‘These nightmares consume my every thought, like advanced cancer. They haunt my days and terrorise my nights. This is the reality of what transpired that day – a legacy I cannot escape.
‘At this time, I pray that the law and justice will go hand in hand, and the sentence will fit this evil act of murder and butchery.’
I bowed my head as I listened to Sam. My words did little to convey how dark and desperate the last year had been for me, but Tanya, Sarah, Anjie and even some of the jury members were in tears.
Then it was time for Liz, Tanya’s family liaison officer, to read out Tanya’s statement on her behalf.
‘I am Tanya Watts, the mother of Rebecca Marie Watts, born 3 June 1998. She was known to me and others as Becky,’ Liz read. ‘Becky’s murder has had an impact not only on my life, but also that of my son, Daniel Watts, and my mother, Pat Watts. Becky has always very much been a big part of our lives since the day she was born. Mum was in the hospital with me when I had Becky and was the first person to hold Becky.
‘Danny was always a lovely, protective big brother to Becky. Yes, they had their little fallouts as teenage brothers and sisters do, but whether they were with me or their dad, the two of them always lived with each other and were there for one another.
‘When I had Becky, it was in hospital and I had to have a caesarean section. It was a little complicated. Becky didn’t want to come out – she was happy where she was. So when they finally brought her out, she was screaming the place down. I always said, “The world knew about it when Becky was born. And they will know about it when she is a teenager!” I never thought it would be like this. Now the world knows all about her death too, in every horrific detail.
‘People always ask, “How are you?” and I don’t know what to say because I am not sure how I am feeling. My beautiful, kind, funny, loving, loyal, feisty, creative daughter has been murdered. Every day has been a living nightmare.
‘And if that wasn’t bad enough, for some reason that I will never, ever be able to understand, after my daughter was murdered she was mutilated, cut into pieces. It is like the worst of all horror movies – but this is real. This is my child, she was only sixteen. How am I meant to cope with that? What can anyone say or do to help me come to terms with that? It just goes round and round in my mind all the time; it is never-ending. I don’t want to remember Becky like this, but the thought of her being dismembered is always at the forefront of my mind.
‘The 19th February 2015 is the day that we have been told Becky was killed. That means that Becky was murdered on Danny’s twentieth birthday. It should have been a day to celebrate. How is he ever expected to get over that? How is he ever going to celebrate any of his birthdays again? He can’t. None of us can celebrate his birthday again. That date will always be etched in our minds as the day that Becky would have been so scared seeing this person that she thought of as a brother attacking and killing her. There is nothing to celebrate any more, not without Becky.
‘In March I was told that Becky had been found and that she had been dismembered. I had already been having difficulty sleeping with her disappearance, but this made sleeping impossible. In the end, I had to rely on one of my family liaison officers to contact my GP on my behalf, as I could not function. I could not bring myself to say what had happened to Becky, and how Danny and I needed help.
‘I keep thinking about Becky, her situation and how she came to be dead, and I am furious. I have so many questions. I can’t rest until I know what has happened, and even then I am sure I still won’t ever be able to understand why it happened.’
In her statement, Tanya then wrote about going to see Becky’s body in the morgue, and I closed my eyes, remembering all too well the horrors of that day.
Liz continued to read: ‘As a family we then suffered further, waiting for Becky to be released in order for her funeral to take place. When the time did come for Becky’s funeral, it was a real mixture of different emotions. I will always be grateful that the public made generous donations allowing for a beautiful send-off for Becky, but I couldn’t help but be angry, hurt and upset that, actually, Becky’s big day should have been her wedding, and not her funeral. Becky has been robbed of her future, and we have been robbed of all of those future milestones we should have been able to share together.
‘Becky’s death has left a massive hole even in just ordinary, everyday things. I can’t believe that I will never have her and Courtney come round my house, going through the cupboards like a pair of locusts! I still have the chicken in the freezer that I was going to do for their Sunday roast. I still have Becky’s pocket money in an envelope that she was due to collect around the time she died. The hardest thing is that I can’t believe I am never going to see her again.’
She said she was more anxious about Danny now, terrified something might happen to him as well, then it continued: ‘Hearing evidence throughout the trial has been incredibly difficult. Becky must have been so scared – thinking she was safely resting in her own bedroom to then be attacked like that, by someone that she regarded as family. Knowing that her last moments were filled with fear and that she would have fought for her life – it is just unbearable for us. I can’t get it out of my mind.
‘It made sense to me that Becky would have fought for her life. That was the kind of girl she was. Sometimes she had a tough exterior, but those people who really knew her (and only a few people truly knew Becky) knew that, underneath it all, she was a big softie. Yes, she could watch a horror movie without flinching – but equally, when she watched a film like Marley & Me she would cry her eyes out.
‘The impact of Becky being taken from us, murdered, dismembered and hidden is massive; trying to describe it is difficult. I often hear myself talking about Becky and asking questions about her death, but it is as if I am talking about someone else, not my baby girl. It is surreal. But the actual reality is that those people who were involved in Becky’s murder, dismemberment and concealment have left us with a lifetime of emptiness, continuing nightmares of her final moments and a grave to visit.’
