‘I just want to find out who murdered Billie’ BRITAIN’S UN SOLVED CRIMES SHOCKING VIOLENCE
Foster dad Sion Jenkins wants justice for teenager killed in her back garden
THE murder of 13-year-old Billie-Jo Jenkins in 1997 in Hastings has been an ongoing case of accusation and speculation.
A young girl innocently painting patio doors at her home had her life taken in the most brutal way – with her skull caved in with a metal spike.
Her foster father, Sion Jenkins, has been tried three times for her murder, spent six years in prison, and yet was eventually acquitted of all charges.
It leaves a family in a desperate state, with no resolution or justice, or knowledge of who killed Billie-Jo.
Care
Billie-Jo Jenkins entered into the foster care system aged nine after her father was imprisoned and her mother struggled to cope raising her alone.
Placed with the Jenkins family, of the same surname but no relation, she had found a settled and by all appearances loving home and family – Sion and Lois Jenkins had four daughters of their own and opened their home to Billie-Jo in 1992.
They moved to Hastings soon after, following a deputy head teacher position for Sion Jenkins at a local school.
On February 15, 1997, Billie-Jo was painting the patio doors on the back porch of their home. Lois Jenkins and two of her daughters were out, and Sion Jenkins and their other two daughters were going to the shops to purchase supplies for the ongoing DIY project.
They left the house, and according to his daughters, Annie and Charlotte, Sion realised he did not have any money on him.
They returned to the house and the girls waited in the car while Sion ran into the house to collect some money. Three minutes later he returned and they went on their way again to the shops.
They came back home 15 minutes later and found Billie-Jo on the ground after clearly suffering a violent attack. She had been hit over the head with a large metal tent peg causing terrible head injuries.
Despite a call to emergency services and the quick arrival of paramedics, Billie-Jo Jenkins died on that patio.
Three weeks after the murder, Lois Jenkins made a statement to police about domestic abuse in the home and the violent and volatile temper she had witnessed from Sion Jenkins during their marriage.
A week later, he was arrested for the murder of Billie-Jo.
A forensic examination of the scene and the clothes of Sion Jenkins revealed over 100 blood spots on the fleece jacket he was wearing that day.
This, according to police, was proof that he was responsible for the murder and was the key piece of evidence which convicted him of murder at his first trial on July 2, 1998, where he was sentenced to life in jail. Lois Jenkins divorced Sion and moved her family to Tasmania in Australia to try to rebuild their lives after the horrendous events of the previous year.
BUT the matter wasn’t over. The droplets of blood found on Sion Jenkins’s clothing were the source of debate between the prosecution, the defence and the witnesses called in his subsequent trials for murder.
According to the defence and expert witness Prof David Denison, a specialist in lung disease, the stains were transferred to Sion as he tended to Billie-Jo after finding her already injured.
He testified that they were a result of “expiration spatter”, a release of fine blood droplets from blocked airways as Sion moved Billie-Jo when trying to help her.
The prosecution argued these stains were “impact spatter” made during the attack on Billie-Jo, proving he was her killer.
The first appeal by Sion Jenkins failed in 1999. However, his case was taken on by the Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2001. After investigating for two years, they felt there were enough grounds for a retrial, referring the case back to the Courts of Appeal.
In 2004, Sion Jenkins won his appeal against his conviction which was deemed unsafe, and he was released on bail pending a new trial.
Money
A second issue was the timescale involved when Sion Jenkins was alleged to have murdered Billie-Jo.
The prosecution stated the three-minute period where he returned to the house to collect money was enough time to commit the assault, but the defence highlighted whoever committed this crime would have been covered in Billie-Jo’s blood.
His daughters did not report a change of clothing when he returned to the car, nor did the police find any clothing within the house pointing to this theory. The lack of obvious blood on his clothing and the lack of time for him get changed, they claimed, suggested he wasn’t the killer.
And little evidence in terms of a motive for why Sion Jenkins would kill his foster daughter has ever been presented.
Two more trials followed. In the first after a deliberation by the jury of 39 hours, a majority verdict could not be reached, and a third trial was ordered.
In this third and final trial, once again the jury could not reach a majority verdict based on the evidence they had heard.
In February 2006, at the Old Bailey, it
FLED: Foster mum Lois moved to Tasmania was declared that Sion Jenkins was not guilty of murder, and he was formally acquitted of all charges.
who was responsible for Billie Jo’s death? Around the time of the murder, the Jenkins reported they were concerned about prowlers and break-ins to such an extent that they fitted window locks and security lights.
There had been reports of a mysterious man who was known to hang around the area and who has been highlighted as a possible suspect in this murder case.
He was identified by police but has not been named and it was revealed he suffered from mental health problems.
Reports suggest he was in the area at UNPROVEN: Blood on Sion’s clothes did not prove he murdered Billie-Jo the time of the murder but police have stated his exact whereabouts have been accounted for the time of the murder.
Another line of enquiry is the fact that Billie-Jo had expressed concerns to friends that she was being followed by a man in a leather jacket some months before the murder.
Links have been made to known Antoni Imiela, the so-called ‘M25 Rapist’ who attacked a number of girls and women in the Kent, Surrey and London area.
Imiela was living near Billie-Jo’s home in 1997, and he fits the description of the man Billie-Jo had said was following her.
There are also similarities between the murder of Billie-Jo and Imiela’s victims. A small piece of black bin liner was found in Billie-Jo’s nostrils, evidence for which there has been no explanation. Imiela often thrust black bin bags over the heads of his victims during his attacks.
He is currently serving a life sentence after being convicted of multiple rapes dating back to 1987.
The murder of Billie-Jo is a crime which many people are unable to forget. A young girl on the back porch of her home who was brutally attacked and left for dead.
In light of the acquittal of Sion Jenkins, a ‘stranger-murder’ is an avenue of investigation – that someone unknown to Billie-Jo entered into the grounds of her house that day and took her life.
At present, it seems this haunting case is not being re-investigated by police, years after Sion Jenkins was acquitted of all involvement in the murder.
He has tried to rebuild his life since his acquittal.
He has remarried and has studied criminology, but the scene he says he found that day in February 1997 still haunts him.
He said: “I want to find out who murdered Billie, then I will never talk about it again.”