Fiction Writing. Trauma? "I think my son's concentration wasn't the way it should have been, but he wasn't slow. "He is easily led. When a police officer asked him why he didn't rescue James bleeding on the railway lines he replied: ' 'Cos blood stains, doesn't it, and then me mother would have to pay more money. Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, both 10, murdered him in cold blood. It is not known whether the boy watched any of his father's adult movies. In quest of companionship, he occasionally bullied his younger brother into truanting with him, and, in an effort to impress his peers, frequently boasted of his late-night exploits on the railway line, but failed to attract much attention. The pattern of bullying among the brothers, which had been noted by the Head mistress of the boys school, appeared to descend down the line, with the eldest Thompson brother beating the one just below him in age, and that brother beating the brother below him, in turn. Her husband came back to Walton now and again to see his mother, but he never came to see the boys. Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right. James Bulger murder: Shelagh Fogarty remembers the trial Tweet. He didn't want to hurt James. Ann, desperate to escape the physical and emotional torment of living with her drunken father, was married to Robert, Sr. in December 1971, on the day of her eighteenth birthday. . He always had plenty of friends. Their. The James Bulger murder View gallery Venables was born on August 12, 1982. Then there were the separated parents, the poverty, the truanting, the videos. I'm warning yer,' she would say. It was this empowering chemistry between them that some argued set into motion the life-altering events that would devastate a family, challenge a community, and rock a nations core in the disquieting months that followed. "In order that justice can be done, no further details are being released at this stage and the proceedings are subject to reporting restrictions.". One of the focal points of the local community was QD Videos at the bottom of Robert's street, where the kids would browse through the horror stacks, discussing their favourites knowledgeably. The best photos of birds and other wildlife from around the world. At first, Robert seemed to respond well to this, taking the initiative to help feed and clothe the baby, and doing what he could to please his mother. That means he is currently 35-years-old. It was to be an adult trial, both boys appearing every day in the full gaze of whoever was in that room, but neither giving evidence directly to the court. It set the tone for the years ahead in which there was to be no respite from the hatred. Jon Venables is demonstrably no such thing. The officer who questioned Venables took the stand and explained how he had asked Susan Venables to absent herself from the next session as her presence was now inhibiting her son from telling the truth. Were they to blame? The breaking point came when Jon was suspended from Broad Square after attempting to choke a classmate with a twelve-inch wooden ruler. The taunts upset Jons already volatile temper, and he began coming home in increasingly low spirits and crying. Such pleasantries were not for Robbie. Robert is not believed to have reoffended - Venables has been convicted twice since being set free. Depressed, Ann began drinking heavily and was taking narcotics which caused her to hallucinate. It worked. ANN THOMPSON, the mother of Robert Thompson, child A, says her son is a thief, a liar, is devious and plays truant. The most agonising thing about the whole case was that so many people had stopped them and questioned them. This time, curiosity took the upper hand: 'I wanted to see what it was like,' he said. Teachers hold placards as they shout slogans while taking part in a protest organised in Manchester as part of a national strike day. Drivers have been warned to leave extra time for their Monday morning commute due to icy roads during rush hour, following a weekend of wintry weather. I would get him something like a cartoon.". His parents, Susan and Neil, accompanied him during the interview process. In the last few years she stopped drinking in the Top House and tried to keep things together. Finally, in 1988, while on a family vacation, the breaking point came, when Big Bobby, then thirty-four, began an adulterous relationship with a friend and neighbor in her fifties. The detective explained how, before she left, she soothed him, told him his parents would love him whatever he told the police, reminding him that Denise neededto know what had happened to her baby. IN their interviews with the two boys, psychiatrists could find no clues to why the boys acted so violently. In a 1993 interview, published in the Guardian newspaper just one day after Robert was convicted of the murder of James Bulger, Ann Thompson was quick to place fault on the neighborhood and the surrounding authorities, who she felt had failed both her and her sons. DAVID James Smith, who visited Mrs Thompson at one of her secret homes, reveals that it was a sad existence. He took a jar of paracetamol. We are proud to endorse the COP27 Leather Manifesto. Like Ann Thompson, however, both parents of Jon Venables rallied round their son and in preparationfor his