RedHanded - Episode 136 - Levi Bellfield: The Hammer Man

Episode Date: February 27, 2020

In 2002 13 year old Milly Dowler vanished from a bus stop on her way home from school; this sparked one of the nation’s biggest investigations, but sadly her remains were found 6 months later. Over the next few years, one by one more women started being attacked across South London. The MO was often different, the vehicle was always different, but the police were convinced that they had a serial killer on their hands... Bonus RedHanded content available now via Patreon: patreon.com/redhanded Sources: Manhunt by Colin Sutton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI8_kLtN8Wk  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6x3vPfzZf0&t=2363s  https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/jun/23/milly-dowler-family-court-verdict https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/jun/24/dowler-family-bellfield-trial-mental-torture https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/sep/08/police-failure-to-investigate-milly-dowler-phone-hacking-unacceptable https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14017661 https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/feb/26/crime.uk   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Get ready for Las Vegas-style action at BetMGM, the king of online casinos. Enjoy casino games at your fingertips with the same Vegas strip excitement MGM is famous for when you play classics like MGM Grand Millions or popular games like Blackjack, Baccarat and Roulette. With our ever-growing library of digital slot games, a large selection of online table games and signature BetMGM service, there's no better way to bring the excitement and ambiance of Las Vegas home to you than with BetMGM Casino. Download the BetMGM Casino app today.

BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. 19 plus to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact ConnexOntario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor. Free of charge.

BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Saruti. I'm Hannah.

And welcome to Red Handed. Be aware, kids at home, that the listeners' choice for the British Podcast Awards is looming. It will be coming very soon. They're not going to give us an award, so it's real people power time. First year we were top 20, last year we were top 10. This year, I would quite like to win, but I will settle for top three. That would be excellent. We shall be requiring your services in that field very soon. So, I don't know, fingers at the ready.

Everyone get ready. Battle stations. Other than that, this is coming out, oh fuck, this week. So next week, if you are a $5 and up patron, you will be getting your March version of In The News. If you are not, you might want to think about signing up for a $5 Patreon because we're going to be talking about all of the Bs. We're going to be talking about Barrymore and that poor man Stuart Lubbock who died in his pool

and also Britain's breast butcher. And it is as bad as that sounds. So head on over to that. Other than that, today we're going to be talking about quite an interesting character. One of UK's most notorious serial killers, Mr. Levi Belfield. I'd say he's definitely a name that people know. He's a household name. He is a household name, even in non-crimey households.

I think Levi Belfield is a household name. We've also obviously got the interview with former DCI Colin Sutton, who was the senior investigating officer on this case, coming out on Friday this week. So check that out. A lot of the research for this episode has come from his book, which is called Manhunt. It is out there now. He posted a picture on Twitter yesterday of it in a bargain box for $3.99. So you can apparently also get it on discount. So go get yourself a copy of Manhunt. It is a really, really good book. I read it in like a day. It's so good. And we also spoke to the man himself. So it's going to be a good one.

Let's kick off. Amélie Martine-José de Lagrange had moved to London in 2004 from Paris. She was a pretty 22-year-old who was described as wicked sharp with a beaming smile. She had come to the UK just to improve her English, but she soon found that she fell in love with the way of life here. She made friends, she met a guy, she was happy. On Friday the 19th of August 2004, Amelie finished work and went to meet some friends at a wine bar called Crystals, with a Z, in Twickenham. I don't know if Crystals is still there, but it sounds like a fucking good time.

Looks like it might even be Crystals. Crystals may be even more fancy. I've literally never set foot in Twickenham in my life, so I have no idea. I went to Twickenham Stadium once. That was about it. That night out at Chris Stowles, Amelie had four glasses of wine and at about 10pm she decided to call it a night. She crossed the road and waited for a bus to Twickenham Green, but she'd never make it home.

At roughly 10.20 that night, a man called tristam beasley suffolk which is possibly the most wiccan name i've ever heard in my life isn't it just it's not even trish tristan it's trish um trisham i can't even say it tristram tristram it's such an unnecessary um addition to this story and i really didn't need to include it. And for ages I put a man and then I thought, no, no, no, no, we've got to say his name. Tristram Beasley Suffolk. Mr Twickenham himself was walking near Twickenham Green

when he saw Amelie. She was lying on the ground face down in the recovery position and there was a huge wound on her head. She was rushed to West Middlesex Hospital, but Amelie died soon after. So now, this was a murder investigation, and the next morning, our good old pal DCI Colin Sutton, who would be the senior investigating officer put in charge, arrived on the scene. When Amelie's body was found, she had no belongings with her, but she was dressed like

she was on a night out, so it was obvious straight away that something was amiss. Amelie's friends told police that when she left the wine bar, they saw her with a bag, a Walkman and a mobile phone. Amelie's missing stuff gave the police some hope. They might be able to trace her phone and that might just lead them to her killer. So that very same day, the telephone intelligence unit at Scotland Yard collected together all of the information they could. According to T-Mobile, which was Amelie's network, her phone's last handshake was at 10.23pm on the night that she was killed. And Tristram had already found Amelie by 10.20, so this handshake had happened to her after she'd been attacked, and after the phone had been taken from her possession. And what was really interesting was that the handshake had come off a mast in Walton-on-Thames, which is six

and a half miles away from Twickenham Green. Most of you are, of course, true crime connoisseurs. Try saying that four times when you're pissed. Jesus Christ. So we know and you know and you know that we know that what we're talking about when we say mobile phone handshake, but let's just indulge ourselves for a moment. When we say handshake in this sense, we're talking about when we say mobile phone handshake but let's just indulge ourselves for a moment when we say handshake in this sense we're talking about a mobile network searching for the location of a phone attempting to establish a connection it's important to note that this is not a ping it's not the same as like a message being sent from the phone and it hitting a telephone mast and that and tracing that it's not the same thing it's literally it's the network searching for a phone and finding it exactly we do go on to talk about pings later, it's not the same thing. It's literally, it's the network searching for a phone and finding it.

Exactly. We do go on to talk about pings later, but it's exactly as Hannah said. This is just the network looking for the location of that phone. So using this data, T-Mobile were able to pinpoint the last place that the connection had been made with Amelie's phone to an area of about 450 meters squared to the north of Walton Bridge. After this 10.23pm handshake, Amelie's phone wasn't seen again by the network. So how can a phone just disappear like this? Well, the important thing to note is that it couldn't just have been switched off, because if it had, the phone would have said goodbye to the network. And so T-Mobile would have known that the phone had been switched off.

I just have this image in my head of invisible messages going from my phone to fucking O2 or whoever I'm with being like, hi guys, everything's fine, don't worry about it, see you in 10 minutes. Exactly. And then if you switch it off, it'll say goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. Her battery's run out again. So the police had to consider a few other possibilities now that they knew T-Mobile was telling them that phone hadn't been switched off. And they knew that it was likely to be one of three things. The phone could have been taken into an area of no signal and left there. The

battery could have been removed without the phone being switched off first, or the phone could have been immersed in water. A good place to start the search for Amelie's phone might have been within the area that T-Mobile had suggested, near north of Walton Bridge. But DCI Colin Sutton wasn't so sure. He had a hunch. There were so many publicly accessible areas around the south end of the bridge, areas in which it would have been much easier to dump something.

So he went against the mobile data and redirected the divers there. And guess what? Within the second 30-minute dive, they had found Amelie's purse, keys and Walkman. Whoever had killed Amelie had fled and then dumped her belongings in Walton-on-Thames. Investigators also examined the CCTV from the bus that Amelie had used and from the surrounding area. The footage showed that Amelie had arrived at Twickenham Green at just after 10pm. So Amelie arrived, was attacked and then the phone transmitted off a mast

near Walton-on-Thames, miles away, all within at most 20 minutes. So the killer had quite obviously, even if he was Usain Bolt, had not done this on foot. So that meant he must have been in a vehicle, which meant the police had to find the vehicle that had been used that night. So they went back to the CCTV and there was indeed something there. They spotted a white van in the footage as Amelie had arrived at the Green at 10.01 that night. And for at least the next 10 minutes, the van in the CCTV had remained parked just seven yards from where she'd been attacked. Police knew they had to find that van.

It was either their killer or a crucial witness. The problem was that the footage wasn't great, though. The police managed to narrow it down as much as they could, but it still left them with at least 24,700 such vans in use across the UK at that time. That's not particularly narrow, I'm going to say. No, it's not the most helpful in the world. It's not like with Hannah Foster which like I know was slightly later on but like within a day they knew exactly what kind

of van it was but that one had a refrigeration unit so obviously that's going to narrow it down in this case they're just like it's a commercial Ford Courier it's a white van essentially there's not much more that they know than that and also the problem was that in 2004 because yes this happened like you know 16 years ago automatic number plate recognition software was just not that great yet it had only just started to be developed it literally puts a shiver up my fucking spine that 2004 was 16 years ago oh yeah that's like a a whole sexually legal person and yeah and it's even more terrifying because they couldn't even recognise your fucking licence plate with a camera. So get this, they had to do it manually.

