My James: The Heartrending Story of James Bulger by His Father

by Ralph Bulger

  It was suggested at his later trial that when he stayed with his father, he had begun to watch some of the movies that Neil had rented. Many of the films were ultra-violent or contained pornography, including a notorious video nasty called I Spit on Your Grave in which a young woman is gang raped in a cabin. She takes her revenge on the gang, picking them off one by one in a series of gruesome killings. Another of the films was the horror movie Childs Play 3, which stars a demonic doll called Chucky that springs to life in a military academy. The doll then abducts a young cadet and tries to kill him under the wheels of a fairground ghost train. In the end it is Chucky, wearing toddler’s dungarees, with his face splashed with blue war-games paint, that meets a gruesome end. The violent plot has terrible echoes of the attack on James and it was reported in the trial that this video was the last film rented by Jon’s dad before James was abducted. Jon was known to have an active imagination and fantasized about being a hero. He was resentful of the attention his brother and sister received for their learning difficulties and often lost himself in a world of fantasy films and violence. The result was a hostile, angry and violent young boy who would do anything for attention.

  It has long been debated whether these films had any influence on him. I accept that the movies may have fuelled the violence already within him, or even just been something he enjoyed, but I have never believed that a horror film can put evil inside a child in the first place or turn him into a killer. Child’s Play 3 did not make Jon Venables kill my James.

  One of the many articles written about Thompson and Venables suggests that they saw my son as a doll, something for them to play with and discard afterwards. In particular, reference was made to police suspicions that the batteries found at the murder scene had been forced into James’s bottom. The author of this article suggested that Robert placed the batteries inside James’s backside as if he was a walking, talking doll that Robert tried to bring back to life again. I understand society’s need to try to make sense of something so horrific, but I have never believed this was a plausible reason for what he did, and still believe it was a sexual assault and that the motive for James’s murder was sexual. The fact that my son’s lower clothes had been removed and there was evidence of some damage to his genitals, as well as what they did with the batteries, shows that sexual abuse was a prime part of the attack.

  Thompson was quizzed about sexually assaulting James and it has been reported that he became very upset and jittery. He was terrified he would be labelled as a pervert and was scared that Venables would tell police that he had sexually assaulted James.

  ‘I’m not a pervert, you know,’ he would tell police.

  The biggest shock of all was the scale of violence inflicted on James by boys so young themselves. And because children who are capable of such terrible deeds are the exception, thankfully, society doesn’t want to believe they can exist — that they are born with this violence in them. But in all the debate it is often overlooked that these two boys were not mentally subnormal. They were canny, manipulative and violent, and so it has always been hard to stomach some of the arguments put forward to explain their behaviour, blaming it on their upbringing. They knew right from wrong, they knew truth from lies, and they chose deliberately to mutilate and kill a child who was begging for mercy.

  They knew what they were doing was wicked. Some may criticize my attitude, but I would have liked to have seen more attention paid to the real punishment of these boys instead of finding excuses for their crime. On that long walk to James’s death, Thompson and Venables had plenty of opportunities to walk away from him, to let him live, but they never once showed an ounce of compassion or feeling for a tiny little boy whose life had barely started. They were happy to abuse, hurt and kill James, leaving him alone to be dismembered by a train. Their only concern was to cover up their crime and their only regret was that they got caught.

  It may oversimplify the arguments, but that to my mind makes them evil beyond belief. And evil does exist among humans. Just look at people like the Moors murderers Ian Brady and Myra Hindley, or the serial killer Peter Sutcliffe. Society has far less difficulty condemning their crimes because they were adults when they hurt others. Thompson and Venables just showed their true colours before they reached their eighteenth birthdays.

  I am never going to be in a position to analyse this objectively because it was my baby boy who was murdered, and I am sure most parents would feel the same as me if their child had been the victim of one of the most shocking crimes of all time. I wish I didn’t have to talk about these little bastards in this book because I get so angry that it always seems to be about them and not my baby. I know I have to talk about them because they are the ones who caused so much misery and suffering but, for me, it will always be about James and what he endured. Whatever lives these boys had before they committed this crime, nothing can ever be as bad as what they did that day to my son. It is also why I never believed they could be rehabilitated. It is my job, as James’s father, to tell how much he suffered and how it feels to lose the most precious thing in your life. It is something that the world should never forget because James was the only victim of this crime, not Robert Thompson or Jon Venables.

  Two days after the boys were charged with murdering James, Robert Thompson and Jon Venables were to make their first appearance before the magistrates in Liverpool. Denise and I decided not to attend after being advised by the police that it would be a formality to remand them in custody and that a full trial could only be carried out before a Crown Court. But it would prove to be an eventful day regardless.

