00:00:06
[Music] when Harry was dring cattle she would spend days and days in bed unable to
00:00:15
speak the medication he was obtaining and applying to his wife was not designed to make her feel better but
00:00:23
perhaps to make her feel lost Harry wrapped her body in a doy and put her under a gap in the
00:00:31
floorboards Harry Jarvis was a totally unexceptional individual to look at he was very Brazen about the whole thing
00:00:40
you put your lover up in the shed in the garden just outside the window your wife
00:00:46
is Harry was determined to do what he did to get what he wanted out of it to do away with Carol and move on with Rita
00:00:56
that was all that Harry cared about just that worry in the back of your mind of is he dad or is he Harry the Killer
00:01:09
[Music] [Music] Carol Jarvis had been reported missing 2 days before she was found
00:01:38
dead initially the missing person's report had come in from Carol's children
00:01:44
to say that they hadn't seen their mom um for some time and their father had said to them
00:01:51
that she was away on resik here up in dunde when she disappeared he reaction was she's left the house she's
00:02:02
gone away is just utterly bizarre because she'd been bad ban for a significant
00:02:08
amount of time decided to form the police just to report a Miss person the police visited the house just
00:02:18
to establish what what had went on a body was then discovered I remember hearing on the
00:02:30
news that a body had been found in a house in Bathgate which was the area that my practice was based in West
00:02:40
lodan I was interested to know what was going to happen with the people who have
00:02:46
been charged with murder the police in Bathgate had discovered caros remains under the uh
00:02:55
floorboards in the high there were clear signs there was a body that had become a deposition site
00:03:04
thoughts very quickly from the police turned to there's only one suspect in this case and it's her
00:03:14
husband there was a very tragic case but from the perspective of those working as
00:03:20
lawyers in the case it was totally unique the background to the death of Harry Jarvis's wife
00:03:30
was bizarre he was very Brazen about the whole thing Clover up in the shed in the
00:03:39
garden just outside the window your wife is this looked like on the surface potentially quite a well planned
00:03:50
murder but actually there were so many issues within Harry's plan for this you couldn't make it up I don't
00:04:00
think he was particularly clever he had some degree of intelligence but he did a number of very
00:04:09
foolish [Music] things whole setup at the house was bizarre Harry Jarvis and his wife Carol
00:04:26
had four children Graham is the youngest son this one yes Mom and Dad always are very
00:04:37
young dad looks really really young there mom's not wearing glasses or that's all right that must
00:04:43
been one when they were growing up to but she looks happy Graham was told his father was
00:04:54
probably her killer and he was nowhere to be seen if your spouse is just been found dead in the floor space in your
00:05:02
house your natural reaction as a grieving spouse would be to stay to help the police with their inquiries to
00:05:10
support the children to plan the funeral so the fact that he absconded and was nowhere to be seen would have
00:05:16
immediately raised suspicions how can you see that somebody is going to do that unless if bu in an
00:05:23
act or they've got a gun then you can't suspect that somebody's going to just
00:05:29
hat your plan to kill somebody or do it SP of the moment you can't foresee that
00:05:34
at all it's going to be really tough for anyone who loses a parent to something
00:05:42
as violent as a murder but even more so when the person who took their life is their other
00:05:50
parent there's going to be a real conflict there between Still Loving a parent as most people do and hating them
00:05:58
for what they've done [Music] Harry Jarvis met his future wife Carol in the late 1970s when he was living in
00:06:10
South London and working as a bus driver I believed in met just by Mom working in the the shoe shop and then
00:06:20
just Dad asking her asking it out on a date mom was 18 dad was 30s or 12 year difference people might say that's a big
00:06:32
gap but sometimes there's a connection or whatever it may be it might just be
00:06:38
it by 1982 Carol and Harry Jarvis were married and the couple went on to have four children together I just thought M
00:06:48
and dad were happy as a couple you know they AR gooded like any other couple would and you know money or life worries
00:06:56
but for me yeah they were just a general normal happy Mom and Dad [Music] couple in the early 1990s the Jarvis
00:07:08
family moved over 400 m away from London settling in the west loan town of Bathgate in
00:07:20