When I read this, I was like, what does that even mean? What does the word manually even mean? I don't even know anymore. We live in the world of automation. But this is what it means. It meant that investigators had to literally go and stand on the side of roads in the freezing cold and take down license plates of passing white vans. What the fresh fuck is that? You know that that's like an officer who's in trouble for something. Oh, yeah. And they're like, right, off you go. Off the side on the A4 for you, Jim.

Exactly. Get out. And this is not me, like, making fun of them. I'm in awe of their diligence and their, like, work ethic. I think what's important to state is throughout this case, we see some phenomenal policing. And we also see some fucking terrible policing. So prepare yourselves.

And the police soon realised that if they were to have any chance at all of finding this van, of the almost 25,000 that were out there, they were going to have to look at each of them individually. And if this didn't work, they could be fucked because it was their only real lead in the Amelie case. By week five of freezing their assses off on the side of motorways and the rest of the investigation, things were moving quite slowly and everyone was getting pretty desperate for a breakthrough. And on the 21st of September 2004, they made a connection.

So in May 2004, so months earlier, another young woman, 19-year-old Kate Sheedy, had been attacked. And the police hadn't originally connected the two cases, as in Kate and Amelie, but detectives considered her age, the location and the time of the attack. And all of those things seemed to fit. It was just the method of attack that didn't. Kate Sheedy was just a kid. She was head girl at Gumley House Convent School.

She was described as popular, bright and confident. After she finished school, she wanted to read politics at Durham, which is where my brother is. Hi. Oh shit, it's his birthday this week. Someone needs to go and get a card. It's definitely me. And just like my brother, grades wise, Kate was very much on the right track to achieve her dream of going to Durham. On the 27th of May 2004, it was the last day of school for Kate before exams started. She did her bit as head girl with thank you speeches and all of the stuff you have to do. At my school, if the head boy and the head girl got married, the school had to pay for the wedding and bought them a house.

Wow. Wow. And the way they got around that was making sure they were the most incompatible people. So like one of them would be like super sporty jock and the other one would be like hyper nerd and they would just like swap it around every year. Why didn't they just get rid of that promise instead of this weird convoluted way? I fucking I have no idea man they're really funny because it's a really old school they're really funny about the rules. So like the head boy was allowed to smoke a pipe around school and keep a goat on the quad. Oh fuck off. Fucking hell I was head girl at my school and i got no such privileges i got fucking nothing i just got dragged into doing speeches all the time and then they put

my name on a board in the hall i don't even know if it's still there whatever whatever she got yourself a goat mate head girl was not allowed a goat noted actually the only real thing they got that was good was they got to park directly outside school god no i we didn't get that either we got a nice little badge though that said head girl on it i must dig mine out i don't know where it is i bought myself one from spittlefield's market once to make myself feel better you're the worst i was head girl in spirit so after um kate had probably less reluctantly than Runter's done all of her speeches, her and her mates went out. And it was their last evening out before revision took over.

And just before midnight, Kate decided to head home. So she said her goodbyes and got on the bus. Kate then got off at a bus stop near her house. But it was here that in the dark, she saw a large car. The engine was on, but the lights were off there was something wrong kate got a sinister feeling from this vehicle and i honestly hate that idea of just a car parked there with the engine running but all of its lights switched off like this person has just sat in the fucking dark in their car of course there's something weird going on here i mean

usually it means they're a drug dealer especially if they're in finsbury park see it all time. And that's actually a really good point to make because the whole of this case, when Hannah's making jokes earlier about Tristram in Twickenham, the whole of this case is basically set in the suburbs of like southwest London, which is like a really nice part of London. This is all happening in incredibly safe, safe neighbourhoods. Yeah,. Yeah, I would almost, I'm probably going to get dragged for this, but I would almost class Twicklam as like suburbia. Like I wouldn't, I don't really see it as London, to be honest. That's the thing. It is, it's the suburbs of London. You know, it is very much suburbia.

It's very, very safe in the places that these things are happening. And it's all in very affluent areas as well. But top credit for Kate for realising that something was wrong. And so she crossed the road to try and get away from this car and she kept walking. She was now just 300 yards from her front door. Then suddenly she heard the car's engine rev. Kate turned and saw the car drive up the road, still with its lights off. Suddenly the car sped up, and it hit her. Kate fell in front of the vehicle, and as she lay there, she suddenly felt an immense weight and crushing pain,

as unbelievably, the car ran over her back. Then it stopped. Kate was now of course seriously injured. She lay spread out, face down in the street. Then she heard the engine rev again. The car reversed and ran over her body car twice. How she manages to get herself up onto all fours, I have no idea. But she does. She must have been in agony. But Kate knew at this point that she was going to have to crawl all the way home, about 300 yards, if she was going to save her life. As she started to move her broken body across the ground, miraculously, Kate managed, in the dark dark to find her bag and her phone. She

called 999 and then she called her mum. Every single one of Kate's ribs were broken. Her spine was damaged and her liver was severed. But Kate survived and against all odds, she took her university place at Durham just 18 months later. At the time of the attack, it was of course investigated, but nothing much came of it. It's a sad fact, but the economics of policing is such that if she'd have died, there would have been more resources put in. In reality, a handful of officers from local CID worked the case probably just in their downtime.

But now the team investigating Amelie's murder had taken notice. Kate looked very similar to Amelie. She was a few years younger, but two pretty young blonde women were attacked in areas that weren't too far apart, in very safe parts of town. It stood out. So they checked Kate's statement and saw that she had described a white van with some quite odd features.

She thought it was definitely a white people carrier style car. She noticed damage to the driver's door mirror and oddly, Kate also described it as having blacked out windows. The police checked the CCTV and just like Kate had said, they could see a white people carrier. They identified the car as a white Toyota Previa. And apparently, those just aren't that common. I can't even picture what one looks like. I have no idea.

I had to Google it. It's just like a big, I'm sorry if anybody has one, it's like a big, ugly people carrier. And when I Googled it, I was like, no wonder they're not that common. Like, it's not a very attractive looking car. Yeah, for like a big family. Yeah, exactly.

I think Americans call them minivans. Yeah. I always think it's a stupid name because obviously all cars are people carriers. They all carry people. No, that's so true. But we call big family cars people carriers. And I believe the equivalent in the States is a minivan.

Yeah. No, you're right. We call them people carriers. And it's also, we keep that separate term in this case because the van that they see in the CCTV when Amelie is attacked is a white van, like a commercial white van, man van. And this one is a white people carrier. So it's a different type of car. That's important to note. It took me so long to get my head around all the different cars that are involved in this case. As these people carriers aren't that common, the police couldn't be sure that the two cases were connected. After all, it was two different vehicles and two different forms of attack. But investigators did begin to worry. If this was indeed the man who

had killed Amelie, then he was even more dangerous and unpredictable than they had thought. So while all this was happening, the police were obviously also taking tips from the public. And one in particular had stood out. The police basically set up these like mobile police stations in Twickenham Green in the weeks following Amelie's murder and one day about a week after the attack a woman named Joanna Collins had walked in and spoken with the officer on duty. She gave a statement suggesting that the police should look into her ex, a man named Levi Belfield. She told them that the two had split many years before, but there was just something about the case that made her think of him.

Belfield and Joanna had lived together, and according to her, one day she had found a black bin liner in her garage. Inside was her dad's old donkey jacket, a balaclava, a kitchen knife, and a magazine. Define donkey jacket. Is it a donkey jacket, a balaclava, a kitchen knife and a magazine. Define donkey jacket. Is it a small jacket for a donkey? I was wondering this, so I did Google it. And apparently it's a very British thing. So good question, even for our British listeners, because clearly neither of us even knew what it was.

It's like a blue woolly, like a blue woolen jacket is the best that I could kind of understand of it. I'm really disappointed that it wasn't an outfit for a donkey. I mean, by the looks of it, you could put it on top of a donkey. But then by that definition, you could put anything on top of a donkey. I don't know.

