Did the family liaison officer suggest where you might find some help?

No. They brought Victim Support to see us. They help victims of crimes and things.

What were they like?

They were quite nice actually. They had a chat with us. And said if there was anything that they could do, they’d be there, but there was nothing really that we wanted them to do. We were just kind of in shock for weeks on end.

Did you want any sort of counselling at that stage, did you want to talk to anybody else about it?

No.

You had your own support and everything?

Yes. My nephew sees a counsellor. He’s seen her for, since probably about two months after his mum died. Victim support helped us with that. And he still sees her now and it’s over two years.

So did they find somebody?

They found someone, yes they because of the circumstances of my sister’s death and the fact my nephew found her.

They pushed this counselling through for him. They said, He really, really needs it.

Is the counsellor a volunteer or somebody with professional training?

She’s trained but she is a volunteer.

I see so she’s a professionally trained counsellor, working for Victim Support as a volunteer?

She doesn’t work for them. She works for another group.

Oh I see, so she’s doing that as voluntary work.

Yes. Yes.

That’s good. And is that free?

Yes it is. Yes.

So they have helped you in that way?

Yes they have helped us in that way. And they did and when Shirley first died, it was because everything from Shirley dying to her actually being buried was nearly two months, we didn’t actually have the funeral until December. So it was quite a long time. So in that time Victim Support arranged for my nephew to go and have a couple of outings out to do things you know, just to take his mind off everything that were going on. Because he’d come home from school and the liaison officers would be here and he’d go, All right. And it would be just, there were that he was that used to them being there.

You know and he just took it in his stride that they were there.

Did someone from Victim Support come and pick him up to take him on these outings?

No they arranged for us to take him and we, and we took him.

Oh. And did they pay for them?

Most of the things were free that we wouldn’t have known about if they kind of hadn’t known about them. Like we took him out on Halloween night to this museum that does like a Halloween it’s not a party, but it’s a walk through. But they change the atmosphere of the museum.

And I’ve lived here all my life and I’d never ever heard of it. Yet the chap from victim support was involved with that so he arranged for us to get tickets to go to that.

And it free when you got there?
Yeah.

So he helped in that he told you about things that your nephew might like to do?

Might interest him, yes.

Oh that was good. And they all work as volunteers do they for Victim Support?

Yes Victim Support, they’re all volunteers.

I mean they did say that they’d if I needed counselling they’d arrange that. But at the time I was at college doing a course to get onto to do my nursing. And all my friends were just so supportive.

Did anybody from Victim Support ever come and visit you?

Yes, Victim Support did. But I feel that Victim Support should have further specialised training to deal with murder victims families. I am not one to sit and criticise systems and say well they don’t do this, and they don’t do that. But what I would say is, they need to do better. It’s not just me saying that, anyone that works within the realms of Victim Support genuinely do so because they want to do good work. It’s not a question of that but many families say the same, that Victim Support hasn’t really given them the support they needed, and I believe that to be because the trauma that victims families go through is not understood enough, and again to, there has been as I understand it and probably you, you could clarify this, there was research recently done where 93% of families interviewed that had suffered sudden death and serious violent crime were suffering post traumatic stress, various symptoms within the strata of post traumatic stress. And of that 93%, 64% were severe symptoms. And I think that if that was taken on board more, by people such as the Criminal Injuries Compensation, and Victim Support, if that was understood and recognised, more widely, then I think we wouldn’t have the problems that are, that are being expressed. Often if a family are feeling that terrible rage, and a nice person comes from Victim Support, or even a Family Liaison Officer, and because of that person’s grief and frustration they start getting very angry, and displaying that anger to the Family Liaison Officer, or the Victim Support, the person that’s come to help, and that person doesn’t understand that’s part of their post traumatic stress, then they take it personally, and they go away often, and don’t come back again?

Is that what happened in your case? What actually happened to you with Victim support?

Well a Victim Support lady came, a very nice lady. And when the actual funeral was due to take place I actually invited her to the funeral. And she explained that she was very sorry that she couldn’t come to Westley’s funeral because she was actually dealing with housing for a family of illegal immigrants. Now, I felt that if she’d have understood the pain that we were going through the fact that her work necessitated her, quite reasonably to look after a family that were in Britain that shouldn’t have been here, one would have thought she would have had the sense not to impart that information to me. Because how can a family of any other set of circumstances be more important than my dead son? No-one could expect me to be able to say, Oh yes, well of course that’s much more important.