Scotland I see done this house a lot of the childhood memories and friend and Neighbors
00:07:27
[Music] and even to family gatherings that happened in in that house she would be the the first one up
00:07:38
dancing or trying to cheer you up and yeah generally quite quite a bit doy and but really um sort of live Lively
00:07:48
character when you wanted to be it was just a mom that was there for you her main sort of life was centered
00:07:57
around the kids and you know the kids extra activities such as the brownies the guides on the off chance he did have a
00:08:05
cup of tea with a friend that would be from a friends across the road the house or or next to her neighbor so generally
00:08:12
just a very very quiet life centered around the four kids har was left to deal with the the
00:08:23
DAT running of the house and the children and she had to see to everybody's needs because Harry was you
00:08:29
know in and out of prison all the [Music] time probably about 97 98 maybe I remember visiting him in sockt so he was
00:08:40
in jail then for whatever reason again I not sure what was if he was in prison mom had the kids and so it was left to
00:08:51
to bring us up Harry was a petty criminal regularly committing low-level crimes such as
00:08:59
deception minor fraud and shoplifting after the London buses dad never really had a permanent sort of
00:09:12
career a permanent job to hold down he did try at times to hold down lawful employment and did try and become fairly
00:09:23
decent person but it wasn't long before he would be enticed back in into breaking
00:09:30
the law again anytime he was in prison or every time he done a disappear AC he came back
00:09:38
it was just normal nothing changed there was never any talk about like sort of mom and dad splitting up
00:09:45
or any changes or at all it would just went back to Everyday [Music] Life when Harry Jarvis was out of prison
00:09:57
there were still times when he would go missing from the family home without warning that just did disappear you know
00:10:06
right from when I was a young kid right up until you know the the last sort of days of of seeing him he would go
00:10:14
anywhere from the local pub to ending up at his brothers down south to you know just no no explanation given at
00:10:24
all for the family the difficulties occurred when Harry was out of of prison but would just then disappear for
00:10:31
periods of time which would cause Carol real anxiety it just became the norm whereby
00:10:39
it was like oh you know we used to come home and Dad wasn't there and then sort
00:10:43
of mom would be are we bit [Music] upset that level of anxiety no matter how hard she tried to Shield her
00:10:57
children from it would have been imp almost impossible because they would have picked up on mom's not okay and
00:11:03
Dad's missing and that would have caused some level of uncertainty and instability within the family
00:11:11
[Music] fold it was almost like Mom was fending for herself and looking after the four
00:11:18
of us and that's when it kind of began to spiral out of control seeing their mom treated in that
00:11:26
way would have had a massive impact on on them family children are supposed to be
00:11:32
protected whereas they will have felt quite protective of their mother because of Harry's
00:11:39
Behavior Dad could do a lot of stuff and they used to fight like C dog but I don't think anybody could ever turn and
00:11:47
go my my dad's got it and him to kill somebody Bathgate in Scotland was the Jarvis's family home for 18 years
00:12:02
bate used to be home where it grew up really so know the streets like the back in my
00:12:13
hand basy is a very average Scottish town with a very close-nit Community most likely the locals would
00:12:22
say nothing exit never happens here sometimes right by when in B gate just to drive by or just out the house
00:12:32
just for a couple minutes just as a we sort of memory to M I'm still thinking about her
00:12:40
and let me get on with my day and and life really he felt quite resentful that he
00:12:49
had a wife and children he lived very much a Playboy lifestyle um but didn't really have the
00:12:58
cash to do so so that's where you know he would fleece Carol and any other woman who had the misfortune to meet
00:13:08
him Carol was aware that Harry had lots of other relationships outside of the marriage and I think she tolerated that
00:13:18
because for her her Central narrative was to get him back Carol Jarvis had been battling ill
00:13:27
health and soon after moving to Bathgate was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and muscle
00:13:36
degeneration at that time Graham had just turned 13 initially mom used to just be tired
00:13:45
and fatigued and used to sort of stay in bed a little bit and used to sort of complain about having s muscles so
00:13:55
that's my first memory of it being I feel in terms of not not being able to get out as bed as