It's just like a big coat basically. Right. Okay, got it. I'm sure somebody is going to tweet at us and tell us in better detail what a donkey jacket is. But that's the best that I could be bothered to do. And it was top fold first page Google. So there you go. I had more important things to research. So this magazine that Joanna found inside this black bin liner with the said donkey jacket was a copy of Cosmo. And she opened it up it up and bizarrely all of the pictures of blonde

women in the magazine had been stabbed repeatedly until their faces had been destroyed and the pages were totally torn up basically she had been like is this you to Levi Belfield when she'd found it and he was like yeah and he her, I fucking hate blonde women. They're bitches. He had a real rage. And so I think Joanna basically goes and tells the police because, as we go on to see, she knows exactly what kind of man Levi Belfield is. And also because Emily had looked so much like the kind of woman

that she knew Levi Belfield hated. Joanna's a fucking genius, man. She's fucking smart. She's incredibly brave, too. They all are. You're going to have so much respect for these women by the end of this episode. I completely did. These tips were obviously being explored,

but something made the officer who had taken Joanna's statement ask investigators if anything had come of the name that she'd given. Simply by chance, given that this officer had asked, investigators started with Levi Belfield. the name that she'd given. Simply by chance, given that this officer had asked, investigators started with Levi Belfield. They checked him out and pulled up a record an inch thick in printed A4. His life had been littered with incidences of violence, drugs, firearms, and just generally illegal activity. He had few actual convictions, but had certainly been in lots of trouble. And then, so as they're delving through this inch-thick A4 dossier of crime,

something caught the investigator's attention. The police had been following up on local leads of white Ford courier vans and one had been registered to a garage. Thanks for putting garage in my bit. Was that self-preservation? I already said it once. She found the donkey jacket in the garage and I said it so well and slid under the radar

sorry so the garage that this uh white ford courier van was registered to said that they had sold the van to uh and this is a quote i'm not using this word to a gypsy not a chill word to be using these days really traveler is preferred and this person was named levi and there was even more in 2004 a month before k Kate Sheedy had been attacked, Levi Belfield had been arrested in a Toyota Previa. It was white with blacked out windows. An alarm bell started going off for investigators. They could now link Belfield to both of the vehicles seen on CCTV

at the time of the attacks on Amelie and on Kate. And when they dug deeper, it turned out that he had since sold the Previa. So they tracked down the man who had bought it. And this guy turned out to be a friend of Belfield's. Obviously, the police seized the car and went over it with a fine tooth comb. But the Ford Courier van was still missing. So they put a tail on Belfield. And while Belfield was under surveillance, DCI Colin Sutton continued to study the intelligence report on him. When something else stood out, it was an address. In 2002, Levi Belfield had been living at 24 Collingwood Place in Walton-on-Thames.

Colin Sutton checked a map. This address was a cul-de-sac opposite Walton Railway station. This is an infamous spot here in the UK because it's where 13-year-old Millie Dowler went missing in 2002. On the 4th of March that year, Millie was on her way home from school. It was just a bit after 4pm. She waved her friends off and was last seen at a bus stop near Walton-on-Thames train station. That day, almost all of her walk had been caught by CCTV. But there was one point, one moment, during which two cameras pointed in opposite directions, and Millie was in a CCTV blind spot.

She disappeared within those 20 yards. It's fair to say that the Millie Dowler case completely took over headlines in this country. It was every parent's worst nightmare and it seemed unbelievable. How could this smart young girl, who everyone said would never go off with a stranger, have simply vanished on her way home in broad daylight, again from a safe neighborhood. And I can't stress enough, like if you're British, you already know this, but if you're not, I don't know how wide reaching internationally this story was, but the Millie Dowler case is up there with like Madeleine McCann. It is,

it's huge. It's huge in this country. For sure. Like I'm not even convinced. I, I definitely knew Millie Dowler's name. I don't think I knew Levi Belfield until like a couple of years ago. But Millie Dowler's name, I've always known. You're so right. It's one of those incredibly rare cases where the victim's name is more famous or infamous than the killer's name. Because you're right.

I guarantee every single person in this country over a certain age knows Millie Dowler's name, but not everybody knows Levi Belfield. So after she went missing, there was obviously a huge investigation into her disappearance. But Millie's remains were sadly found six months later on the 18th of September, about 24 miles away from where she'd gone missing in Yateley Heath Woods in Hampshire. So in 2004, when Colin Sutton and his team are investigating Amelie and Kate Sheedy, her murder was still unsolved. But it had already become one of the most infamous murders in British history at this time. So investigators were shocked. They now seemingly had a link between a violent man whom they suspected of murdering

young women and Millie Dowler. So Colin Sutton put in a call to Surrey Police. He gave them all of the information that he had, but he couldn't really do any more. And what we need to remember as we move forward with the story is that Surrey PD dealt with the investigation into Millie's case, which was called Operation Ruby. Colin Sutton and the Met team were looking into Amelie and Kate Sheedy. This was a totally separate investigation. They couldn't just go and take over the Millie case without more evidence.

And I think we don't suffer the same thing as like crossing state lines in the United States. It's not quite that dramatic, but it is still difficult to take over an investigation. I'm sure like smaller police departments probably get quite pissed off with the Met just like swooping in and taking things over. I think that's exactly it. There's not, it doesn't seem to be as much jurisdictional debate. It's more that, A, does Surrey want to give up the Millie Dowler investigation? If they feel like they've got a strong lead, or they feel like they're making headway with it, they wouldn't just give it over without enough evidence. And also on the flip side, the Met don't want to be taking on investigations that are potentially going to add more work to the load they've already got, especially if it's not connected, especially if it's not going to

actually help them move forward in their investigation. So basically, like everyone's got to be sure on all sides that it's worth doing. Exactly. No one wants to be taking on extra work or shirking work if it's not going to lead to the desired outcome. So Sutton and the Met team were sure that Belfield was their man. They wanted to arrest him, but they weren't really sure on what charge. They needed something more. And just then, something else happened. A man in Strawberry Hill, which is a very affluent area of London, came forward after Amelie's murder to say that

his nanny had been attacked on the 3rd of November 2002. After the attack, she'd returned home to Peru, but he was confident that she would recognise the culprit. Investigators checked it out and they found a hospital record of a lady named Sonia Salvatierra coming in with a head injury. Sonia agreed to come to the UK to try and help identify her attacker. So once again, we have another woman who suffered from a head injury from a stranger attacking her in the street in West London. So they're sort of sensible to look at connecting this with Kate and Amelie, although she looks very different to these two other women. At this point, when Sonia came forward, it was also when police discovered that Belfield had been closely associated with some local child sex offenders. I always read that as like, your friendly local child sex offender, like your friendly local

pedophile, like he's hanging out with all these guys, basically. It's very well known. So using this information, the police managed to get warrants needed to search eight houses, including Belfield's, and they planned the raid. After three months of hard work, they were finally going to arrest him. But unbelievably, a few days before the planned arrest, they got a call from a journalist at the News of the World. The journalist said that they knew that the police had a good suspect and they knew who he was. They were going to print Levi Belfield's name and photo.

This would, of course, have been a complete disaster. It would have tipped everybody off to the raid and Levi Belfield would have fled. So the police managed to talk the paper down from reporting until after the arrests. But the day of the arrest, there was yet more confusion. When the police stormed Belfield's house early in the morning of the 29th of November 2004, to everybody's shock, he wasn't there. No one could believe it. They'd been tailing him. He'd been under constant surveillance. How could he not be in the house? They rushed around, panicked, looking for him. They go and look at like local motels, hotels everywhere. He's got to be in the area because if it's not then, they've lost him. But unbelievably, a sergeant found him. He had been hiding in the loft of his house,

like under the insulation, like he'd gone up into the loft and put himself under the insulation and was hiding there. And he was naked. Why? I guess maybe he sleeps naked. It's not a terrible hiding place, to be honest, but he must have been itchy as fuck. Insulation's horrible, man. And I don't know where I got this from. I don't know if I dreamt it. I don't know if I thought it. I don't know if someone said it in a documentary. It definitely wasn't in the book, Manhunt. But I'm pretty sure that someone said

that he looked like a potato when they found him. Do you know why that is? It's because I sent you that meme the other day of that dog looking in the mirror and the little writing underneath it says me getting out of the showers checking if I still looked like a potato. Maybe it was that and maybe I just thought he looked like a potato. He kind of does look like a potato and I can imagine naked even more so. I often describe

myself as a potato when I'm naked. Apparently either I have done or somebody else has done about Levi Belfield. I'm not quite sure. I didn't manage to get the source on that. It may just be me. I don't know. So that's the image. That's the mental image we all need to conjure up in our minds is a naked Levi Belfield hiding in the loft. That poor sergeant must have had the fucking shock of his life.

I know he went out there to look, but you don't expect him to actually be there. No. So obviously they nicked him. Potato Man Belfield is physically a very thick person. And I'm not saying that, like, the youth of today use it. I mean, like, he's just giant man. He's like a... Girthy.

Girthy is what I think. Yeah, he's a girthy fella. Just so, like... And not in a sexy way. Hench is so, like... And not in a sexy way. Hench is probably a good word. Not in a sexy way. It's kind of like fucking thick-ass traps that just mean that his shoulders are basically coming out of his ears.

He's got the thickest neck in the world. And possibly even scarier than that, he's got really dark and totally blank eyes. No twinkles in there at all. Investigators were surprised when they heard him speak, though, because he spoke in an oddly high-pitched voice. And that's because Belfield absolutely loved the steroids. Could not get enough.

