16 years on, I still haven’t had justice for Emma...
THE mother of a woman found dead in a forest 16 years ago has spoken of her hope that she will still see her daughter’s killer brought to justice.
Sex worker Emma Caldwell’s body was found in a woods after she disappeared in April 2005 while living in Glasgow.
Police were ordered to reopen the investigation into her murder six years ago.
But as the inquiry drags into another year, Margaret Caldwell says her despair and sense of betrayal have only grown while her hopes have faded.
She said: ‘Perhaps there is someone, in some office somewhere, who knows what has happened.
‘If there is, I wish they would tell me.
‘We were told to be patient, to wait for answers. We have waited 16 years and we have had no answers. They asked me to be patient. For what? For how long?
‘We have had nothing, worse than nothing. We were given false hope.’
She added: ‘After all these years how can I believe justice will be done? I would be a fool to believe that. But I do. I have to.
‘If you had told me in 2005 that I would still be waiting by the phone 16 years later, waiting for news, I don’t know if I could have faced it. It seems cruel to have made me wait.’
Miss Caldwell, who was originally from Erskine, Renfrewshire, was found dead aged 27 in woods in rural Lanarkshire on May 8, 2005.
She had last been seen alive a month before on the streets of Glasgow, a 45-minute drive away.
After the death, Mrs Caldwell was reassured that police were doing everything possible to find her daughter’s killer as they launched a sprawling investigation, featuring months of surveillance and undercover officers from Scotland and abroad.
It cost up to £4million but was wrongly focused on a Turkish cafe in Glasgow city centre and charges against four men collapsed.
Police Scotland and the Crown Office say inquiries are ongoing.
‘Despair and sense of betrayal’