A paedophile has been found guilty of killing two girls in the infamous 'Babes in the Wood' murders which went unsolved for more than 30 years.
The bodies of nine year olds Nicola Fellows and Karen Hadaway were found huddled together in a den in Wild Park in Brighton in 1986. They had been sexually assaulted and strangled to death.
Russell Bishop, a roofer who knew Nicola's father, was charged with their killings but cleared following a trial branded a 'shambles' by one of the lawyers involved.
Bishop went on to attack another girl just three years later, molesting and strangling the youngster before leaving her for dead.
He was finally hauled back before court over the original murders this year after advances in DNA science meant a jumper he left near the scene of the Babes in the Wood victims linked him to the scene.
His conviction today - following the longest-running enquiry in Sussex Police's history - marks the end of the girls' families' 32 year wait for justice - and will raise questions over how he was ever allowed to walk free.
Russell Bishop, pictured (left) in prison and (right) around the time of the Babes in the Wood murders, was convicted today, 32 years after the girls were killed
Nicola Fellows (left) and Karen Hadaway (right) were found dead in woodland near Brighton in 1986. The case, known as the Babes in the Wood, went unsolved for more than 30 years
The two girls were last seen playing near the Wild Park at around 6.40pm on Thursday 9 October 1986 and were reported missing that evening.
Scores of locals, led by the girls' parents and Bishop himself, joined search parties to find them, before their bodies were found in a small den-like area in woods in the park at 4.20pm the following day.
Bishop, a petty criminal from the area, gave contradictory accounts to police over his movements on the night the girls died and he was charged in December that year.
The case against him centred on a blue 'Pinto' sweatshirt, which was found on the route Bishop took back to his flat from the park.
But the jumper was initially treated as lost property and placed in a brown paper bag. Another policeman later removed it from a bag, unaware of its significance to the murder inquiry.
It was finally tested after the murder probe was launched, but forensic experts who spoke at the first trial could not be sure that fibres on the jumper came from the girls' clothes.
In what was described as a 'slip-up' by the trial judge, human hairs and fibres were found on Nicola’s body were also not examined.
Bishop was acquitted in just 129 minutes and walked free from court in 1987. The barrister who defended Bishop, Ivan Lawrence QC, described the prosecution case as 'a shambles'.
The girls were found dead in this 'den' in undergrowth in Wild Park, Brighton after the going missing the previous night
Bishop went on trial for a second time after a blue jumper he discarded near the scene 'gave up its secrets' under inspection using modern DNA techniques
Three years later after his acquittal, Bishop kidnapped a seven-year-old girl, driving her to a secluded wooded spot and assaulting her before dumping her body in bushes.
The case had many similarities to the Babes in the Woods murders; the girl was abducted in the evening, was sexually assaulted and strangled and left in dense undergrowth, this time in Devil's Dyke, although this time the victim survived.
Bishop was jailed for life in 1990 for the abduction, sexual assault and attempted murder and has since remained in jail while investigators continued to examine the Babes in the Wood murders.
A change in the law on double jeopardy, along with advances in DNA testing – which was in its infancy when the first trial took place – then led to the Court of Appeal quashing the original acquittals and ordering a second trial.
The same forensics team which helped bring the killers of Stephen Lawrence to justice took another look at the case in 2011 and recovered a billion-to-one DNA match linking Bishop to the sweatshirt discarded close to the murder scene.
A taping taken from Karen Hadaway's left forearm was also found to contain Bishop's DNA.
His latest trial heard about a series of suspicious comments he made, inlcuding when he said he would 'hate to find the girls, especially if they had been messed up', during the search. At that time the girls were still assumed to be alive.
He then told a police officer: 'If I found the girls and if they were done in I'd get the blame, I'd get nicked'.
He knew details of positions the girls were found in, despite others having said he was kept back following the discovery of their bodies.
Bishop claimed he checked Nicola's neck and Karen's right forearm for a pulse, but later denied he had ever touched the girls.
He then changed his story again to cover the damning DNA evidence which linked him to both girls.
Pictured just hours after murder: Chilling photo shows Russell Bishop joining in the search for the girls he had killed the day before
Dead-eyed and smoking a cigarette, this is Russell Bishop hours after he strangled two schoolgirls in a case that became known as the Babes in the Wood murders.
Bishop evaded justice for killing Nicola Fellows and Karen Hadaway for 32 years but was finally found guilty today following a month-long trial.