Yeah, because some people say, like, I was listening to a crime and investigations podcast on this case. You should definitely go check it out. Their whole piece isn't like a rundown of the case. They've just interviewed a forensic psychologist to talk about you know what motivated belfield what drove him and in that the doctor dr boone i can't remember his first name said that he thought that belfield was putting on the voice to sort of make himself seem innocent make himself seem sort of like unimposing because he's obviously such a physically big man but then this man completely

thrives on power as we go on to see. So I don't really think he's putting it on. I think it's because of the steroids. Because apparently, when you're on steroids, testosterone is converted into estrogen inside the body. So men who take steroids wind up with high-pitched voices, and women who take steroids end up with deeper voices. And I'm afraid it gets even a little bit more graphic than that.

Men on steroids will quite often have teeny tiny shrunken balls and women will get very large clitorises. Yeah, look it up. It's a fact. I'm so immature that I just started laughing when you said the word giant clitorises. Yeah, I've watched a lot of bodybuilding documentaries. There's also a joke in there about it just then being easier to find. But I don't know. Somebody else can construct the joke for me.

There you go, guys. Anyway, I really worry about people who can't find them. It's not that hidden away. Sort it out. Exactly. And I'm not even on steroids. Let's move on. Should we take a break?

Yes. Please, for the love of God, let's take on should we take a break yes please for the love of god let's take a break what's happening spooky bitches do you know what patreon actually is because you might have heard us talk about it but maybe you're not completely sure well it's a membership platform that allows us at red handed run a subscription service for you. As most of you know, last year we both went full time and we work really hard on the research for every episode. We really care about what we do and we bloody love it. We also love you guys.

So if you love Red Handed and you want to help support the show and keep it going, you should check out our Patreon. If everyone listening right now pledged just $2 each a month, oh, that's 50 cents or 40p an episode, it would be completely life-changing. And don't worry, there's a lot more to our Patreon than simply getting the warm fuzzies, having helped your girls out. You can choose the amount that you want to pledge to the show

on a monthly basis, and at each level that you give, you will get more and more bonus content and exclusive experiences from us. The show will, of course, always stay free. So if you want a whole load of extra content like full length bonus episodes, weekly after show parties, access to live streams and video content, then consider pledging even just a couple of dollars a month and help us stay full-time on Red Handed. But the extra financial support just means that we'll have the time, capacity, and space to create more exciting stuff for all of you beautiful people. So head on over to patreon.com forward slash red handed right now this second for more information. The link is in the episode description where it will always be forever.

You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either, until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness and inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Combs. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so. Yeah, that's what's up. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down.

Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom, but I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the

biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+.

You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today. Okay, we're back. Welcome. We've managed to get back a hold of ourselves, kind of. So let's move on from that sort of chat and move to where the police took Levi Belfield off to Heathrow Police Station. Is there anywhere that sounds more depressing than Heathrow Police Station? No. No, there just isn't. Possibly Luton Police Station. I won't go.

Luton's not that bad we're just talking about the airport not the actual place chill out everyone so when he was at Heathrow uh police station he was placed in a cell where he managed to get the cord out of his tracksuit and attempted to hang slash drown himself in the toilet so is he I shouldn't laugh suicide attempts aren't funny has he tied his feet to the ceiling and is trying to drown his head in the toilet bowl? To be totally honest, I've read this bit in the book and I was like, just very confused by the mechanics of it. It does seem like he tried to garrote himself,

but his head is also in the toilet simultaneously. But I don't know exactly. I think it's kind of a half-assed attempt. I don't think he really meant it, possibly. I don't know exactly. I think it's kind of a half-assed attempt. I don't think he really meant it, possibly. I don't know. Okay. He was saved by officers and he was fine and then they began the interviews

but Levi just no commented his way through everything. Belfield also had a weird tick and you can see it in all his police interviews. He tosses his head from side to side and blinks quite a lot. It was tough for the police at this point because they finally had him but he wouldn't admit to anything and they didn't have anything concrete enough to charge him with. Sonia, the Peruvian nanny, had not been able to give a positive ID so they needed something, anything, to keep Levi in the police station. And surprisingly,

they didn't need to wait long before it came. Emma Mills, Levi Belfield's partner, had come into the police station, but she hadn't come in to support him or demand that he be released. Quite the opposite. She was there to tell the police all about the kind of man that Levi Belfield truly was. So Emma Mills is, at the time,

currently in a relationship with Levi Belfield and had been for like eight years. Like, they've been together for a long time on and off they've got three kids together but I think she saw this as an opportunity to get out of this relationship once and for all. So Emma goes in and speaks to police and detailed horrific abuse. She talked about rape, emotional torture, physical beatings and more. She told police how Belfield had once raped her in the very spot under Walton Bridge where Amelie's belongings had been found. She told them how Belfield would lock her out in the garden naked, how she wasn't allowed to call her family

and friends and how she was absolutely terrified of him. Emma also stated that his previous partners had faced the same abuse and that they should track them down too. And this is exactly what the police did. They realised that if they could convince more women, more exes of Levi's to testify as to his abusive nature, they could charge him with assault and then bail would be out of the question. That way they could continue on with the murder investigations and keep questioning him. Police went back to Joanna Collings and also found another ex who was called Rebecca Wilkinson.

Both women recounted the sexual abuse, psychological control and physical violence that they suffered at Belfield's hands. They all shared a very similar experience with Belfield. After the initial period of love bombing, where he'd be loving and kind and thoughtful, he'd move in with the women and then it all changed. They had to obey him totally. Otherwise, there would be hell to pay.

And hell was beatings, rape, being locked out and forced to sit on a stool perfectly still for eight hours at a time, and even being forced to have sex with his friends. While all of these brave women came forward and testified against a man they were clearly terrified of, Emma Mills really does become pivotal. And at this point, she told the police something interesting. She said that in March 2002, she had been in West Drayton, house-sitting for a friend. But she'd been living in a flat in Collingwood Place, Walton-on-Thames. At this point, her and Levi were separated separated but they had kids together. He was trying to get back with her and I don't think he was the kind of guy that Emma felt like she could say no

to. So they got back together and started things up again. On the 21st of March 2002 Emma was watching the news and saw the headlines that Millie Dowler had gone missing that day and she remembers this clearly. She's able to talk about these things with very sort of specific detail, vivid memory. Because remember, she is a mother at this time. She lives in Morton-on-Thames. Of course, she remembers the date. Of course, she remembers watching the case unfold with Millie Dowler. I don't doubt any of her sort of story in terms of how strongly she recollects these things.

And she says that Belfield had been staying with her at that house that she'd been looking after in West Drayton. But that that morning, so the day that Millie Dowler goes missing, he had gotten up and left early. And that day, she hadn't received from him the usual barrage of crazy texts and all the sort of phone calls checking in on her her all of that stuff that he normally did in fact she actually tried calling him at one point but unusually his phone was switched off and Levi Belfield had taken Emma's car this is another car we're going to add into the mix everybody I hope you're paying attention we're now talking about a red Daewoo

and so he'd taken this car and he'd also taken the keys to her flat at Collingwood Place, which remember is in Walton-on-Thames. After being MIA all day, Belfield finally came home at 11pm with some fried chicken and four cans of lager. Emma noticed that he'd changed his clothes since the morning. He was now wearing a tracksuit that she knew was in the wardrobe at Collingwood Place. So she can tell he's obviously been to the flat. And he had the keys, so obviously he could have. Emma wanted to know where Belfield had been all day,

but she also knew to leave it alone. So they ate the chicken, they drank the beer, and they went to bed at about midnight. But Belfield was restless. And by 3.30am, he was heading out again and this time he took the dog. The next day with her house sitting duties done and dusted Emma went home to Collingwood Place. When she got in she noticed something odd. All the bedding had been removed from their bed. Levi Belfield was not a domesticated man. He never helped around the house and he certainly didn't do

any laundry. When Emma asked him what was going on, he told her that the dog had made a mess on the bed, so he'd taken the sheets off. Emma didn't believe him. The dog was well trained and she thought that even if that had been the case, that he would have just left it for her to sort out anyway. She assumed that he'd had another woman over and just tried to put it out of her mind. After that day, Belfield started to act even more strangely. He suddenly told Emma that he didn't want to live there anymore and they were going to have to move. A few days later, Emma noticed that her car at the Red Daewoo was missing.

Belfield told her that he had gone for a drink and left it at a pub in Hounslow. He went looking for the car, but it was never found. Again, it wasn't really something that Emma could cause much of a fuss about. And he even takes Emma to the police station and makes her give a report that the car's gone missing, even though he was the one who lost it. But that will become important later, so hold on to it. Now, before we move on, let's look at who this man, Levi Belfield, is. He was born in 1968 in Isleworth in West London. His dad died when he was quite young

and he was raised by his incredibly overbearing mum. He went to the local comprehensive and he was described by everybody who knew him as a weakling. He was tiny and sickly. So his mum suffocated him. Not literally, I mean like with her presence. And he apparently slept in her bed with her until he was 16. Nope.

