Authors: Paul Britton
Other things made me less happy. Why did she visit the room twice? I wondered. Surely it made more sense to take the baby when she first talked to Roger about the hearing test. She couldn’t have known that Karen was a midwife, otherwise she wouldn’t have waited. Karen would have known that Abbie didn’t need a test.
Equally, it was unlikely that she was a former member of staff because someone would have recognized her, and the blue dress she wore looked like a nurse’s uniform but wasn’t.
Shepherd had stopped talking. The real time sense of urgency was even stronger than I had recognized on the phone. He and his team were working on what I call the edge of oblivion. If they got it wrong, they could lose a child but at the same time they had to move forward at a very rapid pace. Everything inside says to you, ‘Slow down, don’t make mistakes,’ but you can’t because a baby is missing, the world is watching and the clock is running. It takes an enormous mental effort to be acting in real time, yet sitting above it and monitoring everything you do so that you don’t make a tragic mistake.
In the silence that followed the briefing, I began trying to see the shape of the abductor’s mind and to consider all the possible motives, even the most malign. I began relating her behaviour to that of other troubled women whom I’d treated in my clinical work, as well as the wider psychological knowledge-base on child abductions.
The main source of information for Abbie’s abduction had been Roger Humphries. Not surprisingly, he’d been deeply traumatized by what had happened and this was reflected in his police statement. There were numerous detailed questions about the abduction sequence and the woman which I needed to have answered if I was to give the police a precise understanding of her.
What were the woman’s exact words to Roger? Where did she stand and how did she walk? Did she stay in the doorway or step inside the room? Did she make direct eye contact or smile? Did she use her right hand or left hand to scoop up Abbie? Why did he think she wore a wig? How well was it fitted?
The answers to these questions and many more could tell me something about the abductor’s carefulness, confidence and motivation. Without them, it was like trying to find someone through a fog when the breeze is constantly making it swirl and thicken, only occasionally giving you glimpses.
The only person who could fill in the missing pieces was Roger Humphries and I suggested to Shepherd that a cognitive interview taking Roger back over the events might extract more detail. The detective agreed and arranged it for Tuesday morning, 5 July.
Until I had enough information to identify and rank in order the likely reasons for the abduction, I couldn’t draw up a psychological profile.
In the meantime, we turned our attention to the pressing question of how best to use the enormous media interest in the abduction. Shepherd knew the media was a powerful tool capable of helping or hindering his investigation. Through newspapers, radio and television he could communicate with the abductor and those around her, but he had to find the right strategy to keep her calm and protect Abbie.
It meant getting the media to cooperate, not always an easy thing to do. Since the abduction, reporters had been screaming for access to the security camera footage taken of the bogus nurse. Unfortunately, the issue was straining relations between crime correspondents and the police. Shepherd wanted my opinion on the issue.
For the rest of that evening and much of the next day I worked on a communications strategy. On Monday, back at West Bridgford, I sat downstairs with Shepherd in a custody suite and outlined my proposal.
I said the woman holding Abbie was unlikely to harm her as long as she wasn’t panicked. ‘But the longer she has the baby, the closer they are going to bond. That’s why the next forty-eight hours are vital. You have got to appeal directly to her and show her the enormity of the anguish being suffered by Roger and Karen - especially Karen. She’s got to see them as real people and not cardboard cut-outs.’
Shepherd asked, ‘Why forty-eight hours?’
‘If you haven’t reached her by then, one of two things has happened - either she’s heard the appeal and isn’t willing to respond, or she’s cut herself off and isn’t listening. At the same time, she’s bonding more strongly with the baby and will be beginning to regard Abbie as hers. This diminishes her appreciation of Roger and Karen as real people and reduces the likelihood of her giving Abbie up voluntarily.’
‘What happens after forty-eight hours?’
‘You change the focus. Instead of appealing personally to the abductor, you talk to those around her; friends, family and neighbours. You give them reasons why it could be someone close to them who has become so misguided as to lose sight of what is right and wrong. You have to convince them that the best way they can help her is to get in touch with you. Of course, this audience has already been listening to the earlier, direct appeals to the nurse and this should help convince them to come forward, knowing that they are helping rather than just turning someone in.’
The central tenet of any appeal had to convey the clear understanding that the police did not see the woman as a criminal who they were going to catch and punish. Something dreadful must have happened in her life to lead her to take such an extreme step and deny Roger and Karen their child. The police understood and wanted to offer compassion and support.
There would be no demand to, ‘Give yourself up!’ - that needed too big a step from the abductor. Instead she would repeatedly hear the gentle urging for her to let Karen know that Abbie was safe. If she could take this small step then we would have established contact and could gradually help her to come in.
These principles weren’t just pulled out of the air. I based them on my understanding of the relationship between human emotion and behaviour, confirmed by years of experience with hostage negotiation in clinical and crime-related situations. This was a logical area of study when I began working at Arnold Lodge, because occasionally patients would take hostages.
If Abbie’s kidnapper had been perched on a narrow window-ledge high above the street, the tactics would have been very similar although in some ways it would have been far easier. If she’d been sitting on a window-ledge, she could be identified and her background uncovered, pinpointing what had driven her this far. This information could be used when I talked to her. Instead I was attempting to negotiate via policemen and the news media with an unknown woman who may or may not have been listening.
There was another problem, however. Although the media were invaluable, reporters invariably want to pump up the emotion, finding different angles every day and tracking down various relatives of Karen and Roger to make appeals. This made the message seem less simple and personal when it was most important that a single person be associated with the appeal - someone who could build up a rapport and speak to the abductor almost on a one to one basis.
‘It can’t be some harsh, sensationalist, unemotional or uncaring face,’ I told Shepherd. ‘It will scare her off.’
‘Why not you?’ he suggested.
