00:00:03
NARRATOR: 2013, Crown
Hill, Bristol, England. It was Angie and
Darren's big day.
00:00:11
After four years together,
they were making it official, celebrating with their
newly blended family.
00:00:18
GEOFFREY WANSELL:
The most chilling picture of this wedding is
forever imprinted on my mind.
00:00:25
There is Nathan Matthews,
dressed up for the wedding. NARRATOR: The bridesmaids
were Matthew's
00:00:31
girlfriend, Shauna Hoare, and
his stepsister, Becky Watts. KERRI NIXON: The stepsister
that he's had an obsession with
00:00:39
but also hates is now 16. NARRATOR: Matthews controlled
his girlfriend Shauna, and together they
wanted to control Becky.
00:00:48
I knew they didn't
particularly like each other. I wouldn't say they
hated each other.
00:00:53
NARRATOR: Matthews wanted
to teach Becky a lesson. Obviously I didn't want
that to be read to someone.
00:01:02
[sobbing] NARRATOR: That lesson led
to murder and much worse. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Matthews
quite coolly and calmly
00:01:12
purchases a circular saw,
which he then uses to dismember his stepsisters body. He cuts it into eight pieces.
00:01:20
NARRATOR: Nathan Matthews
was a callous, cruel man with a deviant fascination
for teenage girls.
00:01:27
Consumed with jealousy and lust,
he brutally took Becky's life and destroyed his
family, making Nathan
00:01:34
Matthews one of the
world's most evil killers. [theme music] On the morning of Thursday
the 19th of February,
00:02:05
2015, 16-year-old Becky
Watts was home alone. Her stepmom Anjie had gone
to a hospital appointment.
00:02:15
It wasn't unusual for her
stepbrother Nathan Matthews and his girlfriend
Shauna Hoare to drop in
00:02:22
with their young child, even
though Becky and Nathan weren't always the best of friends.
00:02:27
COURTNEY BICKER: I don't
know if Nathan hated Becky, but I know he had resentment
towards her and jealousy.
00:02:36
And particularly, I feel like
he must have been jealous of Becky's relationship
with his mother
00:02:43
because they were very close. NARRATOR: Matthews and Hoare had
carefully planned for this day.
00:02:49
Matthews went upstairs
to Becky's room, and she was never
seen alive again. For 12 long days,
only the couple
00:02:57
knew what they'd done to Becky. Her family and the
community believe she was missing, and
clung to the hope
00:03:04
that she was still alive. JULIAN DRUKER: Obviously all
of these people searching
00:03:09
for Becky didn't know her, but
they knew lots of teenagers like her. She was someone they were
so desperately hoping
00:03:17
would return home, and
this girl they knew was the angel of Bristol. Everybody was praying for a
positive outcome to this story.
00:03:26
JOHN GLASWORTHY: We're not
giving up hope, anyway. Absolutely. This family won't
ever, ever do that.
00:03:31
We'll bring this to a conclusion
whatever way the ball bounces, you know. So we have to just continue
now strengthening each other.
00:03:40
GEOFFREY WANSELL: Becky
was just 16 years of age. It doesn't bear thinking
about what actually
00:03:45
happened to Becky Watts. We can't be sure. But we do know that
Becky was killed.
00:03:55
NARRATOR: This
killer story begins on the 9th of January, 1987. Nathan Charles Matthews
was born to his mother
00:04:04
Anjie and an unknown father. KERRI NIXON: Not
having his father in his life at all and no
mention about his father-- he
00:04:11
wasn't even on his
birth certificate-- so he would have had a sense
of, what's my identity?
00:04:16
Who am I? NARRATOR: As a child, Matthews
lived with his grandmother, only a few miles away
from his mom's home.
00:04:25
KERRI NIXON: The fact that
he lived so close to his mom but didn't live
with his mom would
00:04:29
have had an additional
impact of rejection. Yes, they were close,
but a young child
00:04:35
would be confused as to why
he didn't live with his mom like his friends in school would
have lived with their parents.
00:04:43
NARRATOR: From an
early age, Matthews was diagnosed with fibromyalgia,
a chronic condition which
00:04:50
causes pain all over the body. KERRI NIXON: His friends
report that he was in pain,
00:04:56
and as a consequence
of that, he suffered with depression and anxiety. And it had a profound impact on
how he saw himself apparently.
00:05:05
GEOFFREY WANSELL: It didn't
make for a comfortable, happy, settled child. He was a troubled boy.
00:05:16
KERRI NIXON: He felt almost
useless and weak and not as strong as his friends,
so that definitely
00:05:24
would have had an impact
on how he saw himself as a young man growing up. NARRATOR: By 1999,
Matthew's mom Anjie
00:05:33
was in a new relationship with
a man called Darren Goldsworthy. Darren had two young
children, one-year-old Becky
00:05:42
and her four-year-old brother. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Nathan grew
closer and closer to Darren.