No. They should add that shit onto the McDonald triad and make it the McDonald square. Like there's no way that sleeping with your mum till you're 16 is going to do anything good for you. No, it's really not everybody agrees that they had a very very uncomfortably close overbearing intense relationship the stuff about him sleeping in her bed until he was 16 like we don't know if that's true but it is not it seems highly probable given the fact that everybody talks about it all the time and joanna

collings his ex who you remember is the one that went in and originally reported him, says that even in his 30s, when her and he were together in a relationship, whenever Belfield went home to visit his mum, he'd still sleep in the same bed with her. Oh, don't like it. No, I don't like it at all. Okay, perfect in every way. Everyone loves them. Beloved by everyone. Your friends love them way. Everyone loves them. Beloved by everyone.

Your friends love them. Your family loves them. But every time his mum comes to visit, you have to sleep on the sofa and he sleeps in your bed with his mum. Deal breaker? Deal breaker. And I'm being serious.

That's, there's something wrong. There's something not right there. Oh God. Now, obviously Joanna is his ex and she suffered a lot of abuse at his hands and rightfully absolutely fucking hates him so i don't know if this next thing is true or if she's just sort of like doing it to take the piss but she also said that levi belfield had told her that his mum had wiped his ass for him until he was 12. Again, don't know if it's true, but there you go. It's out there now.

Speechless. Can't cope. And the thing is, if only even half of all of the stories about Levi Belfield's childhood are true, it's clear that there was a lot of, like, emotional incest, if nothing else, going on between him and his mum. And it is, and everybody agrees, an extremely weird relationship. And interestingly, when we look at the backgrounds of many serial killers who target women, we often see a controlling, overbearing mother

at the core of their lives, rather than a domineering father. And I guess it makes sense, because that's where that rage against women comes from. But as much as Belfield probably love-hated his mum, he hate-hated the girls at school. There were the usual weird sexual rumours floating around about Levi when he was a teenager. The kids at school used to say that he had raped his sister's rabbit and broken its neck.

And this story earned him the nickname Bugsy from the girls. How do kids come up with this shit, then? Oh, I know. And even when I was writing this, I thought you were going to sort of pick up on the fact that I put the usual weird sexual rumours. I'd be like, what sort of fucking usual sexual rumours were going around at your school? Oh, no.

I spread a rumour that a guy in my year had a curly willy like a pig. Good. We laugh about it. We're friends now. I'm sure he's not bubbling up with rage and just biding his time to murder you at all. No, he's fine.

He does, like, community theatre stuff. He's happy. He's fine. There was a rumour that a kid I went to school with wanked off his hamster. Don't know if it was true. Don't think it was true. That's impossible. Exactly.

But we were not biologists or sexologists. There was a lot. Yeah, there was a lot. There was a lot of mean shit. One of them was like, oh, his parents are fucking fucking first cousins and i don't even think they were it was just because he was a bit i don't know a guy in my year definitely did marry his current cousin oh yeah for real oh some people some people are into it don't do it has everybody watched the bbc documentary was it bbc maybe it's channel four i don't know it's on YouTube called when cousins marry fuck

no me oh my god I'll send it to you it's really really traumatic I watched it and I was I think I watched it when we were doing the GSA episode and uh yeah it really fucking upset me we're not here to force our views down your throat on whether you should marry your cousin or not do what you like there was a couple on tattooers the other day that were like, he had like some awful like naked woman tattoo on his arm and his wife wanted it removed. And they were like, oh yeah, and by the way, we're first cousins. And they were like, is that legal? Like how?

And it was a classic GSA thing where they'd been together as kids and then were separated and found each other much later on Facebook. So it was like the classic GSA. Oh dear. I don't know. I don't know I don't I don't know what to say it's legal in this country to marry your first cousin is it is it is it yeah is it yeah first cousins yeah yeah good to know there you go guys I mean it's not fine it's legal lots of things are legal that shouldn't be oh god so all of this bullying and rabbit rumors

made Levi Belfield's hatred of women incredibly intense. And the types of women that he would choose to kill later on tell us quite a lot. He was deeply insecure. And these women represented everything he felt he couldn't have. These attractive, intelligent, middle class, blonde women. They looked down on him and he wasn't good enough. It reminded him of being at school. So they all had to pay. Because some

of his victims die, we don't know exactly what sort of interaction they had with Levi Belford before he attacked them. Was it just a blitz attack out of nowhere? Did he say anything to them? Kate Sheedy does say that he tried to sort of cruise alongside her and chat to her, like, pick her up, basically. And she was like, no no and then I think that rejection triggers him and he is like fuck you you fucking bitch I gave you a chance and you said no how dare you I'm gonna kill you and it's like an explosion of rage and we'll obviously never know if that's what happened with Amelie but I think we can say that that probably is and I did post this on the Instagram when it happened when I was researching this case it really sort of kept coming back to me that thing I told you about one day I was walking

home from the train station in the dark and this white van pulled up alongside me and it was quite like a big grass bank so I was quite far away from him still because I was on the pavement and he rolled down his window rolled down zipped down his window I don't know and was like um hey do you know where blah blah is like an address and I just said down there I don't know why I responded to him but I also was like it happened so quickly and I just pointed and said it's that way and then I just kept walking and it was only person on the street I was feeling a bit like and I walked down turned into my road and my road is like one of the oldest roads in our town. So it's got no pavement because it's like an old horse and carriage lane.

Also very difficult to do a three point turn on. Very, very difficult to do that. And also very difficult to not be side by side with a man in a white van who then continues to try speak to you. Because there's now no sort of grassy verge between me and him. So he turns into my road and continues to follow me and then obviously i can't walk faster than a van so he pulls up next to me again and goes do you want to lift and i was like and i was so shocked i went i laughed not like out i just went like no and then i just kept walking but like he could have just

fucking run me over after that there was nowhere to go like that's exactly what levi belfield did to kate sheedy apart from the fact that he ran her over twice obviously but fucking hell i didn't take it that seriously when it happened but after reading this i was like shit that is scary shit i don't know how to avoid that situation like i was just walking it was just scary and i just don't understand how like because you know some Like I was just walking. It was just scary. And I just don't understand how like, because some people might hear that story, but oh, like maybe he was actually just offering you a lift.

I do not understand any mentality of a person that's like, oh, this will not be intimidating, this woman walking on her own. Like I just don't get it. I think that's the key point because you're exactly right. Maybe he was just a nice guy. He was asking me if I wanted a lift. The address he had asked was going past the street that I was on started to walk much faster because I could feel him behind me and he could definitely hear me sort of start to break into a jog in high heels. So I really

appreciated that he just slowed right down and almost stopped and let me sort of walk off and then he started walking again. And I felt like he did that because he felt like he was scaring me. And I was like, yeah, I appreciate that. Thank you. That's great. Back to Belfield. When he got older as a teenager, he decided that he was going to change his appearance and he hit the gym hard and also started taking steroids.

The impact was immediate. He got absolutely fucking huge. He looks like he has a very unnatural body and he does because he's taking loads of steroids. It's too much. He's like a fucking bulldog, like a giant bulldog. So now if we couple that anger, the hate that he felt with the drugs and the roid rage in a massive bulk of a man, Levi Belfield was extremely dangerous indeed.

And he'd also spent quite a lot of his life being impotent. And we're not talking about sexually impotent. We're just talking about his relationship with his mum there. So now he was going to take back control. So he became a bouncer working the local bars and clubs in the suburbs of southwest London. And here he abused his power. He would dominate, intimidate and bully the women and girls who came to the venues he worked at. He'd sell them drugs for sexual favours. And he also, according to many teenage girls, straight up drugged and raped them. He was known for using his white people carrier

with the blacked out windows to trap his victims in. There was even, according to some, a mattress in the back. He'd say the girls were gagging for it, but I think people definitely knew what was going on and nobody stopped him. He was a true predator. I also think the two different types of offending that we see with Belfield is quite interesting.

The bouncer work he's doing and the date rapes that he's engaging in. I don't even want to call them date rapes. They're not on dates with him. He's just using fucking, he's just drugging them and then raping them. That's what's happening. But the blitz attacks are happening simultaneously with this kind of attack. So it's very strange. It's very unusual to see these two sort of different MOs because with the Blitz attacks, it's slightly older women.

