A brutal teen murder, her twisted killer and a very disturbing truth
The devastation caused when your child is murdered is impossible to imagine. In the case of Steve and Lynette Williams, their agony was compounded by the knowledge that their daughter’s death was completely avoidable.
Five years on from Georgia Williams’s brutal murder, the grief suffered by her parents was still raw and plain to see in Killed On Camera (Ch5).
Sporty, bright and popular, Georgia, 17, befriended Jamie Reynolds, a young man at the petrol station where she worked. When he told her that he hated his job and dreamed of being a photographer she pitied him and agreed to pose as a model to help him boost his portfolio.
Reynolds was infatuated with Georgia and had been planning her murder for weeks. For years he’d harboured violent, sexual fantasies about women and was obsessed with making his own ‘snuff’ movies (where someone is murdered on camera).
When Georgia failed to return home, her parents sent her text messages and got cheery replies saying not to worry, she was fine and with a friend.
But Reynolds had already killed her, and filmed her slow death. It was him sending the texts.
Georgia had no way of knowing what a twisted individual he was. But the police did — Reynolds had a history of stalking and assaulting women. his own parents had even gone to the police, alarmed at his addiction to depraved snuff films and a psychiatrist had declared him a ‘danger to all women’.
Reynolds had a known list of 32 local girls whom he fantasised about killing, including Georgia. And yet the police did not notify the girls or their families.
Georgia’s killer was handed a ‘whole life’ sentence and today her parents have thrown themselves into setting up a trust in her name. ‘It makes me get out of bed in the morning,’ said mum Lynette.
This was a truly heartbreaking documentary that movingly portrayed a family’s anguish at the death of a teenager which could so easily have been prevented.
The final part of Princess Margaret: The Rebel Royal (BBC2) picked up with Margaret and husband Lord Snowdon on their tour of America in 1965.
The couple rubbed shoulders with celebrities and threw endless parties which, for the first time, led to debate over whether the royals cost too much. Not that it stopped Margaret’s partying.
With her marriage on the rocks, she spent an increasing amount of time on the private Caribbean island of Mustique. It was there that she partied with the likes of Mick and Bianca Jagger and was first photographed with toyboy lover Roddy Llewellyn in 1976.
By then Margaret had been seeing Llewellyn for three years and had even spent time at the hippy commune he lived at in Wiltshire. Not that roughing it put her any more in touch with day-to-day living. Long-time friend Lady Glenconner recalled how, in later years, Margaret would stay at her unassuming house in Norfolk.
One morning, Margaret insisted that her hostess stayed in bed while she made breakfast. A short time later Lady Glenconner was loudly summoned to the kitchen to discover a bewildered Princess unable to fathom how to switch on the kettle.
Discussion over whether Margaret was a trailblazer who was ahead of her time felt lost and unnecessary. But it still remained an enjoyable series full of gossip and intrigue about a glamorous and pampered princess from another era. CHRISTOPHER STEVENS is away.
EAST GOES SOUTH: EastEnders now pulls in the lowest audience of the three major soaps. Little wonder when you consider storylines include middle-aged glamour puss Sharon Mitchell’s affair with monosyllabic grease monkey Keanu Taylor.