Babes in the Wood murders (Wild Park)

Nicola and Karen were best friends who lived close to one another on the Moulsecoomb estate in the north of Brighton but attended different schools. At around 3:30 p.m. on 9 October 1986, the two returned home from school before going out to play.[5][6] At around 5 p.m., Susan Fellows saw her daughter and Karen playing with a roller boot,[7] the last time she saw her daughter alive.

When seen by a 14-year-old acquaintance near a parade of shops in the Lewes Road area, the girls were told to go home, as their parents would become worried. Nicola reportedly told Karen "Come on, let's go over to the park," referring to Wild Park, where they were not allowed.[8] At around 6:30 p.m., the girls were seen near a police box on Lewes Road,[9] where Bishop was also seen near and wearing "what appeared to be a light blue top."[8]

That same day, Bishop had gone to Nicola's house to speak to a lodger who lived there. Nicola told Bishop to go away and called his teenage girlfriend a "slag".[10]

When the girls failed to return home by their bedtime, their parents panicked. Karen's mother, Michelle, made a 999 call.[11] A search party of around 200 police and neighbours was organized.[12] A helicopter was brought in to help search Wild Park.[12] Bishop joined the search, claiming his terrier Misty was a highly trained tracker dog and insured for £17,000.[13] The bodies of the girls were found in Wild Park by searchers Kevin Rowland and his friend Matthew Marchant on the afternoon of 10 October 1986.[14] [15] The girls' bodies were found hidden in a makeshift den in the park. An autopsy revealed that they had both been strangled and sexually assaulted.[16]

Bishop fell under suspicion due to his close involvement in the search. When the bodies of the girls were found, Bishop was close by and ran towards the scene with a police officer. However, the constable recalled that Bishop did not get close enough to even see them properly. Bishop's story was littered with inconsistencies. He told detectives that on the evening in question he had gone to Moulsecoomb because he intended to steal a car from the nearby University of Sussex campus. He also claimed he had gone to a newsagent to buy a newspaper but realised he had no money.

Bishop told detectives he planned to see his teenage girlfriend that evening but failed to turn up because he bought some cannabis and went home instead. He also tailored his story to fit the evidence, claiming he had felt the girls' necks for a pulse after finding them dead, to explain any potential exchange of trace evidence. Due to the series of inconsistencies, Bishop was arrested on suspicion of murder on 31 October.

Bishop (b. 9 February 1966) was a petty thief and jobbing roofer. He was well-known around the Moulsecoomb estate in Brighton. In 1986, he lived in the Hollingdean area of the city, around 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from his two young victims. Despite living with his pregnant partner and young son, he had a reputation as a ladies' man with a string of girlfriends, some of whom were still in school. At the time of the murders he was having an affair with 16-year-old Marion Stevenson, who lived round the corner from Karen and Nicola.

He played football and cricket with Barrie Fellows, Nicola's father. Bishop's friend Dougie Judd lodged with the Fellows family at the time of the murders. Judd knew both pairs of parents and warned Nicola and Karen to stay away from Bishop because of his clear sexual interest in young girls. His teammates recalled how he had a habit of wolf-whistling at schoolgirls when they walked past and stare intently at young girls in skirts doing handstands. There were suggestions that Bishop encouraged local teens to appear in homemade pornographic films that were passed around to men on the estate.

Former friend Geoff Caswell, who used to go fishing with Bishop, described him as a habitual liar. Caswell said, "He was a typical lad around town that time. He'd grown a moustache and he had this car he'd race everywhere and he was always telling lies, trying to big himself up. He was only around 5'5" tall and weighed around eight stone, and I think he suffered from 'little man syndrome'. He was always telling porkies about this and that. He was also a thief. He'd break into cars and he'd steal stuff. He had been a roofer but was going nowhere really."[17] He also said Bishop was wrongly arrested on suspicion of involvement in the Brighton bombing.

Nicola's father, Barrie Fellows, was arrested in 2009 at his home in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, on suspicion of conspiracy to rape his daughter. Douglas Judd was also arrested on suspicion of rape. A spokeswoman for the Sussex Police said the investigation into sexual abuse allegations was unrelated to the ongoing murder inquiry, and both men were eventually released without charge.[18][19]

Bishop was initially tried for the rape and murder of the two girls in 1987 at Lewes Crown Court. He was acquitted by the jury after two hours of deliberations,[20] attributed to a series of blunders in the prosecution's case. The pathologist and forensic investigation team failed to record the temperatures of the bodies and therefore could not accurately state a time of death. At the trial, the prosecution suggested the girls were killed between 6:15 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. Without scientific evidence to back up the time of the murders, the prosecution could not challenge Bishop's alibis on the night of the murders.

Though the girls were strangled to death, neither measurements of hand marks around their necks or fingerprints left by the strangler were taken. Forensic scientists did not analyse blood discovered on Karen's underwear. A key piece of the prosecution's case rested on the recovery of a blue Pinto brand sweatshirt. The top was found close to the railway line of Moulsecoomb station. Police believed Bishop discarded the top after attacking and killing the girls and were confident the clothing held a cache of forensic clues. The police did not properly preserve the evidence, allowing Bishop's defence team to cast doubt on the reliability of the material.