release Mr Venables accom-panied him on trips to football matches. Friday 12th February 1993. "It is hard to take in really. fun to be with". He was in great distress' And what about the little, innocent boy he killed??! His mother gave him pocket money to buy them. I thought he was all right, Jon said of Robert during his police interviews. Grainy CCTV footage later showed the innocent toddler being led away by Venables and Thompson, who marched the little boy through the streets of Bootle for two miles - a walk that would have taken hours given his size. Some people thought they were as old as 12 or 13, but when they met they were both only 10 years old. Superintendent Kirby is a religious man. The two bumped into each other - literally - in the school playground in the middle of a fight. He began telling his father that he believed his parents loved his brother and sister more than they did him, and, at one point, implored his father to send him to school with his siblings. They hid his body under bricks so that the first train to come along cut his body in two, but he was already dead before this happened. It was the kind of family neighbours compare themselves against and then feel better. He disliked Thunderbirds because of the puppets' 'stringy thingies'. 'If, in their own lives, they have had it extremely tough and been bullied and neglected and abused then they end up rapidly having to prove themselves to be extremely tough and invulnerable - a bit like Arnold Shwarzenegger in The Terminator. Directly in front of the bench was the raised dock in which Thompson, Venables, and two social workers would sit for the next four weeks. Venables received a 40-month prison sentence after appearing via video link at the Old Bailey. The other shops in the area were also armoured with mesh, including the Red Garden chipper where Robert used to pop in with his brothers most nights for a 25p bag of chips. He had been stripped from the waist down,. He had been quiet that weekend, they said, but they had thought that was because his mother had taken him to the police station on the Friday evening for playing truant. Robert was number five of seven. 'I didn't know it would be like this,' Mr Venables said with hindsight. The teacher had a different perspective, saying that Susan was in fact aware of the issue, and had expressed deep concern. Thompson & Venebales. rk ye. From a distance Robert looked a sweet child. Half way through the 1992-1993 school year, Robert had already racked up nearly 50 unauthorized absences, and was falling significantly behind in his schoolwork. As a result of the incident, Jon's mother decided to move him to another school. football, snooker, things like that. His mother especially has been a tower of strength, says the source. The shocking murder that shook the nation, Both Venables and Robert Thompson were 10 years-old when they tortured and killed 2 year-old James Bulger, Thompson and Venables were tried as adults, James Bulger, aged 2 years old, being led away in a shopping centre in Liverpool, Denise Fergus denied having anything to do with the Channel 4 documentary about her son, James Bulger's murder case could now be investigated, The petition is on nearly 15,000 signatures, James Bulger was just two when he was brutally murdered, He had been out shopping with his mum Denise, James was made to walk two miles before being left for dead on a disused rail line, Denise tirelessly campaigned to have their sentence increased, Denise once admitted she's lived 'in fear' since the trial. Mrs Venables described how she searched for Jon. This would have been at about 5.30pm - just the time the boys were about to begin killing Jamie. Please review our, You need to be a subscriber to join the conversation. Hes your son., Unhappily, it was during this critical time that Ann became pregnant with her seventh child, the product of another failed relationship. Robert Thompson was born to Robert Sr. and Ann Thompson on the 23rd day of August 1982, in Liverpool, England. Susan and the children moved in with her mother for a short time, and then settled in a small cluster of derelict apartments in Old Swan, where Jon attended the nearby Broad Green Preschool. How could two small boys savage and leave a toddler for dead? Two boys who forged a friendship out of breaking the rules. Susan Venables agreed but on condition that she saw her son first. The two had an aberrant relationship with one another, in the sense that it was almost as though they had never divorced. Neil had been laid off in the months prior, so the couple sold their home, and Neil moved back in with his father, before finally relocating to an apartment in Kirkdale. She found it hard bringing the kids up in the neighbourhood. Englands Ollie Chessum dives in to score his sides second try during the Guinness Six Nations match at Twickenham Stadium, London, Sam Smith arrives for the Brit Awards ceremony, A robin redbreast takes flight in Dublins botanic gardens. "You look at him and you say to yourself, 'How could you be involved in anything like this?'" The couple was financially strained from the start, but Ann did what she could to make it work. ROBERT THOMPSON - angelfire.com James Bulger would now be weeks away from his 23rd birthday. Little Bobby went to visit his brothers every so often, eager to show them the latest playthings he had robbed from the assorted shops nearby. Not surprisingly, Ann had also attempted suicide in the same manner, some months before. On the 20 year anniversary of the murder of James Bulger, BBC Radio 5 Live's Shelagh Fogarty recalls the trial of his young killers. 