00:05:48
They did things together. You know, the father that
Nathan had never really had.
00:05:53
NARRATOR: Darren's children
lived with their mother during the week, and
12-year-old Nathan stayed
00:05:59
at his grandmother's, but
the new blended family spent every weekend together. KERRI NIXON: Darren would
spend time with Matthews,
00:06:09
and they would, you know,
they'd fix cars together. They'd do things, and there was
lots of bonding between them.
00:06:14
So maybe this was something--
a positive, you know, change in his life. This could have been
something that he'd
00:06:20
always been searching for. NARRATOR: In January 2002,
when Darren was awarded custody
00:06:26
of his children,
Becky and her brother moved in with their
dad and Anjie. KERRI NIXON: Suddenly two
children arrive and move
00:06:35
in with his mom, and
move in with his mom that he hasn't lived with. So that must feel really
confusing and difficult
00:06:43
for a teenager to accept. That, hang on, mom. I've never lived with you,
but now two other children
00:06:51
move into your house? That could have generated
some anger inside him. And yes, it seems like they
got on quite well initially,
00:06:58
but I think there could have
been underneath some resentment there. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Nathan joined
the Army Training Corps, where
00:07:08
he learned some more
skills, and he also trained to become an electrician. So you have a young
man apparently growing
00:07:18
up in a conventional way. Darren, his stepfather,
paid for his driving lessons because he thought his son
should be able to drive,
00:07:28
and indeed, eventually,
he bought him a car. It was an act of remarkable
generosity and indicative
00:07:36
of the closeness of
their relationship. But what Darren
didn't reckon with was that there was a completely
separate side to Nathan.
00:07:49
JULIAN DRUKER: We know
that Nathan Matthews had an unhealthy interest
in the most extreme types
00:07:55
of pornography, kidnappings,
and rapes, and really, really graphic material
that he would look
00:08:03
at on an almost daily basis. KERRI NIXON: The effects
of extreme pornography is really quite damaging.
00:08:10
What it does is it desensitizes
the young male brain. When they are watching such
extreme sexual content,
00:08:21
it makes them fantasize
about extreme sexual content, and it makes them seek
out sexual behavior
00:08:29
that isn't normal. And we can see
the things that he was addicted to wasn't what
the average teenage boy is
00:08:36
addicted to. It wasn't just pornography. It was borderline legal. He was looking at teen
sex, very young teen sex,
00:08:46
girls dressed in school uniform. There was explicit and worrying
sexual content in the things
00:08:54
that he was looking at. NARRATOR: He had his
first serious girlfriend at the age of 18.
00:09:03
After a couple of
months, she ended their relationship, claiming
Matthews was abusive
00:09:08
and controlling. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: We see that
he has a lot of difficulty when relationships come to an end.
00:09:16
He doesn't want to accept it
that his ex-girlfriend reports some quite troubling
behavior from him
00:09:23
after that relationship
broke down. He would show up at her house. He wasn't prepared
to let her go.
00:09:29
So we've got some really
significant issues here. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Not that long
afterwards, at the age of 19,
00:09:37
Nathan turned up at the
family house in his car with four young girls,
all aged about 12.
00:09:45
Here's that fantasy playing
out again, young girls. Darren, the stepfather, sees
Nathan arrive with the girls,
00:09:55
goes out the house and
says, take them back home, wherever you found them. He won't let them in the door.
00:10:02
NARRATOR: In 2008,
at the age of 21, Matthews met 14-year-old
Shauna Hoare. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: She
was technically still
00:10:11
a child when she started
her relationship with him, and she does have quite
a troubled background.
00:10:17
She was moved from foster
care to foster care, different families. She never had a real sense
of stability and security
00:10:26
and continuity, and I think
when she meets Matthews, that opportunity is there. KERRI NIXON: So he is
going to be attracted
00:10:36
to the power, the control. It makes him feel like a
man when he hasn't felt like a man in his childhood.
00:10:42
So that would have been
really intoxicating for him that he had this
young girl looking up to him.
00:10:49
JULIAN DRUKER: A few
years after the start of their relationship, Shauna
was living in a hostel.
00:10:53
She broke the rules there
by allowing Nathan Matthews to come and live
with her, and that's
00:10:58
what they did for some time. But Nathan Matthews had
caused a rift between Shauna
00:11:03
and her mother,
and in fact, he'd told her mother
that she wouldn't see her daughter anymore.
00:11:08
GEOFFREY WANSELL: Shauna was
later to maintain that he totally took over her life.