Tanya’s statement almost reduced me to tears, but I swallowed the lump in my throat and reminded myself that I had vowed not to crumble. We’d had our differences in the past – far too many of them – but I agreed with everything she said that day. The courtroom remained silent for a few moments after Liz stopped reading, and I noticed that a few of the jury members were still dabbing at their eyes with tissues.
William Mousely then began to speak, telling the court that Nathan should face a mandatory life sentence for Becky’s murder. He added that the kidnap involved significant planning, and that the concealment and dismemberment of her body were also aggravating factors in the case.
Nathan’s barrister, Adam Vaitilingam, then addressed the court. He pointed out that whole life orders – where prisoners are never released from jail – are only applied to the most horrific and exceptional cases. He added, ‘There are only eight people in the country in that category who are not multiple killers.’
I shook my head. In my mind, Nathan deserved to rot in prison for the rest of his life. I didn’t think the fact that he hadn’t killed before should count for anything.
Andrew Langdon then addressed the court on behalf of Shauna. His argument was that Shauna was a vulnerable child when she met Nathan and, had she not met him, she wouldn’t have carried out the offence. He even suggested that Shauna herself could be considered as one of Nathan’s victims. I think everyone in the courtroom felt he was clutching at straws with that.
The judge announced that he would pass sentence on Shauna and Nathan at 2 p.m., and the court was adjourned for lunch. We had an hour and a half to wait, so we stepped outside. My stomach fluttered anxiously as the time passed. I couldn’t eat, could hardly say a word to anyone because my thoughts were still in the courtroom; I was desperate to hear the sentences.
Finally, the moment we had all been waiting for arrived, and we were summoned to go back
in. This was when we would find out how long Nathan and Shauna would each spend behind bars.
Mr Justice Dingemans started his speech by talking about the vile way Nathan had deceived his family after Becky’s death. ‘Mr Matthews and Miss Hoare lied to the family and to the police, pretending not to know anything about Becky’s whereabouts, at a time when they were in the process of dismembering her,’ he said gravely. ‘Everyone who saw them both, including the first police officers to investigate, were taken in by the apparently concerned couple. Their deceit of the family was particularly cruel and unusual, and the family’s sense of betrayal by Nathan Matthews and Shauna Hoare is both understandable and justified. At the same time that they were deceiving the family, Matthews and Hoare were watching a parody of a song from Frozen, using the words “Do you want to hide a body?”
‘It is apparent that neither Nathan Matthews nor Shauna Hoare have truthfully said what happened to Becky, and I understand the family’s sense of frustration about that fact.’
He continued, ‘I am sure, on the evidence that was adduced at the trial, that the planned kidnap of Becky was for a sexual purpose. But in my judgement it does not require a whole life order, in the circumstances where Nathan Matthews had been of previous good character and had directed the police, after a long delay, to Becky’s remains.
‘This is not in any sense to diminish the loss suffered by Becky’s family. In my judgement the behaviour of both Nathan Matthews and Shauna Hoare in feigning concern with the family, as the family desperately searched and looked for Becky, is a further and serious aggravating feature.
‘In my judgement, the appropriate sentence for Mr Matthews is a mandatory life sentence with a minimum term of thirty-three years. This means that Mr Matthews, as a twenty-eight-year-old man, will be sixty-one before he might be considered for release, and the reality is that he might never be released.’
I let out a huge sigh of relief, and I was aware of Sarah squeezing my hand. I could just about glimpse Nathan in the dock. He was slumped forward in the chair in his usual position, his head bowed so nobody could see his expression.
Shauna was then jailed for seventeen years, with the judge saying that he believed her involvement in these offences was a product of the nature of her relationship with Nathan. She didn’t show a shred of emotion as her sentence was announced.
I wasn’t as happy with the length of her prison sentence, but the main thing I focused on was the fact that she was going to prison, and that Nathan might never be released. God only knows what I’d do if I ever set eyes on either one of them again.
The judge concluded his sentencing remarks by paying tribute to us, Becky’s family.
In an extraordinary moment, he choked back tears as he spoke. All the way through the court case he had been a strong figure of authority, so it was surprising to see him let his emotions get the better of him.
His voice trembling, he said, ‘Finally, I should like to pay public tribute to the family of Becky for the dignified way in which they have conducted themselves throughout these proceedings. Hearing the evidence during the trial has been difficult for anyone, but it is plain that it has been an immense burden for the family.’
With that, he quickly got up and left the court with his head bowed and tears in his eyes. From the shock on everyone’s faces, I could tell that his reaction was rare. His compassion really touched me.
I later found out that Mr Justice Dingemans was a father of three himself, and that his kids – two of them girls – were all aged between eighteen and twenty-three. It just went to show that any parent, even a judge who sits through murder trials regularly, would be affected by what happened to Bex. Even though nothing was ever going to make it right, his compassion gave me a tiny shred of comfort that he understood the hell we had gone through.
