Steve explains what happened next: 'He said, "You and I should have a chat". Monday 7 October 2019, 5:22pm. She too had been strangled. He maintains that he would not have persuaded Halliwell to confess had he not taken this gamble. Fulcher recalled: 'Working on the hypothesis that she could have been kidnapped and was still alive, I conducted this investigation as a crime in action - that means everything else is subordinate to the notion of finding Sian, and seeking to save her life.'. In May 2012 Christopher Halliwell pleaded not guilty to the charge of murdering Sian O'Callaghan, but when he appeared in Bristol Crown Court in October 2012 he pleaded guilty to her murder. The fiend then revealed where cops could find the body of Becky Godden who police did not even know was missing at the time. When DS Steve Fulcher arrested Christopher Halliwell over the disappearance of 22-year-old Sian O'Callaghan, it was the start of his own downfall. Fulcher, now 49, was then suspended from the Force before being disciplined for gross misconduct and ultimately hounded out of his job. Steve, who went on to get a job as a consultant for a private company in Somalia which offers aid from the Foreign Office, admitted he was shunned when trying to find work in the UK.. Wiltshire Police told the BBC : "The IPCC investigation concluded that a misconduct hearing should take place to consider potential gross misconduct. Human remains were uncovered at a field in Gloucestershire, and they turned out to belong to Becky. If Im right, well I take comfort from the fact that he hasnt been able to do that since 2011. In the meantime he was suspended, left pacing the floor at home with worry. It also meant Halliwell was able to evade justice for Becky's murder when he was found guilty of Sian's killing in 2012. In the aftermath of Halliwells arrest, Fulcher was nominated for a Queens Police Medal the highest honour in policing for his work in extracting the brutal killers confession. However, Fulcher had taken Halliwell to a field in the Wiltshire countryside for this discussion without cautioning him or allowing him access to a solicitor. And where had they gone next? If the evidence in the trophy store suggests a truth that still lies hidden, then Halliwell had a prolific propensity to murder perhaps as often as once or twice a year so lives were saved after his arrest.. But forensic evidence that has been used to convict [Halliwell] was available back in 2011. Her husband Glyn has spent 13 years in jail for her murder but maintains his innocence, with his lawyer saying he would be 'very surprised' if he had committed the crime. February 18, 2015 - Halliwell is arrested on suspicion of murdering Miss Godden. It took a jury just two hours to find him guilty. As he points out, however, his focus was on one thing: finding Sian. Halliwell described another victim, a prostitute he said he had killed much earlier, says Steve, and he could take him to the spot where he had buried her as well. Detective Sergeant Steve Fulcher resigned from the police force in 2014 after he was found guilty of misconduct for not reading Halliwell his rights when he first confessed to killing. Steve explained that Halliwell told him to drive them to a local beauty spot, a chalk white horse at Uffington - which turned out to be where he had dumped Sian O'Callaghan's body. Indeed, Fulchers commitment to the victims of crime shines through during our interview. Quite rightly it gives protection to the innocent. I was prepared for this his case wasnt defendable so it was the only thing they could do but I thought reason would prevail. He wanted to use what he believed were emergency powers, to be used only when there is an imminent threat to life. But back then it seems the Wiltshire Force was more preoccupied with a crusade against an officer for failing to follow procedure even when obeying that procedure could have prevented two grieving families gaining a terrible, final closure. Officers observed Halliwell depositing a perfume bottle, car seat covers and bloodied tissues in bins in assorted rural locations. Common sense did not win the day. ", Why? The case attracted widespread attention and press coverage, and on Tuesday 22nd March around 400 members of the public were allowed to help the police search the forest. Published: Monday, 30th September 2019 at 7:00 am. With time running out, DS Fulcher then took Halliwell to Barbury Castle, a beauty spot outside Swindon, where he suspected Sian was being held. Another potential victim is prostitute Sally Ann John, 24, who