Transcription
Thank you. Nine-year-old Christopher Lavarak was described as being a shy but sensible young boy who adored motorbikes and watching television. He was well-behaved at home and at school, where he worked hard.
By early 1984, Christopher had also taken up a new hobby and joined the church choir. Christopher, who was more commonly known as Chris, lived in Humberside and Libby in Hull, England, with his mother Pam Crawley and his stepfather.
Every Friday night, Christopher would either go and stay with his biological father for the weekend, or he would visit his older half-sister Kim Hines, who lived at an address on Harpen Grove with her husband Steve and their 15-month-old son Martin. Chris visited his half-sister regularly and always enjoyed staying for the weekend. The two had a good relationship.
On Friday, the 9th of March 1984, Chris's mother and stepfather dropped him off at his sister's residence as usual at approximately 6:50 p.m. As Chris didn't want to miss the start of his favorite television program, The Fall Guy, which was due to start at 7 p.m.
Around an hour later, at 7:50, Kim left her home for work at the local pub, The Crone, where she worked as a barmaid, leaving her husband Steve in charge of both Chris and Martin. Christopher's mother and stepfather drove Kim to the pub for her shift, where they themselves had a couple of drinks before leaving to visit some family members.
After young Martin was put to bed by his father and with Chris continuing to quite happily watch the television, Steve left the Harpen Grove residence towards the pub where his wife worked, intending on having a few pints and collecting some crisps to bring back home for Christopher. Though Chris was young, he was very responsible for his age, and Steve was more than happy for Chris to babysit his 15-month-old son.
Steve left the residence shortly afterwards. However, this was the very last time that nine-year-old Christopher Lavarak was seen alive.
At around 9:15 p.m., one of the Hines's neighbors, an elderly woman whom Christopher referred to as Auntie Marge, saw an unfamiliar car parked outside of the Harpen Grove home, rather oddly with its engine turned off but its headlights still on. Marge then heard a man's voice coming from the front door of the Hines's property saying, "Steve, I want to talk to you. Steve, let me in."
Concerned and suspicious about what was happening, Marge listened through the dividing wall between the two properties and heard the front door of the Heinz residence open, but this was followed by an eerie silence. A short while after heading to bed, Marge heard the mysterious car drive away, but unfortunately, she never saw the man's face. The car make, model, and even its color was unidentifiable due to the darkness, making it almost impossible for the police to trace down who drove that particular vehicle that night. Though Marge managed to recall the car's basic outline.
Steve returned home from The Crown at around 10:10 p.m. only to find his 15-month-old son crying loudly in his bed and Christopher was nowhere to be seen. Rather strangely, the television set and its wires had been completely ripped out, though the main sockets remained live in the wall, and to this day, the TV set has never been found.
Had a robbery taken place? Steve knew immediately that something was wrong. Chris was a happy, responsible, and sensible boy who had absolutely no reason to run away. So Steve swiftly returned to the pub to inform Kim that Chris was missing, and shortly afterwards, they contacted the police, who promptly conducted searches in and around the house for Chris, but unfortunately to no avail.
Meanwhile, various family members and friends were contacted in the hopes that Chris was with someone he knew, but once again, nobody had seen him. Police searches continued throughout the night and into the following day, with authorities scouring wasteland nearby along with sniffer dogs and dive teams searching open water in that area. But unfortunately, despite their best efforts, investigators found no trace of the missing schoolboy.
Various appeals were made across a number of media platforms in regards to the vehicle seen outside of the Hines's residence on the night in question. However, the driver of this particular vehicle never came forward.
On Sunday, the 11th of March, two days after Christopher had disappeared, a man walking his dog along the Beverly Beck Canal, located 10 miles away from Harpen Grove, discovered a strange trader carpet underlay bag floating in the water by the riverbank. Police were called out to investigate, and what they found horrified them. Inside the bag was the body of a young boy, along with an ornamental brick used to weigh the bag down in the water.
