The victims of terror
Sister of 32-year-old entrepreneur describes her despair as other relations await news of French, Australian and Spanish citizens
THEY had waited two agonising days, sick to their stomachs and desperately hoping for news.
But then, yesterday afternoon, came the knock at the door the family had dreaded.
James Mcmullan, 32, the one Briton missing since the London Bridge terror attack, was almost certainly among the dead. His bank card had been found on one of the bodies yet to be formally identified.
“He was an inspiration,” his sister Melissa Mcmullan sobbed. “No words can ever match his essence. There will only ever be one James.
“Nowhere else will you find such humour and unique personality – someone who puts his friends above all else.”
For the Mcmullan family, the devastating news brought an end to a period of limbo in which all they could do was scour hospitals, make agonising public appeals and call his phone until the battery went dead.
Several other families remain stuck in this nightmare, clinging to the faint glimmer of hope that their loved ones might still be found alive in hospital, not daring to imagine the alternative.
Among those who remain missing are Sara Zelenak, 21, an Australian nanny who should have been babysitting that evening but went out with friends in a last minute change of plan, two Frenchmen and a Spaniard who used his skateboard to try to save a woman from the knife-wielding attackers.
Mr Mcmullan, from Hackney, east London, had not been seen since he stepped outside the Barrowboy and Banker on Borough High Street, where he had been drinking with old school friends. Five minutes later, the terrorists ploughed into pedestrians on London Bridge, before crashing the vehicle directly outside the bar and indiscriminately stabbing people.
Despite her indisputable anguish, Miss Mcmullan, 30, said: “While our pain will never diminish, it is important for us to all to carry on with our lives in direct opposition to those who would try to destroy us, and to remember that hatred is the refuge of smallminded individuals and will only breed more.
“This is not a course we will follow, despite our loss.”
She thanked the emergency services for doing their utmost to protect Londoners from the “deranged and deluded individuals” who took seven lives, noting that the police would not be able to formally identify her brother until the coroner completes his report over the next day or two.
In a tragic twist, Miss Mcmullan told The Daily Telegraph that it had been her brother’s first night out for months, as he celebrated the completion of business project to which he had dedicated every waking hour for two years.
Their father, Simon Mcmullan, 61, vowed to continue the work on his “exceptional” son’s e-learning business.
He said: “At this point in time the subject is too raw. I’m just going to try to keep the business that he was doing alive. He was on the verge of signing his first contract, a $1.5million deal.”
Among others forced to endure the hideous wait for news is the traumatised mother of Miss Zelenak, who would speak to her daughter every day.
This week, the calls have been replaced by a deafening silence and she is instead flying from Brisbane to London to await news.
Miss Zelenak’s stepfather, Mark Wallace, revealed that she had been due to babysit on the night of the attack, but at the last minute the child’s grandmother stepped in to help, meaning she could go out with friends. Mr Wallace, from Brisbane, said: “I feel terrible, I can’t think.
“Authorities in London can’t give any information, they are in a terror lockdown, so there’s just no ability to find out or get any information.
“She has been gone for 48 hours and no one has seen or heard from her. I’ve contacted every hospital in London.”
Ignacio Echeverria, 39, was last seen lying on a pavement after heroically confronting one of the terrorists who was stabbing a woman, friends have revealed.
‘He was an inspiration. No words can ever match his essence. There will only ever be one James’
The HSBC analyst, originally from Las Rozas, near Madrid, was cycling home to Poplar, east London, from a skate park on Saturday night when he ran to the woman’s aid, using his skateboard as a weapon.
His stunned family revealed they have been asked for his fingerprints by the authorities.
Joaquin Echeverria, his brother, said they were “praying” for good news, but acknowledged that this was “not a good sign”.
HSBC is said to have employed private detectives to find him.
Friends of 36-year-old Sébastien Belanger have said they are clinging onto the hope that he is still out there, suffering from amnesia due to a “violent mental shock”.
Mr Belanger, a French chef who works at the Coq d’argent restaurant in the City, had watched the football with friends and was having a last drink in the Boro Bistro when they heard the attackers’ van smash into a wall directly above them.
His friend Robin, 24, said that in the panic, he lost sight of Sébastien.
“We started shouting: ‘Seb, Seb!’,” he told France Info.
“We have no idea which way he left nor what happened.
“I tried to call him but have no news. All Sebastien’s loved ones, including his girlfriend Gerda Bennet, are currently looking for him and giving out flyers in the streets of London.”
Another of the group’s friends, a waiter from Brittany, is thought to be among the dead.
A third Frenchman, Xavier Thomas, who was out with friends, is also missing.
His girlfriend, Christine Delcros, was reportedly seriously injured in the attack and is recovering in hospital.
Christophe Castaner, a spokesman for the French government, said it was believed he may have jumped into the Thames although this has not been verified. “for now we have found neither a body, nor any sign of life,” he told Europe 1 radio.