So it upset you?

So that was upsetting to me.

That was quite insulting really to my son. I felt, you know as I’ve said earlier I’ve tried throughout the whole process to try and take the weaknesses of the criminal justice system and say well rather than jump and down and shout and holler about the fact that it’s all wrong, let’s pinpoint it, lets say well this section applies, and that’s got to be changed to give a better situation for future victims families.

Did the lady from Victim Support do anything to help at all?

Well she came round, and she gave me information about CICA, but I didn’t really feel that she gave me support, and she didn’t because she didn’t know how to. That’s the simple bottom line. It wasn’t that she was coming here to you know, to make herself feel good, that’s not why people do that work, but the fact of the matter is that if you don’t know how to help somebody you’re not going to be able to help them. As simple as that. And for the person on the receiving end they just get frustrated and think, Oh well go away don’t bother to come back. You know, to me the way to support somebody is to always let that person know that you’re there, you’re here if they need to pick up the phone and talk about jam doughnuts, if that helps.

Could you have done that for her?

With her, no. No because I think she, I think when I said how disgusted I was at certain elements of the criminal justice system, instead of just listening I think she felt that I was directing it personally at her, I don’t know because I never actually had any personal arguments, but I think I probably displayed a negativity.

I think it as simple as pie to help families that are going through this kind of grief, and it’s simple by the mere fact that sometimes the desperation is so great that you just need somebody to listen, that’s the most important thing, so really Victim Support just could do with some tweaking, if you like, some training in dealing with serious victims’ families. I mean they receive an awful lot of money from the government to, to do that service, invariably, and that service is given to everyone, which is fantastic, it you know, somebody that suffers a burglary or a minor, you know incident, has the right to have Victim Support, and that’s fantastic. But dealing with victims’ families that have suffered sudden death through, and when I say sudden death, it’s not just murder of course, sudden death that is shocking, it can be somebody run over, suicide, which must rate very closely in that, in what that must do to a family, and there’s no-one answerable, so I think that specialised, there should be within victim support certain people that are specially trained to deal with.

So you don’t think she had any specialist training this person?

Well, I understand that Victim Support do have training, but, as I say.

She couldn’t answer certain questions that you wanted answered for example?

Well I don’t think she was consistent. You know, a month down the line did I get any phone call, two months down the line, did I get a phone call?

No?

A year down the line did I get a phone call? You know to me somebody that’s prepared to support, is someone that thinks, I wonder how Westley’s Mum is at the moment? Oh

You’ve never had follow up phone calls?

No. And I don’t think that’s uncommon, you know, you know other families that I am involved with have said the same. It may not be the fault of Victim Support people individually, I’ve got no criticism, I must emphasise that, you know the lady that came was very nice, it’s not that I’m criticising her, but I am criticising the training perhaps that they’re getting. I know that I used to think well perhaps it was me, but there are far too many other families that say the same.

Did you seek any professional counselling or

I did subsequently, I did, I have received counselling from CRUSE. I referred myself to CRUSE not until a couple of months later and then it was a couple of months after that, or almost three months after that I think that I was given a counsellor, but I have found that enormously helpful. Enormously.

But you had to wait?

I did have to wait, yes I did. And that wasn’t very helpful. The initial contact with CRUSE, with the person who I understand now was assessing me on the phone [laughs] wasn’t very helpful. And I didn’t have high expectations of the CRUSE contact at first, because of my own background, because I’ve worked with families and people a lot so I’ve got a sort of smattering of knowledge of counselling and things, I didn’t have huge expectations but I knew I desperately needed somebody to talk to that I wasn’t going to upset. That was the thing, that, who wasn’t a friendwho wasn’t going to give me advice. Who wasn’t going to make oblique references to moving on.

And who, you know, who wasn’t my daughter, you know, to upset her. So that was my, my aim in wanting to talk to somebody objective who didn’t have an axe to grind. But I didn’t have high expectations. But I have been enormously, enormously lucky in the counsellor that I was given. And I’ve benefited enormously.

What happens in a typical session with her?

Phew, we just talk. I just start to talk and it just always happens and I’ve gained a lot of important insights I think. And I’ve realised, as I was alluding to earlier, that my inability to find a voice and to defend my rights and my needs when my son died has its, has its foundation in things that happened a lot earlier in my life. And I’ve been enabled to look at those things. Since.

Did she have any professional training do you know?