'We have never really been apart,' Mrs Venables said. Three days later his body was found, and three days after that a tip-off came from a shopkeeper who had seen two boys playing truant on the day James went missing and gave police two names - Jon Venables and Robert Thompson. Their age was hard to gauge from the CCTV images, so just when you imagined you couldnt be more shocked by this story, it emerged the two accused were just 10-years-old. CCTV images revealed how James had been lured away by Thompson and Venables, who was also aged 10. The questioning was calm, steady, even playful at the beginning to try to get a sense the two boys really did know the difference between right and wrong. 2023 BBC. David Sharrock, Maggie O'Kane, and Edward Pilkington look at the lives of the rebels who turned to killing, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. It is here, of course, that Jon met and made friends with fellow eccentric, Robert Thompson. Gillespie, McNeilly, and Powell were sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 25 years. Aged 10, he was barely literate. The Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. The week after he walked out the family's home burned down in an accidental fire. Their seats were just below the raised dock where their sons would sit for the next three weeks, listening to a prosecution which aimed to prove not only that they killed James Bulger, but that they planned to, and that when they did they knew it to be wrong. Real bottom of the gut stuff, like an animal. The right will draw attention to the broken homes, the single parents, the persistent truancy. As the paedophile killer pleaded guilty on Wednesday to possessing more than 1,000 indecent images of children and a "paedo manual" - his parents words on their son's involvement make disturbing reading. . It was their sons picked up by detectives. Both parents hope was that he would make something of his life and eventually find some peace. "'It wasnt fair to interview him. Then they would hide their school satchels under a subway and set off on their adventure. I remember watching her then on TV, her sobbing plea for information and thinking how much guts it must have taken to get up that day and face a roomful of journalists and photographers. They played a double act towards the children: his mother, Susan, aged 36, a sharp woman with a hawkish look, was the hard one. She was prone to hysteria and hailed from a 'strict and disciplined' background. Just having a bit of shade!! Take him home, the officer would say to her. Mr Venables said: "He wouldn't watch horror. however, as the incident in the playground shows, the ever-present threat of discovery cast a constant shadow over anyone related to the two murderers. He is one of those children that if you told him to put his hand in the fire, he would. everyone blamed Thompson and. Moments later, we were told, Jon Venables uttered the words, We did it. Neil explained to him that the school they attended was special, and that Jon wouldnt be accepted. They didnt kill him in an accident it was premeditated and they tortured that poor baby. Ian was clever enough to know that to survive he had to get out. Reporters from around the world ended up in the drab streets of Walton, cadging interviews off any 10-year-old boys hanging around in the streets. However, you will find some great articles which you can comment on right now in our Comment section. Facebook gives people the power. Denise Fergus is the same age as me, a fact I only registered when I met her for the first time two weeks ago. James Bulgers mother Denise claims that she managed to track down Thompson six years ago, planning to confront him but instead stared at him from the opposite side of the street, full of rage but unable to act. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. However, given that the tension in the household was persistent throughout the most crucial of Jons formative years, the belief that he had moved through the ordeal entirely unaffected is questionable. Are they mad? See today's front and back pages, download the newspaper, order back issues and use the historic Daily Express newspaper archive. Ann and Bobby fought regularly in front of the children, with virtually all of the fights leading to physical violence. Some of the red brick houses were well-kept, others had torn net curtains and grubby windows. And now The Bulger Killers: Was Justice Done? Since the murder Robert has been in a state of post-traumatic shock, hounded by nightmares and flashbacks from the railway tracks. I made notes of the pathologists evidence. Child killer Mary Bell and Maxine Carr, the former girlfriend of Soham murderer Ian Huntley, are the others. The four who drove Suzanne to Romiley - Jean Powell (now Jean Gillespie), Bernadette McNeilly, Glyn Powell, and Anthony Dudson - were all found guilty of murder. 'They were just your average scruff - like the rest of us.'