Under questioning, Bishop denied that the sweatshirt belonged to him, but his girlfriend, Jenny Johnson, alleged the clothing was Bishop's. Prosecution hoped this would undermine Bishop's credibility and portray him as a liar who was trying to distance himself from a crucial piece of evidence. However, at the trial Johnson changed her story, telling the jury she had never seen the top before.[21] The judge, Justice Schiemann, "directed the jury that unless they were sure first, that the girls were dead by 6:30 p.m. … they should acquit." The prosecution believed that the girls were killed between 5:15 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. However, witnesses stated they saw the girls alive at 6:30 p.m. and Bishop leaving Wild Park at 6:30 p.m.

Bishop was convicted in December 1990 of a similar attack on another Brighton girl. He was found guilty of the kidnapping, molestation and attempted murder of a 7-year-old girl in Whitehawk 10 months earlier and was sentenced to at least 14 years before eligible for release.[4]

The 2005 repeal of the double jeopardy provisions of the Criminal Justice Act of 2003 meant Bishop could face a fresh trial with substantial new evidence. Eurofins Forensic Services was engaged, the same forensics team that helped bring the killers of Stephen Lawrence to justice. Senior scientific adviser Roy Green at Eurofins was asked in August 2012 to re-examine the evidence and recovered a billion-to-one DNA match linking Bishop to the discarded sweatshirt. A taping from Karen's left forearm was also found to contain Bishop's DNA.[21]

On 10 May 2016, a suspect was arrested for the murders.[22] In December 2017, the Court of Appeal ordered quashing the 1987 acquittals and called for a second jury trial for Bishop. On 2 February 2018, the prosecution announced that Bishop would be tried for the murders at the Old Bailey. In May 2016, Bishop was removed from his cell at Frankland Prison in County Durham and taken to the local police station, where he was arrested for the murders of Karen and Nicola. The trial was scheduled for 15 October 2018.[23]

Prosecutor Brian Altman QC told the jury the case against Bishop was not just based on his attempt to kill another child in a similar manner, but on "other compelling evidence." He explained "significant part of the enquiry had been to re-evaluate various areas of scientific work that were performed for the purposes of the 1987 trial but through the lens of modern day techniques, DNA profiling which although available in 1986 and 1987 was then in its infancy."[8][21]

Bishop suggested that Nicola's father, Barrie, was to blame, telling the jury the police spent "32 years building a case against the wrong man". Bishop was not in court every day for his nine-week trial and complained to the judge about feeling "suicidal" over his temporary stay at Belmarsh, requesting his return to Frankland.

At the 2018 trial, the prosecution put forward a different timeline. Altman presented evidence that the girls were alive at 6:30 p.m. and that Bishop returned to Wild Park. Defence witnesses at the 1987 trial returned as prosecution witnesses in 2018. At this trial, Altman argued the forensic samples taken as "tapings" in 1986 were so carefully handled by the police and preserved by scientists that he could present them as a "time capsule" to prove Bishop's guilt.

On 10 December 2018, after a nine-week trial at the Central Criminal Court, or Old Bailey, a jury of seven men and five women returned a guilty verdict after two-and-a-half hours of deliberation.[1]

In March 2020 it was announced that Jennifer Johnson, Bishop's girlfriend at the time of the murders, was to be charged with perverting the course of justice in relation to the police statements and court evidence which she had given during the original investigation and 1987 trial.[24]

• 9 October 1986: The girls go missing.
• 10 October 1986: The girls are found dead in Wild Park, Brighton.
• 31 October 1986: Russell Bishop is first arrested in connection with the murders.
• 3 December 1986: Bishop is charged with the murders and remanded in custody to await trial during 1987.
• 10 December 1987: After a four-week trial, Bishop is acquitted of both murders and released.
• 4 February 1990: Bishop arrested and charged with the abduction, indecent assault, and attempted murder of a seven-year-old girl at Devil's Dyke, East Sussex three days ago. He is remanded in custody to await trial later in 1990.
• 13 December 1990: Bishop is convicted of kidnapping, indecent assault, and attempted murder. He is sentenced to life with a recommended minimum term of 14 years.
• July 2002: Babes in the Wood case is subjected to review and DNA profiling but was not a success.
• April 2005: Double jeopardy laws are changed in Britain.
• January 2006: Forensic tests link Bishop and the Pinto sweatshirt.
• Autumn 2006: Families of both girls are informed that there was insufficient evidence to proceed with a fresh case against Bishop.
• 2011 to 2012: A cold-case review of the murders is conducted.
• 3 November 2013: A full re-investigation of forensics takes place.
• 10 May 2016: Bishop is rearrested.
• December 2017: Bishop's acquittal is quashed.
• 10 December 2018: Bishop is convicted of the murders.
• 11 December 2018: Bishop is sentenced to life imprisonment with a recommended minimum term of 36 years. He is likely to remain in prison for a total of at least 64 years or until he is 88 years old—potentially the longest imprisonment served in the legal history of England and Wales.