A writer who reported on the Soham killings has opened up about his “odd” conversations with the parents of Ian Huntley, with their unusual way of discussing their son’s guilt sticking with him, all these years on
The death of Ian Huntley likely won’t be mourned by many, and even his own mother reportedly knew she’d never find ‘peace’ until he was gone(Image: Geoff Robinson/Shutterstock)
Few, if any, will grieve the death of Ian Huntley, the Soham killer whose crimes rank among the most grotesque in British history. But for his parents, the news will likely bring about complicated feelings.
Evil Huntley was 28 years old when, in August 2002, 10-year-old schoolgirls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman vanished after leaving a family BBQ to get sweets. In the extensive search that followed, the caretaker presented himself as a concerned citizen, scouring the fields with his dog and joining the band of concerned neighbours in their quest to bring the girls home.
The caretaker presented himself as a concerned citizen, even speaking with the press(Image: Shutterstock)
Hated both inside and outside jail, Huntley’s notoriety made him a target, and he died this month following a brutal attack by another inmate at HMP Frankland.
For those who knew Huntley before his true nature came to light, this marks the end of a grim chapter that has left its mark on so many. This includes the journalists who interviewed the young caretaker about his last sighting of Holly and Jessica, little realising they were speaking with a double child killer.
For the Mirror’s very own investigative journalist, Nathan Yates, learning of Huntley’s guilt had a profound impact on how he viewed crime and human nature. He initially thought the killer was a “nice enough bloke” who “was doing the right thing and trying to help”. In a bid to find some sort of closure, Nathan penned the award-winning 2005 book, Beyond Evil: Inside the Twisted Mind of Ian Huntley, which explored how such a monster came to be.
In the course of his interviews, Nathan spoke with Huntley’s parents, Kevin Huntley and Lynda Richards, who produced childhood snaps of Huntley to prove, in their view, that he had been a “totally normal kid”. Nathan, who has since left the Mirror, told us: “That was their take on it, that they did nothing to bring him up in a way that would make him into some kind of monster. He was a totally normal kid. He had a totally normal upbringing. That was what they said.”
While parents of even the most vile of men have remained loyal to their children since time immemorial, Nathan was stricken by Kevin and Lynda’s “odd” turns of phrase when discussing the possibility of their son’s guilt.
Visiting them after Huntley’s arrest, Nathan recalled their chilling claim that alarmed him. “His parents were very strange. They, the father, said, ‘Well, we’re 99 per cent sure that it wasn’t him’. And that’s a really odd thing to say because, you know, usually people, they say, ‘It can’t possibly be, we’re 100 per cent sure’. So they knew that there was something in his background makeup that they knew about that meant that it could have been him, you know? I think that’s what I took from it..”
Huntley’s parents were keen to show that he had a ‘totally normal upbringing’(Image: Shutterstock)
Nathan added: “They stood by him, and they did put forward the theory that it wasn’t him, and that it was someone from the Lakenheath Air Base, who was a visiting American. That was their theory, so maybe that’s how they squared it with themselves.”
As time went on, Nathan got to talking to them “quite a lot”, and even felt some degree of sympathy for them, as intense public reactions swirled. Nathan recounted: “I felt a little bit sorry for them at times because people ostracised them, because they knew who they were. You know, they hadn’t committed the murders, but I suppose people must have felt they’d done something to bring up a kid that would do such a thing.
However, while Nathan did feel some empathy for the shunned pair, he did find some of their behaviours to be “distasteful”, given the horror of the situation. Nathan remarked, “I mean, they were quite odd people. One thing that was a bit distasteful was that they always seemed to be wanting to make money off the back of it. So they wanted us to buy their story, which we wouldn’t do.”
As the years went on, both Lynda and Kevin kept a low profile, but in 2007, they publicly backed calls for their son never to be released. In a statement issued to The Sun at the time, they said: “We have never understood why our son committed such a terrible crime, nor can we ever begin to forgive him. He knows that.”
According to Nathan, Huntley’s parents claimed to have been ’99 per cent sure’ of their son’s innocence(Image: Shutterstock)
It remains unclear as to what might now be going through their minds as they mourn one of the most hated men who ever walked the earth. However, Lynda, now 71, is said to have told friends, “part of me hopes he passes away this time”.
Prior to the killer’s life support machine being turned off, a source told The Sun: “Lynda couldn’t recognise her own son when she saw him in the hospital, his injuries are that extensive. She’s understandably torn by what has happened, but it was a harrowing experience for her. He’s been attacked on so many occasions, and she now thinks it might be better if he didn’t pull through. It’s an extraordinarily difficult thing for her to come to terms with. Part of her just hopes he passes away this time. But he’s still her son, regardless of what happened, and they have remained very close.”
They continued: “She spoke to him on the phone two days before the attack. She can’t be at peace until it’s all over — and it won’t be over until he’s gone. She knows that and accepted it a long time ago. She says everyone is traumatised by what her son did, including his own family.”
After his death, outrage quickly grew at the possibility of the state funding a funeral for the killer following his death. But according to new reports, Huntley won’t have any form of service. Instead, he will have a basic cremation before his ashes are scattered in a secret location by his family.
According to The Sun, the killer’s family declined the offer of a state-funded funeral out of respect for his victims’ families. A source told the newspaper: “There will be no service, no memorial, no mourners, nothing. It is as it should be.”
