00:00:04
[MUSIC PLAYING] PHIL HARDING: Debbie Buxton was,
I think, the word is vivacious.
00:00:17
PIP SHORT: Debbie was a
lover of the countryside. She loved walking
by the river dove.
00:00:23
It is a beautiful place to walk. DAVID GEE: 27th of April,
the sun had been shining,
00:00:29
which may have prompted
Debbie to walk the dogs down here by the river. Tragically, the
clouds soon descended.
00:00:37
Once we'd heard
of Debbie's death, it was such a shock to the
village and shocked everyone
00:00:41
involved. KERRY DAYNES: This woman was
just out walking her dogs and she met with her killer.
00:00:49
DAVID GEE: It was quite a
savage attack to the extent that the wound traveled
right through her body
00:00:55
and really ended up with
having her throat slashed. JOHN ANDERSON BCAC: It makes
it really quite frightening
00:01:02
that a person can go
out there and randomly kill another human
being for no reason
00:01:08
whatsoever other than they
are in the wrong place at the wrong time. PHIL HARDING: This chap
was extremely dangerous
00:01:17
and he was still
out there somewhere. Our main concern
obviously was that he didn't carry out
a further attack
00:01:24
before we could catch him. PIP SHORT: I remember a feeling
as if I'd had a physical blow.
00:01:31
We all felt a, kind of, almost
a personal hurt that it was something that had affected us
not just because of how we felt
00:01:39
about Debbie and
Ron, but also that we had had a great loss as well. [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:02:08
DAVID GEE: We're in the village
of Hatton, which is basically a ribbon village that runs--
00:02:13
builds alongside the 850. There's some great
people in Hatton and great community spirit.
00:02:25
PIP SHORT: Debbie
loved this area. Yes, I think she
came in one direction or another practically
every day and with Ron
00:02:31
quite a lot of the time. They lived on the
main road over there. And so they would walk
along past all these fields
00:02:40
and the Cricket Club,
and then they come down the lane from the main road. CHRIS THURMAN: Debbie
worked for Ron.
00:02:49
She was his personal secretary. I know Ron had to leave
the business quite a lot,
00:02:55
but he restored
books and manuscripts and it was quite a tricky job. And, of course,
while Ron was away,
00:03:01
Debbie would be in sole
charge of the business. And they would run
the business for us
00:03:04
as a very key player
in the business. PIP SHORT: They were both
clearly devoted to each other,
00:03:10
yes. You were looking at a very
happy couple who very much found huge satisfaction
in each other
00:03:19
and in their relationship. There was a sense, I
think, for most of us that while they were very
friendly with other people,
00:03:25
really it was each other that
was the center of their lives. [MUSIC PLAYING] DAVID GEE: 27th of April,
the sun had been shining,
00:03:41
which may have
prompted Debbie to walk the dogs down here by the
river an actual [INAUDIBLE]..
00:03:47
PIP SHORT: She loved
walking by the River Dove. I seem to remember
that it was a nice day.
00:03:54
It was one of those
spring days with the sun and the flowers coming,
out and everything
00:03:59
being as she would have loved
to have it on that day walking by the river. CHRIS THURMAN: Ron had gone
on a business trip to Paris.
00:04:08
I think-- from
conversations afterwards, I think he was looking at some
very important documents that
00:04:13
needed preserving, but he was
desperate to get back home because it was Debbie's birthday
and their wedding anniversary.
00:04:23
[PHONE RINGING] PHIL HARDING: The call
came in from a dog walker who had been
near the river,
00:04:30
walking his dogs along the bank. He's seen Debbie
Buxton before walking the dogs down there regularly.
00:04:37
But the way the dogs were
running around wildly and one was whining constantly,
that made him cross the river
00:04:45
and see what the score was. He hoped at that point
that perhaps Debbie just collapsed and was OK.
00:04:52
Obviously, when he found
her he knew differently. [MUSIC PLAYING] It was obvious, as soon as
you saw the body, that she'd
00:05:07
been violently attacked. What you couldn't
see, of course, was the extent of
the stab wounds
00:05:13
to the body she got clothes on. But certainly, all the
wounds to the head, you could see that
she'd been attacked
00:05:19
violently with something that
it caused very serious injury. DAVID GEE: Ron arrived home
and Debbie wasn't there
00:05:33
when normally she would be. And because it was such a nice
evening, the dogs were gone.
00:05:38
So natural assumption, oh,
she's out walk the dogs. I'll go and have a look for her.