. Child Killer - Thompson & Venables - Murder in the Uk Asked later if he could recall a time when his brother had exhibited any unusually aggressive tendencies, Roberts brother said no: Hes frightened of his own shadow. Nonetheless, in hindsight, its safe to assume that by 1993, ten-year-old Robert was swiftly approaching crisis point., Alarmingly, some of the neighboring children later claimed to have seen Robert behave cruelly towards animals, and pull the heads off of baby pigeons, although this was never unequivocally confirmed. I don't think they understood he was hyperactive. Haunting CCTV footage shows the pair leading the tiny, trusting boy . . By now the two boys from Walton were part of an international freak show. Thousands of members of Unison, Unite and the GMB unions are set to walk out across England and Wales on Monday as part of continued industrial action in the health service, Performers taking part in a parade involving costumes, lion dances and floats, during Chinese New Year celebrations in London, Everton fans hold up banners protesting against the board of directors during their Premier League match against West Ham at the London Stadium, A pair of swans fly over a frozen pond in Bushy Park in London, People take part in a demonstration in support of trans rights outside the UK Government Office in Edinburgh, A member of the Royal College of Nursing holds their dog whilst on the picket line outside Kings College Hospital in London, as nurses take industrial action over pay, The scene on the A39 Quantock Road in Bridgwater after a double-decker bus overturned in a crash involving a motorcycle, A man walks dogs in snowy conditions in a park in Hexham. Last week the author Angela Phillips spoke of how the gentle son of the female friend of hers turned into a fascist skinhead: 'The boy his mother wanted him to become was not man enough for the world he was forced to inhabit. INSIDE the court sat the two boys, dwarfed by the weight and majesty of the place. The bird was taken to the vets where they are nursing it back to health. His mother, Anne Marie Thompson, who is 39, got the house from the local housing trust after her husband, Robert, ran off with a woman from Stockport five years ago. The days James was abducted, February 12 1993, I was a young reporter in my home city of Liverpool. He once came to me crying saying the other boys were picking on him, trying to steal his bike.'. Mr Venables ran out of the car and grabbed him, while Robert ran off down the street laughing and shouting: 'You can't catch me.'. The Bulger Murder: Mother cannot believe that 'devious' child killed: James Bulger: Jon Venables' identity leaked online - news What they did was exceptionally unpleasant and the fact that a little boy ended up dead is not something the nation can easily forget. 'His mum was more strict. Denise was in court that day. In 2010, Meggie Atkinson, then children's commissioner for England, called for the age of criminal responsibility to be raised to 12 in light of the trial. Grainy CCTV footage shows them walking James away from the Strand . The left will make play of social deprivation, unemployment, bad housing and general inner-city rot. Forensic and pathology evidence was a huge challenge for everyone, not least the jury who were shown pictures of James injuries. He would throw things at other children, cut himself deliberately with scissors and stick paper all over his face. View the profiles of people named Susan Venables. Their kids have got everything. Their faces affected me deeply. The family was put up in a hostel temporarily and later relocated by the social services. Thompson was inscrutable in the dock as we heard his voice for the first time. I know how I feel as a mother. The police have uncovered no evidence of any abuse within either family. Just as Venables's confession convicted him, a shoe print belonging to Robert Thompson, found on James cheekbone, confirmed his guilt, too. The Killing of James Bulger: Where are Robert Thompson and Jon Venables 'They would say 'take your son home'. Good people asked the boys if they were lost or urged them to take "their baby brother" home as he cried for his mummy. Instead, she was involved in an ITV documentary with Sir Trevor McDonald that will air on Thursday. He liked to spend the weekend on the streets. She couldn't. Their parents entered the courtroom; The Venables arrived together, Ann Thompson came with supporters but no sign of Robert's father. Less thanfive hours laterthe verdicts were in. She would arrive at the secure unit with food parcels and is said to be proud of his achievements since the crime. As a new documentary is set to air on ITV, the haunting words of Jon Venables' parents have resurfaced. '25 years after the James Bulger trial, I still shed hot tears at the 'Just mad. I dont think she saw a very happy future., The author says there was no contact with the Venables family after the trial as Mrs Thompson focused, her energy on supporting her son, refusing to accept he was a monster. On Sundays he used to watch Thunderbirds. Susan Venables Profiles | Facebook A newspaper man from Detroit said it was because 'Liverpool is the Beatles and love, love, love. Can Nigeria's election result be overturned? He would call people names and get them to chase him. A torrent of questions erupted from the moment the grim news came out that James Bulger's body had been found on a railway line in Liverpool and the last people seen with him were two ten-year-olds, captured on grainy CCTV footage. His mind was too restless to take up other hobbies for long. Every day the public gallery was packed with students, pensioners, mothers, teenagers, all drawn to the courtroom spectacle as to a TV soap. For me, though, it is Susan and Neil Venables who stay most in my memory of that day. Susan seemed happy with the arrangement, although, for the children, this type of relationship would have been just one more confusing anomaly to cope with in the wake of an already confusing time in their young lives. Birds. 