00:11:12
He dominated her. Told her what she could
do, when she could do it, whether she could have
a cigarette or not.
00:11:17
But nevertheless, she
was to bear him a child. NARRATOR: The relationship
wasn't enough for Matthews.
00:11:24
He still harbored
dark, sexual desires, and he lured Shauna into them. GEOFFREY WANSELL: The
relationship between them
00:11:31
became more and more sexual, and
they would fantasize together, and they would text each other.
00:11:38
They would watch porn together,
and Nathan would urge her to find young girls for him.
00:11:46
NARRATOR: By 2011, 24-year-old
Nathan Matthews, his girlfriend Shauna Hoare, age 17,
and their young baby
00:11:56
had moved into their own
house in Barton Hill, not far from where
his mother Anjie was
00:12:02
living with Darrren, stepsister
Becky, and her brother in Crown Hill. JULIAN DRUKER: The relationship
between Matthews and Hoare
00:12:11
was turbulent. There were reports from her
that he was often violent towards her, but this was
an often stormy relationship
00:12:20
that they had. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Nathan
Matthews had instinctively found the ideal apprentice, the
person that would help him live
00:12:32
out his own fantasies,
and they were extremely explicit sexual fantasies. JULIAN DRUKER:
Hoare and Matthews
00:12:40
both had an interest
in teenage girls or girls younger than that. They would message each
other if they'd seen a girl
00:12:47
who they found attractive. We've seen texts where
she messaged him, saying she'd seen a
girl in the supermarket,
00:12:54
and they joked about kidnapping
her and bringing her home. So this was often the subject
of their conversations.
00:13:03
ELIZABETH YARDLEY: This is
yet more evidence of her wanting to be accepted by him.
00:13:08
She is prepared to say
anything, to do anything that will give her that acceptance.
00:13:13
She doesn't want to let
go of this relationship, no matter how dysfunctional
it is because it
00:13:19
gives her a sense of belonging. It gives her a
sense of identity, and that's something
she hasn't had before.
00:13:25
NARRATOR: Being young
parents didn't get in the way of their lifestyle. KERRI NIXON: This baby
seems to have absolutely
00:13:32
no impact on their lives. It doesn't create a
positive change in him, and it doesn't create a
change in Hoare's behavior
00:13:41
in terms of protecting
her baby and not being involved in the
behavior that he wants her to.
00:13:48
So they have a threesome. They have these very
extreme fantasies, and then they start to put
those fantasies into reality
00:13:56
by sending explicit messages
to each other about kidnap, about having sex with
young girls at the time
00:14:02
that they've had
a child together. NARRATOR: Matthews and
Hoare were always welcomed
00:14:07
into Anjie and Darren's home. Along with Matthew's
step siblings, Becky and her
brother, they appeared
00:14:15
to be a normal loving family. JULIAN DRUKER: So to all
intents and purposes, Nathan Matthews and Becky
were brother and sister.
00:14:22
That is how they saw
their relationship. Her first word was Nathan. So even though they
weren't living together,
00:14:29
they were extremely close. It was only as they became
older that this relationship
00:14:34
became more strained. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Matthews
family was a blended family, which is nothing
out of the ordinary,
00:14:41
and also Becky is part
of this family unit. So there is a sense in which
they do feel like a family.
00:14:48
They do things together. They go on holiday together. But I do feel that there is
that underlying sense of envy
00:14:56
towards her because she is
part of this family unit that he's always felt a
little bit separate from.
00:15:02
COURTNEY BICKER: There
were times where they would seemingly get along, and
I think she kind of did
00:15:07
want to get along with him
because that was somebody who she'd known since she was about
two that she saw as a brother
00:15:14
despite their
relationship issues. But she always felt
like he disliked her. NARRATOR: At the
age of 12, Becky
00:15:22
began to struggle with
severe anxiety, which led to her becoming anorexic. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Becky almost
certainly drew the attention
00:15:30
of Darren and Anjie
away from Nathan, and she occupied a
lot of their mind. She was ill, and
at the same time,
00:15:39
she was developing
into an adolescent. KERRI NIXON: Becky
starting to present as a troubled young girl.
00:15:47
She was anxious. She didn't like to go out. There's lots of social anxiety. And eventually, that developed
into an eating disorder.
00:15:54
But from Matthews' perspective,
here's the little girl that walked into his
mom's house, and now
00:16:03
here's this
12-year-old yet again getting all the attention. And I think that
potentially could
00:16:09
have just further
angered him and added to his resentment of Becky. TEELA MAE JONES: I stayed
around Becky's one night,
00:16:17
and we were-- we were in the kitchen
making a pizza. And he was just stood
there staring at us.
