Murder of Becky Watts

Becky Watts
Born	Rebecca Marie Watts 3 June 1998 Bristol, England
Disappeared	19 February 2015
Died	19 February 2015(2015-02-19) (aged 16) Bristol, England
Cause of death	Murder by suffocation
Occupation	Student
Parent(s)	Tanya Watts and Darren Galsworthy

Rebecca Marie "Becky" Watts (3 June 1998 – 19 February 2015) was a 16-year-old student from Crown Hill in the St. George area of Bristol, England, who went missing on 19 February 2015 and whose dismembered body was found on 3 March in Barton Court.

In November 2015, Watts' stepbrother, Nathan Matthews, was found guilty of her murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum of 33 years; Matthews' girlfriend, Shauna Hoare, was found guilty of her manslaughter and sentenced to 17 years. Both were also convicted of conspiracy to kidnap Watts, preventing a lawful burial by dismembering and hiding her body, perverting the course of justice, and possession of two stun guns.

Investigation

Following a highly publicised appeal for information on her whereabouts and intensive police enquiries, body parts believed to be Watts' remains were discovered on 3 March 2015, in a house at Barton Court in the Barton Hill area of Bristol.

Several people were arrested in connection with her murder, and for perverting the course of justice. On 4 March, Watts' stepbrother Nathan Matthews was charged with her murder. On 6 March, four other people were charged with assisting an offender, having been accused of helping to hide or dispose of Watts' body parts. A fifth person, a 23-year-old man who was also arrested on 2 March, was released without charge. On 22 June, Matthews' girlfriend 21-year-old Shauna Hoare, who was originally charged with perverting the course of justice, was also charged with murder. Matthews and Hoare were also charged with conspiracy to kidnap, preventing lawful burial and possession of an illegal weapon. The pair were also charged with four counts of making indecent images of children, although these were unrelated to Watts' murder. Matthews was also charged with sexual assault and voyeurism, which also were unrelated to Watts' murder.

Trial, verdicts and sentences

The murder trial began on 6 October 2015 at Bristol Crown Court. It was the prosecution's case that Watts was suffocated in her bedroom during an alleged "sexually-motivated" kidnap plot carried out by Nathan Matthews and Shauna Hoare. Matthews admitted killing Watts, but denied committing murder. He instead claimed manslaughter, telling the court that he had tried to kidnap Watts as a way of scaring her into changing what he perceived as her bad behaviour, but the plan went wrong and he accidentally killed her. Hoare, who also denied murder, said she had no knowledge of or involvement in Watts' death, describing messages she had exchanged with Matthews about kidnapping schoolgirls in the months beforehand as just "unfortunate" and "sarcastic".

On 11 November 2015, however, a jury rejected their accounts, finding Matthews guilty of murder and Hoare guilty of manslaughter. Both were also convicted of conspiracy to kidnap Watts, perverting the course of justice, preventing a lawful burial by dismembering and hiding her body, and possession of two stun guns. Two men, James Ireland and Donovan Demetrius, were cleared of assisting an offender, which related to the moving and storing of packages containing Watts' body parts. Donovan's brother Karl Demetrius and his girlfriend Jaydene Parsons had admitted the same charge at an earlier pre-trial hearing, though both insisted they did not know the true contents of the packages.

On 13 November 2015, Mr Justice Dingemans sentenced Matthews to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 33 years and Hoare to 17 years in prison. In his sentencing remarks, the judge agreed with the prosecution's belief that the planned kidnap was for a "sexual purpose", telling Matthews he had "a fixation with having sex with petite teenage girls" and that he believed Hoare had been "persuaded to participate in this fixation."

The judge began to sob as he neared the conclusion of his sentencing remarks. He said: "Finally I should like to pay public tribute to the family of Becky for the dignified way in which they have conducted themselves throughout these proceedings" and then continued: "Hearing the evidence during the trial has been difficult for anyone but it is plain that it has been an immense burden for the family." There were tears in his eyes and he left the court quickly.

On 5 February 2016, Demetrius and Parsons were sentenced after admitting assisting an offender. Demetrius was sentenced to two years imprisonment while Parsons was given a 16 month prison sentence.

Post-trial events

Watts' father, Darren Galsworthy, has released a memoir which talks about his daughter's life, her murder and the subsequent criminal trial. Titled Becky: The Heartbreaking Story of Becky Watts, it was published by Harper Collins in March 2016.

In February 2016, a wooden bench was unveiled in her memory, located at Goat's Field close to her home in Bristol. The bench was carved by Andy O'Neill and funded by the Neighbourhood Watch Partnership.