15-Year-Old Daughter Kills Her Father and Friend
They should be the most [music] innocent members of society. But children can be capable of the most sadistic, premeditated, and brutal murders. They beat him and hit him with a bottle. One of them stabbed Jay straight through the heart. What drives these kids to kill men, women, friends, family? She was determined that her mother had to die.
Even their teachers. This was the first occasion upon which a teacher had been killed in class in the course of conducting a lesson. Could they be born evil? They did have a weird, dark sense of humor. He was a little bit different to most of the other kids. He was aggressive, threatening, and dangerous.
Or are they victims of their environment? >> There was a lot of gangs. There was a lot of violence. Uh a lot of drug abusers. With exceptional access to real police [music] tapes, the voice that talked to me, you need to make a sacrifice or we’re going to come and get you. You need to do it. and interviews with those closest to the victims >>>> and the perpetrators, a red mist had simply descended.
>> We reveal what made them such savage killers. >>=>> In this case, we examine two violent murders within the murky street drinking community of Ipswich. She had a cheese grater to her face. He had been smothered. They put salt in her wounds to make the pain even more excruciating.
There was a trainer print found on his forehead. And the shocking revelation that one of the individuals responsible was 15-year-old Lorraine Thorpe, the daughter of the second victim. And she went round and helped kill her father. That just goes to show what sort of girl she was. But what turned a happy, outgoing young girl who doted on her father into his killer, and Britain’s youngest ever female double murderer to date? Ipswich, one of Britain’s oldest market towns famous for its quaint Tudor lanes and architecture.
But in the summer of 2009, it would provide the backdrop to a murder case that would shock the nation the gruesome details were revealed in court. I was appointed as the senior investigating officer into the suspected murder investigation. Local police were called to Rosalind Hunt’s home address in Ipswich on a Sunday morning after a neighbor had not seen her for a little while and had become concerned.
Rosalind, also known as Rosie, was a 41-year-old woman living alone in Ipswich. Rosalind was my youngest sister. What I remember about Rosie growing up as a little girl, she was always playful and a you know, cheerful little kid. Used to sort of like bunk off school a lot. Her and me other sister would always sort of like find a derelict house and sort of like pretend that was theirs, put furniture in it.
Where they got the furniture from is beyond me, but put [music] curtains up and just pretend that was their little house. But by 2009, Rosalind was suffering from acute alcohol addiction. >> [music] >> Having separated from her husband, she was living in a council flat and had fallen into the Ipswich street drinking community. Later on the morning of Sunday, the 9th of August, police made a forced entry into Rosalind’s address on Victoria Street.
It was quite close to the office, within walking distance, so I went straight there as a young reporter. There were forensic officers there. The area was taped off. All of the windows of this property were open, which was a fair indication that a body had been discovered and it may have been there for some time.
She was lying clothed on the mattress in the bedroom of the property, partly covered by a duvet. Whenever we attend a crime scene, we go from door to door in the local area, um and we try to speak to neighbors and ideally hit upon people who knew the victim. Neighbors were complimentary. She seemed to be a very well-liked person.
Her body showed numerous injuries around the chest [music] and abdominal area. There were nine separate ribs that were found to have been [music] broken and the indications were that she was alive at the time that those injuries occurred. For me, looking at this case, the level of brutality is really interesting. It’s really significant.
The level of injuries, the torturous type activity [music] that is evident, suggests whoever did this is expressing a huge [music] amount of anger and is almost out of control. >> [music] >> I got a call from my mother saying that my sister had been found dead. Later, I got another call saying she’d [music] been murdered.
They just beat her to death. When when I found out my sister had been gone for over that, cuz that broke my heart. >> [music] >> The discovery less than 24 hours later would elevate the subsequent trial into one of the UK’s most notorious cases of double murder. A second body had been discovered virtually the day after and in fairly [music] close proximity.
