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Stagg helps Rachel boyfriend to sue Met for negligence
Ted Hynds29 Sep 2009
The man wrongly accused of Rachel Nickell's murder is helping her partner sue Scotland Yard for negligence.
Colin Stagg spent a year in prison for the killing of the former model before being cleared and eventually winning a record £706,000 in compensation.
Her actual killer, Robert Napper, was detained indefinitely at Broadmoor last December after admitting her manslaughter.
She was stabbed 49 times and sexually assaulted as she walked with her two-year-old son Alex on Wimbledon Common in 1992.
Miss Nickell's boyfriend, Andre Hanscombe, 40, claims Napper should have been arrested by the Met three years before, as he had been suspected of an attack on another woman but not questioned.
Mr Hanscombe has instructed a leading London law firm in his attempt to win substantial damages for police negligence. It has now been in touch with Mr Stagg.
Today, Mr Stagg, 46, backed up Mr Hanscombe's legal claim and called for police to be “called to account.”
He said that his sympathy for the trauma suffered by Alex, now 20, swayed him to help the family despite the fact that Mr Hanscombe did not believe his innocence even after he was aquitted.
Speaking on holiday in Cornwall, he said: “I was initially tempted to refuse the request.
“Despite my acquittal Andre Hanscombe remained convinced I had murdered his loved one.I spent the next fifteen years as one of the most hated men in Britain.
“I was treated as a pariah who had got away with the murder of a lovely young mum.
“Andre even refused to apologise to me after her real killer was sent down last November on incontrovertible evidence.
“But I've never lost sight of the fact that the mother of his child had been brutally stolen from him.
“His little boy Alex, almost three at the time, witnessed this horror. He has had to live with it ever since and it has his ruined his life.
“So compared with what they have gone through I got off lightly. They deserve a payday and it gives me a second chance of payback.”
He added: “For what's happened to them they deserve a million pounds.”
Napper was detained indefinitely last December for the killing.
Napper went on to then murder 27-year-old Samantha Bisset in her home in Plumstead, south east London, and her four-year-old daughter, Jazmine.
He was convicted of those killings in 1995 and detained at Broadmoor.
Mr Stagg added: “The Met's bungling led directly to three unnecessary killings, numerous rapes and blighted a lot of lives.
“It's time they were called to account and made to pay for the misery their mistakes caused.”
A shopping list' for documents, contacts and background information has been sent to Mr Stagg's lawyers, WH Matthews.
Mr Stagg's lawyer, Alex Tribick, said:”I was somewhat suprised to receive a request for help from Mr Hanscombe's legal team, given his lack of reaction to my client's innocence even after his award and formal police apology.
“But [my client] has given me the go-ahead and there may be a wealth of information and documentation that could be provided by way of assistance.”
Reader views (3)
when I use to see Mr Stagg being interviewed I always felt that he was always telling the truth and thats not being wise after the event.
So he was a loner who strolled in the park like hundreds of non murderers do.
but the police wanted someone and it was the young Mr Stagg they selected
- Terence Mccarthy, South Africa, 29/09/2009 17:14
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George, London
How very well said.
On a last note it does make you wonder how many others are doing time, that are innocent.
- P Staker, Londonistan., 29/09/2009 12:38
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I always felt uncomfortable about Colin Stagg's arrest and the Police 'spin' around him. They clearly felt that they had to arrest somebody, anybody, due to pressure from the media. Stagg was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, just like Rachel Nickell.
They were more concerned with getting a conviction rather than getting the right man, and if this reflects their attitude in general, it may explain whey Napper was on the loose at the time.
I don't know if this action will achieve much though, what is done is done, but if there is some benefit for her son who had his mother taken from him, then all well and good.
- George, London, 29/09/2009 09:49
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