Hailey's Story--She Was an Eleven-Year-Old Child. He Was Soham Murderer Ian Huntley. This is the Story of How She Survived (9 page)

By this time, he had me pushed up against the gym door with his forearm and pressed his body against me, and he wanted to do it again and again and again.

Desperate, I pointed again and cried out, ‘There are video cameras there. Don't do it.'

But Huntley, by now wildly aroused and unstoppable, shouted breathlessly, ‘They're fake, they don't work.'

The physical and mental torture for me was nearly over when, awkwardly, he withdrew his hand from my tracksuit bottoms and his eyes darted about to see if we were still alone. Maybe now that he was out of his sexual stupor, the cameras worried him.

He again threatened, ‘If you run, I'll come after you! If you dare to tell anybody, then I'll come and kill you. Just remember, Hailey, I only live down the street from you,' he rasped, ‘and I'm a black belt in karate!'

He scared the living daylights out of me, and out of fear I promised once again, ‘No, I won't tell anyone. I promise, I won't say anything to anyone.'

We set off again and, on the last leg of the walk home, he drilled it into my head: ‘If you tell anybody, I'll come and kill you.'

I was devastated at the thought of not reaching home and promised yet again to tell no one.

When my street came into sight I had to stifle sobs of joy as I thought, Thank God!

And at the same time I was consumed with the chill of death as I thought of Huntley's threats to murder me.

Then he left my side, without saying a word, and went into the driveway of Katie Webber's house, where the caravan was.

Just in case he had changed his mind and was coming after me to kill me, I gave a worried glance over my shoulder as I started walking faster. When he left my sight, I wasn't aware if Katie was there… I was just pleased to be alive and back in the street.

I
REMEMBER TREMBLING WITH RELIEF WHEN, A FEW HOUSES AWAY FROM MINE, THE AROMA OF SPAGHETTI BOLOGNESE WAS CARRIED TOWARDS ME ON THE SAME GENTLE SUMMER BREEZE THAT HAD BROUGHT ME THE SMELL OF GRASS CUTTINGS A FEW HOURS EARLIER.
That homely smell was coming from my house. I remember knocking on the outer door and then my mum saw me through the glass of the inner one. ‘Hang on, my spaghetti might burn,' she shouted.

Crying had given me puffy-looking eyes, and they felt like organ stops, but in the time it took to walk home from the school they had become less inflamed. Quickly, I tidied up my clothes and hair. Mum didn't give me a second glance, and why should she, for as far
as she was concerned I had been into town with Katie Webber. I never let on what had happened. Besides, Mum never paid much attention to me when I came home; it was when I was going out that I had to be careful to always look my best, or she would nag me.

I had been so scared of the consequences of having left the street, and now here I was back home, with Mum none the wiser.

As I was undressing to take a bath, I noticed bleeding. I hadn't started my periods at this age, so I wasn't aware of what menstrual blood was. And, anyway, looking back, this certainly wasn't period blood. After seeing it, I felt really sick and dirty.

And the smell: I just couldn't get the stench off me. The more I tried to pull away from it, the more it clung to me. It was in my nostrils, it was in my hair. I was becoming nauseous and I retched. It was a certain smell that I just couldn't get away from, a sort of musty dog smell that reminded me vividly of what had happened to me.

At that moment I wasn't able to take in what had occurred. I was confused and wanted to ask somebody, ‘What happens if he comes and kills me? My bedroom is downstairs and he could come and break the window or whatever, and what happens if nobody believes me?' I had these mad thoughts of self-hatred, self-blame and self-harm. With Huntley, I had been so near to death, which is why now I consider life to be priceless.

I wasn't aware of the long-term significance of what Huntley had just done to me. I wasn't aware that it was an abhorrent sex act. I wasn't able to fully comprehend what he had done in terms of right and wrong. What didn't pass through my mind was that he had no right to have done that. No, I didn't think, He has got no right doing that and I am going to tell my mum and get the police in.

That is not to say that I hadn't been made aware of ‘strangers' and so on. I was aware, but I just thought these warnings related to strange men, not those you knew already. I mean, Huntley was considered a family friend. I didn't even know what there was to fear about strangers, other than that they could take me away. No one had said, ‘Don't let strange men fiddle with you down there, or even men you know.'

There was a man down the street one time who waved me over – I was only about seven – and asked, ‘Are you Mandy's daughter?'

‘Yes, yes,' I replied.

And then he moved a bit closer and said he was something to do with Auntie Bet. She was related to my granddad, but I'm not sure how; all I can remember is she had loads and loads of cats.

This man was her friend and I just said, ‘Oh, right.'