‘No. That would be completely wrong. I was thinking more of you.’
Shepherd had already fronted daily news conferences and made earlier appeals. He had the perfect mix of sensitivity with a soft voice and friendly face. He could look directly into the camera, forgetting how many millions of people were watching, and talk directly to this woman. He could offer empathy and understanding, playing down the crime and punishment aspects, and appealing to her to contact Karen to let her know that Abbie was OK.
‘And if she does get in touch, we need a trained police negotiator to take the call; someone who’s been well-briefed about this woman’s state of mind.’ I knew that such a person could help her and also give police valuable extra time to trace the call.
Unfortunately, it was a fact of life that some of the responses would come from hoaxers. These had to be filtered out by testing their offence-related knowledge - asking the caller to give details of how Abbie had been taken and other information that only the true abductor could know.
Finally, we came to the vexed question of the security video from the hospital. The grainy black-and-white images showed the partial rear view of a woman who was possibly wearing a wig. The media were demanding access to the pictures but I recommended that the photographs be held back.
The public weren’t going to recognize her, but she would obviously recognize herself and then could easily believe that others could identify her. This might well cause her to panic and abandon Abbie where she wouldn’t be found until it was too late.
As we ended the meeting and I left for home, I was confident that with the right approach and by hitting the right psychological buttons we could shape the abductor’s emotional responses. In the meantime, I still needed to find out more about the nurse and that meant interviewing Roger Humphries.
The next morning, I found myself stepping out of strong sunlight into the reception room of a suburban house dappled with shadow. The high ceilings made it seem airy and cool, a blessed relief on another hot day.
Roger and Karen had been staying with friends at this secret address, avoiding the media spotlight. They had made a tearful plea at a news conference on Saturday afternoon at the hospital in which Karen had said, ‘I have got a little boy at home who wants to know where his new baby has gone. If anybody knows any information can they just let us know.’
Roger shook my hand and I recognized a person in post-traumatic shock. His movements were lethargic and slow, or occasionally quite agitated. Although able to focus, he was easily distracted and his face didn’t work as it normally did.
A quiet, well-mannered man, he had been married to Karen for nine years and they lived in a small detached house on a new estate in Nottingham’s Sherwood district. He worked as a supervisor at a local painter and decorators and told me how he’d painted the porch the previous day - ‘the first time I’ve used a brush in six years’. It was his way of relieving the tension.
I explained to him the nature of cognitive interviewing and how it could help people recall more about what they’ve been through and enhance the information gleaned by the police by 40 to 50 per cent. Although it was painful, I had to take him back to Friday afternoon. He sat down in a comfortable chair, leaned back and closed his eyes.
Starting at the birth of Abbie, he described his happiness at having a girl and how they took a few photographs before moving to the other ward. He went to pick up Charlie at about 2.00 p.m. and they came into the QMC through the back entrance, using a staircase to reach B-floor.
He knew his way around because his company had done some painting and decorating work at the hospital. Beside him, Charlie tugged at his hand, very excited.
‘Tell me about the corridor?’ I asked.
‘It has a padded rail; it’s well-lit and has a nice atmosphere.’
‘Who is in the corridor?’
‘Just people coming and going.’
‘Can you see the woman?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where is she?’
‘She’s thirty or forty feet in front of me, walking in the same direction. I can’t see her face.’
‘How is she walking?’
‘She looks as if her arms are folded … she has a funny walk, I suppose, almost bent, you know. Stooped with her body forward, looking down but ahead.’
‘Does she pass anyone?’
‘No … I don’t think so … wait on … Yes, she did, there are two women sitting on a seat - she must have walked right past them.’
‘Who are they?’
‘A mother in her fifties and her daughter. I remember now, I had a card and wanted to borrow a pen. As the woman turned left towards the nurses’ station, I asked the mother and daughter if I could borrow their pen.’
(This was important as it gave the police two more possible witnesses who might have seen and could possibly describe the abductor.)
‘OK, the woman is walking in front of you, what is she wearing?’
‘A blue uniform.’
‘What sort of blue?’
‘Royal deep blue.’
‘How long is it?’
‘Ah, I think it’s slightly above knee length. I can see her calves and they’re out of proportion.’
‘What’s the style?’
‘The sleeves are short; there’s a belt pulling it together at the waist, at the front.’
‘What colour is the belt?’
‘I’m not sure. I can’t remember. I’d remember if it was white.’
‘What about her shoes?’
‘They’re black.’
‘Is she wearing stockings?’
‘Yes, but not black. I think they’re flesh coloured maybe.’
This painstaking and difficult process slowly yielded results. Roger had only seen the woman in the corridor for a short period, yet he was able to give new information about her clothes, how she tied her hair, her skin complexion and how she walked with quick short steps, like someone with a purpose.
I took him through the double doors, past the nurses’ station and on to ‘side-room one’ where Karen and Abbie had been waiting. The door into the room has a viewing screen. At each point, I ask Roger what he could see, hear and smell. He described people feeding babies, visitors arriving and staff carrying out their work.
Karen began fussing with Charlie and introducing him to his new baby sister, who was asleep in a cot beside the bed. A few minutes later, she left the room in her nightdress and walked along the corridor to telephone her mother.
Ten to fifteen seconds later the nurse came in, knocking on and opening the door in one action. The walk to the phone took less than ten seconds so Karen should have passed her in the corridor. Charlie was lying on his mother’s bed with the baby at his side. Roger was looking down at his hands, assembling a child’s model 911 Porsche - a present from the baby to Charlie. He half turned to see her.
She asked, ‘Is it all right to take the baby for a hearing test or do you want me to wait for the mother to come back?’ (So she must have seen Karen walk out.)
Roger replied, ‘She’s making a phone call.’
‘I’ll pop back in fifteen minutes.’