00:16:24
He wouldn't smile or he
wouldn't make conversation. He would just stare at me. Made me feel really
uncomfortable.
00:16:30
KERRI NIXON: We've
got a man here that is already fixated,
not just with Becky, but young girls generally.
00:16:38
So he spends his
time obsessively watching extreme
pornography involving girls of a similar age.
00:16:49
And then there's his stepsister
of that age group, the same age of girls that he's sexually
attracted to and obsessed with,
00:16:58
and there's a girl
right in front of him. But he also hates this girl,
because she took his mom.
00:17:05
NARRATOR: Two years
later in 2013, things were looking up for the family. 14-year-old Becky was
in a much better place,
00:17:15
and everyone was looking
forward to a much-needed and long-awaited celebration. Anjie and Darren
were getting married.
00:17:24
In August, the blended
family became official. GEOFFREY WANSELL: There
is Nathan Matthews
00:17:31
dressed up for the wedding. There's Darren as the groom. There's his mother Angie
wearing a white wedding
00:17:36
dress, carrying a bouquet. NARRATOR: Becky and Matthew's
19-year-old girlfriend Shauna
00:17:42
were both bridesmaids. The day looked picture-perfect. Even Nathan was beaming. KERRI NIXON: It's
interesting when
00:17:51
we look at his behavior with his
family, and actually on the day that his mom marries Darren.
00:17:56
It looks like a
happy, blended family. And if everybody
else would assume that they'd managed
to successfully
00:18:04
blend this family together. So this was a young man
that was able to put on that presentation
that everything is OK
00:18:12
when actually within him
something very different was going on. COURTNEY BICKER: At the wedding,
he was getting really angry
00:18:19
about the shirt he had
to wear for the wedding, and he didn't want
to wear it, and he
00:18:23
got into a massive argument
about it with the family. And that was just over a shirt.
00:18:30
NARRATOR: Sadly the honeymoon
period didn't last long. Anjie's health deteriorated,
and in March 2014,
00:18:40
20-year-old Shauna Hoare became
Anjie's registered carer. Hoare and Matthew
spent even more time
00:18:47
at the house in Crown Hill. COURTNEY BICKER: I would
say Becky did like Shauna because she would always let
Shauna get some of her clothing
00:18:56
when she didn't want it
anymore, because she used to get a lot of new clothes. So Shauna would get her
pick of her older clothes,
00:19:03
and she would always come round. And whenever she was around
and Nathan was in there,
00:19:10
they would talk, and they
would have conversations because it was kind of nice. It was almost, like,
when Nathan was there,
00:19:16
they didn't talk as much. It was more like a nice
breath of fresh air kind of conversation to
not have him there,
00:19:24
because it was almost,
like, he had a problem with them too even talking. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: When I look
at the dynamic between Matthews
00:19:30
and Hoare, I think
what we've got going on here is coercive control. I think there is
a sense in which
00:19:36
Matthews very
slowly chipped away at Hoare's sense of identity. When he met her,
she was a child.
00:19:43
She hadn't known
stability or security or continuity in any
relationship before,
00:19:48
and he offered her that. NARRATOR: Matthews didn't want
Shauna and Becky to be friends.
00:19:55
KERRI NIXON: I think Matthew's
had a simmering, building rage inside him, and I think that
came from feelings of jealousy,
00:20:07
resentment, rejection. And he looked at
this young girl, and he put all of
that rage onto her.
00:20:17
How dare you take the
attention of my mom? How dare you live in my family
when I didn't have that?
00:20:25
And he might not have
actually been able to think clearly like I'm explaining it.
00:20:32
He would have just
experienced these feelings. COURTNEY BICKER: The last time
I saw Becky was the Sunday I
00:20:42
walked her home, and
I said, "Bye, May." And she went, "Bye." And she gave me a hug,
and we did a fist bump.
00:20:48
And then I walked home as
soon as the sun was setting, and that was the
last time I actually
00:20:53
saw her in-person alive. NARRATOR: On Thursday the
19th of February, 2015, Anjie returned from a
hospital appointment
00:21:06
to find that 16-year-old
Becky was not at home. Nathan Matthews and Shauna
Hoare explained that they
00:21:14
had heard her leave the house. COURTNEY BICKER: I think it must
have been 11:00 in the morning.
00:21:19
I sent her a
message on WhatsApp, and it went through with two
texts, but it wasn't read.
00:21:24
And then I sent her another
message about 15 minutes later just to see if
she got the first one,
00:21:29
and it came back with one
tick, meaning undelivered, meaning her phone
was switched off
00:21:34
between that period of time. It was unusual for
her phone to be off. And then I just didn't
think much of it.