The boy was formally identified as nine-year-old Christopher Lavarak by his Uncle Melvin Reed. According to police, Chris had suffered severe head trauma, which was likely inflicted on the night he disappeared. The force was so brutal it immediately ended his life. Christopher also appeared to have been sexually abused on the night he died, so police looked into the possibility that the boy was a victim of a child predator.
Police found no evidence that Christopher had been killed at the Harpen Grove residence or in the immediate vicinity. However, as their investigations progressed, police narrowed down the location of death down to a nearby winter barley field due to the fact that Chris had been dumped in the back. Any evidence such as fingerprints or clothing fibers would have been washed away. DNA would have been as well, but the technology made available to authorities in the 1980s wasn't as advanced as it is today.
As the weeks, months, and years went by, Christopher's case went cold. Though authorities had their own suspicions as to who was responsible for his murder, the only problem being lack of evidence.
In 2007, forensic paleontologist Patricia Wiltshire joined the investigation. She was given the clothes that Christopher had been wearing when he disappeared and found pollen particles on the front of Lavarak's jeans and the soles of his shoes. The area where the pollen had come from was narrowed down to an address on Grantley Grove, a mere 10-minute walk away from the Harpen Grove residence where Christopher was last seen alive. Wiltshire also managed to confirm, through analyzing soil taken from the address in two separate excavations, that the brick used to weigh the carpet bag down in the water also came from the same residence. The car parked in the driveway of the Grantley Grove home also resembled the vehicle that had been seen sitting outside the Hines's residence that night.
The question was, who lived at this address? Melvin Reed, Christopher's lovable Uncle, who had identified the boy's body when it was found in Beverly Beck. The perpetrator was someone Christopher trusted. Christopher's mother Pam always felt in her gut that Melvin had something to do with her son's death, with several others reportedly feeling the same way, but of course, there was no proof at the time that he was involved.
In 2001, a number of boys came forward to the police accusing Reed of sexually abusing them. As a result, Melvin was arrested and spent almost eight years behind bars for his crimes, during which time police made a case against him for Christopher's murder. It's interesting to note at this point that some of Reed's other victims had also suffered injuries similar to those inflicted on Christopher. Melvin also didn't have an alibi for the night of the murder, but he knew the back area well, having once worked in a factory nearby. Police questioned him several times, and in each interview, Melvin showed signs of deception, but without any rock-hard evidence, police couldn't charge Reed in regards to his nephew's murder. The evidence against him was purely circumstantial.
Reed died in prison in 2008, but police still actively looked into Christopher's case, looking for any forensic evidence which linked Melvin to the boy's death. This was when Patricia Wiltshire entered the investigation and finally helped crack this case. This wasn't actually the only case that Patricia helped solve. She also helped solve the infamous case of the Soham murders, the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, the murder of Millie Dowler, and the murder of Sarah Payne.
Christopher's case was finally solved when in 2012, police confirmed beyond reasonable doubt through groundbreaking DNA analysis that Melvin Reed was indeed the one responsible for the murder of nine-year-old Christopher Lavarak. Though Hull police have stated that they believe Melvin may have not acted alone. Unfortunately, if this is indeed the case, his accomplices have never been found.
Rather interestingly to note, Steve Hines, Christopher's half-sister's husband, was arrested in 2014 in relation to child sex offenses against two young girls and was subsequently sentenced to five years in prison. The why did Melvin Reed visit Steve Hines the night Christopher was murdered? What if he wanted to talk to Steve about? Where Melvin and Steve working together in some way? Or was their business with one another? Or whatever they may have been completely innocent? The extent of their relationship remains somewhat of a mystery.
Christopher's killer was eventually found, but unfortunately, for justice to be served, it was too late. His killer was dead. Christopher's family struggled to come to terms with their loss, with the pain of Christopher's death still resonating with his loved ones to this day. It's difficult to comprehend how someone Chris trusted could carry out such a despicable act of violence against such innocence. Chris was adored by all who knew him, a friendly and caring young boy whose life was cruelly stolen away before he even had the chance to truly live it.