vanished from Swindon in 1995. Fulcher was disciplined for misconduct and later resigned, losing his 500,000 police pension and selling his house. Why would this not be the biggest, most protracted, most vigorous investigation in the history of British policing?. To Catch A Serial Killer airs on Thursday at 9pm on ITV, The comments below have not been moderated, By "The panel considered independently whether or not the actions of Steve Fulcher had breached the standards of professional behaviour that apply to all police officers in England and Wales. In the mid 1980s, while serving time in prison, Halliwell reportedly asked another inmate how many women it's necessary to kill before you're considered a serial murderer. But then Halliwell had a second horrific confession. Fulcher played by Sherlocks Martin Freeman ended up in a difficult ethical position that led him to find the killer, but in an unorthadox manner that ultimately ended his career in the police force. She says: 'Steve did what I think any family member would want an officer to do for them. ', He considered his actions: 'Should I stop him confessing? , updated Channel 4 During the investigation, a. Fulcher made the decision. In 2014, he was found guilty of misconduct at a disciplinary hearing. Yesterday he was sentenced to a full life sentence, a tariff reserved for those, like Moors Murderer Ian Brady, who are considered to be societys most dangerous. Steve had been found guilty of gross misconduct by the Independent Police Complaints Commission for not reading Halliwell his rights and taking him back to the police station. The Sherlock actor said he 'couldn't believe' Fulcher's story when he heard it. He was allowed to keep his job, but later resigned. Sian OCallaghans family certainly think so, as does Becky Goddens mother Karen. Fulcher went on to write a book about his experiences, called Catching a Serial Killer. Detective Superintendent Steve Fulcher, 52, from Wiltshire, was one of the most respected officers in the UK when he caught taxi driver Christopher Halliwell in 2011, who went on to confess to the murder ofSian O'Callaghan, 22. What happened in the interim eight years?". The senior echelons arent police officers at all. But a secret trophy store of 60 items of womens clothing suggests dozens more victims may have been raped or killed by him. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. He has written a memoir Catching A Serial Killer upon which A Confession is partly based. I heard nothing for 10 months, he recalls. At Wiltshire he had solved several murders while simultaneously gaining a Masters Degree in Criminology from the University of Cambridge. However, that's not to say he hasn't committed other offences. In 2014, the police found "up to 60" items of women's clothing buried in woodland, close to where a pair of Sian's boots had been found. Jeff Pope's new ITV drama A Confession stars Martin Freeman as Detective Steve Fulcher, whose hunt for missing 22-year-old Sian O'Callaghan led him into an extraordinary situation in 2011. We use your sign-up to provide content in the ways you've consented to and improve our understanding of you. March 18, 2011 - Sian O'Callaghan, 22, is murdered by Halliwell after getting into his taxi while walking home after leaving Suju nightclub in Swindon. On that day, the police made an urgent appeal for witnesses who had spotted a green Toyota Avensis with taxi markings. The 22-year-old office worker had been out with friends, got separated from them and left the nightclub alone. These are usually reserved for terrorist cases. He wanted to seize the opportunity to grill Halliwell before it was too late. But a judge ruled his confession about Becky Godden inadmissible because DS Fulcher had repeatedly failed to correctly caution the killer and questioned him without a lawyer. That girl, we now know, was poor Becky Godden, a much loved daughter who had fallen into drug addiction, prostitution and, ultimately, Halliwells evil hands. But when Halliwell kept answering no comment, Fulcher took another crucial decision, authorising officers to bring Halliwell to the hilltop site alone for what is known as an urgent interview something entirely permissible under the manuals code in a last ditch chance to find Sian. Ainsworth, who had just been suspended over allegations he had sexually harassed female colleagues, was found hanged at home. He said: If I had taken Halliwell into custody we would never have found Sian and obviously we would never have heard of his other victim Becky Godden. If Sian was still