Well, you know, they're like 19 to 22, not really older, but, you know, these are teenagers. They're like 16, 17, the girls he's doing this to in the clubs. And it's interesting, but I guess you could say both of them are just about power. Levi Belfield is about nothing if not about power and control. We've talked about sort of rapists and different types of rapists before. I can't remember which episode, but we definitely have. And that sort of power assertiveness, that power assertive offender, that's what Levi Belfield is because he's so empty. He's so shallow. There's nothing to him. He's deeply insecure. And so he has these explosions of rage because he can't handle rejection he can't deal

with that kind of thing because he needs power he needs to control the entire time and i think that is the single thing that drives him from what i could tell of levi belfield and so as if the power and control that came with being a bouncer wasn't enough belfield also had another job. It was as a boot clamper. Is that what people call it in all countries? I wasn't sure. So boot clamping is like the person who goes around and puts a boot on your car when you park it somewhere you shouldn't. Does that make sense to everyone? Yeah. I think here we call them clamps and in America they call them boots. Oh, okay. Okay. So we covered all the bases. Everyone know what I'm talking about? Yeah. But what Levi Belfield would do, he would just go around and clamp everybody's car and then he would extort money from them. And with his giant intimidating

frame, I'm guessing that few people resisted. The job also had another perk because Levi Belfield could easily get rid of a vehicle by just having it crushed. So one guess where Emma's red Daewoo went after the day that Millie Dowler disappeared. The police were at a difficult impasse at this point. They now had enough to charge Levi Belfield for rape, assault and abuse against his ex-partners. And they did. They did do this. But they were still left with a monumentally difficult task

of proving his guilt in the murders. They had bits linking him to Millie, but that was Remember Surrey's investigation, not the Met's. They also had bits linking him to Amelie and Kate too. Maybe they needed something else, and they needed it quickly. So they looked into other earlier cases, pre-Amelie and Kate, who were both attacked in 2004. If it had been Levi Belfield, then it was not unreasonable to think that he would have attacked others before. And bingo. Marsha MacDonald was a 19-year-old student and she'd been murdered in February 2003, just three months after Sonia, the Peruvian nanny, had been attacked, and just five months

after Millie's body had been found. Marsha, just like Emily and Kate, was pretty, intelligent, young and blonde. She lived with her parents in Hampton, southwest London, and on the night of Tuesday 4th February, she'd gone to the cinema with her friends and was on her way home on the bus. Marsha got off at Kingston bus station, and a few minutes after midnight, she decided to walk the ten minutes home. As she walked, suddenly out of nowhere, Marsha was attacked, hit from behind. She was so close to her house by this point that her neighbour had actually heard the attack.

He and his wife heard a loud thump, a car door slam, and then a long, continuous moan. When the neighbour went out to investigate, he found Marsha laying in a pool of blood. He called the police at 12.23am, just six minutes after she'd got off the bus. Tragically, Marsha died the next day, some 30 hours after being attacked. And I think that really sort of feeds into a lot of what happens in the rest of this case. He attacks and gets away six minutes after Marsha got off the bus. He's fucking watching them. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I think he's just like lurking at bus stops constantly. Yeah, there is definitely the

lurking at bus stops. I also was watching a documentary where they made a good point that perhaps he was driving around looking into buses because buses are actually incredibly well lit. Like if you look into a bus, you can see the people on that. And so I think he's also driving around looking at buses and then he just follows them until the you can see the people on that. And so I think he's also driving around looking at buses and then he just follows them until the victim that he's identified on that bus maybe gets off and then he fucking goes for it. So obviously at the time that Marsha was attacked and killed, a murder investigation was mounted.

And while actually it should have been Colin Sutton who took the case, he had at the time had his hands full with another set of murders. So Marsha was passed on to a different team. And the team that had investigated her murder thought that they had caught their man, and it wasn't Levi Belfield. It was a young man who was only ever referred to as Sharp. He had been placed in a psychiatric facility after he'd been linked with another incident involving a teenage girl in the same area at around the same time. It seemed to investigators like too much of a coincidence. And so Marsha's murder was linked to Sharp and the

case was set aside. But to Colin Sutton, it seemed like Marsha's murder was a much better fit with the Belfield case. So the Met team checked the CCTV from that night. At 12.17am, they saw Marsha get off the bus and they also saw a silver car that seemed to be following her. It looked like a silver Vauxhall Corsa. The driver tailed Marsha as she walked out of view of CCTV. It was all the investigators had, and yes, yet again, it was a different car. The behaviour of the driver was so similar, and the nature of Marsha's murder was so similar. They felt strongly that she too was a victim of Belfield and so this investigation was reopened. The problem was now that the police had identified

multiple vehicles linked to the attacks but finding them wasn't easy. So far they only had the Previa. They needed the white van, the Ford Courier, so they went on BBC Crime Watch. Their plan was to give people who might know something but but who might be scared of Belfield, the confidence to come forward. And it worked. A friend of Emma's came forward and told the police that she knew Belfield had a white van and she knew that he had tried to fix the defects it had and that he had even tried to sell it after the attack on Amelie. But the van still didn't turn up. Police became fairly confident that Belfield had probably crushed it into a tiny cube. So they tried to focus their efforts on the silver Vauxhall Corsa from Marsh's murder. Belfield was known to own such a car at the time, but it had since gone missing, so that wasn't enough.

From the CCTV and the partial plate, they were able to discover that in the UK, there were only about 600 cars that this car could have been. That's better than the almost 25,000 different types of white van that it could have been in the first case. So this looks more promising. But they were still going to have to contact each owner and rule them out if they were to say that this silver Vauxhall had been Belfield's. The police realised as they sort of figured out that a lot of these cars may end up being crushed etc that forensic evidence was looking less and less likely. They knew that they were probably going to have to build all of the circumstantial evidence that they could if they stood a chance of even getting to trial let alone of putting Levi Belfield away

and they also realised that it wasn't going to be enough to just prove that Belfield had owned these cars or even just had access to them. The police had to prove that he was the one who had actually been driving them on the nights of the attacks. So they decided to use his phone to try and prove where he'd been. So now they needed the phone in his hands in the van, given that they have no forensics.

So as they started this line of inquiry, they discovered that someone had called Belfield's mobile at 9.37pm on the 19th of August 2004. That's the day Amelie was murdered, and it was just 20 minutes before her attack. And when they looked at the CCTV, at this time they could see the suspicious ford courier van in cctv around the twickenham green area so basically what they're saying is they need to now prove with his phone data that he was in twickenham green because they can show that the van was in twickenham green using the cctv and so when they realized that this phone call had come through at 9 37 p.m it was perfect belfield had actually cut the call and switched his phone off

after, but it was too late. The call had already been logged and so had the location. And guess what? It of course had pinged in Twickenham Green. With this information, the police went back to Emma. And once again, she didn't disappoint. Emma remembered seeing the news about the attack on Amelie. The night before had been quite a memorable day for her. It had been the first time she'd left the house after giving birth to her third child. Belfield was meant to come home at 7.30 to take her to Tesco, but he hadn't. 7.30 in the evening, that is. Emma needed nappies, so she called a cab and left at 8pm. Belfield had come home while she was out and called her asking, why aren't you at home? She told him where she was, so he went to meet her. He took the other two kids off Emma so she could shop and drove them to Toys R Us.

After a bit, he called her again saying to wait at the supermarket and he'd come back to get her. She paid and went out and there he was, waiting in his white Ford Courier van. Levi took Emma home and she unloaded the shopping while he sat in the driver's seat and took a call on his mobile. Then he drove off. Emma said that that was at about 9.10pm. 30 minutes later, she had gone to make herself a cup of tea and realised that she'd forgotten milk.

She called Belfield, but the call was cut off. This was the 9.37 call that pinged near Twickenham Green. Police confirmed the calls and found the Tesco bill. And they were also able to back up the two calls that Belfield had made to Emma that night. The one at 8.22pm, hitting a mast in Hayes. This was obviously the call that Belfield had put into Emma to check where she was when he'd got home and realised she wasn't there. Then there was another call, hitting a mast near Little Bentley at 9.08pm.

And this is when he'd made the call, sat in the front seat of the Korea van, as Emma unloaded the groceries, because he's such a fucking hero, letting his fucking newly birthed... She's not been newly birthed, you know what I mean? No, she'd probably been the happiest state of her life, having just given birth like birth to a kid yeah and then he's like you're right you go unpack it I've got some calls to make physically I mean birth is a miracle babies are amazing good what I really hate is now every time I open

Netflix the last couple of days it plays that baby's fucking trailer at the top I'm like go away oh mine mine's just giving me fucking bear gwyneth paltrow and i'm like you can advertise that to me every single day of my life and i will still not watch it netflix i just am so baffled by that i'm like who is this for is it for like a fucking middle-aged suburban women like are they the ones watching it i don't know i'm confused by the whole thing so anyway back to this the police basically are now able to sort of timeline Belfield's movements on the night that Amelie was murdered. This is the key thing. And they're able to fucking pinpoint him at the same time that van is seen on CCTV at Twickenham Green as being in Twickenham Green because his phone pinged there. So the police had all of this,

but they had to continue their hunt to eliminate all of the other Silver Vauxhall Corsa owners because the cps had told them what you've got isn't enough we'll give it to you once you've eliminated all of the silver voxels and proven that it could only therefore then have been belfields and finally on the 25th of may 2006 all 600 silver voxel courser owners were cleared and the CPS gave the green light to take Belfield to trial for the murders of Amelie, Marsha and the attempted murder of Kate. The CPS also okayed the inclusion of two other attacks on two other women, Irma Dragosi and Anna Maria Rennie. Anna Maria had been sat at a bus stop in October 2001 at 11.30pm. A car stopped to offer her a lift and she said no.