00:05:44
KERRY DAYNES: So Ron sees
two men and he says to them, have you seen a woman
walking her two dogs?
00:05:51
And they say, well,
we've actually found-- we found her body. PHIL HARDING: He
insisted on going down.
00:05:57
He wanted to see
and [INAUDIBLE] why. And when the police arrived, he
was actually gathering the dogs
00:06:03
and putting them in the car. BRYANNA FOX: When they
arrive on the scene and they see a body that
was just so badly, brutally
00:06:12
murdered, and then the
husband of the victim is standing right there,
it makes sense, not
00:06:19
just investigatively,
but statistically that he was the offender. So until he has an opportunity
to display his alibi,
00:06:28
and explain where he was at, and
go through why he wouldn't have killed her, it was
likely that police would
00:06:34
assume he was the murderer. And they wanted
to just make sure that he was in their
custody and then
00:06:39
they work through the details. [MUSIC PLAYING] PHIL HARDING:
Well, of course, it
00:06:52
was very unusual to have
a situation, especially in an open field
like this to suddenly
00:06:59
arrive and find the
husband actually at the scene with the body. It's very strange
for that to happen.
00:07:08
I've certainly not
experienced that before. Ron wasn't arrested. He accompanied us to
the police station
00:07:17
so that we could
question him further and we could eliminate
him from the inquiries.
00:07:25
KERRY DAYNES: A police
investigation of this type is enormous. And you can't imagine
the number of things that
00:07:31
start to happen simultaneously. So somebody, of course, is
going to be questioning Ron,
00:07:37
somebody is going to be
questioning the men who found Debbie's body, and then
there's going to be police
00:07:43
all over the area
and, of course, there's going to be a
forensic team trying to gather
00:07:49
as much forensic
evidence as they possibly can from Debbie before
they're able to move her body.
00:07:55
[MUSIC PLAYING] PHIL HARDING: They secured
the scene to the degree that nobody else could
get anywhere near it
00:08:03
from any direction. They secured pathways
into the scene in case there were anything like
footprints or evidence
00:08:11
that lay in the field, both to
the body and back to the road. Once scenes of
crime had arrived,
00:08:18
they will call for a
pathologist to come along, to have a
look at the body and certify death, et cetera.
00:08:24
And then they would take
pictures, photographs, examine the scene, and look for
things like blood, footprints,
00:08:33
DNA, anything that had
been left at the scene that could assist the inquiry. There was no indication that
the body had been moved.
00:08:42
So it would appear
that she was killed where the body was found. It's quite possible that
she tried to run away
00:08:49
from her attacker, but we
couldn't say that for certain from what we found at the scene.
00:08:55
KERRY DAYNES: This has
happened in broad daylight, early evening, and there's
not been any attempt
00:09:00
whatsoever to conceal the body. So the killer, whoever
they are, is only concerned with the killing.
00:09:09
Nothing after that. And they're certainly
not trying to cover their tracks in any way.
00:09:12
That's not forefront
in their mind. It is all about their own needs
and their own gratification.
00:09:18
PHIL HARDING: Because
it's in an open field, trying to find bits of blood
or anything of that description
00:09:25
is extremely difficult. We
will be concentrating more on-- perhaps at that stage,
trying to find the weapons
00:09:31
if the weapon were
about, looking for any clues, such as bits of
clothing that have been left,
00:09:36
things that might have been
either in the offender's possession or in the
victim's possession
00:09:42
that had been scattered
about, and looking if those could be used
for fingerprints or DNA
00:09:47
and examine later. DAVID GEE: Debbie
would have been murdered just along--
from where we are
00:09:53
now, just along the riverbank. An attack of such severity, but
those who attended the scene
00:09:59
and dealt with the case are
still to a large or lesser extent traumatized
by what they saw
00:10:05
and what they had
to deal with, such was the savagery of the attack. PIP SHORT: I can
actually remember very
00:10:12
vividly my husband phoned me. And when he told me what
it was, I remember feeling
00:10:20
as if I had a physical blow. We all felt a almost
a personal hurt that it was something
that had affected us,
00:10:28
not just because of how we
felt about Debbie and Ron, but also that we had had
a great loss as well.
00:10:35
[MUSIC PLAYING] CHRIS THURMAN: We heard
about Debbie's murder at the rotary club
meeting on the Tuesday.