  Tight security surrounded their arrival at South Sefton Magistrates’ Court, which was only a few hundred yards from where James had been abducted at the Strand. Emotions were still running very high in Liverpool, much of which Denise and I had been shielded from because we were still isolated and in deep mourning. I knew about the mobs that had threatened Jonathan Green but I didn’t know until then the extent of how the rest of the community and the world at large had reacted to James’s murder. The police had spoken to us about the possibility of disturbances at the court appearance and asked for our help to appeal to the public to stay calm. I agreed instantly and, through the police, Denise and I urged people to act with restraint because the last thing we wanted was an ugly backlash to tarnish our son’s name.

  I have a terrible dilemma over this issue, which I struggle to address. I will readily admit that I wanted James’s killers dead and I would be lying if I said I felt any other way. But I am not a sadistic or nasty man. I am not a killer. As a father, I would never in reality harm or be cruel to children. I felt terrible that, as an adult man, I had these feelings inside me towards two ten-year-old boys, and I found these emotions so hard to deal with. But my responses were primal. Having these thoughts in my head does not mean that I will ever spill over into being a killer myself.

  Over the years, I have met other parents whose children have been murdered and they feel the very same way. A lot of them have said they have wanted to avenge their child’s death by killing the person responsible. It is a natural response for a bereaved parent, but it is very different to actually going out and committing that same crime. Unless you have experienced it, it is almost impossible to understand. It is something many parents will feel and say, but not carry through.

  During that initial short hearing at court, Thompson and Venables confirmed their names and ages, and within just a few minutes it was over. They had appeared before magistrates at a juvenile court that was not open to the public, although the room was packed with journalists, who did have the right to attend. However, at this time reporting restrictions meant the boys could not be publicly named, and were to be referred to in the media as Child A and Child B.

  The killers’ earlier entrance into court passed without incident because the police had taken the precaution of delivering them into the court building before 7 a.m. to avoid any ugly confrontations with members of the public. It w
as a very different story as they left. Despite our pleas for calm, there were some terrible scenes that morning outside the court. Thompson and Venables had been formally remanded in custody and were to be taken back to local authority detention. Crowds had gathered outside the court, aware that the two boys were appearing there, and two windowless police vans with a heavy police escort pulled through the gates of the court building as a screaming mob surged towards the vehicles. Mayhem broke out as mums and dads, teenagers and kids all hurled abuse, stones, eggs and bricks at the vans, believing the boys to be inside them.

  ‘Bastards,’ they jeered. ‘Let them hang.’

  The scenes were captured by television cameras and shown across the news later that day. It was shaming. I understood the fury more than anyone, and instinctively knew that the protestors had acted out of grief and fear for their own loved ones, and it was just a lot of emotions boiling over. But I also knew that I didn’t want my son’s memory to be marred by such behaviour.

  As it turned out, the boys weren’t even in those two vans that were attacked. Police had predicted a backlash from the crowd and had organized a decoy convoy to throw the mob off the scent. Thompson and Venables were still sitting inside the courthouse, and when the crowds had finally dispersed, they were escorted into secure local authority care in separate waiting vans.

  7

  My Son’s Last Journey

  Once Thompson and Venables were charged and put before magistrates, it meant that Denise and I were finally able to start making plans for James’s funeral. There could have been lengthy delays had the legal teams for Thompson and Venables insisted on independent autopsies, but that was not the case, and the coroner was now free to consent to release the body of our baby for burial.

  We had already buried our first-born child, Kirsty, and now we were forced to bury our only other child. But the circumstances couldn’t have been more different. It was hard even to begin to think about funeral arrangements, but we had no choice. We were going to need all the help we could find to get through it. As anyone who has lost a loved one knows, a funeral gives you a sense of purpose in the darkness. It is not something you want to do, but somehow your body carries you through your grief to get the arrangements made.

  Neither Denise nor I was sleeping or eating properly. I would lie down at night and close my eyes and all I would do was see images of my son, screaming and crying in agony as he was tortured. If I dozed off through exhaustion, I would wake shortly after, covered in sweat and with my heart thumping against my chest. I could hardly hold any food down and so I just snatched the odd snack to keep me going.

  Although Denise and I were aware that this was a murder that was being reported across the world, we hardly watched the television or saw reports in the newspapers. If the news came on and James was mentioned, I had to get up and turn it off.

  Our police liaison officers, Mandy and Jim, sat down and spoke with us about the intense interest from the media and how much attention there was likely to be on the day of James’s funeral. I would have given anything to be allowed a quiet, dignified funeral for our little boy but there was also a part of me that wanted the whole world never to forget what had happened to him. One of the issues we had to consider was how to give the media the access they would need to cover the service without taking over this very sacred day. The police suggested allowing live television coverage of the funeral mass inside the church, which would provide the worldwide press with what they needed in the least intrusive way. Denise and I agreed because it was better than having hundreds of journalists and cameras trying to get inside.

  The first job was to call the funeral directors, Graham Clegg, to ask if they would take on the task of burying James. They are a firm that we had used many times in our family and they agreed without hesitation. They also kindly refused to let us pay, insisting that they wanted to help us in any way they could.

