Soham murders

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The Soham murders were a high profile murder case in August 2002 of two ten year old girls, Holly Marie Wells (born October 4, 1991-c.August 4, 2002) and Jessica Aimee Chapman (born September 1, 1991-c.August 4, 2002), in Soham, Cambridgeshire, England. They were murdered by Ian Huntley (born 31 January 1974).

Contents 1 Murders 1.1 Mental assessment 1.2 Carr 1.3 Sentence 1.4 Beginnings 1.5 Police investigation 1.6 Huntley's trial 2 After the trial 3 The Bichard inquiry 4 The Police Reform Act 2002 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Murders

Huntley was the caretaker at the local secondary school, Soham Village College, at the time of the murders, having been appointed to this position on 26 November 2001. He was then living with his girlfriend, Maxine Carr, who was a teaching assistant at Holly and Jessica's school, St Andrew's Primary School.

On the day of the murders, at around 18:15, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman had had a barbecue at Holly's family home and shortly after they went out to fetch some sweets. On their travels they walked past Huntley's rented house in College Close. Huntley asked them to come into the house. He said that Carr was in the house as well, although in fact she had gone to visit family back in Grimsby. Shortly after Wells and Chapman entered 5 College Close, Huntley murdered them. It is said that Holly was drowned in the bath, and Jessica was suffocated with a pillow^{[citation needed]}

Huntley's reasons for committing the murders may never be known, but minutes before seeing the girls, Huntley had slammed the telephone down on Carr after a furious argument. Huntley had allegedly suspected Carr of cheating on him. The police suspect that Huntley killed the girls in a fit of jealous rage. There may have also been a sexual motive. It seems likely that either, or possibly both, of these motives drove Huntley to kill the girls. The police found no evidence of preplanning, and later said that they would have expected to find it if it were there.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Mental assessment

Ian Huntley's mental state was then assessed as to whether he suffered from a mental illness or not, and if he was fit to stand trial. This assessment took place at Rampton High Secure Hospital and was carried out by consultant psychiatrist, Dr. Christopher Clark. Dr. Clark stated in court that:

“

Although Mr. Huntley made clear attempts to appear insane, I have no doubt that the man currently, and at the time of the murder, was both physically and mentally sound and therefore, if he is found guilty, carried out the murder totally aware of his actions.

”

This left Huntley facing life imprisonment if a jury could be convinced of his guilt.

Huntley's defence conceded that he disposed of the girls' bodies and that they were in his house when they died. However, he claimed that Holly Wells accidentally fell in the bath and drowned and that Jessica Chapman was then so distressed that he had to restrain her to stop her screaming, but accidentally did this so forcefully that she too died. This led him to plead guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter, but the jury rejected his story and found him guilty of the murder of both girls.

Huntley was convicted on December 17, 2003, by two eleven-to-one majority jury verdicts, and was sentenced to life imprisonment. No recommended minimum term was made by the trial judge; this would be decided by the High Court at a later date.

The search for the two girls and the subsequent trial generated intense media interest and speculation, ensuring that the names and faces of Huntley and Carr became well-known across the United Kingdom and worldwide.

[edit] Carr

Maxine Carr provided a false alibi to police for Huntley and was convicted of perverting the course of justice. Carr was found not guilty of assisting an offender, reflecting the court's acceptance that Carr only lied to police to protect Huntley because she believed his claims of innocence, not knowing that Huntley had committed the murders. Carr had claimed to be with Huntley at the time of the murders, but was in Grimsby. Carr was released on probation on 14 May 2004 with a new secret identity for her protection.^[1]

[edit] Sentence

At first Huntley was sentenced to two life terms in prison. However, on September 29, 2005, it was announced that Huntley must remain in prison for at least 40 years - a minimum term which will not allow him to be released until at least 2042, by which time he will be 68 years old.

Huntley was among the last of more than 500 life sentence prisoners waiting to have minimum terms set by the Lord Chief Justice after the Home Secretary's tariff-setting procedures were declared illegal. Anyone who committed a murder after 18 December 2003 would have a minimum term recommended by the trial judge and later confirmed - or amended - by the High Court.