00:14:03
much as Carol's Health deteriorated further Harry Jarvis became his wife's
00:14:10
carer I don't think Harry was a particularly caring individual would have relished the idea of having to care
00:14:17
for Carol but actually he probably saw that as a bit of an excuse not to have a job not to have to go to work every day
00:14:25
and he saw it as an opportunity for financial gain as well because he used her money that she got
00:14:32
to support him with having a disability for his own gain going out to the PO B in he didn't think anything of just
00:14:41
leaving Carol and the kids for weeks and weeks and weeks at a time he was somebody who liked things to
00:14:50
go his way anybody who came into his sphere was used and manipulated by him Carol would take to bed particularly if
00:15:05
she was having a depressive episode he would maybe play the attentive husband for a while but
00:15:12
quickly got very bored of that he would do his usual Disappearing Acts for quite
00:15:17
a long time come backwards and [Music] forwards cattle absolutely adored Harry he was able to read all his way back in
00:15:32
and charm her looking back at it now I think to myself how did she manage to do that all
00:15:41
you know I sort of got the the kids now and life's life's a struggle so and yeah
00:15:48
Fair Point Fair Point M she was um one of our [Music] kind as they became adults
00:15:59
Graham and his siblings each moved away from the family home I left when I was 16 I went to stay with my friend through
00:16:10
college and then uni obviously in ter time or at the weekends I used to go back so I was like sort of back and
00:16:21
forth Harry Jarvis was now living alone in the house with his wife Carol har Jarvis was involved in procuring the
00:16:31
medication for Carol Jarvis there were circumstances attached to that which would have indicated that he wasn't
00:16:38
perhaps acting in her best interests there was an indication that the medication he was obtaining and
00:16:46
applying to his wife was not designed to make her feel better but perhaps to make her feel
00:16:55
worse every time I went around everything was Nor in terms of dad was there and mom was
00:17:03
there there was nothing sort of f towards when Harry was dring Carle she would spend days and days in bed unable
00:17:13
to speak she was very Dy she would sleep most of the time the children would pop
00:17:18
in and out she was incapable of holding conversation and purely because Harry was drugging
00:17:26
her when he used to disappear and then we used to try and sort of take over or help out the care between the siblings
00:17:36
mom used to p cup and we noticed a a sort of difference when he wasn't there
00:17:42
to when he was there the fact that she was up and down could have been put down to something
00:17:49
like fibromyalgia rather than the direct correlation of her improving when Harry
00:17:54
was away versus worsening when he was around conversations between me and the sister
00:18:02
or brothers was almost like oh like you know why is it that you know when when Dad's away then like she's up and about
00:18:14
and not even questioning it just sort of like oh wow mom's mom's actually up
00:18:19
she's doing stuff people who use poison or drugs to subdue a person for their own gain or to
00:18:30
ultimately murder somebody as Harry did they're very weak individuals it's
00:18:36
something that can be done quietly almost with minimal force and effort drugging somebody makes them
00:18:44
easier to look after I feel like you never thought or wait a minute here like eventually
00:18:52
that's going to kill her and that's that's a tough one on September 11th 2009 Graham
00:19:02
unexpectedly bumped into his dad Harry in Bathgate Town Center the Friday I seen him at the market he looked a bit
00:19:10
Dazed and Confused as for a couple of pound um never thought anything of it I actually asked him like where's mom and
00:19:19
you said she's in the house sleeping gram noticed a woman trailing behind Harry unbeknownst to him this was
00:19:27
his father's latest lover I didn't link the two of them together but for
00:19:34
whatever reason that memory still comes back to me like how do I how did I remember like a to stranger to of behind
00:19:42
dad like was she that close to him Graham told his eldest brother Kevin about their dad's strange Behavior at
00:19:51
the market so Kevin headed to the family home to check on his parents his mom was nowhere to be seen
00:20:01
and Harry was being evasive about her whereabouts this was so out of the ordinary that Carol would disappear
00:20:09
without telling her children where she was [Music] going just wanted to to find out where
00:20:17
Mom was you know in terms of um making sure she was all right and yeah just something didn't add
00:20:26
up the children of Harry and Carl Jarvis came to the house and Harry Jarvis seemed to do all he
