How Sellotape caught Rikki Neave’s killer
THE killer of Rikki Neave was finally caught after 28 years thanks to a forgotten piece of Sellotape, the cold cases’s leading detective has revealed.
Paul Fullwood, who has since retired from Cambridgeshire Police, said the tape was used to take fibres from six-year-old Rikki’s coat in 1994.
Using modern forensic techniques, James Watson’s DNA was found on the fibres and he was finally convicted of murder last week.
Blamed
Mr Fullwood said DNA detection “wasn’t even on the radar” at the time of Rikki’s death, and officers only found the tape when they dug through 15,000 documents on the case.
“Within the papers were envelopes, and within the envelopes were Sellotape tapings,” Mr Fullwood said.
He also blamed “tunnel vision” by the original police officers, which saw them discount Watson, 40, very early on and focus on Rikki’s mum Ruth,
53, who physically abused her son and his sisters. She was convicted of murder and child cruelty but the murder charge was rescinded and she was released in 2000.
Mr Fullwood’s involvement began eight years ago when he agreed to meet Ruth Neave. He went in with an open mind, he said, as he was never involved in the original investigation. “I had no baggage,” he added.
He agreed to conduct a proper review and five months later he
was confident that reopening the case could secure a conviction.
It emerged that Watson, who was 13, followed Rikki into a Peterborough woodland and strangled him from behind with the zip of his coat. He then arranged Rikki’s body into a star pose, the Old Bailey trial heard.
Mr Fullwood said: “We are far better trained now and far more experienced…[the officers] tried to do the best job they could at the time with the people they had.”