  Denise and I went to Kirkdale Cemetery to meet with the funeral directors, as I had to choose a plot where James was to be buried. Later on my brothers Jimmy and Philip came with me to see the plot and we decided on a peaceful, pretty opening under a tree. It just seemed a very gentle space for my son.

  I remember sitting down under the tree and I began to well up. I was so distraught at the realization that this was where my son’s tiny body was going to rest, and I cried as I thought of how he would be lying there night after night in the dark and all alone, when he should have been climbing into our bed for warmth and comfort.

  Denise and I then had the unbearable agony of choosing a casket for James. He was so small that it would have to be handmade for his little body, but once again the company refused to let us pay for their services. The public support was quite overwhelming for us as a family, but we had seen nothing yet.

  For any parent, to lose a child is the most horrific thing. But not only did we have James snatched from us so savagely, we were also denied the chance to say goodbye to him. It’s bad enough that I couldn’t stop imagining what he must have looked like and what he had been through, but I would have lost it completely if I had seen the state of his body. This also meant that the casket would have to be sealed for the funeral service. I would dearly have loved to hold James one last time, to kiss him gently on the forehead and say my final goodbye, but I was cheated of that chance. I often torture myself in the dead of night, wondering whether I should have seen him anyway, regardless of his injuries. Was I weak to stay away and not see my own son? Not only did I fail to save him from such a terrible fate, I couldn’t even cradle him and say goodbye properly.

  The funeral director asked us what we would like to place in James’s coffin and Denise and I talked it through carefully. We decided on his favourite trousers and a waistcoat, a teddy bear to bring him comfort, his favourite motorbike toy and a torch, because he never went to bed without his torch. We also decided it would be appropriate to put James’s special chair that I had made for him on the altar during the service, placing some more of his toys on the seat.

  It fell to Graham Clegg to drive to the mortuary at Broad Green Hospital to collect the remains of James’s body. It must have been a truly dreadful task for him, but he placed James’s possessions in the coffin with him and sealed the casket up.

  James’s funeral was to take place at the Sacred Heart Church in Northwood, Kirkby. We went to see our local parish priest, Father Michael O’Connell, who had been a great source of comfort to us since the murder. He told us it was important that we had the kind of funeral that we wanted for our baby, and he was very gentle and kind. Denise and I spent a lot of time choosing the right songs, hymns and prayers for our boy, and it was a deeply emotional process. We had to put our own feelings to one side and think only about what was right for James. It had always been about James when he was alive and we had to do right by him in his death.

  Organizing the funeral meant that we were leaving the flat far more than we had since James was murdered. It was a very scary and daunting process. If I could have, I think I would have locked myself away for a very long time, but we had no choice but to get on and do things for our son. For the first time I could sense people looking at us, recognizing us from the television and newspapers. I was completely thrown by this and I felt panicked and uneasy. I didn’t want people to see me or look at me; I just wanted to get back home as quickly as possible, to retreat into my private world of grief.

  A couple of days before the funeral service, Denise and I went to the chapel of rest in Maghull where we would see James’s casket for the first time. It was a devastating moment, knowing that inside lay what was left of our son’s battered and broken body. As I laid my hands on the little white coffin, I just wanted to rip open the lid and hold my baby close to me. I put both my hands on the casket to steady myself.

  ‘I’m so sorry, son,’ I spoke out loud. ‘I love you so much and just want to take you back home with me. I will always love you.’

  There were many tears that day. Denise cri
ed and so did I as we held on to each other hopelessly.

  We had already worked out who would be pall-bearers for James — myself, my brother Philip and two of Denise’s brothers, Ray and Gary Matthews. They all said it would be an honour to carry James, even though I knew it would be an extremely daunting task for them.

  News crews, journalists, photographers and radio stations had flown in from around the world to cover James’s funeral. The police had to make sure the route was carefully planned to deal with not just the press but also the possibility of thousands of people turning out in Kirkby. We had accepted that we would have to allow the service to be broadcast and seen across the globe, but through the police, we asked that we be left in private at James’s burial at the cemetery. That would be our final goodbye and we wanted it to remain sacred.

  With the preparations for the funeral complete, Denise and I retreated to the privacy of our home to steel ourselves for the next day. There was a horrible silence in the flat as we moved around, trying to get everything ready. My suit was hung up and my shirt was pressed. Denise laid out her clothes too, and finally it was time to go to bed, knowing that we would wake the next day to bury our beloved son.

  I hardly slept that night as so many emotions swept over me. I kept thinking of James in his coffin, all alone and cold. Then I thought about the two little bastards who had brutally ended his life and I have never felt so much hatred. I wanted those feelings to leave me but they wouldn’t. And as I lay in the dark, trapped inside my own mind, I just wanted the light to come.

  It was Monday, 1 March 1993, when we laid James to rest. The weather was freezing cold, grey and gloomy. We got ourselves ready and made our way to Denise’s mother’s house, from where the funeral procession was leaving. As I walked along the pavement in silence, I felt sick and my legs were like jelly. I didn’t know how I was going to get through this day. I just had to keep thinking of James and make sure that I did right by him.