The man in the car proceeded to then get out of the vehicle and tried to force her into the car. But thankfully, she managed to escape. Belfield was known at the time to own a car matching the one that Anna-Marie had described and he also matched the description of her attacker. Irma Dragoshi was sat at a bus stop again in West London on the 16th 16 December 2003.

At 7.15pm, she called her husband. The next thing she remembered was waking up in hospital the following day. Officers and paramedics who attended the scene said that she was on the verge of collapse and hysterical. She told them that someone had tried to grab her phone but hit her over the head. When she woke up in hospital, Irma said that she had a lump on her head so big it didn't fit in her hand. Irma, unlike the other victims, said that there had been two men in the car. The other man was Sunil Garu, a friend of Belfield's. Garu spoke to police and told them that Belfield had just randomly stopped the car,

jumped out, hit the woman at the bus stop, and then got back in the car and drove off laughing. And if you're wondering why Belfield might have thought that it was fine to do this bizarre attack in front of his mate Sunil Garu, well, we'll come back to this. So for now, put your pointiest pin in it. So after all the police's months and months of hard work, a date was finally set for trial. But you may have noticed that Millie's name was obvious in its absence from the indictment. So what was going on with that investigation? Well, six months after Colin

Sutton had suggested Belfield as a suspect, Surrey Police hadn't really moved forward in any way. So Colin Sutton passed on what Emma had told him about the day that Millie had gone missing, about the Red Daewoo, about the flat at Collingwood Place and about the stripped bedding. And guess what? When Surrey Police checked CCTV, there was a Red Daewoo coming out of the area at about 20 minutes after Millie vanished.

But it wasn't enough. They needed to find Belfield on another bit of CCTV from the same day. But they'd been a fuck-up and they only had about 20 minutes of footage from the area, either side of Millie vanishing. So the footage they'd had a fuck-up and they only had about 20 minutes of footage from the area, either side of Millie vanishing. So the footage they'd had found was completely useless. So there was no way at that point that Millie could be included in the indictment of Levi Belfield. Firstly, Surrey police still thought that it wasn't Belfield.

And secondly, the case was too weak. If they had added Millie's case into the mix, it could have scuppered everything. The Met had tried to keep Surrey in the loop by making all of the interviews they had available to them and all that sort of stuff. But Surrey weren't being too open about their own investigation. And at the time, no one could see why. That wouldn't come out until 2011. And you need another pin, sorry. Two pins for today.

Stick another one in that one. The Met had enough on their hands, to be honest, without adding Millie into the mix. Because even as it stood, with just Marsha, Amelie and Kate, there was no guarantee. Some of the evidence in some of the cases was stronger than others. The prosecution was hoping that by putting all of the attacks and murders on the same indictment, they could argue cross-admissibility. And this is a situation in which evidence on one count against an accused is capable of being used as part of the proof on another count. The counts in such cases will usually be joined. So by putting everything on the same indictment and arguing cross-admissibility,

they're basically saying, if we agree that the same man committed all of these crimes, then the jury can consider the strongest evidence when considering the weakest. Because the strongest evidence they had was really in the Amelie case, because they had the van, they could prove that he had a van like that, they had the ping in Twickenham Green, and the weakest case was probably Marsha's, because they just had a lot less there. But now Marsha's case could be judged almost with the strength of Amelie's case. So adding another weaker case into it like Millie's was just going

to cause more problems that they didn't need. And so the trial began on the 2nd of October 2007. Many of Belfield's acquaintances testified as to his dangerous and unpredictable demeanour and his mental breaks around the time of Amelie's death. Belfield's friend, a man named Richard Hughes, even told the court how Belfield had placed himself in a psychiatric facility around this time. Sunil Garu told the court about how he had witnessed Belfield's attack on Irma Dragoshi.

Another man known to Belfield, called Clint Stevens, told the court about how he had witnessed the attack on Anna Marie Rennie. But Belfield denied everything. Emma took the stand too. She told the court about all the years of abuse she'd suffered at Belfield's hands. The defense simply tried to discredit every witness. They argued prejudicial evidence and even argued that because Levi's ex Emma had only agreed to testify if she could do it from behind a screen, that would prejudice the jury as well. The judge denied all of these arguments from the prosecution. When Belfield himself took the stand, he oozed false empathy,

saying things like, quote, I'm a father. It was hard enough watching Kate testify. I couldn't ever do that to someone. And the thing you've got to realise about Belfield, he is not stupid. He got away with everything he had done for years. He knew what to say in court and how to act. He was a highly trained manipulator. But every now and again, when the judge and the jury weren't in the room, the mask would slip.

The trial finally ended in February 2008 and no one was sure what would happen next. Like we said, there were no forensics, just masses of circumstantial evidence. The jury took two weeks to deliberate. In fact, they were taking so long that the judge actually had to intervene and agree that a majority verdict would be accepted if they couldn't come to a unanimous decision. And so when the jury finally returned, they started with the weakest case, that for Marsha. The jury had reached a majority verdict, 10 to 2, and found Levi Belfield guilty of Marsha's murder.

Then, on the attempted murder of Kate Sheedy, again, they had reached a majority verdict, 11 to 1, guilty. On the strongest case, which was Amelie's, they had reached a unanimous verdict, guilty. Levi Belfield was sentenced the very next day to life without parole for each of the three counts. Given the judge had recommended a whole of life sentence for Belfield, the jury were told to stop deliberating on the charges for Anna Marie and Irma. So what about Millie? In February 2008, more than six years after she was murdered,

it was decided that Belfield would be charged with Millie's murder. He would also be charged with the attempted abduction of another young girl the day before Millie vanished. And when we were talking about Surrey police being reluctant to engage earlier in the investigation, it was now starting to come out as to why. They had totally fucked up in two ways. So this is when you're going to want to pull that first pin out as to why Surrey were being so cagey about their investigation. Firstly, and perhaps most famously,

it was discovered that a PI working for the News of the World, which was a newspaper here in the UK, had hacked Millie's phone just days after her disappearance. This PI had listened to and deleted voicemails on Millie's phone. So when her mum had tried calling Millie again and again, at first she couldn't leave a message because it was saying the inbox was full. But days later, her mum saw that she could leave a voicemail. This of course gave the family and police false hope that Millie was still alive somewhere, listening to and deleting voice messages. And maybe you're wondering how was this a fuck up on the police's part? Well that came after because Surrey police seemingly did nothing to investigate this illegal phone hacking even though it had disrupted a

murder investigation. There was a big inquiry into this and they simply say now that it was a matter of deep regret. And actually when I say a big investigation into this, I mean an internal investigation. So they investigated themselves. They said that they hadn't done anything because they were just simply focused on finding Millie's killer. I kind of call BS on this because, yes, this internal investigation cleared everyone. It seems a bit dodgy to me. But if the police had managed to sidestep this issue, the news of the world certainly didn't. This scandal was too much for the paper to recover from.

And after 168 years in print, in July 2011, one of Britain's biggest newspapers shut down. Next up in the fuck-up police lottery is fuck-up number two. And that's what Belffield's second trial in may 2011 started with it's a young woman called rachel cowles rachel had been just 11 when an incident occurred she'd been walking home from school the very day before millie dowler vanished on the exact same road that millie had vanished from when a man in a red car stopped and asked her how to get back to where they lived. Rachel was confused but the man said that he was her new neighbour and he was lost. She could get in and help him and then in return he'd drop her off at her house. Rachel said no and at that moment

a police car just happened to drive by. This clearly spooked the man and he drove off. Rachel noted that the car had two baby seats in the back. She had gone home, told her parents. Her parents had called the police and reported the incident. The police just noted this incident down and it was more or less forgotten. Even though, the very next day, a young girl went missing from the same road. And if they'd just read this account and watched the CCTV, they might have linked the red car.

But the police didn't track this bit of information down for years. And when they did, Rachel identified Levi Belfield as the man in the car. It's really fucking unbelievable. Like, the same man in the same car tries to abduct a schoolgirl from the same exact road the day before Millie Dowler went missing. The red Daewoo's on CCTV. And obviously this wouldn't have saved Millie's life. but it could have saved Amelie, Marsha, Kate. Not that Kate died, but you know what I mean? Saved her the trauma of what she went through. And probably all of the other people that Levi Belfort has ever abused or hurt or murdered in his life. And like, good for her at fucking 11 years old to not only go home and tell her parents, but remember specific things like two car seats in the back.