00:10:52
Obviously, complete
shock, usual reactions. It was just unbelievable really. The last time I saw Debbie
was this rotary dinner
00:11:01
dance a few days before
she was murdered. DAVID GEE: I was a
serving police officer
00:11:06
at the time of the murder. I didn't actually
work on the case. It was a colleague of
mine who rang me actually.
00:11:14
"There's an attack
on a woman in Hatton by the river in the village." I said, I don't know.
00:11:19
What's that about? Well, it sounds really bad. I think it's going
to be a murder.
00:11:22
We don't know who she is yet. But, of course, later
on, it turned out to be poor Debbie Buxton
who walking out with the two
00:11:29
Weimaraner dogs and who was
actually looked upon as one of our own. And it being such a
close knit community.
00:11:37
CHRIS THURMAN: Didn't know any
of the details at the time. The details started to
emerge after we discovered
00:11:43
that Ron had been arrested. And the emotions that
you have then, of course, it's one thing for family
purposes to be eliminated,
00:11:52
but it's another thing
when someone's arrested. And sadly, your first thought
is, well, no smoke without fire
00:11:58
and that's a dreadful feeling
to have about someone. PIP SHORT: The problem was that
because he caught the earlier
00:12:05
plane, he could have done it. The timing worked. Now, that for us,
as his friends,
00:12:12
didn't really enter
our thinking at all. It seemed completely
logical that if he was going
00:12:17
to go out and
celebrate that evening and he got a chance to get
back earlier, he would take it.
00:12:23
But obviously, there was a
discrepancy in his return time, which then meant
that he could have
00:12:28
actually committed the crime. PHIL HARDING: Ron Buxton was
telling us about his trip
00:12:34
to Paris, and why
he'd came back early, and his planned romantic
meal, et cetera.
00:12:41
All of this, we ought
to double check, which means contacting
the airline, what time did the plane land?
00:12:48
How long would it take to
get from Birmingham in London back to his home? We had to check everything
that he was telling us.
00:12:55
All this takes time. PIP SHORT: They allowed my
husband to go and see him while he was with the police.
00:13:02
And at that stage,
I think Ron's mind was just so full of
the horror of it all and being unable to go.
00:13:11
And release this grief
that he would have wanted to just made it worse. It made it worse
[INAUDIBLE] stayed.
00:13:18
PHIL HARDING:
Basically, we formed a timeline for his movements,
where he was at any given time.
00:13:23
And that eliminated him
from being at the scene and committing the murder. [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:13:33
BRYANNA FOX: After police
were able to speak with Ron and establish his alibi and
understand that he absolutely
00:13:40
was not the person responsible
for the murder of his wife, they were able to
then examine who
00:13:45
could have possibly done this. And that's where better
forensics are needed. They're needed to do
more investigation.
00:13:52
It really meant expanding
their circle of who could be a suspect and trying
to use forensics and witnesses
00:13:58
to try to fill in these
gaps and understand what really happened in that case. PHIL HARDING: Well
she'd been struck
00:14:05
over the head four times. One blow particularly smashed
her skull, which would have
00:14:12
rendered her
unconscious, but she was still alive at that point. Then she'd been
stabbed with such force
00:14:21
that the instrument used had
traveled right through her body on seven out of 11 stab wounds.
00:14:28
The amount of force needed to
do that is actually tremendous. It must have been hectic,
it must have been frantic,
00:14:36
it must have been really,
really frightening. KERRY DAYNES: The
injuries to Debbie
00:14:43
showed that she had been the
victim of a blitz attack. This is ferocious. This really is.
00:14:49
This is somebody who has
come equipped with not one, but two weapons and who is
incredibly, incredibly angry.
00:14:57
This is rage in motion. So he's either angry at Debbie
herself or at women in general.
00:15:06
PHIL HARDING: There were
numerous lines of inquiry that we obviously
needed to follow.
00:15:13
We ought to look at
people in the area, we ought to look at any
relatives, we ought to look
00:15:19
at people that she might
have fallen out with, anybody who disliked
her for any reason.
00:15:25
Really the lines of inquiry at
that point were innumerable. KERRY DAYNES: So suddenly,
that pool of potential people
00:15:34
grows and it grows massively. Look at the amount of
violence that was used here.