00:21:43
I just stayed at
home for that day. And then later that day, I was
still sending her messages,
00:21:49
and they weren't going through. So I kind of just thought, oh,
maybe she's going to bed early,
00:21:53
maybe she was too busy to reply. TEELA MAE JONES: I
did find it strange that she wasn't texting
back, because she would
00:21:59
always text back straight away. I didn't get too
worried because I know sometimes people just get
distracted doing other things.
00:22:07
NARRATOR: It wasn't
out of the ordinary for Becky to stay over
at a friend's house,
00:22:12
so her family weren't
concerned when she didn't return that night. The following morning,
however, there
00:22:19
was still no word from Becky,
and that wasn't normal. COURTNEY BICKER: When
I called around all
00:22:24
the other friends that we had,
they hadn't heard from her, hadn't seen her. And that's when I rang her
house phone and her family.
00:22:33
Anjie picked up, her stepmom,
and she said that she hadn't heard from her either.
00:22:40
And I was then very concerned,
and that's when I just kept ringing the house phone
every now and then, saying
00:22:46
is she back home yet? Whereas she? And that's when everyone kind
of realized something really bad
00:22:52
was going on. TEELA MAE JONES: I
just remember all of us being so worried about Becky.
00:23:03
I think we were just
so upset and stuff that she had gone missing. It just didn't really
make sense to us.
00:23:11
NARRATOR: With no
news, her dad Darren decided to call the police. OPERATOR: Police,
how can I help you?
00:23:19
DARREN: It seems my
daughter has gone missing OPERATOR: No one
has seen her now?
00:23:24
DARREN: No. We've phoned around the family. All her friends have contacted
us and asking where she is,
00:23:30
and none of them know. OPERATOR: What's her name? DARREN: Rebecca Watts NARRATOR: As the police
began their investigation,
00:23:37
Becky's family set
about spreading word of her disappearance. JULIAN DRUKER: They were looking
for any way possible for people
00:23:46
to be contacted about
where Becky might be. They chose to go on Facebook. They put out an appeal.
00:23:53
Becky's dad needed
help to do that, so he enlisted Nathan Matthews
to put that message online.
00:24:01
NARRATOR: The community
joined forces to search for the missing 16-year-old. COURTNEY BICKER: Her
whole family came out,
00:24:08
and everyone from
our school was there. We were just trying to find
her because, at this point,
00:24:13
there was no updates. We didn't have a clue
what was going on, and it's you just
didn't want to sit
00:24:18
there and twiddle your thumbs. You wanted to do
something, even though it might not amount to anything.
00:24:23
It was better than
doing nothing. NARRATOR: Days went by with
still no sign of Becky.
00:24:29
JULIAN DRUKER: The search
became more and more extensive. This big pond in the area
was dredged by police.
00:24:36
Scores of officers were
involved by this point. A huge operation for
the force in this area.
00:24:42
Plus you had the social
media presence as well. This FindBecky hashtag
was being spoken about all
00:24:48
across the country,
and by this point, millions would have known
that she had gone missing.
00:24:53
TEELA MAE JONES: My
worst fear was maybe just thinking that
something seriously bad had happened to her.
00:24:59
Like, she had been killed
or raped or something, and she was just in a
ditch somewhere, anywhere.
00:25:05
I did think that sometimes. NARRATOR: The police
turned their attention to the two people who'd
heard Becky leaving the house
00:25:16
on the day she disappeared. Her stepbrother Nathan Matthews
and his girlfriend Shauna
00:25:22
Hoare. JULIAN DRUKER: The
questioning of Nathan Matthews was a really slow process.
00:25:26
There was not much
information coming from him for many, many hours. NARRATOR: Unlike
Matthews, Hoare was
00:25:34
only too willing to talk
through the last time they'd heard from Becky. I think we got
there about 11:00-ish.
00:25:42
The door was locked,
so obviously we use the key from underneath
the recycling bin.
00:25:46
Got in. Heard music upstairs, wishing
Becky had been in then. I went into the kitchen
to get a cigarette.
00:25:59
We went to go outside
to have a cigarette. Probably it was
about 15, 20 minutes.
00:26:08
Then we came back up. I went into the
kitchen to get a drink. I think I was washing
my hands, then
00:26:16
I heard the front door slam. NARRATOR: Although
Matthews hadn't said much, he did corroborate
Hoare's version of events.
00:26:25
INTERVIEWER 1: When you
heard a virgorous knock, you're thinking that's the
front door of the sound?
00:26:29
Yeah. INTERVIEWER 1: Yeah, OK. And who did you
think that was then? Not Becky. INTERVIEWER 1: OK.
00:26:38
INTERVIEWER 2: Immediately
before this sound of the door slamming,
what could you hear then?
