Isis victim’s daughter to set up counselling centre

THE daughter of beheaded Tayside hostage David Haines is planning to set up a trauma counselling centre for teenagers and children in her father’s memory.

Bethany Haines said she wanted to follow in the caring footsteps of her aid worker father, who was murdered by Jihadi John.

The 20-year-old from Perth has taken up an Access to Humanities course at Perth College and said her own experience of tragedy and horror was fuelling her ambition.

She said: “I want to do trauma counselling. That was my dad’s dream.

“He said when he was being held captive that he wanted to open a stress centre. Hopefully, I can carry on that dream and make it a reality.

“I felt personally that I wasn’t being told enough or being given the right kind of support at times.

“My aim is to create a place where teenagers who are going through these traumatic experiences can speak in a relaxed way with other teenagers in the same situation.

“I had access to counsellors and obviously my mum too, but when you are that age you have so much other stuff going on that it is easier to talk with people your own age.

“I just want it to be a place where they can open up and not feel they are having to hide a big part of themselves.”

Bethany has admitted falling into drink and drug misuse as a result of the 17 months knowing her father was being held captive by Isis, and then his gruesome death.

She then became involved in an abusive and controlling relationship which led to her former boyfriend Andrew Murray admitting in court last week that he had stalked her for six months.

David was helping civil war victims in Syria when he was snatched and then beheaded by the extremist group.

Bethany Haines