00:15:41
How rare is that? So of course, they're going
to start looking for people in the locality that have
got similar types of offenses
00:15:49
and there's not going
to be a lot of them. PHIL HARDING: One
of the first things
00:15:53
we would do, we would
look into Debbie's past and see whether she's got
any enemies, whether somebody
00:15:59
hold a grudge
against her, somebody had fallen out with her. To such a degree to do
something like this, of course,
00:16:05
would be absolutely phenomenal. But we didn't get
anywhere with that. She was well liked, she
was well-known in the area,
00:16:12
she walked dogs here regularly. Inquiries were still continuing. It was only the next day.
00:16:22
And it takes a while
to eliminate anybody. It was extremely busy and
everybody-- everybody involved
00:16:29
was anxious to get to the bottom
of this as quickly as we could. A number of people came forward
to say they'd seen a man acting
00:16:36
suspiciously in the area. Particularly a fisherman on
the other side of the river
00:16:43
had seen a man
acting suspiciously while he was fishing. JOHN ANDERSON
BCAC: Back in 1993,
00:16:50
I used to spend a lot of time
fishing along the River Dove. I used to see Debbie walking
by with the dogs regularly.
00:16:58
If she came near by walking,
I'd be more static fishing. We'd have a quick chat
for a couple of minutes.
00:17:04
I didn't know her very well,
but she was a nice lady who just came down to clear her head like
we all do with the countryside,
00:17:10
and walk her dog. She minded her own business. She was a lovely
person to talk to.
00:17:16
Very well-known with the
local people as a person that was down here
every day walking.
00:17:21
[MUSIC PLAYING] I was actually fishing
down by the river here, just minding
my own business.
00:17:32
And I became aware of a
person at the top of the bank on a bicycle that
got black jeans.
00:17:38
The clothing they wore just
looked completely out of place. There was something that
made me feel uneasy.
00:17:46
Down by the side of me
was a branch of a tree and I actually put my foot out
and brought it closer to me
00:17:52
to defend myself,
because that's how uneasy I felt with this person. I really didn't turn
my back on them.
00:17:59
I really don't know why either. I couldn't say why
I felt that way. They just didn't look as
if they belonged there.
00:18:05
I felt very vulnerable
is the word I would use. I felt very vulnerable standing
here by the river at that time.
00:18:12
But eventually, after some
time, he just moved on. He disappeared over the
other side of the home
00:18:19
and had gone out of site. But even after that, I kept
looking over my shoulder in case he came back.
00:18:25
It was just-- it's very, very
hard to explain that feeling, but it was just a sense
that something was wrong.
00:18:34
PHIL HARDING: The
day after the events, we were contacted by a
witness who had actually seen
00:18:39
a man riding an orange
mountain bike across the bridge and carrying a pair of garden
shears, which fitted in to what
00:18:48
we felt had happened
at the scene with the wounds that
had happened, et cetera. We thought straight
away, well, perhaps there
00:18:56
could be the murder weapon. Inquiries found he'd also
been seen again the day before at the church
where he'd frightened
00:19:05
a couple of old ladies who were
in the churchyard at the time to the degree that when they
left and not to go past him,
00:19:14
they carried their little
garden shears in front of them to show that they would defend
themselves if he attacked them.
00:19:22
BRYANNA FOX: The thing
about random killings is that they're not
that premeditated.
00:19:27
He knew he wanted to commit
murder, but he didn't know who, or when, or what
the circumstances
00:19:33
were going to be like. He wasn't able to
case a place or stalk her and know her behaviors
and pattern of life.
00:19:42
This is something that had to
be a little bit happenstance. PHIL HARDING: Well,
we got a situation
00:19:50
whereby a man on an
orange mountain bike, which is pretty
distinctive, had been seen in the area over
the previous two days
00:19:57
and actually on the day. He was actually seen
on the riverbank actually in the same field where
the murder took place that day.
00:20:06
And so obviously, he became
very much a prime suspect. The man had got fairly
long, bushy hair.
00:20:14
He was in his late 20s. He was quite rugged build. And that's really all
we got to that stage.
00:20:21
KERRY DAYNES: By
and large, killers choose isolated areas
that they are very familiar with in order to kill.
00:20:28
And so the fact that this
happened where it did suggest that this is
somebody fairly local.
00:20:35
PHIL HARDING: Well, once this
information was out there with the public, then
obviously nobody had
00:20:40
been arrested at that point. And it caused widespread
fear as it naturally would.