00:26:43
I was kind of more trying
to make sure that everything's back and getting my drink.
00:26:47
INTERVIEWER 2: Yeah. No, I heard stomping
down the stairs. That's what made me think
that Becky left in a mood.
00:26:56
I said to Angie, I
said the door slammed. But I wasn't sure if
that was the wind.
00:26:59
I took it because there
was like quite stump, stump, stump down the stairs. I assumed, you know, she was
in a bit one of her tantrums.
00:27:06
[laughs] INTERVIEWER 2: Yeah. NARRATOR: There was
no evidence to connect them to Becky's disappearance.
00:27:13
But the police were left
with an uneasy feeling about the couple. Something was off.
00:27:20
The following day,
they were brought in for further questioning. INTERVIEWER 2: Does Nathan
have any, some concerns
00:27:28
about speaking to us? Not that he told me, no. INTERVIEWER 2: No. If he does, I
wouldn't know that.
00:27:38
INTERVIEWER 2: Yeah. How is he finding it? I mean, he's find it
quite hard actually.
00:27:43
Again, he's kind of more
thinking like, God, if it-- or again, knowing how hard it'd
be for his mom at the moment.
00:27:50
Yeah, because Becky was
almost like a daughter-- a daughter to her. INTERVIEWER 2: Yeah.
00:27:54
You know what I mean? INTERVIEWER 1: And
then over the weekend, you find her, you and Nathan
been involved in searching
00:28:00
for Becky or doing any-- No I was not worried
they were doing a search. I didn't realize until I
think it was yesterday.
00:28:07
I went on my Facebook
and obviously, there was news articles
and pictures popped
00:28:10
up about they did the search. But we weren't told
about it until-- NARRATOR: While the police
continued their questioning,
00:28:19
the forensics team
made a breakthrough. There's a point in any missing
persons investigation where
00:28:26
close family members of the
person who's gone missing have to be looked at by
police unfortunately.
00:28:32
And this was, the
case here, they did a search of Becky's home. And it was during that that they
found an absolutely key detail.
00:28:42
They found her blood in the
door frame of her bedroom. And they found a
fingerprint within that.
00:28:50
NARRATOR: The bloody print
was sent for analysis. And the thumbprint
belonged to Nathan Matthews.
00:28:58
NARRATOR: It was a
huge piece of evidence which placed Matthews
in the house with Becky
00:29:04
at some point when
she'd been bleeding. That pointed to him
being the prime suspect
00:29:10
in her disappearance. NARRATOR: On the 28th
of February 2015, Nathan Matthews and Shauna
Hoare were arrested on suspicion
00:29:20
of kidnapping Becky Watts. Four days later on
the 2nd of March, Matthews submitted
a written statement
00:29:27
through his legal team,
in which he confessed to killing his own stepsister. INTERVIEWER 1: Can you tell
me then, Nathan, because if we
00:29:35
work through what you told
us in this written statement, this idea that-- You have seem--
00:29:42
I think you like more detail. INTERVIEWER 1: Yeah. Is that-- [sighs deeply] Obviously, I should be able
to go into more detail.
00:29:55
INTERVIEWER 1: Mm-hmm. [inhales] [exhales] This
is harder than normal. [sniffs] [exhales]
00:30:06
INTERVIEWER 1: There
are a couple of ways-- Are you going to
have to-- are you going
00:30:10
to have to read that statement? INTERVIEWER 1: No. There are a couple of ways
we could get around this.
00:30:15
Obviously, I don't want
that to be read to someone. [sobs] Nathan Matthews
eventually admitted
00:30:33
to killing Becky Watson. He told police that his
plan had gone wrong. But Shauna Hoare had
nothing to do with it.
00:30:41
In fact, she was
downstairs at the time that all this happened . And she was having a
cigarette in the kitchen.
00:30:47
NARRATOR: Matthews
seemed unwilling to talk about his girlfriend in
connection to the events.
00:30:53
Oh, she said something about,
um, something about Shauna, can you rephrase that.
00:30:59
So you can include
basically everybody in it and not use her name. Like-- INTERVIEWER 1: Do
you want me to say--
00:31:13
Like-- INTERVIEWER 1:
--the other person? Is it you're saying the name? I-- [exhales] we
simply hit everybody.
00:31:22
And then like,
obviously she's in-- obviously would be included
in it, but include everybody,
00:31:28
don't say her name. INTERVIEWER 1: OK. OK. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: I
think what he's doing here
00:31:37
is trying to keep the police
away from Hoare, not because he wants to protect her.
00:31:42
He's trying to
maintain control here. He's pleading with the
police to leave her name
00:31:46
out of this because the
information that she knows is dynamite. NARRATOR: Hoare too
claim she played
00:31:53
no part in Becky's death. INTERVIEWER 1: How do I know
that you weren't involved?