00:20:37
could to prevent them entering the house it was complete manipulation by Hari Jarvis just to keep them out of his
00:20:53
way he gave us some story about he was moving to dund with Mom and she was up in
00:21:02
dunde Graham decided to call the police the police turned up to the house to see if they could establish
00:21:11
Carol's whereabout when police entered the property they found a woman in Carol's
00:21:17
bed who was not Carol despite what she was claiming now fortunately one of the officers had previously met Carol so
00:21:24
realized that this was not Carol Jarvis it would have been at that point where there's a strange woman in the bed Carol
00:21:34
is missing this is really going to raise alarm balls for Polie the mystery person
00:21:39
under the bed was a woman called Rita haser it become AAR that there was this person called
00:21:49
rer we had never really experienced R before and there was still no sign of Carol Jarvis
00:21:59
the police you know said to us that you know that Mom was an adult and there's
00:22:03
nothing they could do for 24 hours I had no idea what was coming the police in Bathgate had
00:22:14
discovered car's remains under the uh [Music] floorboards Carol Jarvis had been
00:22:24
reported missing outside the the Jarvis family home Rita hter had been revealed as the
00:22:32
mystery woman found in the house there was another person in the house that Dad had claimed to be
00:22:43
mom on the night we had no idea as who she would be when Graham saw the woman he immediately recognized her she was
00:22:52
the woman he'd seen with his dad just before Carol's disappearance he was in the
00:23:03
market I remember her trailing behind him for some bizarre reason had a suitcase and again I didn't link the two
00:23:13
of them together but for whatever reason that memory still comes back to me Harry met rer hter in 2008 on the
00:23:26
internet and uh immediately hit it off and of course when R told him who her family
00:23:34
was very well known very famous very wealthy Bakers he immediately decided that she
00:23:42
was going to be his next partner purely for uh financial gain we're talking millions of pounds that's the big
00:23:52
attraction for Harry reers money he's a very manipulative individual he was a
00:24:01
liar and he I think showed narcissistic Tendencies he cared about nobody else really other than
00:24:12
Harry Jarvis Rita was an ays and a lot is made about the fact that she was in this
00:24:20
position but financially she was actually in quite a dire situation she'd lost her house um she'd squandered her
00:24:29
Fortune so it's almost like he's the protector in this role and Carol's the
00:24:34
enemy that needs to be removed so him and R can be together and he can save her you've got Harry at the center of
00:24:45
this family picture with everyone else orbiting around him almost like objects in his
00:24:53
game and he's moving the pieces absolutely horrendous [Music] initially the missing person's report
00:25:07
had come in from car's children to say that they hadn't seen their mom for some
00:25:15
time you're probably just thinking where's mom you know as he as he left
00:25:20
her somewhere or in a hotel or or they sent her to the shops and I'm not not
00:25:27
too sure but yeah yeah you don't think off the the worst case scenario police said that they would
00:25:35
conduct a further search to try and assertain uh where Carol dvis was after 24 hours Carol was still missing police
00:25:46
return to the Jarvis's house Harry and Rita Haster were no longer there they said I we'll go around to the
00:25:57
house to see if she's got a bus pass or purse or bag um if they've any like
00:26:03
recent photos of her so they can log it the police did discover something unusual in the garden
00:26:15
shed Rita hter had been living in the shed so you've got a mislim woman who was very unwell you've got a missing
00:26:25
husband who has just appeared and then they found someone's actually been living in the shed this is a very very
00:26:34
absurd situation are the conditions there dirty grubby basic for anyone to live in those
00:26:45
squalid conditions was a great surprise to me the shed in the garden was a very basic 6x6 garden
00:26:55
shed there was a tiny window in and R lived in the garden in the shed which basically just had a single
00:27:04
mattress and a blanket no toilet facilities existed there were improvised facilities in the form of a
00:27:16
bucket and that was about it the shed was right outside the windows of the house it wasn't far away
00:27:26
only a matter of feet and really the shed was so close to the house that it surprised me that that's exactly what it
00:27:39
was Harry may have been incredibly good at finding victims who were susceptible to
00:27:47
his charms you can see that with the relationship with Rita you know persuading her to live in the
