victor_final
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TechTranscript
00:00 (eerie music)
00:02 - Victor Farrant was Britain's most notorious fugitive
00:07 following the brutal murder of accountant Glenda Hoskins
00:10 at her Port Solent home on February the 7th, 1996.
00:15 - You know, I think everyone in the courtroom
00:17 could see that he was lying to try and save his own skin.
00:21 It's strange, even after all this time.
00:28 I find it really emotional to see,
00:31 to remember those children.
00:32 Watching Farrant.
00:34 I can remember Katie's face looking straight at him
00:41 as he was sentenced.
00:43 It was so powerful.
00:47 They were so brave, those kids were so brave.
00:54 - Victor Farrant remains behind bars
00:57 for the murder of Glenda Hoskins,
01:00 yet he could be released on compassionate grounds
01:03 due to having terminal cancer.
01:04 - I mean, truthfully, we don't really know
01:08 what the process is behind all of this.
01:11 We've been kind of given a vague timeline
01:14 of how this might happen.
01:16 We've got no experience of how the justice system works,
01:20 so we're just really trying to do our best
01:22 in terms of just making awareness.
01:28 You know, I think the public outcry
01:30 has been pretty unanimous from everybody.
01:33 I don't think anybody said,
01:34 "I think he should be released and this is a good idea."
01:38 You know, the feedback we've got
01:40 from all the media that we've done,
01:43 all the journalists, the public at large,
01:46 not only they think this personal story
01:49 is a bit of a miscarriage of justice now.
01:53 - And that sentiment's definitely been echoed.
01:56 Like, I've seen those exact sorts of comments
02:00 echoed in the comments on news articles
02:03 or on social media posts of the news articles,
02:05 you know, people saying exactly that,
02:06 like whether, and noting that we've not really
02:10 had any specific information about his health condition
02:13 or, you know, exactly how bad it is or how unwell he is.
02:18 People have been commenting,
02:21 "Well, even if he's ill, why should he get out?
02:24 "Why should he have the dignity to get out
02:27 "and die in a caring environment?"
02:30 He didn't afford that dignity to his victims.
02:34 And also that fear that he could go out
02:39 and, like Ian said, have a last hurrah.
02:43 And the more I read about him and remember
02:45 over these last few weeks and remember
02:48 and get more of an insight into his character
02:50 and his personality and the way that he does
02:53 and has before manipulated the system,
02:55 the more I think that could definitely be a good possibility.
03:00 - Yeah, I mean, you know, you mentioned before
03:03 about how does it feel to revisit all of this?
03:05 This is something which we had blocked out
03:08 a lot of the details and over the last sort of week or two
03:12 with revisiting it with interviews and speaking about it,
03:15 but also conversations that three of us have had privately,
03:19 there's a lot of stuff that we've actually blocked out,
03:21 a lot of stuff that we were too young
03:23 to really kind of comprehend,
03:24 and a lot of stuff that we actually didn't know at the time
03:28 where people have come forward,
03:29 friends of our mum who still live in the area,
03:34 in South Sea, in Portsmouth,
03:36 and said stuff that we didn't really know about at the time
03:39 that we may have been protected from,
03:41 which is really, really chilling.
03:42 So the more we hear about it,
03:44 there's nothing that has been made
03:47 to ally any of our kind of fears with his release.
03:51 The exclusion zone thing,
03:54 for that to be mentioned sort of straight away,
03:57 it feels that process has sort of been jumped over.
04:00 You know, the conversation must be,
04:03 is he going to be released?
04:04 Not to kind of all of a sudden start agreeing
04:06 exclusion zones from the start.
04:08 And the worry is that to me doesn't appear to be someone
04:14 that is on their deathbed.
04:17 That seems to be someone that can move around freely,
04:19 that has got the freedom to move up and down the country,
04:23 and certainly the physical capacity to be able to do so.
04:26 So from that perspective,
04:29 it doesn't, our fears feel that they're very valid,
04:33 and it doesn't feel that we're just, you know,
04:35 over-exaggerating it just because of the grief that we feel
04:39 and the anger that we feel towards him.
04:41 So I think it's really, really worrying,
04:45 given the lack of detail that we've been given
04:48 and how quickly this can happen.
04:50 - I mean, I don't think being in jail
04:52 would have rehabilitated him in any way.
04:55 Obviously he was in jail before,
04:58 in the '80s and early '90s,
05:00 which only served to make him a more violent criminal
05:05 when he got out of prison.
05:10 From, obviously, again, we've had no insight,
05:12 but all reports from previously spoke to him
05:17 not being someone that could be rehabilitated.
05:21 - I mean, also, one thing that we'd heard
05:24 was that when he was inside in the '80s and '90s
05:28 for the string of crimes that he did,
05:30 he refused all psychiatric help at that point.
05:34 Again, we don't know if that's been the same
05:36 this time around, but, you know, when he left prison,
05:39 he left to murder, and his parole officer
05:42 had said at the time that he was one of the most dangerous
05:46 people that she's ever encountered.
05:48 And that wasn't just purely from the fact that he was,
05:51 it was a thing just about danger.
05:58 It was about the fact that he was so persuasive
06:00 and he just didn't seem that he was capable of that,
06:05 and he convinced people that he wasn't.
06:06 So I think that really does kind of play
06:10 into what we're seeing now,
06:12 and what we're seeing now happening.