Yes. The particular person that I was fortunate enough to have has.

Yes. So that’s why I say I was enormously fortunate, enormously lucky. And I’m very, very thankful for that.

So how long has that been going on for?

That went on for over a year. A long time.

Once a week?

A lot longer than normal. I have to say. It was often, it was for a long period of time once a week, and then we brought it, we started to talk about ending and so I elected that we should go to once a fortnight
o help me to come away from that less painfully. But that has ended now.

And that’s all free?

It is, yes it is. it’s, I can’t tell you how much benefit I feel that I’ve gained and if I had had to pay for that I would not have been able, on two counts I wouldn’t have been able to afford it, and I wouldn’t have allowed myself to move my finances around so that I did afford it, because I wouldn’t, and I think 99% of the population wouldn’t, have given myself that much importance.

I went to see CRUSE, with our son’s girlfriend.

Did you have counselling with CRUSE?

No, and there was a waiting list, we were told of about three to six months. The particular person we spoke to hadn’t got experience of dealing with a traumatic death like ours. They said we could probably have a counsellor if you’ve had more than one death within the couple of years, I said, Well I’ve now had five deaths within three years We ended up handing the box of tissues to the Cruse counsellor, and we then left. Cruse did contact me about six months afterwards.

Could the GP have arranged professional counselling for you?

I’d been to the GP and I said that we were, we were going to a counsellor and also with me been working for who I did, I did have access to a counsellor, but I think that they find, they cannot a counsellor who has actually been in the situation.

So from your perspective there’s a lack of suitably trained counsellors who are available?

Yes there’s counsellors that are available, but it’s unique, anybody who has lost anybody through murder, it’s very difficult. Counsellors may have lost people through road traffic accidents,

But when it comes to murder or manslaughter, and the same with Victim Support, the people, the staff that we’ve experienced that work for these organisations, have not been in the position of losing somebody through murder or manslaughter.

Did they [Victim Support] give you any written information about where you might find other help if you felt they couldn’t help you?

I have been given that by the police in the pack that you get, and they contacted SAMM, Support after Murder and Manslaughter, and in actual fact an office hadn’t been set up in my home town, but there was something in the pipeline. I then got a phone call from the person who was setting something up and a couple of months later I did go along to a meeting. And I felt I was with people that I could relate to and who could relate to myself, but it was more exchanging experience, the person who was actually running the group has got a good insight into a lot of things, even though the experience, his experience was twenty, well thirty odd years previous, and how things had changed. But it was, it, I felt in my comfort zone at the time. I could openly speak to people who understood.

What happened at the meeting? You had a chance to say what you wanted to say?

Yes. And then I’ve met a couple of good friends through that.

Have you been again? Do you go regularly?

I go regularly but at the momentI think you could still go along and if there’s new people that come you feel that you can help and support them.

I’m not quite sure how, we need more, we need more going, or we need something else. Because a support groups good but people might come once, they don’t come again. We are having a Memorial service which will be lovely, at the beginning of December, we had one last year, but the person that runs the local group his aim was to get a Memorial service in the city by Lives Cut Short through Murder and Manslaughter, and the first one was last year, and there is another one arranged for this year, and we had good support last year, because even though people don’t come to the group they were happy to come to the service. And hopefully this years service will be as well represented as last years was.

Do you get men coming to the group as well as women?

Not many, no.

So SAMM’s, they meet in somebody’s house?

No, they meet at the civic hall. it’s got to be on mutual ground, and not in anywhere where they sell alcohol because obviously some people who are distressed they might turn to drink, so there’s not temptation no.

You said the family is being supportive, did you look anywhere else for help, counselling or anything?

Yes, the week before my brother’s death I had been invited on a weekend with men, a weekend that was specifically for men, and it was run by the Catholic Church. And I was invited with, from one of my Catholic friends who had actually was going, and actually was going to be doing some singing. And he asked me to, would I sing? Would I help with the singing? And I said oh yes, I’d come along. And so I went on this weekend, with this group of men, and part of the weekend is to form a counselling group, a group, a supportive group.

