Our anguish, by family devastated by arson attack
HEARTACHE LAID BARE IN COURT STATEMENTS REVEALED FOR FIRST TIME FOLLOWNG MURDER TRIAL
THE heartbreak of a family whose four children were murdered in an arson attack is laid bare in moving statements given to a judge before he handed down sentences to their killers.
The kids’ gran Sandra Lever said she has taken their pictures down from the walls because ‘the pain is so intense having to look at their beautiful smiles’.
Other relatives described veering between tears and ‘raging anger’, explaining how the family had been ‘torn apart and destroyed in one night’.
A devastating 5am fire in Walkden on December 11 last year ended in the deaths of Demi Pearson, 15, and her siblings Brandon, eight, Lacie, seven, and three-year-old Lia. Their mother Michelle, 36, was rescued but remains seriously-ill in hospital.
Two men were jailed for a minimum 40 and 37 years respectively after they were convicted of murder for firebombing the home. A young woman was handed 21 years in a young offenders’ institution after she was convicted of manslaughter. She helped the two men carry out the attack.
Before the judge Mr Justice William Davis sentenced the trio, he was handed ‘victim personal statements’ to read from the Pearson family although these were not read out in court.
The documents, which the M.E.N. requested from the prosecution team can now be published for the time.
They describe the pain and loss the Pearson family still feels, in their own words.
The children’s grandmother wrote: “My life does not feel complete. Michelle is the rock in this family. Upstairs in my house is a cupboard full of unwrapped Christmas presents and the photo frames that beamed smiles in my living room have been taken down as the pain is so intense having to look at their beautiful smiles that I won’t ever see again,” she wrote.
The children’s grandfather said: “My life just doesn’t feel the same. The fact I can no longer take them to Pontins for their holiday or tell them to stop running in the supermarket: that warm feeling of them shouting ‘grandad’ - it makes me feel numb. I know I’m not going to see them grow up and get married or have children of their own. Now these are just memories. All the years of fun and excitement has gone and left a void.”
One of Michelle’s sisters wrote: “The children were a team. They played together and made each other laugh and smile. I just hope and pray their mum can pull through. Michelle is the glue still holding this family together. Michelle would do anything for her children.”
She described the loss of her ‘best friend’ as ‘unbearable’, adding she knew she was ‘never going to be the same bubbly person again’.
‘I know I’m not going to see them grow up and get married or have kids of their own’
“My family will never be the same again,” she wrote, affectionately paying tribute to each of the children who died in the fire.
In a touching handwritten note, one young relative, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said: “Since they’ve not been here I feel so upset and sad and I will miss going to Shell’s and playing with the kids and fun and feeding the ducks and playing Roblox with Brandon, also playing Frozen with Lia and playing My Little Pony with Lacie and chilling with Demi especially as soon as summer comes. We always play in the garden and have a BBQ and go swimming with them all.”
Michelle’s brother Christopher Pearson said: “This has affected me and my whole family massively. Friends, neighbours and the whole community are in shock and are sickened. Even now this doesn’t seem real. How could something so cruel and evil be real? Why would anyone want to harm children let alone kill them? A whole family torn apart and destroyed on one night.”
He added: “Still can’t believe this is real, that I will never see them again, hear them laugh or do stupid little things they used to do.”
Mr Pearson went on: “The first three or four weeks, I cried everyday. Then I just couldn’t cry anymore. I just became numb with a sinking feeling in my chest. I didn’t know how I was feeling. I’ve never felt anything like this before. One day I was crying. Another day I was raging in anger. Other times I felt helpless and just wanted to be in a quiet place on my own.”
The Christmas presents he had bought the children were given away to other kids at Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital where Lia died, he said.
“They should have been opening their own presents on Christmas day and playing with all the toys that they were excited and waiting to open. Christmas has been ruined for me and my family now. Every Christmas will just be a remembrance of the day they were taken away from us,” wrote Mr Pearson.
“And if all this wasn’t enough, Michelle’s whole life has been torn apart and ruined. Her children, not one but four, all taken away from her one night.
“All her and the kids’ belongings, children’s photos and irreplaceable belongings and memories over the years, all gone and the family home destroyed.
“All the physical pain Michelle is going through, body burnt and scarred for life, emotionally drained and the mental and physical scarring she is going through now and will do for the rest of her life.”
In his judgement, His Honour Judge Davis said: “The statements of Sandra Lever, Michelle Pearson’s mother, and Christopher Pearson, Michelle’s brother, set out the devastating effect these events have had on the wider family.”