A remarkable picture from the day after the girls disappeared shows Bishop sitting in Wild Park near Brighton, where the girls' bodies were later found. The two young friends had been sexually assaulted and strangled.
Russell Bishop was pictured, staring into space, as he took part in the search for Nicola Fellows and Karen Hadaway, just hours after he murdered them
Bishop walked free from a court when he was cleared of the murders in a 'shambles' first trial - and went on to attack another young girl, who miraculously survived his onslaught.
In an extremely rare move, appeal judges allowed him to be retried for the murders of Nicola and Karen, after advances in DNA science meant a jumper he left at the scene 'gave up it's secrets', in the words of the prosecutor.
The morning after the girls went missing, Bishop told police he had seen the girls playing around a tree and talking to the park keeper on his way home.
Bishop later took his dog 'Misty' out to join the search for the missing schoolgirls,
Russell Bishop, pictured at the time of the murders, tried to throw police off the scent as they investigated
His move was branded a 'cynical and deliberate attempt to divert attention away from himself' by prosecutors at his latest trial.
His presence at the search became part of his undoing however, when he gave inconsistent accounts of having seen and touched the girls' bodies.
He told police he had helped discover the bodies in the den and described their positions, with Karen lying at right angles to Nicola and her head resting in Nicola's lap.
Bishop also told his friend Geoff Caswell he had gone up to the bodies and tried for a pulse on the necks of both girls before realising they were dead.
Years later, former detective Phil Swan, who had interviewed Bishop on his arrest, said: 'I think he was scared he had left finger prints on them.'
Bishop also told officers he had noticed a bloody foam around Nicola's mouth at the same time.
But in a second interview the following Wednesday police put it to him that Kevin Rowland and Matthew Marchant, who were the first to find the bodies, said they prevented Bishop from going closer than 15 feet from the bodies - a distance from which he would not have been able to make out that detail.
Confronted with this, Bishop later changed his story saying he had lied about what position the girls were lying in and the detail about bloody foam around Nicola's mouth because he wanted to impress people.
However, his descriptions were completely accurate. Bishop also admitted he had gone home and washed his clothes because he had fallen in some dog mess.
The billion-to-one jumper: How DNA advances nailed Babes In The Wood killer Russell Bishop 32 years after he attacked two defenceless schoolgirls
To make sure Bishop did not get away with murder again police enlisted the help of the same cold case forensics team who helped convict Stephen Lawrence's killers.
After the paedophile walked free in 1987 the case remained under constant review and the real breakthrough came in 2005 when the double jeopardy law was abolished.
The Sussex Police cold case review team then decided to take another look at the evidence in light of advances in DNA testing which had taken place in the intervening years.
Eurofins Forensic Services Ltd was engaged and senior scientific advisor Roy Green was asked in August 2012 to inspect the original exhibits taken in the lead-up to the first trial which had been 'locked in place and time'.
Forensic experts used the latest techniques to link a jumper found not far from the girls' bodies to Bishop and the killings
In December of the following year a framework was agreed to review the fibres, pain, hair and DNA evidence.
It was agreed that all DNA work was to be subjected to DNA-17 testing which was brand new and considered to be the most sensitive technique available.
Mr Green found 11 fibres on the Pinto matching those taken from a sock in Bishop's home.
Mr Green also confirmed there to be 26 fibres matching another jumper as well as a further eight matching a second different pullover taken from the paedophile's home.
He found 13 fibres on the Pinto matching those of Karen's green sweatshirt and was also able to confirm the presence of at least four that matched fibres from Nicola's pink jumper.
On the girls' clothing Mr Green confirmed that there was a single fibre matching the Pinto on tapings taken from Karen's t-shirt and skirt during the post mortem examinations.
He also confirmed on other tapings from the t-shirt a total of 34 matching fibres from the Pinto, as well as 11 from her skirt, five from her underwear and at least 12 on her green sweatshirt.
On Nicola's clothing at least 13 fibres found on her pink jumper matched fibres from the Pinto in addition to three on her skirt and one on her underwear.
In an attempt to determine whether there was any support for the assertion Bishop had actually worn the Pinto experts looked at tapings taken from the inside and outside of the jumper.
Another one-in-a-billion hit on a taping taken from the outside of the Pinto matched Bishop's DNA whilst another taping from the outside back of the jumper indicated Bishop could have contributed to the sample.