He was putting boxes into the boot of his car and he asked, ‘How's your mum?

‘She's fine, thank you,' I answered.

As he handed me 50 pence he chirped, ‘Here you are, duck.'

I can remember going in and joyfully telling my mum as I held out my hand to show her this nice shiny coin, ‘Look, Mum, I just got 50 pence off that man down the road.'

Mum froze and sternly demanded, ‘What man?'

Innocently I replied, ‘The man who is putting boxes into the back of his car. He knows you.'

‘What bloody man?' Mum snapped as she stood up, went and opened the door and craned her neck out to see the man for herself. With relief in her voice, she said it was this man called Rob. But she warned me, ‘Mind, don't you ever go near anybody whether they say, “Oh, I know your mum” or “I know your dad” or whatever.'

I tried to explain to Mum that it was only because he said, ‘I know Mandy, you know. Mandy, your mum…'

Mum stopped me short when she hammered her point home: ‘Don't go near anybody who says that or anybody who says, “Come with me”, OK?'

‘No, Mum,' I said respectfully. ‘I'll never do it again.'

So I knew at that age not to talk to or accept money from strangers, but to me Huntley wasn't a stranger. So back then I was double wary of strangers and, as I said, Huntley wasn't one, just as he wasn't to Holly and Jessica.

He had built up trust within the community and held a responsible job, so who would think a school
caretaker could take the lives of two children when he had been passed fit to be around them?

In total, Huntley came to the attention of the Humberside Police on ten occasions. In addition, between August 1995 and July 1998, he was reported to North East Lincolnshire Social Services on five separate occasions. Unbelievably, three of the reports alleging underage sex were passed on, independently of each other, to the Humberside Police.

I lay the blame squarely at the doors of North East Lincolnshire Social Services and the Humberside Police. From the Introduction to this book and what I say later, you will see why.

After kicking my clothes into the corner of the bathroom, I ran the water from just the hot tap: it was the hottest bath I've ever had. My feet and hands were really cold and I had a sick and ill feeling within me as I got into the bath. As I sat in that hot water I just wanted to dissolve into it and let it consume me, let it cleanse me through and through.

But the water on its own wasn't removing the remnants of Huntley from me. I felt repulsed at what he had done; my body was screaming out to be purified.

I remember seeing the bottle of bleach and then a small brush, like a nailbrush, really thick. I had to get rid of that rancid smell, so I undid the yellow cap on the bottle and slowly poured the bleach over what I saw as Huntley's calling card. I tried to scrub away in a mad
frenzy what Huntley had done to me. As I scrubbed, the area became red-raw. My skin was starting to blister.

Although I was cleansing the superficial film of Huntley's filthy touch from the outside of me, my insides were churning and my stomach was in knots. I was at the end of my tether as I reached out and picked up the bottle again. I pushed down the childproof cap and unscrewed it, then immersed the part-filled bottle in the water and let it fill. I wanted to really cleanse the stench of Huntley away. I felt soiled and sick. The hurt of that dirty, shameful nightmare was horrendous.

As my hands clenched in tension around the plastic bottle, part of me had shut down and the only way I could deal with the torment was by gulping down the cocktail of chemical and bathwater. As the hot toxic brew entered my mouth, I prayed that the liquid filling me would wash away my living nightmare. How much of the mix I swallowed, I don't really know. I just kept gulping it down. I didn't care, so long as I could get that monster's stench off me and out of me. If only I could have washed away the pain that easily. The realisation that I was never going to be the same person again was dawning on me.

I thought I must be a dirty, horrible person and I was trying to wash it away. But it wouldn't go away. And, when I couldn't wash it away, I decided to push it deep down within me. I locked it away behind a mask of self-hatred.

Looking back, I don't know how I didn't kill myself by what I did. It wasn't something I had planned; it was just a spontaneous act on seeing the bleach bottle. The contents were stronger than soap and I knew it was used for deep cleaning. I had no intention of killing myself, I just had to get rid of this smell, because what if anyone could smell it on me? What if they found out I had been out of the street with Huntley? Then I'd really be in for it. I needed to wash the stench of Huntley's breath from my mouth, too.

I was ill for the rest of that night. Between my legs it burned from my scrubbing. I got my pyjamas on and sought the soothing comfort of my bed. Mum sensed something was amiss and asked, ‘Is everything all right? Did you have a good time?'

Although I longed to confide in her, I just couldn't find the words, so I buried the pain in my reply, ‘Yes, thank you. I don't feel very well. I'm off to bed.'

