Drivers helped justice
Page 16
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
by Karen Miles • Lorry drivers made an enormous contribution in bringing the killer of Celine Figard to justice, according to evidence heard during the trial of her murderer, owner-driver Stuart Morgan.
Thousands of drivers and companies provided vital clues to police, culminating in Morgan's conviction. He is now starting a sentence of life imprisonment for the French student's murder.
Before Figard's body was found, one driver told the police that the photo-fit issued of her suspected abductor resembled a driver who operated out of Southampton and who probably lived in the area.
In fact Morgan had been working as an owner-driver from the Southampton depot of haulier Dual Carriage and was living in Poole, Dorset.
The 19-year-old girl was last seen on 19 December climbing into the cab of a white Mercedes-Benz truck at Chievely service station in Berkshire. Her naked body was found 10 days later in an isolated lay-by on the A449 between Worcester and Kidderminster. She had been raped, beaten and strangled.
Up to 4,000 drivers were subsequently interviewed. Because Figard had been raped police were able to carry out DNA testing. About 30 drivers were tested before Morgan, who was arrested and tested on 17 February.
He continued to deny having picked up Figard until the driver who was parked next to the vehicle she had boarded picked him out in an identity parade.
Although some of Figard's belongings were subsequently found hidden at his £100,000 house, and spots of her blood were found in his cab, Morgan denied murder. He would only say that she had agreed to have sex with him.
West Mercia police, who conducted the murder inquiry, are sending a dossier on Morgan's movements as a lorry driver between March 1991 and February 1996 to all police forces. They will check to see if there is any possibility of Morgan being connected with any unsolved murders, says a West Mercia spokesman.