Hope to Die

CS: She definitely didn’t open it?

KP: No, she just ripped it up.

CS: Do you think she did that because she recognized the writing?

KP: Impossible to tell, to be honest – sorry.

CS: Not at all – you’ve been an enormous help. If you remember anything else, or if you recognize that stamp somewhere else, please get in touch straight away.

* * *

Adam Fawley

25 October

13.35

Even if the A417 wasn’t the most obvious route back I’d have asked Quinn to take it: I wanted to go exactly the same way Camilla Rowan said she went the day her baby disappeared. I’m sure it’s more built-up than it was in 1997, but it’s still pretty rural, even now. Every lay-by we pass, I think, is that it? Is that where she gave her child away?

The phone goes. Nina Mukerjee. I put her on speaker.

‘I just wanted to update you on where we’ve got with the familial DNA.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Nowhere fast, is the short version. I’ve found no close relatives at all. The closest match thus far is three people who are fourth cousins, but that’s pretty distant in terms of tracking someone down. It basically means the dead man and the person on the database shared one set of great-great-great-grandparents.’

‘How many fourth cousins would you typically have?’

‘Around a thousand.’

‘Three doesn’t sound a lot, on that basis.’

‘This database is a pretty narrow sample, remember, but you’re right – even allowing for that I’d usually expect to find around thirty matches at this stage. I’ll have a closer look at the three we’ve found, but like I said, they probably have nothing to do with the man you’re after.’

Quinn makes a face and shakes his head. And I get it.

My phone’s beeping now. ‘OK, thanks, Nina. Can you keep at it? I have another call coming in so just let me know if you get anything.’

I press end and quickly check the number that’s now come up on my screen.

This isn’t good.

‘DI Fawley,’ says a woman’s voice. A voice I know only too well. ‘Could you hold for Superintendent Harrison? He needs to speak to you. Urgently.’

* * *

News Last updated: 13:40 GMT, 25 October 2018

EXCLUSIVE NOT GUILTY? Shock and disbelief as news emerges that Milly Liar did NOT murder her newborn child. Missing for 20 years, Camilla Rowan’s son has now been identified – as a DEAD MAN. Does this mean that after 15 years in prison Britain’s most notorious ‘baby-killer’ will now be freed?

BY LINDA LOMBARD FOR MAILONLINE

More than twenty years since he was last seen leaving hospital in his mother’s arms, Camilla Rowan’s infant son has finally been found, the Mail has learned. Rowan, now 38, was sentenced to life for murdering the baby at a sensational Old Bailey trial in 2003, but evidence has now come to light that casts doubt on the validity of that conviction. The baby’s remains were never found, and despite several appeals and a Criminal Cases Review Commission review, Rowan has remained in HMP Heathside. But that may be about to change.

Earlier this week Thames Valley Police posted a picture on their Twitter feed, asking for the public’s help in identifying a young man (shown below) arriving at Oxford station last Sunday. No further details were given, but it was widely rumoured that the man had been shot and killed at a large country house on the outskirts of the city a short time later that evening. Local residents have identified the property as owned by an elderly couple who’ve lived there for at least ten years but ‘always kept themselves to themselves’. The Mail can now reveal that DNA tests have proved conclusively that the dead man is Camilla Rowan’s missing baby.

Rowan always insisted that she never harmed the child, saying that she gave it to its biological father, whom she named as ‘Tim Baker’. However, no Tim Baker ever came forward, nor, despite exhaustive searches by South Mercia police, has he ever been conclusively identified. Speculation is now rife that Rowan may have been telling the truth all along, and there are bound to be calls for an inquiry into the way the original investigation was conducted. Nothing is known about the identity the dead man has been using, or where he’s been living for the last twenty years.

Thames Valley Police have not yet issued a comment, nor has there been a statement from Rowan’s legal team. But surely it’s only a matter of time before they make an official request for her immediate release.

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