The Mysterious Vanishing Act Of Libby Squire | True Crime Documentary

“Libby, my darling pie, we just want to know that you’re safe. Please get in touch with us anywhere you can. The whole family is missing you, especially me and your dad, sisters, and your brother. I miss you so much. It’s breaking my heart not knowing where you are. Please come forward with any information you may have, no matter how small or irrelevant it may be. We just want Libby home.”

“After 7 weeks, Libby’s family were told yesterday that a body had been found in the Humber Estuary. Tonight, they got the news they’d been dreading as police confirmed it was Libby’s body.”

“And although she has been physically taken from us, the memories we have and the love we share will never be taken. Thank you. Thank you.”

Hull, East Yorkshire, in England. Home to the University of Hull, which looks after around 14,000 students. Amongst those students was 21-year-old Liberty Squire, who went by Libby. Libby was in her second year and had thrived at university. She had done well in her studies, enjoyed the social aspect that being at university gave her, and had a great group of friends. Those that knew her said she was wickedly fun, talented, witty, and always made an effort to include everybody. She was a doting big sister to her brother and two sisters and was very close to her mother, Lisa, and father, Russell.

Libby had always been very bright and pushed herself hard to achieve good grades, but family said she definitely held herself to an impossibly high standard. Her mental health soon started suffering; she was battling an eating disorder, self-harming, and her grades were slipping. She continued to push through and persevered to get her A-levels and was beaming when she was accepted into university to study philosophy. Lisa said she was worried about her daughter being so far away, not wanting her mental health to start suffering again, but Libby was adamant it was for the best and couldn’t wait for a fresh start. She took a gap year and went traveling in Paris, and by the time she got back, she was more than ready to move into the next phase of her life. She was in a strong relationship with her boyfriend of 3 years, Connor, with him saying she was the most interesting person he’d ever met, caring and empathetic.

“I know it’s easy to say at my age, but I knew she was the person for me,” he recalled.

Libby was always busy and had lots of plans already made for when she graduated. She wanted to go traveling with her housemates and hopefully move into journalism. University had brought out another side in her, and Connor said she was more confident and happy than ever.

On January 31st, 2019, at 8:30 p.m., Libby left her student accommodation on Wellesley Avenue, and she and some friends walked to another student house. Most students nearby were going out, and the plan was that Libby and her group of friends would have some drinks, play some games, catch up, and then head out to a popular nearby club called the Welly. At around 10 p.m., she sent Connor a text message to say good night as she was leaving her phone at home, and at 11:20 p.m., the group arrived at the nightclub, picked up by CCTV as they walked in.

Libby was refused entry. She was clearly intoxicated and struggling to walk or stand, and the security team turned her away, saying she’d already had too much to drink. They regrouped, and 10 minutes later, her friends put her into a taxi, gave the driver some money, and told him to take her back home. They watched as the taxi drove off and carried on with their night.

 

Just before 3:00 a.m., the group, who were now starting to arrive home and wind down, sent a text message to a housemate of Libby’s that had stayed at home to see how she was. To their alarm, they said Libby hadn’t come home and they hadn’t seen or heard from her. They assumed that she was still out of the club. Everybody started calling around other people’s homes, wondering if she’d gone there; not one person had seen her. And as her phone was still at home, they couldn’t get hold of her that way either. They also found her house keys in the garden, too. Not only was Libby very intoxicated, it was bitterly cold outside and snow was covering parts of the road. They knew this wasn’t safe if she was still out there, and they called the police right away.

 

The police were definitely concerned, and the investigation moved quickly. Was it possible that she was struggling with her mental health again and this had caused her to run away, they wondered? Her friends and family said they had to consider every possibility, but this one was highly unlikely. She had been in the best of spirits, loved her housemates, and had just received great marks and feedback from her Christmas assignments. Within just a few hours, the media was running with the story, and Libby was at the forefront of everybody’s minds.

“The two CCTV cameras are on a nearby property agency, and they show the area where people queue to get into the Welly nightclub. Here, Libby Squire is seen coming up to the club. Off-camera, she’s turned away by a doorman and then goes back down to the group. The businessman who’s released the footage to police says he hopes it serves to jog someone’s memory of seeing Libby that night.”