As we got up, I shot one last look at Nathan and Shauna, who were being taken down to the cells for the final time. Neither of them met my gaze, but they both looked terrified as they contemplated their long prison sentences. It would never be the same level of terror that Becky had faced, but it would have to do. Justice had been served.
Chapter 16
Aftermath
After the sentencing, Sam and Sarah told me that some members of the jury had approached them to ask if they could meet us to pass on their sympathy. I was keen to speak with them too, so we arranged to meet five of them in a Wetherspoons pub around the corner from Bristol Crown Court. As soon as they introduced themselves, I thanked them for putting those monsters behind bars.
‘You have no idea what it means to me and my family,’ I told them, shaking hands and hugging every one of them. ‘Thank you from the bottom of my heart for seeing through those evil lies. All we’ve wanted this whole time was to get justice for Becky, and you did that for us. Thank you.’
The family celebrated with a few drinks that night, but it was a bittersweet moment. We were thrilled that Becky’s killers were behind bars, but, of course, justice being served was never going to bring her back to us, where she belonged. Every time the story popped up on the pub television that night, we held up our drinks, cheered and proposed a toast to Becky. But although Nathan and Shauna’s convictions were a massive weight off my shoulders, there was still a huge hole in my life.
The sentence Nathan was given seemed like the best possible conclusion to the harrowing five-week trial, but I often wondered if justice had really been done. In prison, Nathan and Shauna would be warm and they’d have three meals a day; they’d be able to listen to music and possibly to make friends. Even though Nathan was having to serve a minimum of thirty-three years, meaning he wouldn’t be eligible for parole until he was sixty-one, I couldn’t help but wonder if I would rather he had paid for his crime with his own life – something I freely told the press. I didn’t want to think of him having any happiness ever again.
As for Shauna’s sentence – just seventeen years – I wasn’t overly pleased with that. She was twenty-one and if she served half her sentence that would mean she could get out of prison by the age of thirty. She would still have a shot at building a life for herself – something my Becky would never have. Still, I was happy that she was behind bars. There had been times when I worried that the jury would buy her ridiculous story about being completely unaware of Nathan’s crime, about not questioning the noise and smell as he dismembered Becky’s body in her bathroom.
Wherever we went, newspapers had Becky’s name and face plastered all over them, and every time I turned on the television I saw Anjie and myself on the court steps, blinking as cameras flashed all around. Suddenly, the Becky Watts murder trial was absolutely everywhere. It wasn’t just a Bristol story any more – all the nationals wanted a piece of us, and it was overwhelming. Not many people murder their stepsister, the girl they’ve grown up with, so for the media it was a highly unusual case.
We decided to give immediate interviews to the Sun newspaper and BBC Points West, and we went on Good Morning Britain on Thursday, 12 November, the day after the verdicts were announced. Doing interview after interview was draining, and speaking about the devastating effect of Becky’s death on my family never got any easier, but I felt that it was important to explain our side of things and bring the focus back onto my beautiful, loving daughter.
It was quite nerve-racking giving our very first live interview on mainstream television. I’d never been on television before, and Good Morning Britain was obviously a huge household name. I reminded myself to keep my swearing in check and not let myself get too angry in front of the cameras. Anjie and I had to get up at the crack of dawn for filming, and we both felt fragile after all the tension of the previous day. We were being interviewed by presenters Susanna Reid and Ben Shephard, and when the time came we were led out to sit with them on the famous sofa.
‘What were your feelings yesterday, Darren, when those verdicts came in?’ Susanna asked, after thanking us for appearing on the show.
‘A great deal of relief, I m
ust admit,’ I answered truthfully. ‘But it’s a bittersweet verdict for us.’
Ben then directed his gaze at Anjie. ‘Obviously, Nathan was your son,’ he said. ‘And he committed this appalling crime. How did you feel, sitting there looking at him in court, and hearing that verdict read out, and sitting through the case?’
‘Absolutely disgusted,’ Anjie replied, shaking her head. ‘I couldn’t take it all in, what had happened.’
‘We’ve just been stunned all the way through this,’ I added.
‘As you were sitting there, Anjie, was there any sense that this was the little boy you had brought up and loved as a mother all through his childhood?’ Ben asked again.
‘No,’ she answered adamantly. ‘He was a different person. He’s not the child I remember bringing up.’
Susanna and Ben then asked us if we’d ever sensed the anger Nathan appeared to be harbouring towards Becky while they were growing up.
‘It was just sibling rivalry,’ I replied. ‘And not even that serious. We never saw any of this coming. Even after Becky disappeared, he was helping me put photos on Facebook, getting the message out there. We were desperate to find her.
‘When they arrested them, we still said, “You’ve got it wrong.” We trusted them, and the betrayal hurts so much. We loved them. They were all our kids, even if they had different DNA. It didn’t make a difference. We loved them, they were our family.’
When asked how she felt about Nathan now, Anjie simply said, ‘I still love him. I just find it hard looking at the monster he’s turned into.’
‘What happened between you, what one parent’s child did to another, is enough to shatter any relationship. How have you managed to stay strong together through this?’ Susanna asked, looking at us intently.
Becky Page 23