.

52:12.839 --> 52:15.000
[Lizzie] Do you remember
this letter now, Colin?

52:15.080 --> 52:16.240
No comment.

52:17.359 --> 52:19.480
[Lizzie] "The man then goes over
to his pile of clothes

52:19.560 --> 52:22.040
and produces some string and a knife."

52:22.560 --> 52:25.720
What the killer of Rachel Nickell had

52:25.799 --> 52:29.560
was a series
of very specific elements in their fantasy

52:29.640 --> 52:31.359
that are not that common.

52:32.600 --> 52:37.640
And now Colin Stagg seems to have
exactly that same set of fantasies.

52:39.760 --> 52:42.920
[man 2] We have to look at the fantasies
as they've progressed

52:43.000 --> 52:45.000
as you've written to Lizzie James.

52:45.799 --> 52:47.160
The increasing deviance,

52:47.240 --> 52:50.160
the increasing domination,
the increasing violence.

52:50.680 --> 52:53.080
The need to humiliate and dominate.

52:53.160 --> 52:56.399
There was just so much pointing
towards him as being the murderer.

52:57.000 --> 53:00.120
[man 2] I think what happened
is you walked off down the windmill path,

53:00.200 --> 53:02.319
and you sat down
on a little patch of grass.

53:02.399 --> 53:06.359
I think you actually described it
in one of your letters to Lizzie James.

53:07.440 --> 53:10.480
The fact that you see
this gorgeous blonde woman

53:10.560 --> 53:12.560
approaching from a distance.

53:12.640 --> 53:15.160
-Is that what happened to Rachel?
-No comment.

53:15.240 --> 53:18.560
[man 2] You looked down
from your vantage point and spied her.

53:18.640 --> 53:21.040
And you rushed down, and you ambushed her.

53:21.120 --> 53:24.040
And you pushed the little boy face down.

53:25.000 --> 53:27.319
Pushed the little boy face down
into the mud.

53:28.600 --> 53:32.960
-No comment.
-[man 2] Then you stabbed Rachel 49 times.

53:33.040 --> 53:33.920
No comment.

53:34.000 --> 53:40.120
On 15th July 1992, on Wimbledon Common,

53:40.200 --> 53:42.440
you murdered Rachel Nickell,

53:42.520 --> 53:45.399
causing her death by multiple stab wounds.

53:45.920 --> 53:46.960
No comment.

53:47.040 --> 53:49.040
[indistinct chatter]

53:50.040 --> 53:52.920
[reporter] After being held overnight
at a police station nearby,

53:53.000 --> 53:56.359
Colin Stagg was driven quickly
into Wimbledon Magistrates Court,

53:56.440 --> 53:58.760
charged with the murder of Rachel Nickell.

54:01.960 --> 54:05.080
Magistrates remanded him in custody
until next week.

54:05.680 --> 54:07.799
[Penrose] The Crown Prosecution Service
were consulted

54:07.879 --> 54:12.680
with all the evidence relating
to the letters and the interview,

54:12.760 --> 54:15.120
and it was decided
that there was enough evidence

54:15.200 --> 54:17.319
to charge him with the murder.

54:19.560 --> 54:22.080
With Colin Stagg off the streets,

54:22.160 --> 54:25.359
as far as I was concerned,
this was all finished.

54:26.680 --> 54:30.720
So I decided that it was a good time
to go for something else.

54:31.240 --> 54:33.520
So I left the investigation.

54:35.600 --> 54:38.680
The fact
that Colin Stagg was now in custody,

54:38.760 --> 54:41.000
it gave a certain…
certain feeling of relief.

54:41.080 --> 54:42.960
But we'd learned really early on,

54:43.040 --> 54:48.640
I knew that if you'd been through
a situation as we'd had,

54:49.399 --> 54:55.399
you're constantly protecting yourself,
and you have a wait-and-see mentality.

54:56.839 --> 54:58.839
[crickets chirping]

55:04.960 --> 55:06.960
[quiet, tense music playing]

55:11.920 --> 55:15.799
Police in South London hunting the killer
of a four-year-old girl and her mother

55:15.879 --> 55:19.520
say it's one of the most shocking cases
they've ever had to investigate.

55:19.600 --> 55:22.000
I'm Mummy. [laughs]

55:22.080 --> 55:24.160
[reporter] Close friends of Samantha
and Jazmine Bisset

55:24.240 --> 55:26.120
are still trying to take in what happened.

55:27.720 --> 55:30.720
What has shocked police
is the ferocity of the murders.

55:30.799 --> 55:34.359
A senior officer said
Sam Bisset's injuries were horrific.

55:35.160 --> 55:37.960
[man] I mean,
I consider myself fairly hard,

55:38.560 --> 55:40.359
uh, not affected much,

55:40.440 --> 55:42.399
but… [sighs]

55:42.480 --> 55:44.160
…even now, it makes me think,

55:44.240 --> 55:48.920
"Christ, what on earth went on there?"
I mean, it was horrendous, you know?

55:49.920 --> 55:52.080
Micky Banks was
my detective superintendent.

55:52.160 --> 55:55.560
He was the senior investigating officer,
and he actually…

55:55.640 --> 55:57.440
I remember he put his arm around me

55:57.520 --> 56:00.879
and said, "Rog," you know,
"just brace yourself, son."

56:00.960 --> 56:04.160
"This is the worst one I've ever seen."
I remember that to this day.

56:06.799 --> 56:09.720
And then we went in together
with the forensic team

56:09.799 --> 56:11.120
and went through the flat.

56:12.359 --> 56:14.560
It was a small flat. It was one-bedroomed,

56:14.640 --> 56:17.720
and we understood
that Samantha Bisset lived there

56:17.799 --> 56:20.839
with her four-year-old daughter,
but they had to share a bedroom.

56:21.879 --> 56:25.120
She was a single mum,
probably didn't have much money.

56:26.160 --> 56:31.000
There were lots of toys in the bedroom,
lots of Jazmine's paintings on the walls.

56:32.480 --> 56:35.000
It seemed to me that they were very close.

56:36.399 --> 56:37.720
Uh, and when we walked in,

56:37.799 --> 56:42.879
it became apparent that Samantha had been
possibly stabbed to death in the hallway,

56:44.560 --> 56:46.319
dragged through to the living room,

56:46.399 --> 56:50.000
and placed on a large cushion
in, like, a star formation.

56:50.879 --> 56:52.960
And she'd been mutilated.

56:53.480 --> 56:56.600
Uh, an attempt had been made
to remove her legs,

56:56.680 --> 56:59.120
and the body had been opened up.

57:01.760 --> 57:04.120
When we walked back down the hallway,

57:04.200 --> 57:07.280
the bedroom was at the right-hand side
near to the front door.

57:07.359 --> 57:09.280
And we went into the bedroom,

57:09.359 --> 57:14.440
and there was a little girl's head
peeping out of a… underneath a duvet.