alive, she probably wouldnt survive the 96 hours we could keep him in custody if he refused to co-operate.. A Confession which starts on ITV on Monday 2 September at 9pm relives the shocking case of Sian OCallaghan who was murdered by local taxi driver Christopher Halliwell, and how Detective Superintendent Steve Fulcher solved the crime, but was punished for his conduct. He had killed her two minutes after she got in his cab. He lost his police pension worth 500,000, had to sell his house and now works training police in war-torn Somalia. Steve Fulcher, played by Martin Freeman, lost his career after catching a serial killer Detective Superintendent Steve Fulcher resigned from Wiltshire Police in May 2014 ( Image: PA) As. "He killed Becky in 2003, he killed Sian in 2011, so that's eight years. On March 19 2011, 22-year-old Sian O'Callaghan disappeared from Wiltshire after last being spotted at a nightclub in the area. A police telephone trace threw up a clue - he had texted her half an hour after she left the nightclub saying, 'Worried'. Later that year, he resigned, his police career over. What is right and what is wrong? Sian O'Callaghan's boyfriend had reported her missing after she failed to return from a night out with friends in Swindon, Wiltshire, in March 2011. It's just not going to happen. You are talking about co-ordinating hundreds of officers. There is an obsession with procedure at the expense of the bigger picture. As Steve Fulcher tells of his battle with pen-pushers and myopic box-tickers within the police service, one thing is clear: the treatment received by this senior officer is enough to drive anyone to despair at the insanity of our legal system, one in which an obsession with process has taken precedence over the rights of victims and their families. Halliwell, 55, had already admitted murdering Sian in Swindon in 2011, but DS Fulcher's intervention saw him confess to killing Becky Godden 20 years earlier as well. The car had been seen on CCTV pulling up next to Sian on her way home. 'He had done what I considered to be the right thing. However, Fulcher was eager not to lose the opportunity to elicit another confession, so he went with Halliwell to the site where the remains of Becky Godden, 20, were discovered. DC Fulcher quit after being accused of gross misconduct over murder case. Det Supt Fulcher had risen through the ranks at Sussex Police before moving to Wiltshire. Once in the remote woodland, Halliwell stood on the exact spot where he claimed hed buried a girl years earlier. May 31, 2012 - Halliwell appears at Preston Crown Court and denies murdering Miss O'Callaghan. Realising something was seriously wrong when Sian failed to come home or answer his texts, Kevin raised the alarm. 'I am really open-minded there is an eight-year gap between Becky and Sian,' Memory said. "Further to the hearing, Steve Fulcher was found guilty of two counts of gross misconduct (the execution of his duty and inappropriate contact with the media) and received two final written warnings, but remained a member of Wiltshire Police. As a result of being found guilty of gross misconduct in January 2014, Steve Fulcher was given a final written warning, which could have led to his dismissal if he'd fallen foul of any more. 12:20 GMT 20 Sep 2018 In it, he argues that his actions were to preserve the life of a hostage, as he was working on the assumption OCallaghan could still be alive and that Halliwell could lead him to her. No one wants to go back to the old days where the police sometimes ran roughshod over the rules, but the pendulum has swung way too far in favour of the criminal, he says. 23:33 GMT 23 Sep 2016 There is a significant gap in his offending. Sians mother Elaine Pickford, who is played by Sobhan Finneran, was grateful to DS Fulcher. In 2018 he appeared on the ITV show To Catch a Serial Killer with Trevor McDonald.My view is that I have brought two daughters back to their mothers and Ive prevented other victims resulting from Halliwells continued pursuit of his career as a serial killer," Fulcher told McDonald. You might think that witness statement would be taken, but it never has been to my knowledge. I did these things because they were the right things to do in these circumstances. So I thanked him and explained that he would be given his rights, taken back to the police station, 'I interpreted "you and I should have a chat" as some quid pro quo, I thought he would want the deal in terms of me catering for his family who would be affected by his incarceration.'