As I walked towards my bedroom, I bit down hard on my lip, praying that I wouldn't burst into an uncontrollable flood of tears in front of Mum. I just couldn't bring myself to tell her what Huntley had done to me. I resigned myself to a life of bitter silence. In time, the pain of silence would become too much to bear.

When I closed the bedroom door, all of the ache inside me welled up and spilled out as tears of pain rolled down my cheeks. I felt so numb, lost and alone.

I was terrified of what might happen to me, as I was in the downstairs bedroom on my own. He only lives a few minutes away, I thought. He could come to my window easily at nine o'clock at night, put it through and kill me, and everyone is upstairs.

That night, as I lay there, it all came hurtling back to haunt me. I can remember literally twiddling my thumbs out of nervousness: 50 times one way and then 50 times the other way. Things started to come to the front of my mind, but I was running on autopilot, twiddling until my thumbs ached.

What am I doing that for? I thought. I kept going over what had happened during the day and thinking, I really, really, really want to tell somebody but what happens if he comes to kill me? Exhausted from the torment, I fell asleep.

A few hours later, about three o'clock, an uncomfortable feeling of dampness awakened me. I had wet the bed. I had never done it before, and I was quite embarrassed for myself. I tried to conceal this from Mum and didn't tell her.

The next day – well, a few hours later – I remember just staying in the sanctuary of the house, but then I started worrying. What if Huntley were to knock on the door and come after me?

The odd thing is that Katie never made any effort to come and see me after that fateful day when Huntley took me to ‘climb trees', which was unusual. I,
obviously, wasn't going to call on Katie, because Huntley was there.

I don't know the reason for Katie Webber's withdrawal from my life immediately after that sunny Saturday afternoon when Huntley turned his evil thoughts into reality. But it has to be considered very strange that she didn't even come along for the regular Saturday trip into town. The longest length of time she had stayed away before that was about three or four days.

No one even asked why I never went around to Katie's. It was as if she had never existed. At some point, I thought, she would have called to see me to ask why I hadn't been going there. I was quite surprised and thinking, Why hasn't she come along to see me?

She never even came to see what happened on the Saturday she had called for me, the day she had hurriedly left and said she would see me at her place. Surely that warranted some explanation?

As time went on, I was having flashbacks to the sex attack. I was finding it increasingly difficult to contain it within me. I felt it would only take some stupid thing to trigger the release mechanism within me and I would spill the beans on Huntley's crimes.

This is exactly what happened one day in July 1998 when a fête was taking place next to our local church in Humberston. The venue was what is called the Paddock, where the swings are, and they usually had bric-a-brac stalls and other attractions.

My friend knocked on the door and asked, ‘Are you coming out to the fête today, Hailey?'

‘Yes,' I said enthusiastically.

No sooner had I spoken than my mum came out of nowhere and overruled me: ‘No!'

In stark disbelief I pleaded with her, ‘Oh, what's the matter, why?'

To my relief, Mum said, ‘Not until you've tidied your room.'

‘OK,' I groaned, and told my friend, ‘I'll meet you there in half an hour.'

‘It'll take you longer than half an hour to clean your bedroom,' Mum said.

OK then, I thought. But by this time I had an attitude like: I don't care what anybody says, I will do what I want and nobody has the upper hand with me. I'm a big girl and, if you want to mess with me now, you mess with me.

I cleaned my bedroom quickly by putting everything under my bed and under my quilt, all my mucky clothes and things, and then cheerfully announced, ‘I'm finished. I'll walk to the fair now.'

‘No, you are not,' Mum insisted.

‘Why not?' I moaned.

She barked back, ‘Your bedroom is still bloody messy and this is getting ridiculous. Keep your room tidy. It used to be nice and tidy, why isn't it tidy now?'

After the Huntley attack, I must admit, my whole
outlook on life seemed to have changed overnight. The experience had a dramatic effect on my character. Whereas once I would be polite and wore party dresses and had long hair, now I was dressing down, trying to make myself as unattractive as possible. I cut my ponytail, shunned dresses in favour of trousers and became a rebellious teenager.

My bedroom was downstairs, facing the garden. The fête was a tantalising thought. So, when Mum was out of sight, I shut my bedroom door, jumped out of the window and scampered off to the Paddock with an arrogant air about me.

There I met up with all my friends, and after about 15 minutes I spotted the local bobby, PC Andy Woods. It turned out that he had been to our house for a coffee to see how my mum was. My dad was a special constable and Andy, as well as being a policeman, was a friend of the family.

Mum had got nattering with him and she had a strop on about the state of my room and how I had slipped away to the fête. She said to Andy, ‘If you see Hailey when you're at the fête, will you pick her up and bring her home, please, because she shouldn't have gone.'