I’d rather die than know he is guilty
Mother’s agony as son is held in search for missing Libby
THE mother of the Polish butcher arrested on suspicion of abducting Libby Squire said: ‘I’d rather die than know he is guilty.’
Marzena Relowicz – whose son Pawel, 24, is being questioned by police over the missing student – said ‘everyone has a weak side and there is no such thing as an ideal person’.
Speaking from the family home in Poland, Mrs Relowicz said she had been told that her son had offered Miss Squire a lift in his silver Vauxhall Astra.
‘Pawel was driving home and saw a girl crying,’ she said. ‘He had given her a lift as she wanted to go home. He had put her address into his satnav system.
‘I know in my heart that Pawel did not do anything to this girl. He is a good boy who respects women and would not do anything to harm anyone.’
In a tearful interview, the devout Catholic said: ‘If something isn’t right, God forbid, then there must be punishment.’ But Mrs Relowicz, 52, insisted her son was not capable of harming Miss Squire, 21.
Placing a hand on her heart, she said: ‘My son Pawel did not abduct that girl. I would rather die than know he is guilty. My heart is breaking over this and I feel so sad for the girl’s parents and what they are going through.
‘I can’t imagine their pain. I desperately hope they find her alive.’
The investigation into Miss Squire’s disappearance took a dramatic turn on Wednesday when police arrested Mr Relowicz at the rented home in Hull where he lives with his wife and two young children.
The property is half a mile from the bench where Miss Squire was sitting in a drunken state shortly before midnight eight days ago. Mr Relowicz emigrated from the village of Warszewice in northern Poland to the UK five years ago and found work as a butcher in a bacon factory in Malton, North Yorkshire. He met his future wife Jagoda at work and they have sons aged two and three months. Asked whether her son had a second job as an unlicensed taxi driver, Mrs Relowicz said: ‘It’s so far away that I don’t ask. Maybe he did something – everybody does what they can.’
The mother, who has five other sons and two daughters, added: ‘I feel so helpless here. If I could go to England I would kneel before the girl’s family and pray that she is found.’ Officers have removed Mr Relowicz’s car for examination by forensics experts. Detectives were yesterday granted a further 36 hours to question him. Miss Squire, a second-year philosophy student at Hull University, was put into a taxi by friends on Thursday last week after being refused entry to a nightclub.
She was dropped off outside her student home at 11.29pm and was caught on CCTV sitting on a bench about 300 yards away. She was last spotted in the area at 12.09am.
Police said a taxi driver and another motorist who ‘stopped to help’ have been eliminated from the investigation.
Mrs Relowicz said she wants a ‘good lawyer’ for her son. She described Pawel as a ‘ quiet and kind family man’ who has a passion for hockey and fishing. Mrs Relowicz added: ‘It just does not sound like him to be involved in anything bad. I did visit him in Hull and I didn’t like it. It gave me a bad feeling about England.’ n Last night CCTV footage was being the Grainy for area examined the film where missing from Miss by student. a police camera Squire searching near was last seen shows a man smoking by a car. Later another figure opens the passenger door and ‘someone or something’ is put inside. The smoker then gets in the car and drives off. Police say the clip – obtained by ITV News – is among hundreds of hours of footage being investigated and officers continue to keep ‘an open mind’.
‘I feel so sad for her parents’