[edit] Beginnings

In February 1999, Huntley (then 25) met 22-year-old Maxine Carr at Hollywood's nightclub in Grimsby town centre. She later moved in with him at his flat in Barton-upon-Humber, a small town on the southern banks of the River Humber. Carr found a job packing fish at the local fish processing factory while Huntley worked as a barman. He also travelled to Cambridgeshire on his days off to help his father who worked as a school caretaker in the village of Littleport near Ely. He enjoyed the work so much that in September 2001 he applied for the position of caretaker at Soham Village College, a secondary school in a small town between Cambridge and Ely, after the previous caretaker was dismissed for having an inappropriate relationship with a female pupil.

Huntley was accepted for the post of caretaker at Soham Village College and he began work on 26 November 2001.

[edit] Police investigation

Regardless of how the girls died, Huntley disposed of their bodies in a ditch 20 miles away and set them alight in a bid to destroy the forensic evidence. The search for the girls was one of the most highly publicised missing person searches in British history and Huntley even appeared on the BBC's Look East regional news programme speaking of the shock of the local community. Their bodies were found near the perimeter fence of RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, on 17 August 2002, just twelve hours later their clothing was discovered in the grounds of Soham Village College and Huntley had been arrested. The girls had been missing for 13 days when their bodies were found, with police stating that both corpses were "severely decomposed and partially skeletonised".

He was later charged with two counts of murder and detained under Section 48 of the Mental Health Act 1983, at Rampton Hospital, before a judge decided that he was fit to stand trial on 8 October 2002. He was subsequently moved to Woodhill Prison at Milton Keynes, where he attempted suicide on 9 June 2003 by taking 29 anti-depressants which he had stashed away in his cell. There were fears that Huntley could die as a result of the overdose, but within 48 hours he was back in prison and was later transferred to Belmarsh Prison.

When the girls were first reported missing, Huntley was not the police's prime suspect, as on the same day that the two girls were reported as missing, the body of another man was found on a nearby railway line - he was believed to have committed suicide. However, it was later discovered that this was a simply a coincidence, and that this man was not involved in the girls' disappearance, but had in fact died several hours earlier in a completely unrelated incident.

[edit] Huntley's trial

Huntley's trial opened at the Old Bailey on 5 November 2003. He was faced with two murder charges, while Carr was charged with perverting the course of justice and assisting an offender. Huntley admitted that the girls had died in his house, but claimed that he had accidentally knocked Holly into the bath while helping her control a nosebleed and had accidentally suffocated Jessica when she started to scream. He admitted manslaughter, while Carr admitted perverting the course of justice.

However, the jury rejected his claims that the girls had died accidentally and on 17 December 2003 returned a majority verdict of guilty on both charges. Huntley was sentenced to life imprisonment, with his minimum term to be decided by the Lord Chief Justice at a later date. Carr was cleared of assisting an offender but found guilty of perverting the course of justice and jailed for three and a half years, but she was freed under police protection after just 5 months because she had already spent 16 months on remand. She was provided with a new identity and lives under police protection after leaving prison on 10 May 2004.

After Huntley was convicted, it was revealed that he had been investigated in the past for sexual offences and burglary, but had still been allowed to work in a school. None of these investigations had resulted in a conviction. Indeed, Huntley's only previous conviction was for riding a motorcycle without a licence or insurance (an offence for which he had been convicted in 1993).

Home Secretary David Blunkett ordered an inquiry into these failings, chaired by Sir Michael Bichard, and later ordered the suspension of David Westwood, Chief of Humberside Police. The inquiry criticised Humberside Police for deleting information relating to previous allegations against Huntley and criticised Cambridgeshire Police for not following vetting guidelines. An added complication in the vetting procedures was the fact that Huntley had applied for the caretaker's job under the name of Ian Nixon, although he did state on the application form that he was once known as Ian Huntley. It is believed that Humberside Police either did not check under the name Huntley on the police computer - if they had then they would have discovered a burglary charge left on file - or did not check at all.