Samples matching Bishop and his long-term partner were also recovered from the inside of the garment whilst four hairs recovered from it were also found to match his DNA sample.
Mr Green also examined tapings that were taken from Karen and used to recover fibres and other debris from exposed areas of the skin.
Each was searched for the presence of skin flakes and submitted for DNA-17 testing.
One taken from Karen's left forearm produced a one-in-a-billion match with Bishop.
Prosecutor Brian Altman QC told the jury: 'The science alone is quite simply so overwhelming as to prove not only that this defendant wore the Pinto, but also that the Pinto was worn by him when he killed those two girls'.
'If you are sure about that then this defendant has lied about his links to it and has lied about his involvement in these killings – and that is that,' he added.
Victim's father was forced to move out of his home town after police grilled him and lawyers accused him of being involved in the killings during the Russell Bishop's trials
Barrie Fellows broke down and had to leave court after he was accused of killing his own daughter
The father of one of the Babes in the Wood murder victims was accused of involvement in the killings in what the prosecutor called a 'smokescreen'.
Barrie Fellows, who played cricket with Bishop, attending the trial of his daughter's killer, only to be cross-examined himself.
Mr Fellows denied any involvement and had to leave the court after weeping in the witness as he was accused of killing the girls.
Bishop's barrister Joel Bennathan QC had told jurors 'that the police and prosecution have spent 32 years building a case against the wrong man'.
Bishop's former girlfriend Marion Stevenson told jurors how she visited the Fellows' home with Bishop before the killings to see another man, their friend Dougie Judd who lodged there.
When she crossed the living room on her way to the kitchen for a glass of water, she claimed to have seen Mr Fellows watching a video of his own daughter having sex with Mr Judd.
Mr Fellows denied this ever happened when he gave evidence.
Prosecutor Brian Altman QC slammed the defence case, saying: 'What you have seen unfolding before your eyes is the creation by the defendant of a smokescreen in the hope, quite literally, that he gets away with murder for the second time.'
He said the 'common theme throughout was an effort to smear Barrie Fellows', perhaps to bolster his ultimately unsuccessful claim for compensation years later.
Mr Altman accused the defence team of 'scraping the Barrie barrel' and dragging Mr fellows' name through the mud in a 'desperate' attempt at sidestepping the mountain of scientific evidence against him.
Mr Fellows was questioned by police following his daughter's death.
He told officers that instead of joining his wife, Susan, and Michelle Hadaway in the search for their daughters he had eaten his dinner at home. Officers found this explanation unconvincing.
Pictured: Mr Fellows shortly after his daughter's murder
After he was taken in for questioning, police did nothing to assuage residents suspicions and a hate campaign erupted on the Moulsecoomb estate.
Graffiti was daubed on a nearby house which said: 'Fellows out.'
At the first trial Ivan Lawrence QC - who was also a Conservative MP - sought to place doubt in the mind of the jury over Mr Fellows' innocence.
Mr Lawrence said Mr Fellows' alibi that he was at home having his dinner while his wife searched for their daughter was weak.
Mr Fellows responded by storming out of the public gallery saying: 'I've had enough of that.'
Mr Lawrence told the judge: 'I don't suggest for a moment that Barrie Fellows was the murderer and I'm sorry he left before he heard me say this. He can't be the murderer because of the times.'
But Mr Lawrence went on to say there was enough suspicious evidence surrounding Mr Fellows as there was concerning Bishop.
In 2009 - now divorced from wife Susan and remarried - he was arrested at his home in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire over an alleged plot to rape Nicola before her death.
Weeks later it was discovered the allegation had been made 20 years earlier by Bishop's former girlfriend, Marion Stevenson, and found to be completely baseless.
The 2009 claim was just a repetition of the earlier allegation and was again investigated and the case dropped but Fellows saw it as clear illustration of the police's lack of joined up thinking on the case and an example of his continued harassment by the police.
Link hienalouca.com
https://hienalouca.com/2018/12/10/babes-in-the-wood-killer-russell-bishop-found-guilty-of-1986-murders-of-two-nine-year-old-girls/
Main photo article A paedophile has been found guilty of killing two girls in the infamous ‘Babes in the Wood’ murders which went unsolved for more than 30 years.
The bodies of nine year olds Nicola Fellows and Karen Hadaway were found huddled together in a den in Wild Park in Brighton in 1986. They ...
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Dianne Reeves Online news HienaLouca
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