HEARTBROKEN FAMILY OF KILLED TEEN I just want to
Put heat on cruel killers
LINDA Jones clutched her husband’s hand as she stared, transfixed, at the floor of a lock-up once used by the man who murdered her daughter.
The mum found it hard to hold back the tears as she imagined her beautiful 15-year-old Danielle buried beneath the concrete, which had clearly once been hurriedly resurfaced.
For 16 years Danielle’s killer – her own uncle – has refused to reveal her whereabouts and Linda and husband Tony hoped police had finally found their tragic daughter’s resting place.
But after an agonising four-day wait, the couple were delivered the devastating news that Danielle had not been found, crushing the family’s only hope in over a decade.
“I was absolutely, utterly devastated when we didn’t find Danielle. I’d felt sure that was where Danielle was,” said Linda, talking for the first time since the excavation six weeks ago.
“When we were taken to see that garage I couldn’t stop staring at the floor. I stopped hearing what people were saying around me as I looked at the spot that had was all rough and resurfaced. It was body-length.”
Goodbye
She added: “I wondered if my daughter was two or three feet away. All I can remember clearly is turning to one of the officers and asking, ‘Could this be the place? Is it big enough?’
“When they said yes I was convinced Danielle was there and that we would finally get the chance to say goodbye.
“The day we found out it wasn’t was like losing Danielle all over again.”
The family are now calling for the introduction of a “No body, No parole” law which will deny killers the chance of freedom unless they reveal where they hid their victims.
Danielle, who disappeared in June 2001, was just like any other teenager. A Robbie Williams fan, she loved her pet rabbits and singing along to Steps songs in her bedroom.
She was on her way to catch the school bus when she vanished.
When Danielle failed to arrive at St Clere’s school near her home in East Tilbury, Essex, her parents first thought she had skived off, which would have been out of character.
When she still hadn’t appeared days later, attention turned to her uncle Stuart Campbell who had been hiding a dark secret from his family – a twisted fascination with teenage girls.
Campbell, who was married to Tony’s sister Debbie, had been secretly downloading indecent pictures of underage girls and posing as a fashion photographer to picture youngsters in their underwear and bikinis. He was convicted of Danielle’s murder in December 2002.
But Campbell, 59, has prolonged the agony for shop worker Linda and husband Tony, 67, by refusing to say what he did with their daughter’s body.
In May, the family were offered their first major glimmer of hope in 14 years.
Detectives received a tip-off that a lock-up close to the killer’s home was dug up by a builder using a blue van, just like Campbell’s, at around the time Danielle disappeared.
“The garage was just a walk from Campbell’s home which made us think he’d maybe dragged Danielle there,” said Linda, 57.
“When he was arrested he had keys to a lock-up on him but we never found out where it was. So when police got this tip-off I really ally thought, ‘This is it, we’ve found nd her’.
“I couldn’t sleepleep the night before the police olice took us there. When we arrived it was covered by a huge white tent and as we walked in I just hoped againstinst hope this was the place.” ”
But four days ys later the parents got a call to o say nothing had been found.d.
“We were with our police liaison on officer at the e time,” Lindaa continued. “He picked up the phone and when he didn’t look at me during the conversation I just knew it was bad news. “I was just crushed – it was the first hop hope we’d had since a young girl’sgirl’ body was found