57:15.919 --> 57:18.440
You could just see
these tousled, um, hair,

57:18.520 --> 57:21.160
and it turned out
that she'd been suffocated

57:21.240 --> 57:22.640
and sexually assaulted.

57:23.160 --> 57:25.600
So she was dead,
but she looked like she was asleep.

57:26.120 --> 57:28.520
[sorrowful music playing]

57:28.600 --> 57:29.720
[Micky] First thoughts was,

57:29.799 --> 57:33.000
"We've gotta get whoever done this,
because this is a maniac."

57:35.160 --> 57:39.319
Everybody wanted to catch this bastard
that had done this crime, you know?

57:39.399 --> 57:42.440
Uh, it was…
it was a thing that we all agreed on,

57:42.520 --> 57:44.720
because if you don't,
there'll be another murder.

57:44.799 --> 57:46.839
Because once these people start this,

57:46.919 --> 57:50.640
you know, it's quite obvious
they would become a serial killer.

57:53.960 --> 57:56.160
There was hundreds of fingerprints
in the flat,

57:56.240 --> 57:59.960
and, of course, it had to go through
the fingerprint department,

58:00.040 --> 58:02.000
each one looked at individually.

58:05.720 --> 58:08.560
The fingerprint officers would
look through a magnifying glass

58:08.640 --> 58:12.279
at a fingerprint and identify it
through the swirls and the marks,

58:12.359 --> 58:14.000
which is an art.

58:15.040 --> 58:17.440
But within maybe two months,

58:17.520 --> 58:21.359
we'd managed to eliminate
all of those finger marks,

58:22.600 --> 58:24.960
which in itself is quite unusual

58:25.040 --> 58:29.200
because there's normally one or two marks
which remain unidentified,

58:29.279 --> 58:31.640
and they're often the suspect's.

58:31.720 --> 58:35.000
There was no… no DNA. There was no clues.

58:35.080 --> 58:38.600
Nothing at all
that would help the investigation.

58:38.680 --> 58:41.919
We found absolutely nothing,
which is most unusual.

58:42.000 --> 58:44.399
[reporter] There was no sign
of a break-in at the flat,

58:44.480 --> 58:47.359
and detectives admit
they have few clues in this case.

58:47.440 --> 58:50.839
As for the motive for this murder
of a mother and her young daughter,

58:50.919 --> 58:53.279
it appears only the killer knows that.

58:54.040 --> 58:57.879
I was approached
by my then-detective chief superintendent

58:57.960 --> 59:00.759
that, uh, I should get Paul Britton in

59:02.480 --> 59:03.799
because he was an expert.

59:03.879 --> 59:07.000
He'd done a lot of work
on the Rachel Nickell inquiry.

59:10.560 --> 59:15.040
[Paul Britton] I was then taken
to the scene of the murders itself.

59:15.120 --> 59:20.160
The flat that Samantha
and Jazmine Bisset lived in

59:20.240 --> 59:22.839
is really quite important in its location.

59:22.919 --> 59:25.520
Immediately behind the flat,

59:25.600 --> 59:28.000
there is a garden area.

59:31.919 --> 59:33.160
And then beyond that,

59:34.000 --> 59:35.879
you have a tree-banked area,

59:35.960 --> 59:39.600
where he sits,
he watches, he fulfils his fantasies,

59:40.319 --> 59:41.879
and gets these sort of thoughts.

59:41.960 --> 59:43.839
"You're not going to tease me."

59:43.919 --> 59:46.240
"You're not going to ridicule me."

59:46.319 --> 59:48.879
"Let's see how you get on
when I've finished with you."

59:49.640 --> 59:52.640
Paul Britton's a clinical psychologist.
How much do you think you know him?

59:52.720 --> 59:55.640
I think we know quite well
what was going through his mind

59:55.720 --> 59:57.359
at the time of the offense,

59:57.440 --> 01:00:01.720
but I would like him to tell me
how he got started on the pathway

01:00:01.799 --> 01:00:05.160
that led him eventually to kill,
to harm Samantha.

01:00:05.240 --> 01:00:06.680
You'd like him to tell you?

01:00:06.759 --> 01:00:09.000
He's not very likely to ring up and say,

01:00:09.080 --> 01:00:12.120
"Can I speak to Paul Britton, please?"
and here are his answers.

01:00:12.200 --> 01:00:15.720
I think that there is a possibility
that he might want to do that.

01:00:17.399 --> 01:00:21.480
[Roger] It's extremely rare that
strangers attack members of the public.

01:00:23.319 --> 01:00:26.160
Children being present is even rarer.

01:00:27.960 --> 01:00:31.120
He's probably done
something similar before.

01:00:31.200 --> 01:00:35.640
He's not gone out and just done this.
You work up to that level of violence.

01:00:37.560 --> 01:00:40.759
And we couldn't fathom out how,

01:00:40.839 --> 01:00:44.879
within a gap of 16 months

01:00:44.960 --> 01:00:50.120
between the Wimbledon Common murder
and the Plumstead murder,

01:00:50.640 --> 01:00:57.560
how two different people could commit
such ferocious, audacious crimes.

01:00:57.640 --> 01:01:01.359
So was it possible
that the same person committed both?

01:01:03.279 --> 01:01:08.040
The victims were
very similar in age and looks.

01:01:08.720 --> 01:01:12.279
Both had a child present
during the attacks.

01:01:12.960 --> 01:01:17.040
And the number of stab wounds
on Rachel Nickell and Samantha Bisset

01:01:17.120 --> 01:01:18.640
were in the region of 50.

01:01:21.160 --> 01:01:22.879
So at our request,

01:01:22.960 --> 01:01:25.960
the senior detectives
investigating the Nickell investigation

01:01:26.040 --> 01:01:27.480
came over to our incident room

01:01:28.720 --> 01:01:32.319
to discuss the similarities
between both scenes.

01:01:33.720 --> 01:01:37.799
And they basically dismissed
our suggestion

01:01:37.879 --> 01:01:41.160
that the two crimes could have
been committed by the same person.

01:01:41.240 --> 01:01:42.520
Because, of course,

01:01:42.600 --> 01:01:45.799
Colin Stagg was in custody
when the Bissets were murdered.

01:01:48.480 --> 01:01:53.520
And we tried to impress upon them
that they may have got the wrong person.

01:01:55.640 --> 01:01:57.120
[woman] And how was that met?

01:01:57.200 --> 01:02:01.960
Uh, with hostility and just absolutely…

01:02:03.160 --> 01:02:05.560
"There's no way
we haven't got the right person."

01:02:07.520 --> 01:02:10.440
[Micky] They had their suspect,
and, uh, they just…

01:02:10.520 --> 01:02:12.720
they weren't interested in discussing it.

01:02:13.799 --> 01:02:16.200
They were convinced
that they had the right chap.

01:02:30.000 --> 01:02:32.520
[sing-song] Opening the presents!