Since being jailed, Huntley has repeatedly admitted that he lied when giving evidence at his trial. He changed his story about the death of Jessica, having previously admitted to suffocating her in a panic. An audio tape recording of Huntley speaking to a relative at Wakefield Prison revealed that he allegedly killed her when she tried to call for help on her mobile phone.

On 29 September 2005, High Court Judge Mr Justice Moses, who presided over Huntley's original trial, ruled that he should spend a minimum of 40 years in prison before he can be considered for parole. He was not issued with a whole life tariff because the judge said there was no evidence of abduction or a sexual motive. The beginning of his sentence was backdated to October 2002, when he was first remanded in custody — not August 2002, as he was initially held in a mental hospital before a judge decided he was fit to stand trial.

Under this ruling, Huntley is expected to remain behind bars until at least October 2042 and the age of 68. In March 2007, the Lord Chancellor sparked controversy when he said in a Sunday Telegraph interview that Huntley is among a number of prisoners who should never be released as "that is what the public expect".^[2]

The families of Huntley's victims later revealed that they had been hoping for a whole life tariff to be set, but Huntley's sentence was approximately three times heavier than the minimum terms imposed on most convicted murderers.

The Wells and Chapman families received £11,000 in compensation for the death of their daughters, which was widely criticised in the media. The director of the Victims of Crime Trust, Clive Elliott, described the compensation as a "pittance". [1]

On 14 September 2005 Huntley was scalded with boiling water when another inmate, Mark Hobson, attacked him. ^[3] A prison service spokesman said that due to the nature of high-security prisoners, "it's impossible to prevent incidents of this nature occasionally happening", but Huntley alleged that the prison authorities failed in their duty of care towards him, and launched a claim for £15,000 compensation. Huntley was reportedly awarded £2,500 in legal aid to pursue this claim, a move strongly criticised by the Soham MP, Jim Paice, who insisted on tight restrictions on the use of public money for compensation, and said, "The people I represent have no sympathy for him at all". Huntley's injuries meant that he did not attend the hearing at which his minimum term was decided.

On 5 September 2006, Huntley was found unconscious in his prison cell, thought to have taken an overdose. He had previously taken an overdose of anti-depressants while awaiting his trial.^[4] He was under police guard in hospital until 7 September, whereupon he was taken back to his prison cell under police escort, prompting much reaction from many present at the scene as well as making the front pages of many of the UK papers the next morning. Following this attempted suicide his cell was cleared and a tape was found which was marked with Queen on one side and Meat Loaf on the other. This tape is thought to contain confessions from Ian Huntley on what he did and how he did it. It is believed that Huntley made the tape in return for anti-depressants from a fellow prisoner, who hoped to obtain and later sell the confession to the media upon his release.^[5][6] On March 28, 2007, The Sun began publishing transcripts of Huntley's taped confession.^[7]

On 23 January 2008, Ian Huntley was moved to HM Prison Frankland in County Durham.

On 30 January 2008, it was revealed in the UK press that Maxine Carr was engaged to be married.

[edit] After the trial

Following the announcement of Huntley's conviction, it emerged that various authorities were aware of allegations, from a number of sources, that he had committed one act of indecent assault, four acts of underage sex and three rape.

The only one of these allegations that resulted in a charge was a rape, and the charge was dropped before it could reach court. Huntley had also been charged with burglary, but he was not convicted, although the charge remained on file. On the day of Huntley's conviction, the Home Secretary David Blunkett announced an inquiry into the vetting system which allowed Huntley to get a caretaker's job at a school despite four separate complaints about him reaching social services. One of the pertinent issues surfaced almost immediately when Humberside police (where all the alleged offences had taken place) stated that they believed that it was unlawful under the Data Protection Act to hold data regarding allegations which did not lead to a conviction; this was contradicted by other police forces who thought this too strict an interpretation of the Act.

There was also considerable concern about the police investigation into these murders. It took nearly two weeks before the police became aware of previous sexual allegations against Ian Huntley, and despite him being the last person to see either of the two children, his story was not effectively checked out early during the investigation.