00:20:47
You can try and alleviate that
fear to some degree by saying, well, we'll have extra
patrols and we have no reason
00:20:53
to believe that a further
attack will take place, but obviously we were
concerned because
00:20:59
of the nature of the offense
that something else could have. PIP SHORT: It was the
violence of the attack
00:21:06
as much as the fact
of it that made people feel not only very sad
and horrified, but also quite
00:21:16
uneasy. And for a time, at
least the whole area around where she walked
was regarded with some fear
00:21:26
by a lot of people. WOMAN: Ron Buxton had returned
home from a business trip to France and was expecting
to go out to dinner,
00:21:33
but Debbie wasn't at home. Police say they've been
in touch with other forces to see if there are
any similarities
00:21:39
with the murders of Rachel
NIckell and Jean Bradley. But at the moment,
there's no connection.
00:21:44
At this point in time,
we cannot connect this-- our offense with any other
murder down the country.
00:21:49
We obviously looked at
it very, very close. We are aware of the murders. [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:21:55
PHIL HARDING: It's
the first time that I've ever been called to
a body in the middle of a field
00:21:59
where there appears
to be no motive whatsoever for the actual
violence that's been used.
00:22:07
There was absolutely no
evidence of any, sort of, sexual assault to a body. Clothing and not being
raped or anything like that.
00:22:17
There was no evidence
that anything had been stolen from her at the scene. So perplexing
really in many ways.
00:22:24
Why, why on Earth
would somebody kill this woman in the middle of a
field that must [INAUDIBLE]??
00:22:30
[MUSIC PLAYING] DAVID GEE: So I was in the
Derbyshire police force at the time and was actually
at work when the news
00:22:49
broke about the attack. And of course, that's quite
an alarming thing to happen.
00:22:54
Not an everyday occurrence. I think Derbyshire,
at the time, was going through about 15,
16 murders a year,
00:23:00
which is obviously too many. But in terms of
numbers, not that great. And every time a
homicide happened, it
00:23:07
was quite rightly a big news. And this was made bigger
news, in fact, because of the strange element involved,
which is very unusual then
00:23:16
and it's still
very unusual today. So the attack on Debbie
Buxton really raised a level
00:23:21
in terms of not only the
public interest in the area, but also the police interest
across the forest area.
00:23:29
KERRY DAYNES: A crime like this
has such a massive impact on us all really. I would say that they are
like acts of terrorism.
00:23:38
So wherever this
had taken place, this was going to be felt
very widely by the community.
00:23:44
But the fact that this is
in a very small, rural area where really there's
not a lot of crime
00:23:50
just makes that
impact even greater. So you can imagine that
everybody was talking about it.
00:23:56
And I imagine that every woman
for a 10, 15, 20, 25, maybe more mile radius must have been
feeling the fear at that time.
00:24:10
PHIL HARDING: An officer
who had just gone off duty and obviously had learnt
about the murder came forward
00:24:16
and told us that
we should really be having a look at a man
by the name of David Bond.
00:24:23
He previously committed
violent offenses against women and we should
consider interviewing
00:24:28
him, seeing him, and eliminating
him from the inquiry. Well, obviously, this was a
very interesting development.
00:24:36
We searched the police database,
looked at previous convictions, et cetera, and found
that he had indeed
00:24:43
committed numerous
offenses against women, very violent offenses. And that actually only been out
of prison for about 11 weeks.
00:24:54
KERRY DAYNES: David Bond is 27
and he's living with his mom fresh out of prison.
00:24:59
So he's just 11 weeks out of
serving an eight-year sentence for the assault of two girls, a
14-year-old and a 20-year-old.
00:25:09
And he left a 20-year-old
with life-changing injuries and scars. He stabbed her several times,
a brutal attack also that took
00:25:20
place in a riverbank location. PHIL HARDING: So that
fitted in to the modus operandi of attacking lone
women for no reason whatsoever.
00:25:30
They weren't sexually
assaulted, there wasn't any sign of robbery, there
wasn't anything
00:25:34
that gave a reason other
than his mental state for these attacks. KERRY DAYNES: The
similarities are just too
00:25:42
much for the police to ignore. PHIL HARDING: We went to his
mother's house in Stretton.
00:25:48
He was out at that point. He'd gone to have his haircut. We stayed at the house
and talking to his mother.
00:25:54
His mother said that he did
own an orange mountain bike and that he had been out
the previous afternoon.
00:26:00
So again, he became
very strongly a suspect. When he came back, they saw that
he fitted the brief description
00:26:08
that we got at that
point and they asked him to accompany them to
the police station
00:26:12
while further
inquiries were made. [SIREN] [MUSIC PLAYING] Soon after Bond had
been taken from his home
00:26:23
to the police station, we
spoke again to his mother. His mother revealed that going
for an [INAUDIBLE] was unusual.