01:02:32.600 --> 01:02:33.960
[giggles]

01:02:34.040 --> 01:02:38.160
[André] It had been a year and a half,
and Alex was, you know, in a good place.

01:02:38.240 --> 01:02:42.520
There are not much presents
under the tree now.

01:02:42.600 --> 01:02:44.480
[André] There's loads of presents
under the tree.

01:02:44.560 --> 01:02:47.120
He was settled in at school,
happy with his friends.

01:02:47.200 --> 01:02:49.279
So, you know, he was really thriving.

01:02:49.359 --> 01:02:51.240
It's a big crane.

01:02:55.359 --> 01:02:56.879
[André] Around that time,

01:02:57.440 --> 01:02:59.480
the word got to me that, uh…

01:03:00.480 --> 01:03:05.799
that the police needed Alex
to give evidence at Colin Stagg's trial.

01:03:08.240 --> 01:03:11.480
They were hoping he could provide
physical descriptions of the assailant

01:03:11.560 --> 01:03:14.600
and also descriptions of his movements
before and after the attack.

01:03:16.919 --> 01:03:19.879
So once again, we're caught
between a rock and a hard place.

01:03:20.759 --> 01:03:21.839
What do we do?

01:03:21.919 --> 01:03:26.040
If this is the person
and, uh, we don't turn up,

01:03:26.120 --> 01:03:27.399
he's back on the street.

01:03:27.480 --> 01:03:29.680
But what is the price
that Alex is gonna pay

01:03:29.759 --> 01:03:32.960
in coming face-to-face
with the person who did this?

01:03:33.040 --> 01:03:35.040
[TV playing in background]

01:03:42.359 --> 01:03:44.359
[suspenseful music playing]

01:03:47.680 --> 01:03:50.319
[Micky] I think it was just a feeling,
you know.

01:03:50.839 --> 01:03:53.759
Just a feeling
that there was something so wrong here.

01:03:59.560 --> 01:04:02.600
Because it was one of the first crimes
I've ever been to

01:04:02.680 --> 01:04:06.200
where every print
that was there was eliminated.

01:04:12.960 --> 01:04:16.399
[Roger] Micky Banks spoke to me,

01:04:16.919 --> 01:04:21.640
and he wanted
the finger marks to be searched again,

01:04:22.240 --> 01:04:24.359
especially those
belonging to Samantha Bisset.

01:04:25.520 --> 01:04:28.520
Micky really, really pushed hard
for that to be done,

01:04:29.120 --> 01:04:32.319
and the fingerprint branch
eventually gave in

01:04:32.399 --> 01:04:37.640
and agreed to re-examine
some of the more suspicious marks

01:04:37.720 --> 01:04:39.839
which were found at the Bisset flat.

01:04:46.040 --> 01:04:51.560
Sometime afterwards, he called me
and said, "We've had a result."

01:04:53.040 --> 01:04:54.160
Some of the fingerprints

01:04:54.240 --> 01:04:57.960
that had initially been identified
as belonging to Samantha Bisset…

01:05:00.839 --> 01:05:02.000
did, in fact,

01:05:02.720 --> 01:05:04.399
belong to a man called

01:05:05.200 --> 01:05:06.240
Robert Napper.

01:05:07.680 --> 01:05:10.480
[Micky] And that was a eureka moment,
I'll tell you.

01:05:11.600 --> 01:05:15.520
I'll never forget it, you know.
God… Jesus, I was over the moon.

01:05:16.120 --> 01:05:20.799
They found about three or four prints
of Napper in the flat.

01:05:20.879 --> 01:05:24.120
Uh, one was on the ledge
outside the patio door,

01:05:24.200 --> 01:05:25.640
and some on the inside,

01:05:25.720 --> 01:05:29.680
where he'd obviously got in
through the French windows.

01:05:31.200 --> 01:05:34.439
He lived locally.
He had a very, very short criminal history

01:05:34.520 --> 01:05:38.160
and had, in fact,
spent, uh, two months in custody.

01:05:38.240 --> 01:05:40.919
[reporter] Napper was arrested
at his home on Friday.

01:05:41.000 --> 01:05:42.799
He was living in Plumstead High Street,

01:05:42.879 --> 01:05:45.200
half a mile
from where the killings took place.

01:05:46.200 --> 01:05:48.720
After he was arrested and assessed,
it was apparent

01:05:48.799 --> 01:05:51.040
he was suffering
from some sort of mental illness.

01:05:51.120 --> 01:05:52.759
And when he was interviewed,

01:05:52.839 --> 01:05:56.839
um, he did give very, very strange answers
in the third person,

01:05:56.919 --> 01:05:58.960
as if he was talking about someone else.

01:06:00.040 --> 01:06:03.720
He was the sort of bloke who thought
that he was different to the rest of us.

01:06:03.799 --> 01:06:06.439
He was aloof. Weird, weird chap.

01:06:06.520 --> 01:06:08.759
Everybody said the same,
anybody who met him.

01:06:08.839 --> 01:06:10.359
He just… He was weird.

01:06:11.759 --> 01:06:15.200
[Roger] We went to his flat
at Plumstead High Street,

01:06:15.279 --> 01:06:17.160
a very, very small bedsit.

01:06:19.359 --> 01:06:22.839
Uh, he didn't have a bed or a mattress,
which I thought was strange.

01:06:22.919 --> 01:06:25.040
He slept on the floor, apparently.

01:06:26.560 --> 01:06:29.879
And then we began to search the property.

01:06:31.399 --> 01:06:35.759
And very quickly we found the red toolbox,

01:06:35.839 --> 01:06:37.759
which was on the floor.

01:06:39.359 --> 01:06:41.000
Uh, it was padlocked,

01:06:41.080 --> 01:06:44.359
and obviously we were desperate
to find out what was inside.

01:06:44.439 --> 01:06:45.680
When we opened it,

01:06:45.759 --> 01:06:48.359
there were knives.

01:06:50.000 --> 01:06:51.040
There was a book.

01:06:51.120 --> 01:06:54.839
And in the book, there were methods
of, I think, strangulation

01:06:54.919 --> 01:06:57.759
and vulnerable points on the body,

01:06:57.839 --> 01:07:03.120
which were used to attack people
and either immobilize them or kill them.

01:07:04.080 --> 01:07:05.720
There was an A to Z.

01:07:08.720 --> 01:07:12.279
And in his A to Z, there were
all sorts of markings and doodles.

01:07:13.160 --> 01:07:15.640
At the time,
we couldn't work out what they were.

01:07:18.520 --> 01:07:21.359
And we thought they were
obviously gonna be very important

01:07:21.439 --> 01:07:26.160
in the possible identification
of, uh, of scenes of his crimes.

01:07:26.240 --> 01:07:28.839
And on one of the doodles,

01:07:30.200 --> 01:07:32.399
there was a set of steps

01:07:33.960 --> 01:07:37.759
which looked like it could have
possibly been Heathfield Terrace.

