A psychopath who butchered a Scots mother and her daughter 15 years ago admitted to the killing of Rachel Nickell.
The confession of serial sex attacker Robert Napper, 42, yesterday brought to a close one of the most infamous unsolved murder cases in recent legal history.
Following the conclusion of the trial at the Old Bailey in London, the Crown Office and Metropolitan Police issued public apologies to Colin Stagg, who was mistakenly targeted by police based on flawed psychological profiling.
They also said sorry to relatives of Miss Nickell and Scots-born Samantha Bissett and her four-year-old Jazmine, also killed by Napper, for missed opportunities to arrest the killer which could have saved their lives.
A senior officer admitted that Napper could have been arrested before the Wimbledon Common killing after his mother reported an earlier rape.
Rachel, a 23-year-old part-time model, was stabbed 49 times on Wimbledon Common on July 15, 1992.
Her two-year-old son Alex, who had watched his mother's killing, was found by a passer- by clinging to her blood-soaked body, crying "Wake up, mummy". A piece of paper had been placed on her forehead by Alex to form a plaster.
The boy was later given counselling and was eventually taken to live in France by his father in an attempt to give him a fresh start.
Napper was treated as a suspect after he admitted butchering 27-year-old Miss Bissett, originally from Dundee, and smothering her daughter in November 1993.
Napper, who has been in Broadmoor maximum security hospital since 1995, was finally charged in 2007 after a five-year, multimillion-pound reinvestigation by police.
The breakthrough came after microscopic traces of DNA taken from Miss Nickell's body, which would have been undetectable in 1992, matched his profile.
He denied murder, claiming diminished responsibility. Victor Temple, QC, prosecuting, yesterday confirmed that the plea was acceptable to the Crown. Mr Justice Griffith Williams ordered Napper's detention in Broadmoor under the Mental Health Act "without limit of time".
Rachel's parents Andrew and Monica Nickell kept their composure yesterday as they saw their daughter's killer finally brought to justice.
After the case, Assistant Commissioner John Yates said "mistakes were made" as Colin Stagg was targeted.
He said: "In August 1993 he was wrongly accused of Miss Nickell's murder. It is clear he is completely innocent of any involvement in this case and I today apologise to him for the mistakes that were made in the early 1990s."
Crown Prosecution Service lawyer Rene Barclay said outside court that he had written to Mr Stagg to express "regret" that the prosecution against him was brought.
Mr and Mrs Nickell continued to believe for many years that Mr Stagg was their daughter's killer and even considered taking civil action against him.
But Mr Nickell said yesterday: "It's easy with the benefit of hindsight to say mistakes were made. But we never felt at any time that the officers and staff involved in the investigation gave less than their very best."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article