She even remembered that one was pink and one was blue. They're Emma's kids' fucking car seats. It's her car. Like, she remembered all of this detail and Emma was able to confirm it. Fucking Rachel, man, you're a hero. The second trial was obviously, yes, focused on Rachel, but it really was the Millie Dowler trial. And obviously this was something that Millie's family had been waiting years for. By this point, it had almost been a decade since Millie had died. But I have to be honest, the way they were treated during this

trial, I found frankly heartbreaking. The defence tore this poor family apart. And yes, I understand how the court system works. I do. I do understand bullish defense teams. I get it. But I really do feel like they were really unfairly treated. Bob Dowler, who's Millie's dad, was originally a chief suspect for Surrey Police. Okay, that makes sense. Looking at the dad, I'm like, okay, I'm with you. I get it. But it felt like Bob Dowler was forced to defend himself in the courtroom, like he was the one who was on trial and not Levi Belfield. The defense really went to town on him. They suggested to Bob Dowler that perhaps Millie had found his box of pornography in the loft, and that's why she'd run away. The box that they were referring to contained bondage magazines,

a rubber hood, and a ball gag, according to The Independent. And the defence made Bob Dowler admit that if Millie had found these things, then she would likely have been disgusted and potentially could have run away. Bob Dowler broke down multiple times whilst giving evidence. And I'm just like, obviously the defence is trying to create a narrative in which it's Bob Dowler, sorry police's original chief suspect. But fucking hell, he's not just got this pornography lying around the living room. He's got it in the loft. And also, she didn't definitely find it.

That's such a weird, tenuous, oh, you had this specific thing in your house hidden away. That's just not good enough. They're basically trying to say either you murdered her or, because look at you, you're a fucking sex maniac, or she ran away and she died or whatever. Like, it's unbelievable. They humiliated this poor man who lost his daughter at this trial for Levi Belph. Oh, I don't know.

It just really made my blood boil. And like fucking kinky people have kids too. Exactly. Give it a break. God. Like I said, he had it fucking hidden in the loft. He didn't just have it like on the dining room table, you know? Just displayed on the mantelpiece.

The defence also suggested that maybe Millie had run away because her mum and dad didn't love her enough. The police found brooding diary entries and letters in Millie's room. Millie had written a letter that it's quite possible she never even planned giving to her parents that she signed off your little disappointment Amanda and of course that's sad but she's 13 and I definitely wrote loads of shit like that when I was a teenager. And just to clarify Amanda is her given name Millie is like her nickname. Sally Dowler, Millie's mum, was accused of having neglected Millie. And perhaps because of that, Millie had taken herself off and killed herself in the woods. By that time, Millie's remains had been found

six months after she had vanished. And they were just bones, so cause of death couldn't be identified. Sally Dowler collapsed in court. After all of this, however, all of the torment that they put the Dowlers through, they did get justice for Millie. Belfield was found guilty of her murder and sentenced to another whole of life tariff. He is actually the only serial killer in the UK who has ever been sentenced to two whole of life sentences, which I thought was quite interesting. Oh, good knowledge. That's a good fact. Thank you very much. And I think like he always knew he was going to get sent down and even if he didn't he was going to spend the rest of his life in prison anyway. That trial was just about making it as painful as possible for the Dowlers because he's a sadist and he's fucking power crazy. Now that

he's in jail he doesn't get many opportunities to do that kind of thing anymore so he was going to ride this for all it was worth but levi belfield is now in prison rightfully so he is specifically in hmp franklin which is a maximum security prison i saw it described as the monster mansion but i thought that was wakefield maybe they just call all of them that definitely is wakefield and during his time in prison belfield has converted to islam and now goes by the name Yusuf Rahim. But despite binding God, he still shows absolutely no remorse for any of his crimes. He hasn't even admitted to any of his crimes. So we will never really know the true extent of Levi Belfield's actions or how many actually suffered at his hands.

Even of the victims we know about, he wasn't convicted of all of them. The prosecution decided to leave out the charges on the rapes and assaults against his three ex-partners. They also drew a line under the many drug rape victims who had come forward. The police and his accusers came to that conclusion based on the idea that, quote, justice for her is justice for me. Since his incarceration, you will also notice that if you just go to your Google News bar now

and search Levi Belfield, he's rarely out of the headlines. As recently as just 10 days before we wrote the script for this episode, in February 2020, he is still in the papers. He's been writing letters to a pen pal, hinting that he may be involved in the murders of other women. And I think it's highly likely that there are other victims. He was just going around fucking bashing people over the head with complete disregard. Like, of course there are other victims. But I think it's incredibly unlikely anything will ever come of these stories.

The only remaining investigation with which Belfield is definitely linked that's still ongoing is one concerning his mate Sunil Garu, who witnessed the attack on Irma Dragoshi. He, so Sunil and his brother Suraj, and their mate Victor Kelly have all been connected with a child's sex ring, and that allegedly included Levi Belfield. There's apparently video footage out of Levi Belfield participating in these rapes, and I don't doubt it,

but the videos are yet to be discovered and the investigation is going on as we speak. So that is the case of Levi Belfield, Millie Dowler, Marsha MacDonald, Amelie De La Grange, Kate Sheedy, and the countless other women. So hopefully you're still there. That's quite a difficult one. And if you want to find out more, you should definitely tune in on

Friday when we will be releasing our full interview with former DCI Colin Sutton. And you can also do all of the other usual things that we ask you to do. Sign up to Patreon, Go follow us at all of the social medias at Red Handed the Pod. And anything else we need to say? No? Should we? Nope. So let's jump straight into the thank yous for Patreons. Fucking hell, there are a lot of you. So let's crack on. Thank you, Carolyn Bracken, Morgan Meredith, Leanne Taylor, Julia Lavery, Mara Friedman, Alexia Orlana, Cy, do we think? Cy Mannis, Alex, Lauren Kelly, Anita Cowman, Sneha, who has upgraded, probably thanks to your lovely judgment of her name, Emma Hayward, Mari B. Hedgecoth, Sarah Townley, Laura Hayhurst, Ebby, Megan Nottage, Diana Tran, Amy Cleveland, Amber Knox,

Hannah Kennedy, and then Hannah can go. Are you having a laugh? I can't spell now to see how many there are. Okay, you tell me then. You tell me when I need to be done. Michaela Tybukas, Jessica Davies, Penelope, that's an interesting way, Penelope, Antonio, yep, Ellen Livercy, Demi Fitzpatrick, Rihanna, Victoria Price, Bryony, Erin H, Jo Hornsby, Adriana Parker, Michelle Wesenberg, Sophie Laws, Suzanne Ochoa,

Kimberly Brown, Sayan Sable, Brooke Wallace, Anna Slavin, Grace Burdick, Jessica C, Cheryl Mayer, Holly Mills, Grace Glembowski, Yang Pa, Andrew Ness, Joe Westwood, Emma Paradis, Haypa, Andrew Ness, Joe Westwood, Emma Paradis, Hayley, Joe Boyd, really? Still?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, you put these here, so. Tanya Zederbauer. Okay, I'll do it. Becky Catsteel, Sophie Harris, Emma Munford, Tanya Lichtensteiger,

who I think also upgraded because of the way I said her name. Yeah, they love it. Amanda Sharkey, Becky Nash, Alice Hallel, Mike Van Devoort, Annette Morton, Emily Cook, Donna Barnes, John Margash, Megan Riley, Baby Tank, Alicia Fanny Ho, Eddie Grace, Danielle Speck, Mairwen Watson, Rosie, Lindsay Gowdy, Daniela Karuma, Demi Smith, Hayley Dalton, Daniel, Kate Hart, Laura Gingell, or Gingell possibly, Jen Greger, Natasha Griffith, Sarah Lane, Amber Spence, Beth Foreshaw, Emily Clarkson, Antoinette Brigoglio. Brigoglio. Brigoglio. Kevin Cumming, Julie Aid, Janine Payne, Devin, Emiliano Lozano, Patience Handel.

What a name. Not so patient, though. She asked us why we hadn't said our name yet. Mate, I saw that and I thought that was so fucking funny. Hi, Patience. We said your name now. Kate Tong, Noala Clark, Katie, Elaine Leopard, Rachel Allison,

that's not a word. That's barely got a vowel in it. Jules. Yeah. I can't shine a light on the origin of that. Vicky. Cheers, guys. Thank you guys so much.

We love you. It means so much to us. And yeah, et cetera, et cetera. Tune in immediately after this if you are a $5 up patron for Under the Duvet. Oh, yeah. We're going to talk about Kevin Spacey and his dick.

Shit, shit, shit. Yeah, we're right. We should have said this at the start. We're going to talk about all the people that have accused Kevin Spacey and died. Goodbye. Bye. Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America.

But when a social media-fueled fight over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudian Gay is now gone. We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On the Media. To listen, subscribe to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off,

fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Lainey Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite. Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton When missing.