Huntley had not been convicted of any of the underage sex, indecent assault or rape allegations, but his burglary charge had remained on file. Mr Howard Gilbert, the then head teacher of Soham Village College, later said that he would not have employed Huntley as a caretaker if he had been aware of the burglary charge, as one of Huntley's key responsibilities in his role was to ensure security in the school grounds.

On November 25, 2004, The Sun newspaper published details of a tape-recording they obtained of Ian Huntley admitting that he had lied in court. He was quoted as saying "I said that Jessica died in the bathroom. She didn't. She died in the living room. Everything happened as I said it did, apart from that." He said that he killed Jessica after she tried to flee once she had realised her friend had been killed elsewhere in the house.

Huntley also claimed that he couldn't live with the guilt of what he had done, and that he planned on committing suicide.

Huntley added that Carr had told him to burn the girls' bodies after he murdered them, a claim which contradicted the jury's opinion that Carr was not guilty of assisting an offender and had not known that Huntley had committed the murders.

[edit] The Bichard inquiry

The inquiry was announced on December 18, 2003, and Sir Michael Bichard was appointed as the chairman. The stated purpose was:

“

Urgently to enquire into child protection procedures in Humberside Police and Cambridgeshire Constabulary in the light of the recent trial and conviction of Ian Huntley for the murder of Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells. In Particular to assess the effectiveness of the relevant intelligence-based record keeping, the vetting practises in those forces since 1995 and information sharing with other agencies, and to report to the Home Secretary on matters of local and national relevance and make recommendations as appropriate.

”

The inquiry opened on January 13, 2004. The findings of the Bichard Inquiry were published in June 2004. Humberside and Cambridgeshire police forces were heavily criticised for their failings in maintaining intelligence records on Huntley.

The inquiry also recommends a registration scheme for people working with children and vulnerable adults, like the elderly. It also suggested a national system should be set up for police forces to share intelligence information. The report said there should also be a clear code of practice on record-keeping by all police forces.

[edit] The Police Reform Act 2002

Sir Michael Bichard's report severely criticised the Chief Constable of Humberside Police, David Westwood, for ordering the destruction of criminal records of child abusers. Though supported by Humberside Police Authority, he was suspended by then Home Secretary David Blunkett, using powers granted under the Police Reform Act 2002 to order suspension as "necessary for the maintenance of public confidence in the force in question". The suspension was later lifted, with Westwood agreeing to retire a year early, in March 2005.

The Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire Police, Tom Lloyd had also been criticised, as his force had failed to contact Humberside Police during the vetting procedure. Lloyd was criticised by the police inspectorate for being slow to cut a holiday short after the investigation had become the largest in the force's history. The inspectorate also criticised a 'lack of grip' on the investigation, which included nationally televised appeals by both footballer David Beckham and Detective Superintendent David Beck, who announced that he had left a message for abductors on Jessica's mobile phone before the case was taken from him.

Another complication was that two of the Cambridgeshire police officers involved with the families of the murdered girls had become Operation Ore suspects a month before the murders. Antony Goodridge, one of the exhibits officers, later pleaded guilty to child pornography offences and was given a six-month sentence. Detective Constable Brian Stevens, who had read a poem at the girls' memorial service, was cleared of charges of indecent assault and child pornography offences after the poor presentation of prosecution evidence by computer expert Brian Underhill caused the trial to be stopped. Stevens was later convicted of a charge of perverting the course of justice after it was proved that he had given a false alibi to clear himself of the charges, and was imprisoned for eight months. The Stevens case may have affected other Operation Ore inquiries.

Tom Lloyd announced his resignation in June 2005 following accusations that he had become extremely drunk at the Association of Chief Police Officers' annual conference and had pestered a senior female official.

[edit] References

• BBC News - Huntley attacked in prison
• BBC News - Huntley ordered to serve 40-year minimum term
• BBC News - Huntley in hospital after overdose
• AOL News - Huntley attacked in prison

[edit] External links

• BBC News report from the time of Huntley's arrest
• BBC News report on Huntley's conviction
• BBC News report on Blunkett's inquiry
• BBC News report detailing previous allegations against Huntley
• The Bichard Inquiry