* * *
Sebastian Young is already in reception when Somer gets there, looking for all the world like he’s come for a job interview in his light cotton suit and button-down shirt. Ev was apologetic about dragging her in on a Sunday, but frankly it was a relief. Anything to stop her thinking about where she was supposed to be this weekend. And why she isn’t. But she’s careful not to arrive at the station too early, because she can’t risk any small-talk time with Ev. She’s incredibly fond of her, and she knows how much she cares, but right now, she isn’t in the mood for confessions.
She isn’t in the mood for Dave King, either. Her heart plummets when she spots him at the coffee machine right outside CID. And the fact that it’s obvious what’s dragged him into the office on a Sunday doesn’t help. She’s been trying not to think about Fawley; she can’t believe he’s guilty of something so unimaginable, but she can’t square away the evidence either. It’s all too much, on top of everything else – Giles, the baby that wasn’t, the ultrasound –
King extracts a cup and presses the button, then looks at her with a nasty knowing smile.
‘I don’t suppose you’ll be seeing much of the boyfriend now then, all things considered?’
She stares at him; how the hell does he even know about Giles? What business is it –
He takes his cup and straightens up. ‘I mean, you could do a whole lot better than that. Even if he is a sodding DI.’ She glares at him and he lifts his hands, all innocence. ‘Just saying.’
‘You don’t know the first thing about him.’
He raises an eyebrow, evidently amused. ‘Ah, now that’s where you’re wrong. We worked a case or two together, back in the day.’ He takes a step closer. ‘I know a lot about that bastard – much more than you think –’
He has his coffee black, which is unfortunate, because it means the liquid is scalding as it hits his face, his eyes, his chest – splattering over the floor, running down his neck –
‘What was that for?’ he gasps, staggering back. ‘You fucking bitch – how fucking dare you – look at my fucking shirt –’
He’s shouting now, because she’s walking away. ‘You bitch – I’ll get you for this – you hear me? I’ll fucking get you for this –’
* * *
Alex Fawley looks at her watch again. Ten to four. Somewhere in her brain she registers Nell next door in the bathroom, sorting laundry, Gerry downstairs with the kids, one of the neighbour’s dogs barking. She checks her tablet, refreshes the page. Her fingertip leaves a damp mark across the screen.
* * *
[ARCHIVE TAPE OF BBC JOURNALIST, OUTSIDE THE OLD BAILEY, 20 DECEMBER 1999]
‘After a nine-week trial, Gavin Parrie, the so-called “Roadside Rapist”, was today sentenced to life for the rape and attempted rape of seven young women in the Oxford area. Judge Peter Healey described Parrie as “evil, unrepentant and depraved” and recommended he serve at least fifteen years. There was uproar in court as the sentence was announced, with Parrie’s family abusing both the judge and jury from the public gallery. As Parrie was led away, he shouted threats at the officer who had been instrumental in his arrest, saying he would “get him” and he and his family would “spend the rest of their lives watching their backs”. The officer in question, Detective Sergeant Adam Fawley, has received a commendation from the Thames Valley Chief Constable for the role he played in securing the conviction.’
[JOCELYN]
I wasn’t in court that day. I was still at college. But I do remember the case, and I remember thinking what sort of man could not only commit such terrible crimes against women, but then threaten the family of the man who’d helped convict him.
Now, of course, I know a lot more than I did then. I’ve also talked at length to Gavin myself, and I know he sincerely regrets any distress he caused that day. He has also been deeply affected by the terrible toll the trial took on his own family, especially his children. Even though the Parries were divorced by the time he was convicted, his family were hounded – by the press, by vigilantes, by their own neighbours. They became pariahs, and Sandra was eventually forced to move to Scotland and revert to using her maiden name, purely in order to protect her kids.
[SANDRA]
‘It’d been bad enough bringing up three kids on my own before that – it was ten times worse so far away from my family. Gavin’s brother used to send me cash whenever he could, but most of the time we barely got by. As for traipsing five hundred sodding miles to visit Gav, forget it.’
[JOCELYN]
It meant Gavin scarcely saw them, of course, but he knew what they were going through – he knew his family were the Roadside Rapist’s victims too, just as much as he was, and the women were. And that made what he considered to be a terrible injustice all the harder to bear.
Because his position has never changed: he did not assault those women, and the man who did is still out there. He still believes the Thames Valley investigation was fundamentally flawed, though these days he doesn’t use words like ‘framed’ or ‘fitted up’. He’s older and wiser and more measured (eighteen years in prison will do that to you). But regardless of whether it was a cock-up or a conspiracy, the end result is the same. He’s spent the best years of his life in jail for crimes he did not commit.
I’m Jocelyn Naismith, and I’m the co-founder of The Whole Truth, a not-for-profit organization that campaigns to overturn miscarriages of justice. This is Righting the Wrongs, series 3: The Roadside Rapist Redeemed? Chapter six: Parole
[THEME SONG – AARON NEVILLE COVER VERSION OF ‘I SHALL BE RELEASED’]
[JOCELYN]
I’m going to start this episode with a confession. The first time Gavin and his lawyers approached The Whole Truth to take on his case, we turned them down. And the second. But then the case hit the headlines again, and everything changed.
Earlier this year, when Gavin was still in Wandsworth prison, there were two horrific assaults on young women in Oxford – assaults that bore an uncanny and terrifying resemblance to the attacks Gavin was accused of. Was it a copycat or were these attacks the work of the real Roadside Rapist?
That’s when Gavin’s lawyer, Jeremy Peters, contacted us again, and it didn’t take us long to realize that this was a case that deserved our attention.
[JEREMY PETERS]
‘Gavin’s conviction was reviewed by the Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2002, but they declined to send it back to the Court of Appeal. And even though he’d been a model prisoner, he’d always refused to admit guilt, and that hampered his ability to get parole, even though he’d have been eligible for it after fifteen years. So by early 2018, we were running out of options.’
[JOCELYN]
The fact that Gavin had never wavered in his insistence on his innocence, even though that was working against him, was probably the single most important factor in our decision to take on his case. And having made that decision, we did what we always do: we went right back to the very start and looked at the whole investigation. The statements, the forensics, the witnesses. How the police carried out their enquiries, the evidence the jury were presented with in court.
And – crucially – the evidence the jury never saw at all. Because there’s an element in this case that makes it unique in our experience: the fact that one of the leading detectives subsequently had a relationship with – indeed actually married – one of the victims. And not only a victim: the victim. The woman whose intervention led the police directly to the one and only piece of forensic evidence that definitively linked Gavin Parrie to the crimes: a strand of her hair, recovered in his lock-up. Hair Gavin Parrie has always believed was planted. Possibly with Adam Fawley’s knowledge; even – perhaps – at his instigation.