01:07:40.279 --> 01:07:44.359
And in that doodle,
he wrote the words "potential area."

01:07:45.799 --> 01:07:48.919
He'd identified it
as a possible target for him.

01:07:49.720 --> 01:07:52.040
A 28-year-old man has been charged
with the murders

01:07:52.120 --> 01:07:53.839
of a single mother, Samantha Bisset,

01:07:53.919 --> 01:07:56.200
and her four-year-old daughter
last November.

01:07:56.279 --> 01:07:58.600
[reporter] Today,
Robert Napper denied murder

01:07:58.680 --> 01:08:00.680
but admitted their manslaughter.

01:08:00.759 --> 01:08:04.359
Samantha's killer is expected
to be sentenced later today.

01:08:05.600 --> 01:08:09.640
The really sad thing about this case
is that Samantha was an only child,

01:08:09.720 --> 01:08:12.120
and her mother, Margaret,

01:08:12.640 --> 01:08:14.399
never recovered from the loss

01:08:14.480 --> 01:08:16.720
of her only grandchild
and her only daughter.

01:08:18.319 --> 01:08:20.960
[Micky] I mean, it's bad enough
losing your daughter,

01:08:21.040 --> 01:08:22.800
but your granddaughter as well?

01:08:24.080 --> 01:08:25.840
The family's wiped out.

01:08:27.800 --> 01:08:30.120
You know, tragedy. Awful.

01:08:30.200 --> 01:08:34.599
And to add to the distress of this case,

01:08:35.120 --> 01:08:36.200
her mother died

01:08:36.279 --> 01:08:39.760
the very day before Napper was
due to stand trial at the Old Bailey.

01:08:42.520 --> 01:08:45.479
So it's just a very… very, very sad case.

01:08:52.279 --> 01:08:54.279
[suspenseful music playing]

01:08:55.599 --> 01:08:57.040
Sometime later,

01:08:58.479 --> 01:09:00.240
looking at his maps again,

01:09:01.880 --> 01:09:05.560
although most of the markings
were within Southeast London…

01:09:09.080 --> 01:09:11.520
there was a particular mark

01:09:12.720 --> 01:09:14.679
way away from Plumstead

01:09:14.760 --> 01:09:17.160
in Richmond Park, Southwest London.

01:09:18.120 --> 01:09:20.040
It's called Isabella Plantation,

01:09:21.800 --> 01:09:26.279
which was a plot of open land
very, very close to Wimbledon Common,

01:09:26.359 --> 01:09:28.599
the scene of the Rachel Nickell murder.

01:09:32.840 --> 01:09:35.960
[reporter] Stagg was first questioned
by detectives last September.

01:09:36.599 --> 01:09:38.240
He's due to appear here at court

01:09:38.319 --> 01:09:40.960
charged with murdering Rachel Nickell
this morning.

01:09:46.679 --> 01:09:51.120
I was informed before the trial
that, uh, Alex wouldn't be needed,

01:09:51.200 --> 01:09:53.160
that his testimony wasn't necessary.

01:09:53.240 --> 01:09:56.639
A part of me was very grateful
he wouldn't have to go through the ordeal.

01:09:56.720 --> 01:09:58.200
Another part of me was concerned

01:09:58.280 --> 01:10:01.599
that we weren't putting
everything into this we possibly could.

01:10:04.720 --> 01:10:07.840
And then a few days later,
the shock news came.

01:10:08.360 --> 01:10:12.160
A friend called to see how I was,
to see if I was holding up with the news.

01:10:12.240 --> 01:10:13.760
And I said, "With what news?"

01:10:13.840 --> 01:10:16.040
And he said, "You don't know?"

01:10:16.120 --> 01:10:18.560
He said, "It's been…
It's been thrown out."

01:10:20.000 --> 01:10:22.920
The man accused of the brutal murder
of Rachel Nickell

01:10:23.000 --> 01:10:24.720
on Wimbledon Common two years ago

01:10:24.800 --> 01:10:28.560
today walked free from court
before the trial proper had even begun.

01:10:28.639 --> 01:10:30.240
It was an absolute shock.

01:10:30.320 --> 01:10:32.760
An Old Bailey judge
launched a stinging attack

01:10:32.840 --> 01:10:35.360
on police methods today
after throwing out the case

01:10:35.440 --> 01:10:38.320
against the man
accused of killing Rachel Nickell.

01:10:38.400 --> 01:10:42.040
[reporter 1] Colin Stagg walked free,
having spent more than a year in custody

01:10:42.120 --> 01:10:45.240
after being entrapped
by an undercover police operation

01:10:45.320 --> 01:10:50.000
that was strongly criticized by the judge
and ruled to be inadmissible.

01:10:50.080 --> 01:10:55.840
I was angry because whoever decided
that this evidence was good

01:10:55.920 --> 01:11:00.200
and would stand up to challenge
had obviously made a big mistake.

01:11:00.280 --> 01:11:03.679
And I was angry that maybe
the person who decided to kick it all out

01:11:03.760 --> 01:11:07.560
was going to an extreme, because there was
strong circumstantial evidence.

01:11:07.639 --> 01:11:11.960
There was probably a feeling
that if there was a decision to be made

01:11:12.040 --> 01:11:16.000
as to whether
Colin Stagg committed a murder,

01:11:16.080 --> 01:11:18.400
that decision should be made by a jury.

01:11:19.000 --> 01:11:20.800
But we didn't get that far.

01:11:20.880 --> 01:11:25.599
[reporter 2] William Clegg QC, defending,
argued WPC James had lied,

01:11:25.679 --> 01:11:28.160
offered inducements of sex
and a relationship.

01:11:28.240 --> 01:11:29.760
[reporter 3] Mr. Justice Ognall said

01:11:29.840 --> 01:11:33.920
the police behavior betrayed
not merely an excess of zeal

01:11:34.000 --> 01:11:36.560
but a blatant attempt
to incriminate a suspect

01:11:36.639 --> 01:11:40.080
by positive and deceptive conduct
of the grossest kind.

01:11:40.160 --> 01:11:41.200
We failed.

01:11:41.720 --> 01:11:44.560
And, um, that is not a good feeling.

01:11:45.480 --> 01:11:49.200
"My life has been ruined by a mixture
of half-baked psychological theories

01:11:49.280 --> 01:11:52.240
and some stories written
to satisfy the strange sexual requests

01:11:52.320 --> 01:11:54.200
of an undercover police officer."

01:11:54.280 --> 01:11:57.160
"The judge recognized
there was never any evidence against me,

01:11:57.240 --> 01:11:59.920
no forensic evidence,
no confession evidence, nothing."

01:12:00.000 --> 01:12:03.880
[reporter 4] Asked if Stagg should receive
an apology from the police,

01:12:03.960 --> 01:12:06.760
Sir Paul Condon said
the police had already apologized

01:12:06.840 --> 01:12:08.639
to those it thought necessary.