Our suspicions, of course, when that happens is that they’re in some way linked. The body of Desmond Thorpe was found lying on a sofa. The method with which Des Thorpe was killed was smothered with a cushion. The events really started to then overtake our early investigative inquiries in relation to Rosalind Hunt’s murder.
It was clear to the police from the outset that the murders of Rosalind Hunt and Desmond Thorpe were closely connected. They were both members of the Ipswich street drinking community and were known to be friends. Additionally, both bodies were found within 2 miles of one another in northwest Ipswich. The level of violence in this case and the ferocity involved would have suggested to the police early on that the victim would have known their perpetrator.
There was a wealth of evidence coming in from within that group and people on the periphery of that group that Rosalind was or Rosie Hunt was being subjected to regular physical assaults. From the early stages of the investigation, the same names kept coming up. 41-year-old Paul Clark and shockingly a 15-year-old girl, Lorraine Thorpe, the daughter of the second victim.
We quickly identified that Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe had been at that address. Certainly, we believed at the time when Desmond Thorpe was deceased, but they had left the premises prior to the emergency services arrival. In the morning of Monday, the 10th of August, the decision was taken that we would formally arrest both Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe on suspicion of the murders of Rosalind Hunt and Desmond Thorpe.
In my experience, I’ve not seen this level of violence, [music] these type of injuries enacted by a 15-year-old girl. Usually in cases like this, they will partake in some violence, maybe on the the borderline somewhere, but to be actively involved in such [music] torturous activity is incredibly rare. On the 10th of August, 2009, police arrested two individuals on suspicion of committing double murder.
One of them was Lorraine Thorpe, just 15 and the daughter of the second victim. Understanding how a young girl came to be part of such a brutal sequence of events would become a key part of her trial for double murder. I think I can definitely say that over the 30 years of my police career, [music] this would be one of the most shocking cases I’ve dealt with.
Lorraine Thorpe’s early years were relatively stable. [music] She grew up with her parents and three siblings on Clapgate Lane, a leafy suburban street in South [music] Ipswich. There is an understanding that she had ADHD, but she was on medication for her ADHD. [music] Her friends said that she was outgoing and friendly and kind girl.
But then we get to this critical period in 2006 when the family breaks down. Lorraine’s parents separated when she was 12 or 13. And at that point, her whole life changes. 12-year-old girls are going through a critical point. They’re going through changes emotionally. They’re going through puberty and their brain is entering the biggest growth spurt that happens to a child.
So, at the point that she’s going through all these changes, her life is shattered. She is then put into care. She’s then gone back to her mother. Then migrated to stay with her father. Des. After the breakup, Lorraine’s father descended into a turbulent and unstable existence, semi-homelessness and alcoholism. You know in the days yeah.
Typical old street drinker. Des was a typical street drinker, yeah. Nice fella. Got a bit loud and rowdy when he had a few bevvies, but he was harmless basically. Harmless. Ipswich has quite a well-known street drinking culture. Anyone time there’s probably about a dozen individuals at least on the streets of Ipswich.
And there was a hierarchy within that culture. Mixed up with very nature of alcohol. It was very aggressive environment to be a part of. By the age of 14, Lorraine was spending most of her time living in this environment with her father. They look at it like it’s a family. And most of the time it is a family [music] cuz they look after each other.
They do look after each other, they do. But you always get a certain people in the family that are there they use, they abuse. Social services did try to intervene where Lorraine was concerned. She was clearly very headstrong and was certainly not compliant. She was temporarily removed from that group, but then of her own volition then put herself back into that situation again and and this was what was going on over the months leading up to the murder.
Her father, as he became more of an alcoholic and his health deteriorated, Lorraine Thorpe had to give him more and more care. So, not only was she being impacted by his alcoholism and his behavior, but now her whole life was dedicated to caring for her father when she was supposed to be living her years. Lorraine was said to have really doted on her father.