00:27:56
shed if you find find the right target a person can be very Charmed and hopeful we didn't really know anything
00:28:06
about it until the Monday night it was almost like this this R woman the lover that was hiding in the
00:28:17
shed Biz I have no reason to believe that she was there under any Jess I do think she was there from the
00:28:33
evidence under the manipulative aspects of Harry Jarvis's character and he persuaded her to to go
00:28:41
there I'm not saying that was against her will but I'm sure that this was his
00:28:48
initiative and that this is what he wanted Rita's residence in the shed was unfortunately not the only Discovery the
00:29:03
police made at the Jarvis house when the police came around they said look listen you know we we found I
00:29:14
found a body in the house and um yeah we knew that that would be mom if you're looking for a person and
00:29:24
they find the body a good chance it's not going to be some else up what had been a missing person case
00:29:35
was now a homicide investigation Harry was determined to do what he did to get what he wanted out of
00:29:43
it which was to do away with Carol and move on with Rita that was all that Harry cared
00:29:52
about for Graham what he's caring about is a lot bigger just like just got rening You' you've almost prepared for
00:30:04
yourself for two days that you know something bad's happened and you're kind of stopping yourself
00:30:12
from thinking the wor nobody knows exactly when Carol Daris died but sometime between sep
00:30:27
nember 11th and September the 15th 2009 the police in Bathgate had discovered car's remains
00:30:37
under the uh floorboards in the KN apparently the children used to play in that exact
00:30:46
spot there was two basement the real one in the living room is where they founder we used to go down there as kids
00:30:55
and quite like hide and seek I used to have a mini kid snooker table down there and
00:31:01
[Music] stuff hearing that from the police again just makes you sick was just horrific just horrendous man like I was
00:31:19
sick harrie was so blinded by his obsession with Rita he just wasn't thinking about consequences or next
00:31:26
steps he wanted to be with Rita he saw that Carol was in the way of that therefore removed Carol and he's
00:31:36
free to be with r that's probably about as sophisticated as it got Carol's husband Harry Jarvis had
00:31:46
last been seen in the house the day before with Rita hter police needed to find the couple
00:31:54
urgently I'd got a text message from a police contact who said that there had been a
00:32:06
body found in a house in Bathgate it became very apparent very quickly that they had a suspect close to
00:32:16
home for this the police basically said to us listen we trying to find a dad we don't
00:32:23
know where he is just that sort of worry in the back of your mind of to wait a minute here like is he is he dad or is
00:32:35
he har the killer I can't believe that he could have been a killer or was a killer
00:32:45
and still sit here in disbelief that that that [Music] happened Harry and Rita were on the Run
00:32:59
with Carol found dead in the basement and evidence that Rita had been living in the shed for some
00:33:05
time they were both now Prime suspects for Carol's [Music] murder Harry and R spent the night in a
00:33:16
B&B and the next morning they disappeared without paying the owners of the B&B phoned the
00:33:23
police and gave a description of the people that had uh just left without paying police Tracked Down the couple
00:33:31
the day after Carol's body was discovered arresting them as they got off a bus in
00:33:38
Edinburgh both were charged with murder they released him on Bale and they were still the court process to go
00:33:46
through it was almost like you he was still dead and I think the four of us spoke and was like we're just going to
00:33:54
need to try and help him somehow giving him like sort of a jacket or money to go and and stay somewhere you
00:34:03
didn't think it was possible it was almost that moral compass of like mom would want us
00:34:13
to help him out I can sense that kind of tension that struggle between my dad and this
00:34:23
murderer and I think that tension is always present for for for Graham he works really hard to find a way to deal
00:34:32
with that internal conflict which at times can be very difficult for him as the details of the case started
00:34:45
to emerge and the horror in which Carol had died and the circumstances under which she had
00:34:52
died people couldn't believe it you know how could this happen right under their
00:34:56
noses after police had found Carol's body love letters that Harry Jarvis had
00:35:02
sent to Rita were discovered in the house Harry shows that he had every intention of killing Carol because of
00:35:11
the content of the letters that he sent Rita that in and of itself is very juvenile one said the drugs are doing