01:12:09.679 --> 01:12:12.960
I… I make no apologies at all

01:12:13.040 --> 01:12:16.599
for the Metropolitan Police inquiry
in this case.

01:12:16.679 --> 01:12:19.520
I fully support the action of my officers,

01:12:19.599 --> 01:12:23.320
and I take full responsibility
for police action in this case.

01:12:25.400 --> 01:12:27.400
[poignant music playing]

01:12:28.599 --> 01:12:31.400
[André] It felt like
we were back at day one,

01:12:32.120 --> 01:12:35.920
you know, with the killer on the loose
and no protection.

01:12:38.320 --> 01:12:40.120
And what really underlined that

01:12:40.200 --> 01:12:42.960
was Paul Condon, the head of the Met,
making a statement

01:12:43.040 --> 01:12:45.320
that they weren't looking for
anybody else.

01:12:45.400 --> 01:12:48.240
At the moment,
there is no new information,

01:12:48.320 --> 01:12:50.880
no new leads for us to explore.

01:12:53.040 --> 01:12:56.320
[André] They made it clear that
they thought Stagg got away with murder

01:12:56.400 --> 01:12:57.800
and was now on the loose.

01:12:58.840 --> 01:13:02.000
I was left feeling like
I couldn't trust anybody,

01:13:02.080 --> 01:13:06.599
and we always wondered whether or not
we were treated in a different way

01:13:06.679 --> 01:13:09.840
because, uh, I was a young man of color.

01:13:11.320 --> 01:13:13.880
You lose all faith in… in the system.

01:13:14.480 --> 01:13:16.679
So now any closure that we…

01:13:17.200 --> 01:13:21.200
that was gonna be truly meaningful was
something we'd have to find for ourselves,

01:13:21.280 --> 01:13:23.599
and we couldn't rely on
outside circumstances

01:13:23.679 --> 01:13:25.120
to provide us with that.

01:13:28.200 --> 01:13:30.200
[gentle music playing]

01:13:37.480 --> 01:13:41.000
[man] For many, many years,
there was no real… real progress.

01:13:43.000 --> 01:13:47.360
Nothing had really changed
in terms of, you know, what we knew.

01:13:52.080 --> 01:13:54.440
From day one, it was the three of us.

01:13:55.200 --> 01:13:58.960
You know, my father and me
and our dog, Molly.

01:13:59.040 --> 01:14:01.280
That was who we were as a family.

01:14:02.080 --> 01:14:05.400
My father knew
that I understood what had happened.

01:14:06.360 --> 01:14:08.000
That my mother loved me,

01:14:08.599 --> 01:14:12.400
and, um, that
she wouldn't have wanted to leave me.

01:14:13.760 --> 01:14:15.520
So, my father and me,

01:14:15.599 --> 01:14:18.080
we didn't talk about… about my mother.

01:14:18.160 --> 01:14:20.320
You know? We didn't talk about the past.

01:14:22.719 --> 01:14:26.800
But I still… I felt an anger
that this had happened,

01:14:26.880 --> 01:14:32.160
and, you know, that no matter what I did,
I couldn't stop it from happening.

01:14:35.840 --> 01:14:40.240
I think if you witness
that degree of evil,

01:14:40.320 --> 01:14:42.880
you know, as a small child,

01:14:44.440 --> 01:14:47.440
the illusion that you have,
you know, that your parents,

01:14:47.520 --> 01:14:50.120
no matter how good a job they do,

01:14:50.200 --> 01:14:52.639
can really protect you from harm,

01:14:52.719 --> 01:14:55.599
I think that that…
you know, that collapses.

01:14:56.880 --> 01:15:00.000
[André] Alex was absolutely
a really sweet little boy.

01:15:00.520 --> 01:15:03.120
There was a joy that was there.

01:15:04.520 --> 01:15:08.240
But then in the preteen years,
there was an anger, you know,

01:15:08.320 --> 01:15:12.040
and the anger was, you know,
quite rightly directed towards me.

01:15:13.520 --> 01:15:17.000
I was very angry about a lot of the things
we'd lived through.

01:15:18.120 --> 01:15:21.760
The sessions that went on
for weeks and months.

01:15:21.840 --> 01:15:25.040
The thing that was most distressing for me
was to be taken back,

01:15:25.120 --> 01:15:26.920
you know, to that day repeatedly

01:15:27.000 --> 01:15:30.920
and suggestions given
about how I should feel about it.

01:15:31.000 --> 01:15:34.599
And, you know,
I guess I carried that with me somewhat.

01:15:37.160 --> 01:15:39.400
[André] He did get into trouble
with the authorities.

01:15:39.960 --> 01:15:44.040
Just small stuff, but the police
were on the doorstep on occasions.

01:15:47.000 --> 01:15:50.240
[Alex] I don't think that I had the same…
the same respect,

01:15:50.320 --> 01:15:53.520
the same trust for my father
as I once had.

01:15:55.360 --> 01:16:00.120
And the fundamental point was that he was
the protector of the family as the father

01:16:02.080 --> 01:16:06.679
and, you know, unfortunately
had allowed this to happen to us.

01:16:07.520 --> 01:16:11.920
So in my teenage years,
you know, we had a lot of conflict.

01:16:14.679 --> 01:16:19.440
[André] I had a huge sense of guilt
that… that I hadn't protected my family.

01:16:21.520 --> 01:16:23.120
And you do feel stupid.

01:16:23.200 --> 01:16:24.520
You feel like a fool,

01:16:24.599 --> 01:16:30.240
because we're told to put our security
in the hands of other agencies.

01:16:30.320 --> 01:16:34.400
Once upon a time, it was the Wild West,
and you took the law into your own hands,

01:16:34.480 --> 01:16:38.679
and you protected, you know,
your loved ones with whatever it took.

01:16:39.960 --> 01:16:42.040
And that's what hit me at the time.

01:16:43.000 --> 01:16:44.320
I didn't do that.

01:16:44.920 --> 01:16:46.280
And I wish I had.

01:16:51.960 --> 01:16:53.960
[music fades]

01:16:54.719 --> 01:16:58.320
[Alex] With every week that goes by,
with every month that goes by,

01:16:58.400 --> 01:17:00.400
with every year that goes by,

01:17:00.480 --> 01:17:03.560
you've kind of come to terms with,
on some level,

01:17:03.639 --> 01:17:05.560
that this may never be resolved.

01:17:08.560 --> 01:17:10.000
[suspenseful music playing]

01:17:10.080 --> 01:17:11.719
[carousel clicks]

01:17:23.480 --> 01:17:29.280
[woman] By 2002, the Rachel Nickell case
did become a cold case.

01:17:33.360 --> 01:17:38.320
The police came and asked
if I and my team would have a look at it.

01:17:42.080 --> 01:17:46.639
I knew from reading the newspapers
that this had been a very violent attack.