It was said that she more or less had to carry him around and and bathe him. The effects of caring for an alcoholic parent at such a young age is going to be significantly harmful for a child. Lorraine and her father, it seems, lived a very chaotic lifestyle. Moving from place to place, sofa surfing, even living rough. At this point, Lorraine Thorpe was spending all her time with these drunk, homeless males.
And what she learns from these individuals is continuing lack of no boundaries, violence. There was a lot of violence between the males, inappropriate behavior, dishonesty, drinking. She’s learning how to be socially unacceptable. She’s not learning the things that a child should be learning.
She’s learning everything what you don’t want your child to be. Another member of the drinking group was the first murder victim, Rosalind Hunt. Rosalind was I suppose fortunate enough to >> [music] >> be able to claim benefits and she had her own stable accommodation. She had a flat in Ipswich. And it seems that she was rather taken advantage of by members of the community with which she >> [music] >> mixed.
Rosalind and her ex-husband had remained on good terms. He’d last seen her about a month before her death when he found 10 [music] or more of the Ipswich street drinkers in her lounge. Concerned, he asked if she needed help getting them to leave. But she insisted it was all right. That property was just regularly used as somewhere to stay either with or without her agreement.
Ex-serviceman Paul Clark was the ringleader of this group and well-known to Rosalind. He was in his 40s and came from a disadvantaged and troubled background. He used to drink a lot, a lot. I mean I like a bevvy, but he had he had a bevvy lot. Paul Clark was a particularly nasty person. He had a history of violence and low-level crime.
He liked to brag about his time in the army, but now ruled over Ipswich’s street drinking community with fear and intimidation. Paul Clark was very much a bully, very much a manipulative individual and very much an individual that people were wary of. We can see similarities in this group to like gang culture where you have vulnerable people that collect together as a unit.
And what you see then that happens is they have a dominant person that often takes leadership of that group and will use things like isolation, [music] manipulation, aggressiveness, violence to control that group. When Lorraine and her father met Paul Clark, he quickly became a role model for her.
He became almost the father figure that Des sadly might not have been able to provide for her. But then she starts following his behavior. She’s drinking alcohol now. And alcohol on a young teenager’s brain is going to cause damage. She should have been at school, but she should have been at school. But she wasn’t.
She was on the streets drinking, doing drugs and running around after him. She soon stopped going to school altogether and had also stopped taking the medication she needed for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or ADHD. Unmedicated ADHD has a devastating effect. If a child has a diagnosis of ADHD and they stop taking the medication, they’ll see an increase of all of the symptoms, the inattention, the hyperactive behavior, the irritability as well.
There is a link between ADHD and aggressiveness, particularly if it’s not medicated. So, all these factors combined are going to affect her decision-making, her consequential thinking. That certainly will have an impact. The exact nature of 15-year-old Lorraine’s relationship with 41-year-old Paul Clark was subject to intense [music] speculation.
Clearly people were concerned was there any form of sexual relationship. That was denied by both of them during the course of the inquiry. All the factors combined in this case, her her background, her ADHD which is now unmedicated, her caring for her father, the alcohol, the fact that [music] they haven’t got a home to live in, makes her a very vulnerable person.
>> [snorts] >> And at that point she’s obsessed with Paul Clark and he’s able to take complete control of her. She was lost. A lost sheep. And she was following what she thought was a shepherd style. Well, it was a wolf really. In the lead-up to the murders, 15-year-old Lorraine Thorpe had been staying with Clark at the home of Rosalind Hunt.
At some point, there was a spark which would light the touchpaper for one of the most brutal and prolonged murders ever witnessed in Ipswich. The reason came up in court, my my sister, Rosalind, was attacked and tortured over the allegations of her kicking Paul Clark’s dog. She had taken Paul Clark’s dog into the town center of Ipswich and the dog had either bitten or attempted to bite a child.
And as a result of that, the dog had been chastised by Rosie. So, she kicked or pulled or yanked it back by the chain and someone has gone running back and told Paul Clark about this. Rosalind, feeling scared for her safety, sought refuge with Lorraine’s father, Des. She was staying around there because she was too scared to go back into her own flat.
