Concluding the Case

At the start of this investigation the police had no clues into where Holly and Jessica had gone or what had happened to them, they were relying on witnesses to point them into the right direction and one step closer in finding them. Sky news later interviewed Ian Huntley and Maxine Carr on different occasions (you can view these videos on the surveillance page) and the reporter noticed that they were talking about the girls as if they were dead by talking in the past tense so he informed the police of his findings so they were analysed but this was not enough proof to bring him in for questioning. Forensic experts were called in when a bin was found containing Holly and Jessica's red Manchester United t shirts and other clothing were found cut and burned in an outbuilding of Soham Village College. Police discovered them after finding a set of keys in Huntley's home. After analysis they found Ian Huntley's hairs, fingerprints and DNA around the bin and in bags surrounding the area and in Huntley's home. This resulted in Huntley's arrest where they found Maxine Carr to be his accomplice. 

Ian Huntley was unsuspected at first to be the person behind this brutal story but in 2001 there were no safety measures when it came to hiring people, especially in schools and when Huntley was interviewed for the position of caretaker at Soham Village College and nobody knew about his convicted past of being a sex offender. In the years after he left school, Huntley already seemed to have developed an interest in young girls, and he was seen out with 13-year-old girls when he was eighteen. In December 1994, Huntley met 18-year-old Claire Evans, embarked on a whirlwind romance, and married her within weeks. The marriage was short-lived, however, and she left Huntley within days, moving in with Huntley’s younger brother Wayne. An enraged Huntley refused to grant his wife a divorce until 1999, preventing his brother’s marriage to Evans. Following the collapse of his marriage, Huntley became more nomadic, moving from one rented flat to the next, frequently changing jobs. He had a succession of relationships, one of which was with a 15-year-old girl, with whom he fathered a daughter in 1998. A subsequent inquiry revealed that between 1995 and 2001, Huntley had sexual contacts with eleven underage girls, ranging between 11 and 17 years old. On 7 January 1998, he appeared at Grimsby Crown Court charged with having burgled a neighbour's house, and in May 1998, he was charged with the rape of an 18-year-old girl in Grimsby. Neither case proceeded to court due to lack of evidence, but the rape allegation tainted him substantially. In February 1999 he met 22-year-old Maxine Carr at a nightclub, and they moved in together after four weeks. The relationship endured despite some turbulent rows, and they moved to Littleport, near Soham, in 2001, where Huntley took a job at the Soham Village Centre as the manager of a team of caretakers. In September 2001 he applied for the post of caretaker at Soham Village College, and in November 2001, despite his history of sexual contact with minors, he was awarded the position. Carr was employed as a teaching assistant at the local primary school. Huntley's past was perceived as a shock to the police and to the rest of the community which later lead to introducing CRB checks before being employed to work with children across the UK.

When police searched the area where the victims were found and in the school where Huntley tried to burn their clothes there was sufficient forensic evidence found enough for a conviction, such as; hair, DNA and fingerprints which was a 100% match to Ian Huntley. At the start of this investigation Huntley and Carr were considered witnesses therefore there was no other witnesses placing them near the victims when they went missing so the police had no evidence pointing to the pair and they had other suspects who had connections with abductions or Holly and Jessica. The investigation lead to the facts of Huntley's past and to the discovery of the girls bodies, in which the analysis of the evidence collected showed what truly happened on August 4th 2002.

There was no pattern identified in Huntley's way of murder, however he was very interested in children as he was convicted of having sex with a minor yet the vetting system blundered as he was hired as a school caretaker without having his criminal record checked by police. Humberside Police was accused of "systematic and corporate" failings after an inquiry, led by Sir Michael Bichard, found the force had failed to keep records of the allegations against Huntley, or share them with police in Cambridgeshire. Humberside and Cambridgeshire police forces worked together in this investigation as they had to widen their search when the girls initially were reported missing and they were not hopeful for their safe return. They shared evidence and eventually found the victims’ bodies and their killer, however it is still left debated in whether it was their fault in first sight as they were responsible for lack of vetting in the Soham area and therefore lead to Huntley's occupation within the school.

Despite Huntley's attempts to destroy forensic evidence, extensive hair and fibre residue remained which linked Huntley to the girls. Huntley was formally charged with the girl's murders, and sectioned under the Mental Health Act at Rampton Hospital, pending a hearing to establish if he was fit for trial. Carr was arrested for assisting an offender, as well as conspiring to obstruct the course of justice, as she had initially provided Huntley with a false alibi for the time of their disappearance.

The trials of Huntley and Carr opened, to worldwide media interest, in London, on November 5, 2003. Huntley was faced with two murder charges, while Carr was charged with perverting the course of justice and assisting an offender.

The prosecution entered exhaustive evidence linking Huntley to the girls and, three weeks into the trial, despite previously having denied any knowledge of their murders, Huntley suddenly changed his story, admitting that the girls had died in his house, but he claimed that both deaths were accidental. The defence called Huntley as their first witness, and he described how he had accidentally knocked Holly Wells into the bath, while helping her control a nosebleed, and had accidentally suffocated Chapman when she started to scream, and he had tried to silence her. On cross-examination the prosecution described his latest version as "rubbish."

Carr's testimony began three days later, when it was claimed that she had no control over the events on the day of the murder, and that, had she known of Huntley's murderous intent, she would never have lied to protect him.

Following her testimony, the prosecution presented their closing statements, claiming that both Carr and Huntley were convincing liars, and also that Huntley's motive for murdering the girls was sexual, although physical evidence of assault was impossible to prove.

After five days of deliberation, the jury rejected Huntley's claims that the girls had died accidentally and, on December 17, 2003, returned a majority verdict of guilty on both charges. Huntley was sentenced to life imprisonment, but there was a delay on the setting of his sentence, as the 2003 Criminal Justice Act came into force one day after his conviction.

At a hearing on September 29, 2005, a judge ruled that the Soham killings did not meet the criteria for a "whole-life" sentence, which was now reserved for sexual, sadistic or abduction cases only under the new act, and imposed a 40 year prison sentence, which offers Huntley very little hope for release. On September 14, 2005, Huntley had been attacked by another inmate at Belmarsh Prison, and scalded with boiling water, which prevented him from attending this sentencing hearing.

Carr was cleared of assisting an offender, but found guilty of perverting the course of justice, and jailed for three and a half years, but she was freed under police protection in May 2004, as she had already spent 16 months on remand, pending the trial.

Carr was given a new identity on her release and, on February 24, 2005, was granted an indefinite order protecting her new identity by the High Court, on the basis that her life would be in danger were her new identity to be revealed.

A number of investigations, launched by then Home Secretary David Blunkett, investigated the failures of both the police, and other social and vetting agencies, in stopping Huntley sooner, and system wide communication and intelligence-sharing errors were identified, which led to the suspension and early retirement of the chief of Humberside Police.

Since being jailed, Huntley has reportedly admitted to his father that he lied when giving evidence at his trial, alleging that he killed Jessica Chapman to prevent her from calling for help on her mobile phone, rather than suffocating her accidentally, as he claimed in court.

Following an incident in prison, the Home Office released a statement to the media.

"Huntley continues to be managed according to Prison Service policy on the prevention of suicide and self-harm. In particular he will be subject to Assessment, Care in Custody and Teamwork (ACCT) procedures through which his risk will be continually assessed. The Prison Service works to minimize the risk of any prisoner taking their own life, but it cannot eliminate that risk entirely."

Huntley had been considered a suicide risk after he took 29 anti-depressant pills, which he had hidden away in a box of teabags, in June 2003.