00:31:59
Again, I shouldn't
have any DNA reason to be involved in it. Again, especially when
one looks at my past,
00:32:10
to think that I could
allow him to come to somebody else like
that, it's highly unlikely.
00:32:18
And again the fact
that, as far as I knew, he was, you know, changing. He wasn't as violent anymore.
00:32:25
NARRATOR: But
Matthews was violent, and investigators were
working hard to prove it.
00:32:32
They discovered CCTV
footage from the day after Becky disappeared. It showed Nathan Matthews
visiting a DIY store.
00:32:45
Matthews quite
coolly and calmly purchases a circular saw,
which he then uses to dismember
00:32:51
his stepsister's body. He cuts it into eight pieces. So the idea that he can
do this without completely
00:32:58
breaking down tells us a lot
about the kind of person he is. KERRI NIXON: I
don't think anybody
00:33:05
can even begin to imagine what
that would have been like. It is not easy to cut up a body.
00:33:13
It would have taken great force. The amount of blood
would have been horrific. And he was able to do
that to his stepsister.
00:33:24
JULIAN DRUKER: So where
do you hide body parts? Well, Hoare and Matthews went
to a friend in Barton Court.
00:33:31
They offered them
10,000 pounds to store these packages inside a shed. But they told them not in
any way to look inside them.
00:33:41
NARRATOR: The friends agreed to
take a suitcase from Matthews. Following his confession,
the police recovered Becky's
00:33:48
remains from their garden shed. INTERVIEWER 1: I suppose
the question is, why Becky?
00:33:58
I don't know. Again, I knew they didn't
particularly like each other. I wouldn't say they
hated each other,
00:34:04
I'd never seen him
have an argument. NARRATOR: As the
questioning went on, Matthews claimed that he'd
never intended to hurt Becky.
00:34:14
She'd leave things out on the
floor of my mom to trip over and obviously would
talk to her like she's
00:34:24
saying nasty comments and talked
to her like dirt on the floor. And I thought if I was able to
scare her and obviously her not
00:34:38
be harmed and
obviously be released, I was thinking
when she got back-- [exhales] she
obviously would have
00:34:47
been scared and
more appreciative of things as people are. Even when he's
confessed to her murder,
00:34:57
he is painting her
as the aggressor. He's saying she was the
one who was badly behaved.
00:35:02
She was treating my
mother horrendously. So he's trying to basically say,
she deserved it essentially.
00:35:11
INTERVIEWER 1: So when did
you think all of this up? I can't be certain. I'm no good with dates.
00:35:21
I've said this repeatedly and
date muddle into other days. If it was a plan to just
kidnap her and scare her,
00:35:29
how did he possibly think he
was going to get away with that? What was the purpose?
00:35:34
I think there was
more behind that plan. I think he planned
to do harm to Becky.
00:35:42
NARRATOR: Matthews and
Hoare were brought to court together to face charges. I felt sick looking at
him, knowing what he did.
00:35:53
And yeah, I didn't
always like Becky. But she was a nice enough girl. She was so young.
00:36:03
[sobbing] I don't
understand how he could he have done that to us. NARRATOR: Gradually
from Matthew's account
00:36:17
and the evidence they
gathered, investigators were able to piece together what
happened on that fateful day.
00:36:26
GEOFFREY WANSELL: When
they arrived on the morning of the 19th of February
2015 at Angie's house,
00:36:31
it was that they
were also carrying among the many other
things, two stun guns. Now what was that about?
00:36:37
Was it to take Becky
prisoner and whisk her back to their own house? Was it to subdue her while they
did whatever they wanted to do?
00:36:50
What it does is
precisely underline the premeditation
that Matthews brought to the killing of Becky Watts.
00:37:00
JULIAN DRUKER: It
was just after 11:00. It's not entirely
clear what happened but Matthews went upstairs.
00:37:07
He was wearing a mask. He went into Becky's room. Some sort of fight ensued. His mask slipped but ultimately,
Becky ended up being murdered.
00:37:18
At any point within
this altercation, he could have chosen to stop. He could have chosen to
step back, to walk away
00:37:25
and to leave Becky
with her life. But that was not
what he wanted here. He wanted to destroy her.
00:37:33
GEOFFREY WANSELL: And
Becky had suffered. She had cuts and
bruises on her face. She had 15 stab wounds
inflicted after she died.
00:37:44
It is horrifying. JULIAN DRUKER: What happened
happened fairly quickly. But Becky was put
into a suitcase.
00:37:53
Becky's stepmom arrived home
around an hour or so later walking past the
car that Becky was
00:38:01
in the boot of at this point. And she found Hoare and
Matthews acting normally. They're actually watching
TV when she returned home.
