My daughter's killer stole my life

It is almost 16 years since playmates Nicola Fellows and Karen Hadaway were abducted, sexually assaulted and murdered. The girls' disappearance lead to a frantic police hunt before their bodies were found within screaming distance of their homes.

For the first time in more than a decade, Nicola's mother has broken her silence.

"One minute she was in the garden, playing with friends, and the next she was gone."

Late in the afternoon of October 9, 1986, Susan Eismann watched through the window of her Brighton home as her nine-year-old daughter, Nicola Fellows, played in the garden with her ten-year-old friend, Karen Hadaway.

That image is etched in her memory because it was the last time Susan saw her little girl alive.

Her attention had been diverted from the window for a matter of seconds and when she turned back the two girls had vanished.

Knowing Nicola would not even cross the road, let alone run away, she and Karen's mum, Michelle, formed a search party, calling at the houses of friends and scouring every garden nearby.

They even began searching Wild Park, near to their Moulsecoomb homes, but a heavy mist came down, shrouding their vision, and they turned back to let the police take over.

Their worst suspicions became reality when, just after 4pm the next day, the bodies of two young girls were found in woodland in Wild Park. Nicola and Karen had been sexually assaulted and strangled.

When Susan was told, the awful truth was too much to bear and she passed out before having to be heavily sedated.

Susan, who now lives in Whitehawk, said: "My son Jonathan had formed a search party with his friends and they were up at Wild Park when they heard.

"He came back home and said the girls had been found. I asked if they were fine and a police officer explained they were dead.

"I blanked out. I must have fainted. Afterwards I had to be sedated because I just couldn't cope. My husband at the time, and Nicola's father, Barry, went to pieces. The whole family did.

"We couldn't believe it had happened and thought the police must have made a terrible mistake."

Susan still has difficulty accepting her daughter's death. She often refers to Nicola in the present tense and is haunted by thoughts of what she would be doing if she was alive now.

She said: "Sometimes I ask why it had to happen. I go to my bedroom and I think she should be here and I wonder whether she would be married or have kids of her own.

"I imagine her nagging me to babysit them or I wonder what marks she would be getting in her school exams. I've been robbed of those times.

"You never get over it. It doesn't get any easier because I can't help thinking what she'd be doing if she was here now.

"The person who did this has taken my life and my happiness away from me."

The shock waves of Nicola's death created a ripple of heartache through Susan's family, which she believes will never be calm until her daughter's killer is brought to justice.

Roofer Russell Bishop, now serving life for the sexual assault and attempted murder of a seven-year-old Brighton girl, was tried and acquitted of the Babes in the Woods murders.

When he was cleared, Susan, her husband Barry Fellows and their 15-year-old son Jonathan decided to start a new life in London.

But Susan felt she had left part of her family behind. The couple began to blame each other about the circumstances leading to Nicola's death and the unimaginable stress left their relationship in tatters.

After almost 25 years of marriage, the couple divorced.

Susan, now 52 and a school cleaner, said: "About six years after Nicky's death I split up with Barry. We had moved to London but I wasn't settled there. I wasn't settled anywhere any more.

"I felt like I had left a part of me in Brighton and came back to visit Nicky's grave as often as I could.

"Barry and I kept arguing about there being no justice for our daughter. We were leading separate lives under the same roof.

"We blamed each other for what had happened. Nobody can survive that sort of pressure."

She has since remarried, a school caretaker called Peter but the memory of what happened to her "cheeky, outspoken" daughter continues to torment her.

On good days, she is able to conjure up happy memories of Nicola, to replace the tortured thoughts of her murder.

Susan said: "I remember her cheeky ways. She would stand up to people.

"When she was little she used to pack up her bag after a row and say she was running away. She'd only walk around the block and then she'd be back again.

"When someone would say 'I thought you were running away', she would say she wasn't allowed to cross the road on her own.

"I remember when she was eight, she was a princess at Moulsecoomb carnival. She was very excited about it and was all dressed up with a crown. She used to want to be a princess when she grew up.

"Once she decided she wanted to be a nurse. I'd been in hospital having an operation and she went off with one of the nurses. When she came back she had one of their hats on.

"Two weeks before she died she went on her first holiday. She only went to London to visit her aunt but she was so excited about it. She didn't have a care in the world.

"Then I think about the last time I saw her. I was indoors and she was playing. One minute she was there and the next she was gone."

Despite splitting up from Barry, Susan has remained in contact with him and his family have been a tower of strength for her.

Barry's brother Nigel, a driver from Whitehawk, and another brother, Ian, have started a campaign to demand the Government changes the law on the sentencing of paedophiles and child murderers.

Nigel, who has five children and two grandchildren, is almost obsessional in his determination to fight for justice for his niece.

He said: "What happened to her sends a shiver down my spine and it is that that keeps me campaigning.

"The whole family went through hatred, revenge and all the grief you go through when you finally accept she isn't going to be with you any more.

"It is like multiplying your worse case scenario by 1,000. People tell you it will get easier but it doesn't. We just try to cope in any way we can.

"I'm very strict with my own children now. I make them come home at certain times and if they're a minute late I come down on them like a ton of bricks.

"My daughter is 15 but I still make her come home by 9.30pm. I'm overprotective towards my children now."

Nigel's own marriage broke down because he said a day does not go by when he does not think about what happened to Nicola.

Along with Ian, who lives in South Wales, Nigel wants the death penalty to be brought back. They began the campaign on the day the bodies of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman were found in a ditch in Suffolk.

The brothers, backed by Susan, are taking their campaign nationwide and asking others to start their own petitions.

They want some action to protect children, whether it be the death penalty for child sex killers, life sentences to mean life or greater protection for children.

They feel the Government should hold a referendum to establish public opinion.

Nigel said: "When Holly and Jessica's bodies were found it brought back the nightmare for us.

"It was like reliving the horror of what happened with Nicky and Karen 16 years ago. We only had 24 hours to wait before police found their bodies but Jessica and Holly's parents had a much longer nightmare.

"They must have gone through pure hell.

"If we could offer them any advice it is just to take each day as it comes."

Nigel, 48, is organising a walk in memory of murdered children everywhere, from Churchill Square to Wild Park, to take place in October.

He said: "Something has to be done to stop this. We want the death penalty brought back to act as a deterrent to child killers and because they deserve to die.

"The phrase that I have adopted as part of this campaign is 'if you do nothing, nothing will get done'."

To contact Nigel about the campaign, Our Simple Aims (Protection of Children), call 01273 242459.