00:26:30
She'd been on a team
for a number of days because he looks scruffy. But she did say that
he'd done exactly
00:26:36
the same thing after his
previous attacks on women. She also said that on
the day of the offense,
00:26:44
he'd arrived home around
about 5:30 I believe, and that he'd got changed
and asked her to wash
00:26:50
[INAUDIBLE] that got on
it with grass stained and it had got dirt
and was spotted on it.
00:26:57
KERRY DAYNES: It must be
very difficult for a mother to have to
acknowledge to herself
00:27:02
that her son is capable
of such a dreadful act. But luckily, Bond's
mom was sensible
00:27:11
and she knew she couldn't
deny her son's history. And I think that she genuinely
wanted to help the police
00:27:18
and prevent anything
further from taking place. PHIL HARDING: David Bond was
being interviewed as a witness.
00:27:25
His movements were such,
according to him, that he'd been nowhere near the scene.
00:27:30
He'd been elsewhere
and completely the opposite direction
to where the murder took place during that day.
00:27:37
He told us that he'd been
to look at a new bike. And in actual fact, that's
what he'd also told his mother.
00:27:43
We became more and
more suspicious. And at that point, in order
to carry out further inquiries
00:27:48
and to interview
him under caution, he was arrested on
suspicion of the murder. At that stage, we were unaware
of any connection between David
00:28:00
Bond and Debbie Buxton. And subsequent
inquiries revealed that there was
actually no connection
00:28:06
whatsoever between the two. CHRIS THURMAN: Debbie, she was
just a lovely, sweet, bubbly
00:28:12
person, so inoffensive. And so in so many
ways, this would have been a purely absolute
evil random act of murder
00:28:20
without question. No motive. I cannot possibly see why
anyone would want to destroy
00:28:27
such a lovely person frankly. PHIL HARDING: After we'd
spoken to David Bond and got his account
of his movements,
00:28:35
we were quickly able to
disprove some of those. We traced the fact that he'd
actually visited the Spread
00:28:42
Eagle Rolleston that
day on two occasions on the day of the
murder according to his story at the beginning.
00:28:51
He'd been nowhere near there. After he'd been arrested and he
was confronted with that fact,
00:28:57
he changed his
story and admitted that he had been there,
but still denied being
00:29:01
anywhere near the murder scene. We looked at the
route that he would have taken on his mountain bike
to get to and from the scene.
00:29:12
So we searched in that area and
we found a jumper that we later identified as being
identical to one
00:29:20
that he'd been
wearing at the time. Well, all this area was
thoroughly searched.
00:29:26
It was searched more
or less fingertip search, which is
a massive field, but it had to be undertaken.
00:29:32
There was always the
possibility, of course, that the assailant had thrown
the weapons into the river.
00:29:38
So we had to get our
underwater search team out and search the full
length of the river
00:29:44
as it went past the field. [MUSIC PLAYING] JOHN ANDERSON BCAC: I came
fishing along the river
00:29:52
again a few days later
with a friend of mine. We walked for quite a long
way downstream from where we
00:29:57
stand today and walked
up along the river, fly fishing for trout. As we got a short way up
from where we stand now,
00:30:05
there is a big red buoy in
the middle of the River Dove. And what was even more bizarre
was it started moving upstream
00:30:13
and we couldn't really work
out why this red buoy was moving up against the current.
00:30:18
It was quite a bizarre thing. It doesn't sound
it possibly now. And we stood staring and a
diver bobbed up, and then
00:30:25
another diver, and they turned
out to be police divers looking for weapons in the river.
00:30:30
[MUSIC PLAYING] PHIL HARDING: The divers were
searching for a number of days actually.
00:30:42
But on the 1st of May, they
were searching below the weir, and they came across
a ball-peen hammer
00:30:49
and they came across
half of shears. The bolt in the middle of
the shears had been taken out
00:30:57
and the half shear
was found there. We knew that somebody
had been seen riding a bicycle in the
area with a pair of shears.
00:31:09
By comparing the stubble
to the shears themselves, we found that this was
probably the murder weapon.
00:31:18
JOHN ANDERSON BCAC:
There was a porta cabin in the field, which
was a little bit odd
00:31:22
with people sitting outside. We waded in the river
and they came over. It turned out that there were
the police from the murder
00:31:29
squad that streamed
all of the undergrowth from around the bushes
and found various weapons.