01:17:47.440 --> 01:17:48.520
But I was aware

01:17:48.599 --> 01:17:53.160
Colin Stagg had been accused
and then acquitted.

01:17:53.240 --> 01:17:56.840
But I think he was still a suspect
as far as the police were concerned.

01:17:57.880 --> 01:18:01.840
And so they wanted us
just to cast a fresh pair of eyes over it

01:18:01.920 --> 01:18:03.120
and see whether or not,

01:18:03.200 --> 01:18:05.760
out of the things
that they'd collected at the time,

01:18:06.280 --> 01:18:08.080
whether there was anything in that

01:18:08.160 --> 01:18:10.679
that could possibly be used, um,

01:18:10.760 --> 01:18:14.240
to identify Rachel's attacker.

01:18:17.520 --> 01:18:21.719
There were some tapings,
these sticky tape lifts,

01:18:21.800 --> 01:18:24.920
um, taken from Rachel's body

01:18:25.000 --> 01:18:27.960
and particularly
the intimate parts of her body.

01:18:30.840 --> 01:18:31.920
And we noticed

01:18:32.000 --> 01:18:36.280
that the original scientists
hadn't found any DNA on these tapings.

01:18:36.360 --> 01:18:40.440
And so we knew immediately
that something was wrong,

01:18:41.160 --> 01:18:42.560
because there should've been

01:18:42.639 --> 01:18:45.520
an enormous amount
of Rachel's own DNA on these tapings.

01:18:46.440 --> 01:18:48.800
I think what probably happened is,

01:18:48.880 --> 01:18:51.679
if you have too much DNA in a sample,

01:18:51.760 --> 01:18:55.480
it can swamp the technique
so that you don't see anything.

01:18:55.560 --> 01:18:59.679
And so one of the first things we did
was, of course, to repeat it,

01:18:59.760 --> 01:19:02.280
but doing it in a slightly different way.

01:19:02.360 --> 01:19:04.360
[suspenseful music continues]

01:19:07.360 --> 01:19:10.560
Just as expected,
we got lots of Rachel's DNA.

01:19:15.880 --> 01:19:19.080
But we also got a tiny trace of male DNA.

01:19:22.320 --> 01:19:25.040
When we got this hint of male DNA,

01:19:25.120 --> 01:19:26.760
we really didn't know

01:19:26.840 --> 01:19:31.360
whether we'd be able to develop it enough,
get enough information out of it

01:19:31.440 --> 01:19:35.599
to identify one particular individual.

01:19:37.719 --> 01:19:41.040
And so we developed a whole new technique,

01:19:41.120 --> 01:19:42.800
a new sensitive technique,

01:19:43.480 --> 01:19:48.679
um, and this involved taking
a tiny amount of DNA from a sample

01:19:48.760 --> 01:19:52.840
and then multiplying up the DNA,

01:19:52.920 --> 01:19:54.840
or we call it amplifying.

01:19:54.920 --> 01:19:58.400
So you've got
several times your original amount,

01:19:58.480 --> 01:20:00.679
so you've got enough to actually analyze.

01:20:01.880 --> 01:20:03.440
It took about two years

01:20:03.520 --> 01:20:08.160
to develop this technique
to the point where we could use it.

01:20:11.000 --> 01:20:14.480
Before we ran the…
uh, the information that we had,

01:20:14.560 --> 01:20:17.160
this DNA profile we had,
through the database,

01:20:17.240 --> 01:20:19.360
we checked it against Colin Stagg,

01:20:20.000 --> 01:20:22.679
and it definitely didn't match him.

01:20:22.760 --> 01:20:24.120
[keyboard keys clacking]

01:20:24.880 --> 01:20:28.000
And so we put it through
the National DNA Database.

01:20:28.520 --> 01:20:32.920
And when we did that,
that's when it came up as a match.

01:20:35.480 --> 01:20:37.080
[André] The phone rang one day,

01:20:38.200 --> 01:20:41.360
out of the blue, and it was the police,
and they had news.

01:20:41.880 --> 01:20:45.800
And the news was
there was a positive identification.

01:20:45.880 --> 01:20:48.960
And they said
that the person that had been identified

01:20:49.040 --> 01:20:50.599
was a completely new name.

01:20:52.080 --> 01:20:55.800
[Angela] The DNA database produced a match

01:20:56.920 --> 01:20:58.880
for someone called Robert Napper.

01:21:06.200 --> 01:21:10.599
And then we discovered
that Napper was in Broadmoor

01:21:10.679 --> 01:21:16.080
because he'd also committed
a murder of a mother and a young daughter.

01:21:16.160 --> 01:21:18.160
[poignant music playing]

01:21:20.679 --> 01:21:23.280
It had been somebody else all the time.

01:21:24.360 --> 01:21:25.599
So that moment in time

01:21:25.679 --> 01:21:29.360
was when our worst possible scenario
had proved to be played out,

01:21:29.440 --> 01:21:31.240
that somebody else had been murdered

01:21:31.320 --> 01:21:33.639
by the same person
in the same circumstances.

01:21:33.719 --> 01:21:35.360
Another family's been destroyed.

01:21:38.360 --> 01:21:42.560
So if I didn't know
how blessed I'd been that Alex survived,

01:21:43.160 --> 01:21:45.920
when we found out
what happened to Samantha and Jazmine,

01:21:46.679 --> 01:21:48.679
I thank God every day.

01:21:48.760 --> 01:21:52.679
Because it's only by the grace of God
that… that we've survived together,

01:21:52.760 --> 01:21:55.840
and it's only by the grace of God
that he survived physically.

01:21:55.920 --> 01:21:57.880
[poignant music continues]

01:22:03.880 --> 01:22:05.880
[music fades]

01:22:05.960 --> 01:22:07.960
[crowd cheering, whistling on TV]

01:22:09.800 --> 01:22:12.840
[man] I was watching a football match
on TV one evening.

01:22:15.280 --> 01:22:16.760
There was a knock on my door,

01:22:17.280 --> 01:22:20.880
and I was a bit annoyed
'cause I was missing the match.

01:22:24.320 --> 01:22:28.000
There was two journalists standing there.
And they said, um… um,

01:22:28.080 --> 01:22:30.800
"Did you know
that the police have arrested another man

01:22:30.880 --> 01:22:32.599
in relation to the Nickell murder,

01:22:32.679 --> 01:22:35.280
and they got DNA evidence
to prove he was guilty?"

01:22:35.360 --> 01:22:38.120
I was like, "Can you come back
in about an hour's time?"

01:22:38.200 --> 01:22:39.719
"I'm watching the match."

01:22:39.800 --> 01:22:42.120
They were like, "No problem,"
and they walked off.

01:22:43.599 --> 01:22:45.880
I was sick of the whole thing, you know?

01:22:45.960 --> 01:22:48.040
It dragged on for about 15 years.

01:22:48.120 --> 01:22:50.760
[reporter 1] Colin Stagg had
police protection today

01:22:50.840 --> 01:22:53.679
as the Rachel Nickell case
continued to haunt him.