06:13 You know, people are convinced, "Oh, he's dying.
06:15 "Give him another chance.
06:16 "Come on, you know, what difference will it make?"
06:18 Well, he knows how to work the system,
06:20 and I think that should be really, really taken into account
06:23 when you're looking at kind of what the game plan is
06:26 for him being released.
06:27 I mean, if you're dying and your family's disowned you,
06:29 what difference is it dying inside or outside?
06:32 I mean, we haven't been told that the prison
06:35 doesn't have the care to take, you know,
06:36 people die in prison all the time.
06:38 So I don't really subscribe to that argument
06:41 that the prison can't take care of him to his end of life,
06:44 which, you know, as we mentioned before,
06:46 that Judge Butterfield has said
06:47 that it is absolutely something which he should die in prison.
06:52 That was made very, very clear in 1998.
06:55 - And remembering he wasn't only on trial
06:57 for the murder of our mum, you know,
06:59 six weeks earlier, the attack he carried out on Anne,
07:04 on the other woman was horrific.
07:06 Like people remember the image of her injuries to this day
07:11 that were printed in the paper.
07:13 It was, I think, and I don't want to speak for her,
07:16 but I think she had lifelong, she has lifelong injuries.
07:21 I think I read, you know, she was in a coma,
07:22 she had her part of her brain removed.
07:24 Like it was just a really massively violent attack.
07:29 And the fact that he was tried for those two together,
07:33 you know, meant no one could think,
07:36 oh, this was a, I'm gonna hate this phrase,
07:39 but a crime of passion,
07:41 or it was a spur of the moment event.
07:46 You know, you could see a true like line of serial events.
07:51 - When you just think about the fact
07:54 that kind of after that had happened,
07:56 you know, in consecutive months,
07:58 he went on the run and just convinced everybody
08:01 he was just a regular guy running a backpack hostel.
08:04 And, you know, I think there were pictures
08:08 that surfaced at the time of, you know,
08:10 people being sat outside having drinks
08:12 and he was sort of, you know, so chilling really.
08:16 And again, that is something
08:18 that could quite easily happen again if he's released.
08:21 You know, I don't have the information,
08:23 so I can't with absolute surety say,
08:26 but I mean, if he is released
08:27 and he starts normal life over again,
08:31 it's not like he's gonna go around
08:32 with a sign over his head saying that I've, you know,
08:35 killed one person, attempted murder, rape, whatever.
08:40 People will just take him at his word.
08:41 He's a very persuasive person
08:43 and has been seen over the years.
08:44 He's a master manipulator and can take people in.
08:48 He's had now probably years of reflection
08:52 and I'm not convinced that he probably thinks that,
08:56 you know, there's been no attempt made
08:59 at any apology or, you know, or anything.
09:04 And even if he did, I actually wouldn't believe him anyway,
09:06 because the whole thing was premeditated.
09:09 He'd been in prison before, he had a series of, you know,
09:14 I mean, these were all attacks on women.
09:17 There is something kind of fundamentally wrong
09:18 with the way that he views women
09:20 and how he should be around them, you know?
09:22 And I just think that how can you let somebody out
09:27 through the back door of prison
09:28 when you have all those psychiatric evaluations,
09:31 all those things that normally be considered.
09:33 This is someone that's a category A prisoner
09:35 that was told should never ever be released.
09:37 So, you know, the highest consideration
09:40 should be made about his release.
09:41 And I'm sorry, but just the fact that you're dying,
09:44 that was already factored into your sentence
09:46 and the court case.
09:48 So this isn't something brand new
09:50 that should be kind of considered.
09:52 It was always assumed that he would die in prison.
09:55 - And that's the thing with the exclusion zones.
09:58 That was what was so actually upsetting
10:01 about being asked to nominate exclusion zones,
10:03 because yes, we could nominate exclusion zones
10:07 and presumably have him not living near any of us.
10:11 But as we do believe,
10:13 the evidence points to him being a dangerous person.
10:17 Why are we valuing our lives and safety
10:20 over somebody in a zone
10:22 that we didn't nominate for an exclusion zone?
10:24 We're almost being asked to play God a bit.
10:29 Like I'm not gonna say, oh yeah, he can live here,
10:32 but he can't live here, but he can live there
10:35 when that could be putting somebody else at risk.
10:38 - I mean, the worrying thing for me
10:39 is why would he want to be released from prison?
10:42 If he is dying to this extent, you know what I mean?
10:46 Why would he want to be released to prison
10:48 when his family don't want anything to do with him?
10:53 That to me feels worrying.
10:55 It feels like there's an agenda for him
10:56 wanting to get out.
10:58 And that's where we all feel for our safety
11:00 and particularly coming forward in such a public way.
11:03 I mean, we are now targets for him.
11:06 What do we think a tag is gonna make any difference
11:08 from him rocking up at our house or whatever?
11:12 This is someone who evaded the law for five months
11:14 and evaded Interpol.
11:15 That's the question you've got to ask yourself,
11:19 anybody watching or listening to this
11:21 is that would you be happy with someone like that
11:24 living on your street?
11:26 Would you, as your next door neighbor,
11:29 would you be happy for him to be in your local community?
11:34 (ominous music)
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11:47 (ominous music)
11:49 [BLANK_AUDIO]