PARENTS, friends and investigators have shared all in a candid documentary on the murder of 34-year-old John Pordage.

Channel 5 Star's Killer Kid: The Murder of John Pordage, centres around the incident that saw John attacked with a cosh, and 17-year-old Bradley Blundell fatally shoot him on August 5 2017 at a BP garage in Baddow Road, Great Baddow.

Following an exchange of words at the petrol station, Blundell shot John, who grew up in South Woodham Ferrers at point blank range, with one shot hitting a telephone box down the road, the other hitting him in the chest.

Thurrock Gazette:

At the time Blundell was on bail for offences that included possession of class A drugs and handling two knives in a public place.

DCI Martin Pasmore, of the Kent and Essex Crime Directorate, said: "When you look at the amount of fire arms offences in Essex, they are nothing like this."

After the incident, Blundell, of Cromwell Close, Boreham directed driver of a blue Ford Fiesta, Ella Colgate, 19, and a group including 18-year-old Saul Stanley, an unnamed boy and Colgate’s friend, Florence Lawes to the Saltmarshes in Maldon.

DCI Pasmore said they burned their clothes, and Blundell even covered himself in petrol to remove any evidence.

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The image from Essex Police above shows Ella Colgate at the petrol station, and the blue Ford Fiesta which she drove from the scene after John Pordage was murdered.

He added: "Blundell had washed himself in petrol so there was clearly forensic awareness amongst them to deal with that aspect of gunshot residue.

"We found areas of burned grass, buttons from jeans and it started to transpire that it was Blundell that was directing the actions that took place here.”

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The incident sent shockwaves through the city of Chelmsford.

DS Louise Giles from Essex Police said: "It was something everybody was so impacted by because nobody ever imagined that it would happen.

"These were kids, kids with guns."

A manhunt then ensued, with two suspects, Stanley and the unnamed teen already in custody, but Blundell was still at large.

Sue Wilson, John's mother remembered the moment she was asked to identify her son's body.

DS Giles described the moment as one of the hardest parts of the investigation.

She said: "You go in there, and you can't go near him because it's a crime scene, because John is a crime scene.

"So I thought, why are they doing now whatever they want to do, but I cannot kiss or touch John."

Mrs Wilson believed that all the teenagers inside the vehicle should have been arrested for John's death.

While other suspects were in custody, Blundell had travelled across Europe in order to evade capture.

Phone records found him the day after John's death at Selfridges in London, shopping for his girlfriend.

His phone later popped up in Norwich, Enfield and then he went "off the grid".

Officers assumed he had gone into hiding abroad, and a continent wide search begun.

In December 2018, police released CCTV footage of Blundell from the night of John's death.

The footage showed Blundell wearing the same clothes as the suspect involved in the incident with John outside the petrol station in the early hours of August 5.

In January 2019, DCI Pasmore had to face the press and admit officers were not sure of the whereabouts of Blundell at that time.

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After 239 days on the run, on March 30, Blundell handed himself into police in Amsterdam, shortly after his fellow suspects had appeared in court and been sentenced.

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He was extradited back to the UK and held in Chelmsford Prison until he appeared in court.

Quickly after he arrived back in the country, Colgate was arrested for perverting the course of justice.

She accepted instructions from Blundell to lie to the court, claiming she could not remember what happened.

Colgate asked her friend, Florence Lawes, who was in the car at the time to do the same, which she refused.

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Allan Compton, prosecution barrister, said: "During the first trial when she gave evidence, she didn't have any difficulty then in saying things that were helpful for that juvenile.

"But in order to do so, those answers had to be unhelpful for Bradley Blundell.

"That was fine in the first trial because he wasn't there in the dock.

"Those words came back to haunt her, because I had that transcript.

"She realised she had gone down the wrong path."

She received 12-months in prison for perverting the course of justice.

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At trial, Blundell claimed to be holding the cosh that struck John and he never handled the gun.

Mark Jones, who had been friends with John since they were nine, said: "I locked eyes with him in that courtroom, he just stared at me, pure evil."

After CCTV investigation, the prosecution proved Blundell's claim to be wrong.

The jury later found Blundell guilty of the murder of John Pordage, a result John's mother described as a "relief".

Thurrock Gazette:

On January 25 2019 at Chelmsford Crown Court, at the age of 19, Bradley Blundell was sentenced to 22 years for murder.

Mrs Wilson added: "I do not think people realise how bad it has got.

"Everything has changed. I'm not the same person I was before, I know that he will be saying; 'Mum go and get a life', but what sort of life?"

Blundell "smirked" as he was sentenced by Judge Charles Gratwicke, while the family and friends of John cheered.

The documentary will air on Monday, June 3, at 9pm.