00:31:38
So what it seemed
as if it happened is this person had
stashed various weapons on both sides of the river, just
waiting for the right person
00:31:47
to come along. That put the wind
up me a little bit, thinking that I
could very well have
00:31:52
been the right person as well. I don't think he cared
who he was out to murder from what we could make
out from the police.
00:31:59
It was just out to
murder a person. PHIL HARDING: We
then thought, well, where did he likely
to have got those from
00:32:06
and where would garden
shears be used locally? So we thought of the
church, the church yard.
00:32:13
We went up there and
spoke to the grave diggers and the gardeners there. When we talked to
the grave digger,
00:32:19
it was apparent that the
other half of the shears was still in his tool shed and
we recovered it from there.
00:32:27
We subsequently
heard that examined and it matched the other half
that we found in the river.
00:32:35
Also taken from there
was the ball-peen hammer that was identified. And apparently, at the same
time two belts went missing.
00:32:43
We found that the belt that
David Bond was wearing when he was arrested fitted that
description of one of the belts
00:32:51
that had been stolen. When it was shown
to the grave digger, he identified it as being
taken from his shed.
00:32:56
[MUSIC PLAYING] On the 2nd of May, Bond
was charged with the murder of Debbie Buxton.
00:33:10
He appeared in court
and was remanded in custody awaiting trial. BRYANNA FOX: The
fact that Bond stole
00:33:17
these weapons from a church
shed before he went to commit the murders indicates
that he knew
00:33:23
he was going to commit murder. This is premeditated. It was not something that was
spontaneous and indicative
00:33:29
of an argument between
these two strangers that went wrong and escalated. It was something
that he wanted to do,
00:33:36
went through steps to prepare to
do, had the chance to cool off, and Bond chose to do it anyway.
00:33:44
CHRIS THURMAN: After
Ron was released, there was absolute relief. And of course, we were able
to reconcile our own feelings
00:33:51
with Ron, which of course,
had been a lot of turmoil up to that point. DAVID GEE: The stranger element
is so unusual that made it
00:33:59
all the worse for any person
walking around, minding their own business,
and Debbie Buxton just
00:34:05
happened to be in
the wrong place unfortunately at the
wrong time and fell prey to this violent attack.
00:34:16
PHIL HARDING: I was
obviously very pleased. We were all very pleased
that we'd managed
00:34:20
to charge somebody so quickly. The situation, at that point,
as it is with every murder
00:34:26
is that the job's not
finished at that point. We have still got to make
loads more inquiries,
00:34:32
gather evidence. We still need to
establish and prove beyond doubt that that person
has committed the offense.
00:34:52
After Bond had
been charged, we'd still got to try and
gain as much evidence as we possibly could.
00:34:57
So we carried out a
further search of the route that Bond would take
down to the scene
00:35:01
of the murder from his home. We found a glove in a ditch. An examination of
the glove, it was
00:35:12
found that there was
blood inside the glove, which matched Bond's blood. And on the outside of
the glove was blood that
00:35:21
matched that of Debbie Buxton. So it was very good evidence
as far as we're concerned.
00:35:29
We made further inquiries
about the glove it was shown. To David Bond's
stepfather who identified
00:35:36
it as being identical to a glove
he'd given Bond in January. KERRY DAYNES: It really is one
thing to know who your man is
00:35:47
in your heart, but of course,
you've got to build a case and you've got to have
the physical evidence
00:35:52
to support your case. So when you find what we
call that golden nugget of forensic evidence, it's
a massively exciting time
00:36:00
for an investigation because you
know you've got a good chance of securing a conviction.
00:36:16
PIP SHORT: My husband
conducted Debbie's funeral and I attended. It was a marvelous
funeral in the sense
00:36:26
that this church was packed. And there was an
enormous sense of support for Ron and for the
members of Debbie's
00:36:37
his family who were there. And it was one of those
occasions where people seem to participate quite
consciously in a way
00:36:50
to try and help people
to feel that they have got people behind them. [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:37:08
PHIL HARDING: Bond, at court,
was again expressionless. He took the occasional
note both occasionally
00:37:16
to his defense barrister. He showed no emotion as such. He was sentenced to
life imprisonment
00:37:25
with a minimum time of 40 years. He became very
angry in the door. He was upset and he
shouted out to accuse
00:37:36
the police that it was all of
it-- that he had not done it. He was innocent. Shortly after he was
sentenced, the judge
00:37:49
was asked to speculate on what
Bond would have been given-- what the minimum
sentence he would
00:37:56
have been given had he not
had his previous convictions. And he wrote a letter
saying that he thought
00:38:02
he would have sentenced him,
under those circumstances, 25 years. That letter somehow came
to light at a later time
00:38:12
and the actual sentence
was reduced to 25 years. CHRIS THURMAN: I find that
beggars belief quite frankly.