01:22:53.760 --> 01:22:57.040
[Colin] From when I was arrested,
there were articles in the newspapers

01:22:57.120 --> 01:22:59.240
stirring people's emotions up against me.

01:22:59.320 --> 01:23:01.960
People shouting out stuff like,
"Guilty," "Hang him,"

01:23:02.040 --> 01:23:03.360
stuff like that, you know.

01:23:03.440 --> 01:23:06.599
[reporter 2] Mr. Stagg remained
uncomfortably in the media spotlight

01:23:06.679 --> 01:23:08.280
even after his release.

01:23:08.920 --> 01:23:09.880
[woman] Don't!

01:23:11.040 --> 01:23:12.920
[Colin] Instilling in people's minds

01:23:13.000 --> 01:23:17.240
that, "We know we had the right man,
but he got off on a technicality."

01:23:17.320 --> 01:23:20.040
You know? So I had to live with that.

01:23:20.560 --> 01:23:22.240
[man] Many people thought he was guilty,

01:23:22.320 --> 01:23:26.360
but nobody actually heard the evidence
either for him or against him.

01:23:26.440 --> 01:23:29.719
That meant that he was
in a kind of limbo for all these years.

01:23:29.800 --> 01:23:32.719
Now, 15 years on, a man has been charged.

01:23:32.800 --> 01:23:34.800
He's 41-year-old Robert Napper.

01:23:34.880 --> 01:23:37.880
The last man to be charged,
Colin Stagg, was cleared

01:23:37.960 --> 01:23:40.719
because a policewoman
had tried to entrap him.

01:23:41.320 --> 01:23:45.080
[Colin] I'd never had a proper girlfriend
up to the point of 29.

01:23:45.160 --> 01:23:48.320
So when I received a letter
from Lizzie James,

01:23:48.400 --> 01:23:51.480
I just felt really, um… happy

01:23:51.560 --> 01:23:54.040
that, um, a woman had shown
some interest in me.

01:23:54.800 --> 01:24:00.320
It is clear that he is completely innocent
of any involvement in that case.

01:24:00.840 --> 01:24:03.360
And I today apologize to him

01:24:03.440 --> 01:24:06.840
for the mistakes that were made
in the early 1990s.

01:24:08.200 --> 01:24:11.400
[Colin] I had very low self-esteem anyway
before this started.

01:24:11.960 --> 01:24:15.520
This knocked me back even further,
so even deeper and deeper.

01:24:17.840 --> 01:24:19.639
It did make me feel very paranoid.

01:24:19.719 --> 01:24:23.719
If I would accidentally sort of look at
a woman crossing the road and that,

01:24:23.800 --> 01:24:26.679
I used to immediately think,
like, "No, look away,"

01:24:26.760 --> 01:24:28.639
because somebody could be watching me

01:24:28.719 --> 01:24:30.840
thinking, "Hang on,
he's stalking that woman."

01:24:31.520 --> 01:24:35.040
And I just thought,
"Well, you know, this is your life now."

01:24:35.120 --> 01:24:39.920
"You've just got to get on with it.
You know, don't trust anybody."

01:24:50.360 --> 01:24:54.360
[André] On the build-up to the trial,
one of the lead detectives said, uh,

01:24:54.440 --> 01:24:57.000
"After you fly in," he said, "we'll meet."

01:24:57.520 --> 01:25:01.920
There was something I needed to know
before we got to the courtroom itself.

01:25:03.200 --> 01:25:06.360
Seven o'clock in the evening,
we met at Hendon Police Station.

01:25:07.920 --> 01:25:09.760
He showed me into a back room.

01:25:11.320 --> 01:25:15.240
We're just the two of us present,
and he pushed a dossier across the table.

01:25:15.320 --> 01:25:17.800
[tense music playing]

01:25:17.880 --> 01:25:20.000
What I saw in the dossier of documents

01:25:20.080 --> 01:25:25.440
was just
what an utter chaotic catalog of errors

01:25:25.960 --> 01:25:27.679
this whole investigation had been.

01:25:30.280 --> 01:25:32.080
It was absolutely devastating.

01:25:33.800 --> 01:25:36.719
It took me
all the way back to the very first day.

01:25:37.520 --> 01:25:38.679
The very first call,

01:25:38.760 --> 01:25:41.960
the very first news
that Rachel had been taken from us,

01:25:42.040 --> 01:25:44.520
and that Alex had been through
such an ordeal.

01:25:45.040 --> 01:25:46.760
We'd been trying to make sense of that

01:25:47.280 --> 01:25:50.040
week after week,
month after month, year after year.

01:25:51.760 --> 01:25:53.639
And all that's just exploded.

01:25:55.599 --> 01:25:58.560
Because here it says
it was all preventable.

01:25:59.480 --> 01:26:01.240
[sorrowful music playing]

01:26:06.520 --> 01:26:08.320
[Roger] In the summer of 1989,

01:26:08.400 --> 01:26:10.560
three years before
the murder of Rachel Nickell

01:26:10.639 --> 01:26:13.400
and also the murders
of Samantha and Jazmine,

01:26:13.480 --> 01:26:17.599
a serial rapist started attacking women,

01:26:17.679 --> 01:26:19.520
some with children present,

01:26:20.200 --> 01:26:22.440
on the Green Chain Walk pathway,

01:26:22.520 --> 01:26:27.200
which runs through woodland
and open common land in Southeast London,

01:26:28.040 --> 01:26:32.440
which is also not far
from the scene of the Bisset murders.

01:26:36.440 --> 01:26:40.480
DNA had identified one suspect
for that series of rapes.

01:26:43.040 --> 01:26:46.639
Two people who had seen the poster
contacted the police and said,

01:26:46.719 --> 01:26:49.040
"That artist's impression

01:26:49.120 --> 01:26:51.599
looks remarkably like
a guy called Robert Napper."

01:26:52.960 --> 01:26:56.520
Two detectives investigating
the Green Chain Walk rapes

01:26:56.599 --> 01:26:59.320
went to his, uh, known address.

01:26:59.400 --> 01:27:01.840
He appeared. They both spoke to him.

01:27:01.920 --> 01:27:06.240
He was, uh, told that he had been
identified as a possible suspect.

01:27:06.320 --> 01:27:10.280
And he then was asked to come
and voluntarily give blood,

01:27:10.360 --> 01:27:11.719
which he agreed to do.

01:27:12.800 --> 01:27:14.960
But he failed
to attend the police station,

01:27:15.560 --> 01:27:17.480
so they went back to his address.

01:27:17.560 --> 01:27:19.639
He'd packed his bags and left.

01:27:21.120 --> 01:27:22.120
He'd gone.

