Murder squad detectives in hunt for missing Sarah
... as doorbell camera footage gives police clue to her last location
MURDER squad detectives last night took over the case of missing Sarah Everard as her ‘desperate’ family spoke of their fears for the marketing manager.
The 33-year-old vanished on Wednesday night after leaving her friend’s house and setting off on a 50-minute walk home.
Scotland Yard yesterday revealed that new CCTV footage showed her last known location near Clapham Common, south-west London.
The clip – captured on a doorbell camera – provided officers with new information about her last known location.
Miss Everard had left a house in Clapham at about 9pm and was walking back to her home in nearby Brixton.
The doorbell video was taken less than 500 metres from the common at about 9.30pm as she walked along a residential street.
Police had already released another CCTV image captured earlier in the evening.
She could be seen wearing navy blue trousers with a white diamond pattern, a green rain jacket and turquoise and orange trainers.
Miss Everard, who is 5ft 4in, is also thought to have been wearing green earphones and a white beanie hat.
Family described the disappearance as ‘totally out of character’ amid growing concern that she may have been harmed. Detectives are now focusing on door- to- door inquiries in the area in the hope of finding any further sightings of her.
Around 20 specialist search and rescue personnel were last night conducting a stepbystep inspection of the common. Specialists from London Search and Rescue could be seen combing through grass, while officers in a boat used a sniffer dog to scour the park’s ponds.
Police were also seen searching neighbouring streets and gardens along her route home.
Friends said Miss Everard, who moved to London in 2008 after graduating from Durham University with a geography degree, spoke to her partner on the walk home for 15 minutes, with the call ending at 9.28pm. Scotland Yard said it is not known whether she made it back to her property.
Drivers in the area at the time have been asked to come forward with dashcam footage. Miss Everard’s family, who have travelled from their home in York to help the search, have described their anguish at coping with her disappearance.
Her parents, Jeremy, 67, a professor of electronics at York University, and Sue, 64, a charity worker, said: ‘With every day that goes by we are getting more worried about Sarah.
‘ She is always in regular contact with us and with her friends and it is totally out of character for her to disappear like this.
‘We long to see her and want nothing more than for her to be found safe and well.’
Her uncle Douglas Everard told The Sun: ‘She is lovely, a really lovely young lady, very sensible. It is a really tough time. Her parents are devastated and they are desperate to find out anything they can.
‘They have always been a very, very close family. Sarah, her parents and her sister and brother, they are all in touch on a regular basis.’
The Met Police said yesterday that the case is still being treated as a missing person’s inquiry, adding there is ‘no information at this stage to suggest anything untoward may have happened’.
But it came as the case was taken over by Scotland Yard’s Specialist Crime Command, which deals with murder, manslaughter and other significant crimes.
They said the change was due to the ‘ complex nature’ of the investigation.
Katherine Goodwin, a detective chief inspector who specialises in homicide and other major crimes, said: ‘The focus remains on returning Sarah home to her family safe and well.’
According to her LinkedIn page, she started a new job with the Flipside Group marketing company in February.
Her friend Rose Woollard told the Brixton Blog website that the missing woman was a ‘ beautiful, thoughtful and incredibly kind friend’.
‘We long to see her’