'I think about little James and what he must have gone through, how they must feel. Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in, Parents of Jon Venables and Robert Thompson talk about their sons, Find your bookmarks in your Independent Premium section, under my profile. Heck, we don't even have murderers that young in New York.'. Denise Bulger believes her son's murderers - men now - should be in prison for ever. Susan opted to remove him from the school then, and some months later, she reenrolled him in St. Marys in Walton. But Robert was stuck in Walton with his older brothers and the baby. He was repulsed because he found Robert's disdain for authority scary. He would often have to stay in class at break times to catch up. 'I think it has something to do with a hatred of vulnerability and babyness in themselves which they projected on to this toddler.'. From the moment Robert Thompson and Jon Venables were convicted of the murder of James Bulger, their, families have been condemned to lives spent looking over their shoulders. 'I even went up to the railway line because I knew the other boy had a den up there and was on the railway nearly all the time.'. What's the least amount of exercise we can get away with? She was a woman as large in personality and physique as the burdens she carried. The atmosphere in the courtroom was oppressive as the tension of a month was about to break. kl. re bz. When they finally came to a disused railway track near the police station, the murderous duo tortured James, throwing stones and bricks at the baby, and kicking and stamping on him before finally dropping a heavy iron bar on to the defenceless tot. The trial though didnt, and was never designed to, shed light on how two such young children could be guilty of such sustained barbarity. Susan Venables, mother of Jon, blamed her son's "weakness" for the killing and said he was "fearful" and "provoked" by his accomplice Robert Thompson. He is one of those children that if you told him to put his hand in the fire, he would. The guilty verdicts came quickly - within five hours. He has had Christmas presents. According to a legal source we spoke to this week, Jon Venables parents have sought to be a support for their son, despite the enormity of his crime. On one occasion, he said, Robert ran off down the street laughing, "You can't catch me". Forlorn hope, though. Something went wrong, please try again later. Jon Venables arrived at Walton St. Marys Church of England School a disrupted and attention-seeking boy, whose behavior was so bizarre at times that one of his teachers considered him to be emotionally unstable. In the autumn term of 1992, Robert played truant for 49 half days and Jon for 40. Financially, the couple appeared to be functioning, but meanwhile, Susan was at the end of her rope with her eldest son, who, having become increasingly frustrated at his inability to communicate, had grown terribly unhappy and was having temper tantrums regularly. If it suited his moodwhich it frequently didBobby would beat the boys, curse at them, and threaten to send them to a home for children who misbehaved. I couldnt make any sense of it, Robert later recalled, desolately, when asked about his fathers unexpected departure. There is hatred and envy directed at the baby - a wish to see it suffer in the way they have suffered. At the trialnine months laterI would learn that Robert Thompson had been among those people. Murder of James Bulger - Wikipedia "Contrary to what the papers will tell you, he is not a little urchin boy. That seems the very least they could face for what they did. I just burst into tears because you just knew what that meanther heart was broken. Just four years earlier, we had all covered the Hillsborough disaster and come together in grief. Jon was also mad on computers. It has already been reported that Jon Venables real identity has been exposed in prison, where he is said to be receiving 24-hour protection. Not for long though. How can people defend their actions .#TheBulgerKillers.". The press were gobbling it up. It should certainly be moved up to 12; in some European countries it is 14," she said. "My heart really goes out to them. When she turned around moments later, her son was gone. It was a sign of such restlessness that he was unable to hang on to a football team for long - he kept shifting his allegiance like a floating voter. Haunting words of killer Jon Venables' parents resurface on 25th One police officer described how Jon Venables was so small, his legs were swinging in the air as he sat in the custody office.