The police were able to track down the taxi driver. He said he had dropped her at Wellesley Avenue, and when he glanced back, he saw her walking towards her front door. For whatever reason, Libby hadn’t gone inside. Fortunately, the streets were covered by CCTV, and knowing the time she was placed in the taxi, it wasn’t hard to find her and track where she had walked after getting out of the cab.

Cameras showed Libby walking on the roads nearby at 11:37 p.m. At 11:40 p.m., two passersby stopped to try and help her when they found her lying in the snow. They said Libby was crying and agitated but didn’t want any help and was snappy and incoherent; they felt there was nothing they could do. A group of students then saw her outside their house and invited her in to check that she was okay, but she carried on walking, seemingly aimlessly. Authorities said given how cold it was that early morning, she could well have been suffering from the early side effects of hypothermia.

“Days since Libby Squire was last seen, and forensic officers from Humberside Police have spent today at the place where she was last spotted. They collected items of interest as their investigation into the missing 21-year-old student continues. Police say they’re extremely concerned for her welfare. Specialist teams, aided by coast guards, are continuing their search efforts along the nearby River Hull. Students have also helped in the ongoing operation.”

“It doesn’t feel real. It still feels like really surreal. We were talking like last night, and it feels like something out of a movie. And the second you don’t like do anything, you just get frustrated. She’s a lovely person, and it’s so out of character for something like this to happen. Please come home. We know we love you. All the support… there’s over 200 people in there for you. Please, please come home soon.”

“Obviously, when people go out and they drink, sometimes you lose your phone…”

Upon sentencing him, the judge said that Libby did not stand a chance that night and said that Pawel may never be released, and if he is, he will be monitored for the rest of his days. He called the whole case unimaginatively harrowing. If he is successful in his parole applications, he will be in his early 50s.

“Firstly, we would like to thank everybody for their love and support over the last two years. We’ve both really appreciated it. Our special thanks go out to the police teams and the other agencies that were involved with Libby’s case from the outset through to today. As a family, today’s verdict changes nothing for us. There is no closure. We don’t get to have Libby back, and our lives don’t revert back to normal. However, we are pleased that all the hard work and dedication of the police and legal teams has been recognized. Libby will always be with us, and we are all so proud of our beautiful, caring, wonderful girl. And although she has been physically taken from us, the memories we have and the love we share will never be taken. Thank you. Thank you.”

After his conviction, his wife separated from him and moved back to Poland. She maintains to this day that their relationship was nothing but good, and she was horrified when everything came out as it was not the man she knew.

Lisa remains committed to campaigning to change the laws around non-contact sex offenses, asking for harsher sentences. Police joined forces with the Squire family with a campaign that urged people to report what is considered low-level sex offenses. Lisa even had a meeting with the then Prime Minister Boris Johnson, where she argued that whole-life tariffs should be automatic for anyone convicted of murder. She said that Boris Johnson told her there aren’t the prison spaces.

Lisa responded, “Well, then build more prisons. It’s as simple as that. Anyone who goes out and takes a life should be given a whole-life tariff. End of. In 27 years, Libby doesn’t come back. I don’t get my daughter back. My children don’t get to have their sister back. We have a whole-life sentence to live.”

In 2022, Lisa said she wanted to meet with Pawel in prison to talk about what had happened that night. Pawel agreed.

“A lot of people don’t understand this. I don’t hate him. I’m not angry with him. I just want information from him. I don’t wish to forgive him. I don’t wish to understand why he did what he did. For me, it’s very much about finding out how she was in those last 20 minutes of her life. It’s actually quite a brave thing for him to do, to agree to see me in the first place is a big thing, and I am grateful. Nothing he can tell me can be worse than what goes on in my imagination,” Lisa said.

 

But in February 2023, Pawel retracted the agreement, saying he felt that he had been portrayed as a bad person in the media because of the Squire family, and as a result, he no longer wanted to talk to Lisa. For Lisa, who quite frankly had shown nothing but grace towards him, it was a huge blow and clearly his way of keeping some element of control until the end.

Libby’s family have continued to show an unwavering level of decorum and strength, channeling all their energy and efforts into hopefully making changes to the laws and keeping Libby’s memory alive.

Lisa said, “Every morning, in that lull between sleep and waking up, I still think life is normal. Then I wake up and remember Libby is gone. Sometimes the grief takes me by surprise, looking at pictures of Libby that I’ve looked at a million times in tears, thinking, ‘Why has someone taken this lovely human being?’”