00:38:22
And it is concerning that
what steps are taken when someone is let
out on parole, are
00:38:28
they being properly monitored? Are we safe? Am I safe? Who knows? KERRY DAYNES: I suspect
that Debbie was probably
00:38:38
aware of her attacker because I
think that he probably stalked her for a while, waiting
for the opportune moment
00:38:44
to assault her. So I think that she would
have been incredibly nervous and then, of course,
she would have
00:38:50
been aware of the first
couple of blows to her. There were defensive
wounds to her hands,
00:38:55
so she's clearly tried to
protect herself at some point. So she wasn't killed
instantaneously
00:39:01
and her last moments
were spent in fear. [MUSIC PLAYING] PIP SHORT: After Debbie died and
after people begun to come out
00:39:20
of the shock, there was
a very strong feeling amongst the rotary wives
that they would like
00:39:26
to do something in her memory. And one of them, who was a
professional photographer,
00:39:31
had started to take
photographs of Debbie's walk as a memento of that. And one of the other wives
is a beautiful landscape
00:39:40
watercolor painter. And so she chose the
three views of the church from the photographs
that had been taken
00:39:49
and she painted three
lovely watercolors of them. And so it starts, just
as Debbie's walk did,
00:39:58
with the lane from the main road
and then across the little lane to the church. And that's the view you
get from the main road
00:40:07
and as you walk towards it. And the central one was from
just opposite the church,
00:40:15
the left gate entrance there. They were chosen because
the church is set in Midland
00:40:23
beside the River Dove. And it was the area that
Debbie so much loved. PHIL HARDING: Bond, after
serving his minimum sentence,
00:40:38
was fully entitled
to apply for parole. Fortunately, the parole panel
refused to give him parole
00:40:45
or send him to an open
prison based on information that they got at that time. In my view, if I
met Bond, I would
00:40:54
be extremely concerned should he
be released back into society. JOHN ANDERSON BCAC:
It was an awful crime.
00:41:01
It was a totally random crime. Why does he deserve to
be ever free again, ever? And for him to
come up for parole,
00:41:10
I can't think of
anybody that should think that he should be paroled
and should be free again.
00:41:14
Now, he needs to stay in
prison till the day he dies. PHIL HARDING: David Bond
showed no emotion whatsoever.
00:41:24
He made no admissions
to the murder. He was a man who showed
no remorse whatsoever.
00:41:31
People tell me that
there's good in everybody. I never saw any
good in David Bond.
00:41:38
He was, in my view, evil. He's a very, very,
very dangerous man. CHRIS THURMAN: After
the event, Ron and I
00:41:47
became much closer
friends and then we did socialize quite a lot. The room would confide
in us up to a point
00:41:54
we'd have no discussion. Then suddenly, it would
all come back and he'd say, enough is enough.
00:41:59
And he would have to stop. One can only imagine what
he must have gone through. He was very brave.
00:42:07
He handled it very well, but
he was always there underneath. He got that for the
rest of his life,
00:42:12
and that's the tragedy of
when these things happen. DAVID GEE: I don't think Ron
ever recovered from seeing
00:42:18
his wife in that position. Who would? Such a traumatic event. He had to move on
and he certainly did,
00:42:25
but the memory of that
image, I would suggest, plus the fact that it was
well-known that they had
00:42:31
a very, very strong,
loving relationship would be difficult
for him to dismiss. And I know that he carried--
00:42:37
he carried his
heartache to his grave. PIP SHORT: Debbie
loved this area. I think that was part of
the sorrow at all in a way.
00:42:51
And it really made
people who lived near feel as if
somehow the beauty had been sullied for a long time.
00:42:58
That it had been
something which not just killed Debbie,
but damaged the whole place itself for a while.
00:43:08
It's still referred
to, from time to time, as, Oh, that's where
there was that murder.
00:43:14
And that's sadly what
happens with places. They hold on to something that
happens there, good or bad.
00:43:21
[MUSIC PLAYING]