And we had done this, and this was just a week before my brother’s death. And we had formed this group over this weekend, it was very supportive it was a, I think there was five of us in it, this small group. And we talked about lots of issues, different issues that we were going through as men, whether they’d be family, marriage, and parenting, all those things we talked about, and shared, and the idea of this was that it was supposed to be established in this weekend, and then it was to continue once a month or so after the weekend. And we had actually booked our appointment, our first appointment for the 5th August. That was in our diaries after this weekend that I went on with them. And the 5th August was a few days after my brother was killed, and funnily enough the group all phoned round and said, We can cancel it, and move it because of what’s happened, because we don’t want to go on with our, have our first meeting without, you know, one of the members, because of what happened. And then I got a call from my friend and he said, Oh we’ve cancelled, we’ve decided to cancel it, just because of what’s happened, we don’t want to go on without you, and I said, You know something, don’t cancel, I’m going to be there, I’m going to come to the meeting, and that was the best thing that I did.

They supported you?

Because the support, this was the first time, sorry, this was the first time I felt supported, you know because the first time I felt that people heard my grief, and heard my pain, and heard my insecurities, and heard my fears, and I was able just to be me. I was, I didn’t need to be a husband, I didn’t need to be strong as a brother, as an older brother, and there was a lot of that when a, when a, when a death takes place there’s a lot of having to be strong for other people around you, having to be strong for your Mum, you don’t want your Mum to see you broken because you want her, her to be strong. You don’t want your sisters to see you broke, you know, you want to be strong for everyone. And you don’t want to be, you want to be strong at home, you want to be still showing that you’re coping. But this was the first time I was able to just

Did you feel you could cry?

I could cry. I was able to cry. I was able to share every emotion and feeling that I had, that I felt, and do you know something I was, I was able to hear from other men also their experience and you know, so many answers were given to me at that, that session, to so many of the things that I had, was battling, I was battling with., my personal battle in accepting this, this death. In trying to cope and move on from this; so many answers came out of that, that group of men.

Did you meet again? Did you ever?

We met again, yes, we met, continued to meet for a number of sessions, after that, and again it was it was, it continued to be a strength and we dealt with lots of different issues, we dealt with other people’s issues as well, after that, but that first session was entirely for me I think, they had all, or whatever they, issues were going on for them, they had just put to the side.

The other thing is that they don’t live in this area, they don’t, they don’t know. You know they live in a very, very maybe affluent area, part of the city, they had never ever been in contact with anyone from violence. I was the only black male in the group you know, it was a completely different life for them, you know, and this was an experience I guess that they never ever thought that they would ever meet someone who had lost a member of their family, so it was completely new for them, and they were totally accepting. The acceptance I felt at that meeting, the fact that they were all there, they all turned up. None of them was too embarrassed to come; none of them was too embarrassed to ask questions. I mean, you know, they didn’t treat me with a sense of ignoring, or there was no difficulty there, they just they seemed to at ease with it, and I guess that came because of the week that we had had, the weekend that we had had together, we had formed such a good relationship, and I guess you know when I talk about God and my faith in him, I really feel that that group was formed a month before my brother died and it was key to seeing me through. I believe that it was him, that he, God knew that this was happening, and this was preparation for me, this was going to be my, my outlet, this was going to be the place that I found comfort and that I found him, you know and his love, and I found a great lot of love in that, in that, in those meetings with them.

I was lucky in the fact that the people I was working for at the time allowed me time off, and actually paid me for being off. So I was off for a good six weeks before I could actually go back to work, and that process you know everybody was very helpful. But if I can go back to the court, after the court case, we were very angry. Well, I was very angry and I know, like felt let down by the whole process. And I thought, well it can’t be the end, you know there must be something else that I can do, and I started then to look at websites, where people were injured and I came across a website up in Manchester which was a Hazards Campaign and I read through some of the stuff there.

The Hazards Campaign?

Hazards Campaign and I contacted, I e-mailed a woman there, and said, you know, look I’m interested in some of the things that you’ve been saying, and I didn’t hear anything for about a week, and then I got this e-mail from her saying, you know she was so sorry to hear what had happened to me, she was involved in a group called FACK, which was Families Against Corporate Killers, and if I was interested she would send me some stuff, so a couple of days later she sent me some bits and pieces, and then she sent me her phone number so I phoned her and we spoke and she then put me through in touch with [the woman who started FACK].

Do you find it comforting to be in contact with other people whove been through the same thing?

I find it comforting but I also find, [sigh] it, I find it’s helpful because these people are in the same position as ourselves. And they don’t want this happening to anybody else either. And they are committed to stopping it. And this is what I want to do, and I feel, I get a lot of support from that, feeling that I’m actually doing something to help prevent it happening to somebody else’s son or daughter.