But Paul Clark sent Lorraine Thorpe round to try convince her to leave. [music] Everything would be all right. So, my sister stupidly believed her and went. And Lorraine Thorpe, that’s exactly the traits and the qualities that she’d been taught by this nomadic, alcoholic group that she’d been living with.
So, she’s very manipulative and she used that to be able to entice Rosalind back to the flat. And that’s >> [music] >> when I believe all all the torture and start after that time. In the summer of 2009, Ipswich was the location of one of the most infamous double homicides in British history. On the 2nd of August, the first murder victim, Rosalind Hunt, was persuaded by 15-year-old Lorraine Thorpe [music] to go with her.
Lorraine led her to Paul Clark’s flat in Mount Baden Court where Rosalind’s terrible ordeal began. We identified a number of witnesses that suggested she had been systematically abused and in fact held against her will. We learned that Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe were engaged in an attack which involved the use of a cheese grater on Rosalind’s skin.
An electric fan being held up against her face which didn’t have its safety guard on. And also being beaten with a dog chain. It was a repeated and sustained attack and the pair of them began the attack, they went away, they came back. It lasted for days. It was hard to imagine what the state of her mind must have been in those days that she was held in Paul Clark’s flat.
She was put in a suitcase. They burned her hair. She was basically used as a punch bag. She laughed about the level of violence they used against Rosalind Hunt. They literally rubbed salt into her wounds. When analyzing Lorraine Thorpe’s behavior and her part in this, her life was torn into bits. She had no control.
And then she’s in a situation where she’s given control over somebody else. And that would have been so addictive to her cuz suddenly she feels a sense of control that she hasn’t had in years. On the afternoon of the 4th of August, Lorraine Thorpe and Paul Clark moved Rosalind Hunt back to her home in Victoria Street, arousing some suspicion.
We learned that would have been perhaps a a day or two into the attack, that a neighbor had reported concerns having heard a commotion, screaming, swearing from that property. There certainly was a call on or around the 4th of August to the address. When police attended, there was no reply. Now, Rosalind was in the flat very probably lying on a mattress badly injured.
The decision to leave the scene without further investigation would prove a missed opportunity to save her. Both officers were disciplined. Should they have entered the property by force? It’s difficult to say. Lorraine Thorpe told friends that she’d stamped on Rosie’s head and appeared to revel in the fact. She bragged about the level of violence.
She bragged about the fact that she still was alive and they went back and beat her again. There were so many opportunities for her to realize what she’d done, to [music] try and get out of that situation, but she didn’t. The duo made a final trip to the Victoria Street property, taking sleeping pills with them with the intention of making Rosalind’s death look [music] like suicide.
She was forced to swallow drugs that they had acquired from someone else and they just they had to die. On the morning of the 9th of August, after a second alert from a neighbor, local police forced entry to Rosalind’s property having noticed flies at a broken window. Early indication at the scene was that she had probably been deceased for a little while, possibly a number of days as some early decomposition of the body was present.
Whenever we attend live crime scenes as reporters, our job is to get as much information as we possibly can. We certainly started to pick up details. The pathologist termed the injuries as very significant blunt trauma that taken together were responsible for her death. Lorraine Thorpe is now completely under Paul Clark’s spell.
Before the ink was dry on the headlines reporting the barbaric [music] torture and killing of Rosalind Hunt, this case would become a double murder, the second no less heinous than the first. So we now have a situation where Paul Clark and Lorraine [music] Thorpe have murdered Rosalind Hunt because of the potential threat to the end of this existence, their relationship.
And then the next threat is her own father. Lorraine bragged to friends about what she’d done to Rosalind Hunt and word got back to her father, Desmond Thorpe. Des was very upset about what had happened to Rosalind Hunt and >> [music] >> he was going to go to the police or other agencies about what had taken place. Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe decided that they couldn’t allow that to happen and that Desmond Thorpe needed to be silenced.