. January 30, 2012 - Mrs Justice Cox rules the evidence of Halliwell's confessions to the murders of both women is inadmissible. But whats the true story behind Steve Fulcher? In an explosive new book, Catching A Serial Killer, Steve tells the inside story of the case and how his quest for justice cost him his job. His actions compromised the court case against Halliwell and called into question one of the most important principles of the criminal justice system, the PACE guidelines. Halliwell finally guided DS Fulcher and his team to a remote gully near the White Horse landmark at Uffington where he had dumped Sians body. An investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission in 2013 found the police officer had a case to answer for gross misconduct for ignoring force orders. Instead resources went into investigating me for years.. For other inquiries, Contact Us. A murder trial began, and in 2016, after two hours of deliberation, a jury found Christopher Halliwell guilty of the murder of Becky Godden-Edwards. When cornered by detectives, Halliwell admitted that he had killed Sian and led them to her body. The fallout for Steve Fulcher was huge. This was roughly 12 miles away. Finally, Halliwell confessed to Sian's murder and offered to take him to Sian's body, leading the police to her burial spot. At this point, with the focus shifting from kidnap to murder, Fulcher should, according to guidelines drawn up in The Police and Criminal Evidence Act of 1984 (PACE), have cautioned Halliwell again. "But for my course of action Becky would still be in that field, Sian would never be found and Christopher Halliwell would be walking the streets.". But to get those confessions, Fulcher was accused of breaching the guidelines of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) by failing to caution Halliwell and denying him access to a solicitor at the time the confessions were obtained. Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right. He had murdered before. 14 Aug 2019 ITV ITV's A Confession throws up an unimaginable ethical dilemma that real-life Detective Superintendent Steve Fulcher faced in 2011: break police protocol to catch a serial killer. He lost his police pension worth 500,000, had to sell his house and now works training police in war-torn Somalia. Sians only crime was to resemble Halliwells own mother, who he hated. 10:45 GMT 24 Sep 2016, By the way, it was a pleasure ruining your career, you corrupt b*****d.. On 24 March, OCallaghans body was found in a shallow grave near Uffington, Oxfordshire, and Christopher Halliwell, a 47-year-old taxi driver from Swindon was arrested, charged and later sentenced to a life sentence for the murder. By then, Halliwell had been charged with Sian OCallaghans murder he had stabbed her to death before dumping her body and placed on technical bail (where bail is granted as the accused is already in custody) for the murder of the as-yet-unidentified woman. Met Eireann has pinpointed a two-week period where 'weather warnings or impactful weather are possible'. Judge Mrs Justice Cox ruled both of Halliwell's confessions were inadmissable as evidence because Fulcher had breached Police and Criminal Evidence Act guidelines. Joe Absolom plays the Swindon taxi driver Christopher Halliwell who had taken the lives of two you women. Fulcher was disciplined for misconduct and later resigned, losing his 500,000 police pension and selling his house. Which was quite odd, actually I felt the sense of gratitude. This service is provided on News Group Newspapers' Limited's Standard Terms and Conditions in accordance with our Privacy & Cookie Policy. March 26, 2011 - Halliwell is charged with Miss O'Callaghan's murder. DS Steve Fulcher, played by Martin Freeman in A Confession, resigned from the police after being found guilty of gross misconduct in the Christopher Halliwell case, Get daily headlines and breaking news alerts for FREE by signing up to our newsletter. For his emotion, when it comes, isnt for his own plight, but that of Becky, Sian, and their families. We also may change the frequency you receive our emails from us in order to keep you up to date and give you the best relevant information possible. In fact she was found in a very shallow grave. Away from the press, Fulcher and his team had also identified the taxi driver 47-year-old father-of-three Christopher Halliwell (played by Joe Absolom) and were keeping him under surveillance, hoping he would lead them to Sian. So on a lonely windswept hill in Wiltshire he tore. It need never have been so. 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