01:27:25.040 --> 01:27:26.120
Subsequently,

01:27:26.200 --> 01:27:29.160
on the grounds that he was taller

01:27:29.240 --> 01:27:31.480
than the descriptions
given by the rape victims,

01:27:31.560 --> 01:27:32.800
the decision was made

01:27:32.880 --> 01:27:36.320
by the senior investigating officer
and his deputy

01:27:36.400 --> 01:27:40.639
to exclude him as a suspect
from that inquiry.

01:27:42.320 --> 01:27:44.160
So basically nothing else was done.

01:27:46.679 --> 01:27:48.400
Which baffles me to this day.

01:27:50.120 --> 01:27:52.200
[music fades]

01:27:52.280 --> 01:27:54.679
Had Napper attended the police station,

01:27:54.759 --> 01:27:57.759
as he said he would do,
and his blood sample taken,

01:27:57.840 --> 01:28:02.639
he would have been then arrested
for the Green Chain Walk rapes.

01:28:03.400 --> 01:28:04.840
That didn't happen, which…

01:28:05.360 --> 01:28:07.320
It had catastrophic consequences.

01:28:07.840 --> 01:28:09.800
[poignant music playing]

01:28:09.880 --> 01:28:12.679
[André] And then
there was something in the dossier

01:28:12.759 --> 01:28:15.920
that was, for me, even more devastating.

01:28:17.560 --> 01:28:22.599
In September or October of 1989,
and years before Rachel was killed,

01:28:22.679 --> 01:28:25.679
Robert Napper's mother
reported to the police

01:28:25.759 --> 01:28:29.679
that he confessed that he'd raped a woman
on Plumstead Common.

01:28:30.719 --> 01:28:32.840
But the police didn't follow it up.

01:28:35.960 --> 01:28:37.400
This was a fork in the road.

01:28:37.920 --> 01:28:41.320
If the police had followed up
on Robert Napper's mother's call

01:28:42.000 --> 01:28:43.920
and taken a blood sample from him,

01:28:44.000 --> 01:28:47.759
this could have prevented
all of the attacks that followed.

01:28:48.719 --> 01:28:51.320
The attack that Alex witnessed
was preventable.

01:28:51.840 --> 01:28:53.599
Rachel's death was preventable.

01:28:55.639 --> 01:28:58.440
Samantha and Jazmine's deaths
were preventable.

01:28:59.759 --> 01:29:03.560
If they'd done their job properly,
he would have been taken off the street.

01:29:05.200 --> 01:29:08.240
[reporter 1] We watch today
as one of the great unresolved murders

01:29:08.320 --> 01:29:10.280
was finally resolved.

01:29:10.360 --> 01:29:13.160
[reporter 2] Today, the killer
of Rachel Nickell was found guilty

01:29:13.240 --> 01:29:16.480
of stabbing her to death
on Wimbledon Common 16 years ago.

01:29:16.560 --> 01:29:18.480
[laughter and chatter on video]

01:29:18.560 --> 01:29:20.480
Robert Napper was led out of the cells,

01:29:20.560 --> 01:29:22.840
up into the dock of Court 1
here at the Old Bailey,

01:29:22.920 --> 01:29:27.120
and there, gray-faced and balding,
with Rachel Nickell's parents looking on,

01:29:27.200 --> 01:29:29.880
he finally confessed
to killing their daughter.

01:29:29.960 --> 01:29:32.440
[Rachel laughs] André,
I'm right up on your…

01:29:33.360 --> 01:29:35.840
[Alex babbles]

01:29:35.920 --> 01:29:38.440
[reporter 3] Today's confession
brings to a close

01:29:38.520 --> 01:29:42.320
one of the most damning episodes
in Scotland Yard's history.

01:29:43.160 --> 01:29:45.719
[reporter 4] They admitted
they could have caught Napper earlier

01:29:45.800 --> 01:29:47.120
and stopped him killing.

01:29:47.200 --> 01:29:49.320
If the police had done things differently,

01:29:49.400 --> 01:29:52.080
Rachel Nickell
and Samantha and Jazmine Bisset

01:29:52.160 --> 01:29:53.679
would not have lost their lives.

01:29:53.759 --> 01:29:56.639
More could and should have been done.

01:29:57.599 --> 01:29:58.880
Had more been done,

01:29:58.960 --> 01:30:01.960
we would have been in a position
to have prevented this

01:30:02.040 --> 01:30:05.120
and other very serious attacks by Napper.

01:30:05.200 --> 01:30:07.280
[music fades]

01:30:18.160 --> 01:30:20.160
[birds singing]

01:30:21.679 --> 01:30:23.679
[André] We all grew up with fairy tales.

01:30:25.960 --> 01:30:29.080
We all grew up with that warning
not to go into the woods.

01:30:29.160 --> 01:30:32.440
The darkness,
the monsters, the… the danger.

01:30:33.719 --> 01:30:35.440
But it's not a fairy tale.

01:30:35.960 --> 01:30:38.000
There is true evil in this world.

01:30:39.360 --> 01:30:40.960
[soft, pensive music playing]

01:30:43.480 --> 01:30:47.920
I was really forced to…
to come to terms with that.

01:30:49.920 --> 01:30:54.440
My greatest confusion was, uh…
was why, you know?

01:30:54.520 --> 01:30:57.440
You know, the anger with God that, uh…

01:30:58.599 --> 01:31:01.120
that these kind of things
can happen to good people

01:31:01.200 --> 01:31:03.360
with absolutely no explanation.

01:31:06.400 --> 01:31:08.080
And so I had a mission,

01:31:08.160 --> 01:31:13.160
and, uh, that was to bring, you know,
Rachel's child through this

01:31:13.240 --> 01:31:14.880
in the best way possible.

01:31:16.920 --> 01:31:21.440
[Alex] I think with people
you live through difficulties together,

01:31:21.960 --> 01:31:25.560
they either break you
and they break the relationship

01:31:25.639 --> 01:31:28.719
or they make the relationship
that much stronger.

01:31:29.759 --> 01:31:32.400
We were ultimately forced
to find our own closure,

01:31:32.480 --> 01:31:35.480
which I think is actually a good thing.

01:31:35.560 --> 01:31:37.880
And that was ultimately
the realization that,

01:31:37.960 --> 01:31:40.920
you know, you have no choice
but to make peace.

01:31:41.000 --> 01:31:42.000
Make peace with it.

01:31:45.800 --> 01:31:50.599
My parents believed in
the infinity of the spirit.

01:31:51.560 --> 01:31:56.000
That my mother would be with me always
wherever I went.

01:32:01.040 --> 01:32:05.599
My father sacrificed everything for me
and for what he believed in,

01:32:06.120 --> 01:32:09.400
without any guarantees
of how it would turn out.

01:32:12.520 --> 01:32:17.120
He was brave enough to…
to do what he felt was right in his heart.

01:32:19.320 --> 01:32:21.679
I'm forever indebted to him for that.

01:32:25.560 --> 01:32:27.560
[music fades]

01:32:29.679 --> 01:32:31.679
[soft, sorrowful music playing]
that.