I think she got to the point where she had absolutely zero respect for her father because he become such a absolute drunk who was no longer in control of himself. I think she got to the point that she thought she was superior to him. She was basically groomed by Paul Clark. He made her feel special.
He made her feel strong and she saw him as strong and that made her resent her father further and made her disrespect him further. I don’t think she had any respect for him. On the 10th of August, Lorraine Thorpe and Paul Clark took her father back to the flat where he was staying in Limerick Close. It would be the last time he was seen alive.
Within the the very early hours of the next morning, ambulance attended an address in Limerick Close in Ipswich where the body of Desmond Thorpe was then found lying on a sofa. Because of his poor health and lifestyle, [music] initially the police could not confirm that it was a murder scene despite the terrible condition of his body.
But they soon found evidence which suggested foul play. Scenes of crime searches that took place identified a a pillow or cushion in some bushes outside of a window of the flat. That cushion had blood on it from Desmond Thorpe. The fact that it had been discarded was significant. Lorraine Thorpe and Paul Clark left the Limerick Close property shortly after Des Thorpe’s time of death.
Paul Clark was seen by police officer in a road nearby to that address and he was arrested and taken to Ipswich police station at that time. We traced Lorraine back to her mother’s address which was local in the town. Ipswich police took Lorraine Thorpe in for questioning. She didn’t show any particular remorse around the death of Rosie Hunt and completely denied any involvement in her father’s death.
She bragged about it. She laughed about it. She laughed about the level of violence they used against Rosalind Hunt. So she’s showing no empathy, no remorse. And she’s only 15, so we can’t look at things like personality to sort of but we can look at emerging negative personality traits. And actually if we look at her, she’s at the age where her brain is developing and yet she’s in a toxic environment.
That is going to have a detrimental effect. Over the course of the inquiry, evidence revealed that Desmond Thorpe had been subjected to a level of brutality similar to that of Rosalind Hunt and some of this had come from Lorraine herself. In questioning, she said, “You’ll find my footprint on my dad.” She was referring to a trainer print found on her father’s head.
So she didn’t stand by and watch her father be killed. She actively engaged in the violence towards her father. The presence of a trainer print on Des’s forehead is indicative of the violence that they were content with using and how little they cared. How can a girl like that, that young age, do something as serious and as bad and as cruel as this? I was disgusted.
On the 10th of August 2009, [music] Lorraine Thorpe and Paul Clark were arrested for the brutal murders of Rosalind Hunt >> [music] >> and Lorraine’s father, Des Thorpe. If convicted, this would make Lorraine, at just 15 years of age, Britain’s youngest female double murderer. In July 2010, Lorraine appeared at Ipswich Crown Court in a case that would shock the UK.
It really wasn’t until the trial that we learned just how violent and and almost sadistic Rosalind’s death had been. Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe pleaded not guilty to the deaths of Rosalind Hunt and Desmond Thorpe. Because the defendants were regularly present at all three of the crime scenes, forensic evidence was of little or no use.
It was more a case of trying to obtain the best evidence from witnesses. The community of those who perhaps would normally have a great distrust of the police. I’m not a grass. I’ve never grassed anyone up and I never thought I would. But a situation like that, We received a significant amount of information from people from within that wider group that Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe was part of.
As a result, over the course of a 7-week trial, the jury were asked to judge witnesses that were alcoholics, drug addicts, [music] and people with personality disorders, making for a particularly fraught courtroom. The atmosphere was tense because of the difference between the defendants in what their alleged roles may or may not have been.
The first time I went to court, I all I remember is Lorraine Thorpe laughing and giggling to Paul Clark as if it was a big, big joke. When somebody has got a diagnosis of ADHD, if they stop taking the medication, this will see an increase in the symptoms of irritability, of lack of attention, of lack of being able to think clearly.