00:38:10
NARRATOR: The couple
remained at the family home, keeping up the pretense
of normality until 7:00 PM
00:38:17
that evening, around eight hours
after Becky had been killed. During this time, the
16-year-old's body
00:38:25
lay hidden just meters away. GEOFFREY WANSELL: They
take the child back home. They leave Becky in
the boot of the car.
00:38:34
They order a takeaway. And they act as though
nothing has happened at all. It was so matter of fact
that it defies belief.
00:38:44
We don't see this in the
majority of murder cases. Generally, especially
this is the first time
00:38:51
they've taken a life. You know, they're not
serial murderers here. That's-- it's shocking to take
the life of another person.
00:39:00
So most people, even if
they've taken a life, will have some element
of a shock response.
00:39:06
But that's not here. NARRATOR: On the
4th of March 2015, Nathan Matthews was charged
with the murder of Becky Watts.
00:39:16
Hoare, who along with Matthews
claims she'd been completely unaware of Becky's
death, was charged
00:39:22
with attempting to pervert
the course of justice. But that was before CCTV began
to emerge of the couple buying
00:39:34
the bags and the things
to dispose of the body, plus the discovery
of Hoare's DNA.
00:39:43
So in June 2015, Hoare too
is charged with murder. KERRI NIXON: And I think that's
where any empathy that we have
00:39:55
for Hoare in that she was
this abused vulnerable girl who was controlled by him.
00:40:03
And yes, I absolutely
agree that she was. But her actions now post-murder
are just unforgivable,
00:40:15
the fact that she goes
along with the way that he treats Becky's body. NARRATOR: On the
6th of October 2015,
00:40:25
Nathan Matthews and
Shauna Hoare stood trial. Although Matthews
admitted killing Becky,
00:40:32
he and Hoare both denied murder
and conspiracy to kidnap. The prosecution
presented their case
00:40:40
as a sexually-motivated
murder based on Matthews and Hoare's joint
fixation on teenage girls.
00:40:48
KERRI NIXON: There was
definitely elements of a sexually-motivated murder. However, I think it's a factor.
00:40:55
And I think it is
quite simplistic to just look at that. And I think the
hatred that he had,
00:41:02
the love-hate obsession
that he had with Becky is absolutely crucial. And that's why it was Becky
and not a random teenage girl
00:41:12
that he killed. NARRATOR: Hoare's defense
claim that she'd been subjected to years of physical
and emotional abuse
00:41:20
at the hands of Matthews. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: I think many
people have quite a difficulty
00:41:25
in making sense of Hoare. Because looking at this from
the outside, how on earth
00:41:30
could you go along with
this kind of thing? How on earth could you
tolerate the kind of behavior
00:41:35
that Matthews was engaged in? But that kind of
judgment is made without an awareness of what
coercive control actually is.
00:41:43
It's taking away
someone's identity. It's taking away their capacity
for independent thought.
00:41:49
Everything that Hoare
was, she was for Matthews. She was enmeshed with him. She was embedded with him.
00:41:55
And by the time that she
extracted herself from that, Becky had already been killed.
00:42:00
NARRATOR: On the 11th
of November 2015, Nathan Matthews was found guilty
of the murder of Becky Watts.
00:42:08
He was sentenced to a minimum
of 33 years in prison. Shauna Hoare was found
guilty of the lesser
00:42:16
charge of manslaughter
and sentenced to 17 years. I've covered lots of murders
in Britain unfortunately.
00:42:24
But this case really
stands out because of that family relationship. It is so unusual for
someone to kill someone
00:42:31
who's essentially a sibling. And for them to dismember them
as well, absolutely horrific.
00:42:38
But almost exceptional
really that someone would do that to someone
so close in their family.
00:42:47
COURTNEY BICKER: It's also
hard because sometimes I think about her and
I'm like, oh, Becky
00:42:51
would have liked to do this. Like, if we go to-- like
if I go to the beach or I go to a theme
park, I'm like,
00:42:57
she would have loved this. And she really wanted to go on
holiday for her 18th birthday.
00:43:01
Go to somewhere like
Magaluf or something. And so when I went
to Spain myself, it was kind of bittersweet
because like, I'm
00:43:10
doing this for
you, but also, you don't get to experience this. NARRATOR: Nathan
Matthews sadistically
00:43:18
killed his little stepsister
in the cruelest way possible. Then he sat back and watched as
an entire community desperately
00:43:27
searched for the
missing teenager. He brutalized Becky
in life and death, condemning his whole family
to a lifetime of pain,
00:43:36
making Nathan Matthews one of
the world's most evil killers. [music playing] [audio logo]