00:35:22
the job just took longer than I thought but going fast now another claimed Carol is dying as I
00:35:31
write then we have the house to ourselves and sell all in it to move on dangerous times but we will get
00:35:40
there we can see Harry's intention with the letters that he was writing to Rita there is definitely premeditated
00:35:49
Behavior at play here so this wasn't a crime of passion this was a crime of planning
00:36:01
Harry's trial began on January 31st 2011 he pleaded not guilty and the true horrors of the crime played out in
00:36:17
court there was no established cause of death but the circumstances pointed to Harry having a major involvement in the
00:36:26
deterioration of her health creating a set of circumstances with the administration of
00:36:34
medication or maladministration of medication which contributed to that Harry was already drugging
00:36:43
Carol he anticipated that he would be able to uh get rid of her fairly quickly after Carol passed away Harry
00:36:54
wrapped her body in a Duvy and and put her under um a gap in the floorboard and he told the police that
00:37:06
he'd put Carol there to keep her close to him and me he tried to claim that Carol had died from natural
00:37:14
causes hiding her in the way that he did and saying she died in natural causes just shows a real lack of
00:37:24
remorse car was identified through d DNA from her fingertips because there had been such a decomposition of the
00:37:32
body the postmortem could not show any cause of death and how Harry did it har Jarvis wrote notes which were
00:37:45
producing evidence and the prosecution relies on those notes they were crucial to the prosecution case to show some
00:37:54
degree of evil intent on his part and some intention to act to the detriment of his wife's health and as the
00:38:02
prosecution argued his intention was to kill [Music] her the jury concluded that all the
00:38:16
evidence was such that a clear inference could be drawn Beyond reasonable doubt that Harry was responsible for her death
00:38:29
Harry Jarvis was eventually convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment even after the verdict
00:38:40
Harry remained silent about the murder we'll never know as what happened what made him do it or how he done it if
00:38:52
he stabbed her or shot her then that's like clean cut but it was never Cas of
00:38:59
it was clean cut as to what had happened Graham as an adult has to come to terms with his father murdered his
00:39:11
mother and buried her body in the house that his father had a mistress living in
00:39:20
the shed and had planned to get rid of Carol and run off with Rita that his father was basically a
00:39:29
criminal hidden in plain sight and this is the person you call Dad this would be mindblowing for Graham
00:39:40
to wrap his head around all these multiple narratives about this one man this is my dad I loved him as a child
00:39:49
and these are the things that he did as a result of his behavior Peter hter instructed
00:39:57
a member of my firm who constructed me as solicor Advocate to defend her for the charge of
00:40:04
murder 5 months later on June 15th Rita Haster stood trial at Edinburgh High Court charged with murder and attempting
00:40:14
to defeat the ends of Justice DNA identified as being that of Rita hter was found at the edge of the
00:40:24
trap door leading down to the sell area below the living room where the body of Carl Jarvis had found that doesn't
00:40:33
necessarily mean that R hter was there but it did link her physically to the premises and to the vicinity where the
00:40:42
body was found by the finding of a DNA in the house together with all the other circumstances led the jury to convict
00:40:52
her of the charge of attempting to defeat the ends of justice and she was sentenced to 4 and
00:40:58
1/2 years imprisonment for that but of course the murder charge did not apply to
00:41:06
her in 2017 6 years into his life sentence 67-year-old Harry Jarvis died in prison
00:41:16
of heart failure Graeme and his siblings would have felt this huge loss with their
00:41:25
mother but also with their father so there will be lots of complex feelings here and and trying to figure
00:41:34
out that relationship and where it stands after that point Harry dying in prison might not have brought closure to
00:41:40
his family because he didn't serve much of his [Music] [Music] sentence because you've lost both of
00:41:56
them you're not really angry you're more sad at the overall situation all did get on top of me and
00:42:04
then I done some mental health therapy stuff C CBT and that um which which which
00:42:17
helped still have you know I still have the old Nightmare and that about the the
00:42:24
basement in the floor and don't no better we get rid of it at [Music] all life goes on eh
00:42:44
[Music] [Music] [Music]