There were elements during the trial of of involuntary laughter, if you will. No one stopped it. No one stopped it at all. I felt disgusted. I felt like I wanted to jump over jump [music] over and just whip her head off. Because of her diagnosis of ADHD, she was given regular breaks in terms of what she in the court process.
She would start looking [music] around the court. You would hear the giggles coming from her or smiles or looking at people around the court. It was quite disrupting from that point of view. As the trial progressed, the details of the gruesome events that took place between the 2nd and the 10th of August, 2009, were described to a horrified courtroom.
The level of violence was one of shock, really, to any public gallery where persons were hearing that for the first time. Lorraine chose not to give evidence, so it was difficult to tell whether Lorraine showed any remorse. In relation to the murder of Rosalind Hunt, the court heard that in questioning, Lorraine denied the beatings at Mountbatten Court took place.
And also denied ever being present at Victoria Street. But witnesses said she was actively involved. One claiming they’d heard her and Clark shouting repeatedly, “We’re going to kill you. We’re going to kill you.” at Rosalind during the attacks. When looking for a motive in this case, the defense offered the suggestion that Paul Clark and Lorraine Thorpe were angry at Rosalind because she kicked Paul’s dog.
But actually, I think the motive goes deeper. The prosecution put forward an alternative theory. The attack may well have been exacerbated by Rosalind suggesting that she was going to report her concerns about the welfare of Lorraine. That’s going to terrify Paul Clark. It’s [music] also going to terrify Lorraine Thorpe because she doesn’t want this relationship [clears throat] to end, whatever that relationship is.
The police did attend Rosalind’s property on the 17th of June, 2009, looking for Lorraine. Paul Clark was very annoyed that uh it’d been identified that Lorraine was staying there, and I think Rosie was [music] blamed for perhaps having told the agencies that’s where she was. I’d like to think that my sister was trying to get Lorraine Thorpe out of this lifestyle that my sister had been dragged into.
As a result, Thorpe had been briefly taken back into care before running away once again. At the point that she thought she was going to get taken away, Lorraine Thorpe would have been devastated. Even though prior to that, as a young child, she desperately would have wanted stability. Now she’d become embroiled in this lifestyle.
She liked the freedom. She liked the lack of constraint. She liked the fact that she was with top dog Paul Clark. She liked the fact that she was allowed to drink alcohol. She felt a sense of power and belonging now, and she didn’t want to lose that lifestyle. Where the second murder was concerned, that of Thorpe’s father, Desmond, both she and Clark claimed he died in his sleep after choking on his own vomit.
[music] He was a very ill man in relation to his extreme alcohol dependency, and as such was very frail. That, of course, had to be taken into account [music] in terms of his death, and was there any possibility it was natural causes? But the court heard evidence supporting the police theory that he was smothered.
As a result of the postmortem processes that took place, it was identified that he had a number of bruisings within his inner bottom lip, which would have been consistent with his lips being pressed hard onto his teeth, so effectively teeth marks on the inside of his lip. Another witness said that Thorpe had confessed to killing her father because he was going to tell the police about Rosalind’s murder.
And you know what would piss me off the most? Is Desmond the [ __ ] snitcher of you would have. He wouldn’t grass it up. You would have. He wouldn’t have. He really wouldn’t have. He wouldn’t have. It’s a lie. He wouldn’t have. At the end of the trial, the key question for the jury at Ipswich Crown Court was whether Thorpe, as a minor under Clark’s control, >> [music] >> could be held responsible for her actions.
The defense at the court also suggested that Lorraine Thorpe had little chance of being a happy adult, and it was always going to take someone like Paul to [music] manipulate and coerce her into doing things that she didn’t want to do. >> [music] >> The judge was sure that Lorraine could tell the difference between right and wrong.
Whilst it’s very easy to see as a 15-year-old she was heavily influenced by Clark, [music] the judge was very careful to still point out that she clearly had become accustomed to the violence that she had been exposed to within that drinking community on a daily basis. So, she might have been led astray, but I don’t believe that one little bit.
She knew what she was doing. She had shown a willingness to act independently. She enjoyed using violence. Found it exciting. >> [music] >> I think personally that she was off on one and didn’t realize what was going on until it was too late. She knew it was wrong to beat up a vulnerable, innocent woman. She knew.
She knew that was wrong, yet but yet she got caught up in the moment. She enjoyed it. >> [music] >> The jury were finally sent out to deliberate. It took them more than 17 hours pouring over the evidence that had been presented to them over the 7-week trial [music] to arrive at verdicts for each case. They were unanimous in their decision on Rosalind Hunt’s murder and reached a 10 to 2 majority [music] on that of Desmond Thorpe.
Both were found guilty. Paul Clark was sentenced to a minimum term of 27 years imprisonment. Paul Clark didn’t really want to know and refused to leave his cell when he was sentenced. The judge took into account the fact that Lorraine may well have been under the spell, to a certain extent, of Paul Clark.
But at the same time, he acknowledged that she could be cunning and manipulative despite her emerging from such a chaotic background, she developed that aggressive streak. Lorraine Thorpe, taking account of her age, was sentenced to a minimum term of 14 years imprisonment. Which I thought was unfair.
I thought she should have got the same as Paul Clark. The unnerving revelation that a 15-year-old girl could be found guilty of two such brutal murders, one of which was her own father, was a challenge for the people of Ipswich to come to terms with, and begged the question, could this have been avoided? I think this case really highlights the nurture aspect of behavior.
The judge in this case said that Lorraine Thorpe was brought up without any concept of what’s right and wrong, and that’s probably quite accurate if her parents were focused on drinking alcohol and not taking care of her. And those formative years, you know, the first five to seven years of a child’s life, that’s the blueprint of a young child’s way to act.
Society needs to have a look at itself in this case and others where teenagers kill. How as a modern society do we allow that to occur? Parental responsibility, I’m afraid, for me is one of the biggest contributing factors to why so many young young people do end up in in all sorts of horrific circumstances.
She’s goes to live with her mom and then ends up in a children’s home, then is with her father, then is sofa surfing, then is spending time with adult males drinking. That is such an inappropriate environment for a young girl. And at that point, in walks Paul Clark, who is talking the talk, protecting her, and has a place for her to live.
I think anyone showing Lorraine some attention was going to she was going to be drawn towards that. And unfortunately, as we know, [music] it wasn’t it wasn’t a happy relationship by any stretch of the imagination. >> [music] >> That child, prior to getting involved in violence, was let down [music] by the parents that should have protected her and by society that should have seen there was a vulnerable child being [music] abused and being neglected.
It would possibly [clears throat] been different if someone had a picked her up at that time. And maybe removed her from that family home at that tender age. Someone should have stepped in. Someone should have stepped in. Someone should have. It’s one of those cases that could have absolutely, 100%, have been prevented.
In 2014, Paul Clark was found unresponsive with a ligature around his neck in his cell at Whitemoor Prison. You had the easy way out. You you wasn’t beaten. [music] You wasn’t You [snorts] wasn’t tortured. You had the easy way out. You couldn’t do the prison time. [music] So, you just chose the easy way out. If Lorraine Thorpe is released at the end of her 14-year [music] sentence, she’ll still only be in her 20s with her whole life ahead of her.
Whether that will happen, though, isn’t [music] clear. The judge stated she won’t be released until she is safe to society. You would hope that there is every chance that she can be rehabilitated, come to terms with what she did, and can, upon release, become a >> [music] >> useful person in society again.
Of course, there will never be any guarantees of that. >> [music] >> I often visit the grave and lay flowers on her grave. >> [music] >> When I’m there, I say to the grave to her headstone, “Rosie, I can’t hurt you no more. The pain’s over. They can’t get you no more.” >> [music]
