Unveiling a Heart-Wrenching Betrayal: Tia Sharp Case Investigation
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00:00 [no audio]
00:08 ...was a sparky girl who was full of life, but you took that life from her.
00:13 All that lay ahead of her, a career, loves, and family of her own, will now never be.
00:20 [no audio]
00:38 Tia Christine Sharp was born to parents Stephen and Natalie on the 30th of June 2000.
00:44 Stephen split from Natalie when their daughter was a baby.
00:47 Despite her parents' separation, her family was incredibly close-knit, and they lived in Croydon, South London.
00:54 [no audio]
00:56 Tia had a deep and close bond with her maternal grandmother, Christine.
01:00 Tia, Natalie and Christine are a tight family unit, with Natalie saying the three of them were friends as well as family.
01:07 [no audio]
01:09 The close bond continues as Tia grows up, with Christine saying Tia would occasionally call her mom,
01:16 "I wouldn't bat an eyelid," Christine said.
01:19 [no audio]
01:20 The love that Natalie had for Tia was reciprocated as Tia adored her mother in return, and the pair were inseparable.
01:28 Tia saw her father every holiday until the relationship between Stephen and Natalie soured.
01:34 As she entered secondary school, Tia was confident, happy, and never afraid to voice her opinion and have herself be heard.
01:42 She was feisty and brave, with her mom saying she was often the loudest in the room.
01:47 In 2002, Christine was working as a barmaid in a pub in Rains Park, South West London.
01:53 It was here that she met a man named Stuart Hazel.
01:57 He was ten years her junior, and they started a relationship in 2007, with Stuart moving into her home in New Addington.
02:04 Natalie had had a fling with Hazel before he began seeing her mother.
02:08 He shared a good bond with Tia and she called him "Grandad," as did Tia's two younger brothers.
02:13 Although she achieved good grades in school and was popular with her teachers, her attendance was an issue.
02:19 In 2008, social services became concerned with Natalie and her partner using cannabis, and therefore became involved with the family.
02:27 A report issued by social services said that while there was no neglect or abuse towards Tia, the family and family dynamic was dysfunctional.
02:36 After carrying out a probe into Tia's chaotic home life, social workers concluded in November 2011 that no further assessment would be needed.
02:46 Instead, it was decided that Tia's school should be asked to keep an eye on her and report any concerns.
02:52 Tia would regularly spend the night with Christine and Stuart.
02:55 Even when Christine had to work a night shift, she would stay there with her step-grandfather.
03:01 In June 2012, Tia was celebrating her birthday with her mother and grandmother.
03:06 She had the option to bring a friend along for the celebrations, and she chose Stuart, illustrating how close she was to him.
03:13 August 2012
03:19 Unbeknownst to Natalie, Tia had messaged her grandmother and Stuart, asking if it was okay if she stayed there for a couple of days.
03:28 Stuart sent a text message to Natalie, saying that Tia was welcome to stay.
03:33 Christine wouldn't be there, but she could still stay if she wanted to.
03:37 Tia was excited to go. She ran to kiss her mother goodbye and then set off to her grandmother's house.
03:44 Thursday, August 2nd
03:49 Stuart meets Tia as she gets off the tram at 4.50pm, and CCTV follows them as they go shopping in New Addington.
04:12 Later that night, Christine called the house and spoke to Stuart asking if everything was okay, and he confirmed it was and they were playing on the PlayStation together.
04:20 The following day, Friday August 3rd, Christine returned home from work and Stuart told her that Tia had gone into Croydon to buy some new shoes, five miles away in the Whitgift Centre.
04:31 By 6 o'clock that night, she still hadn't returned home, so Christine phoned Natalie, who confirmed she hadn't seen her either.
04:40 They tried contacting her via text message and Facebook, but heard nothing back.
04:46 They decided to go driving around the area to see if they could spot her, hoping perhaps the public transport was running late and that was causing a delay.
04:54 By 10 o'clock and with still no sign, Christine, Stuart and Natalie headed to the police station to report her as missing.
05:03 Stuart told the investigators that he had seen Tia around midday before she headed into Croydon to go shopping. A phone call from a neighbour also suggested that they had seen her leaving the property.
05:14 They searched the house where she had been staying with her grandmother and Stuart, but no trace of her was found.
05:20 As she clearly wasn't in the house, the police widened their investigation to the local area.
05:25 The story of the missing 12-year-old spreads like wildfire, with major news outlets picking up on the story.
05:33 Stuart Hazel was seen leading one of the searches.
05:37 Police said that she had only taken a small amount of money with her and did not take her travel card or her mobile phone, adding that this was very out of character for her.
05:49 Area Commander Neil Basu stressed the investigation was still a missing persons inquiry and did not suggest there were any suspects in the case.
05:59 The family want Tia home, they miss her dreadfully and I want to assure you of all the work the Met is doing and we are doing everything we can, everything we possibly can to find her and trying to support the family at this time.
06:13 Let me give you a sense of the scale of the inquiry at present.
06:17 I have had Olympic resources redirected to help in the search for Tia and over the last three days or so that has meant more than 100 extra uniform officers in the Croydon and Mitcham areas.
06:28 There are over 80 officers working on this case, 40 of them detectives, 40 of them specialist search officers.
06:36 We have collected more than 800 hours so far of CCTV footage from buses, from trams and we have viewed more than 120 hours of that CCTV in live time and that continues round the clock.
06:50 I would also like to thank everybody in the Croydon and Mitcham communities that has helped with the investigation so far.
06:57 I spent time with councillors and with members of the Pathfinders charity on the new Addington estate yesterday evening.
07:03 I was completely moved by their generosity, their energy and commitment.
07:07 We were stopped many times on the way to and from by people handing out leaflets showing Tia and to everyone who is doing that I wanted to say thank you and please continue to look for her.
07:18 Can I once again thank every member of the public who has phoned in to the incident room.
07:22 The Met's priority at this time is to find Tia safe and well.
07:27 The family were absolutely distraught.
07:30 Natalie told a local news outlet, "We all feel terrible. We think she's been taken but we just don't know. There's no CCTV. We know absolutely nothing. I wish to God I could tell you something. My baby girl walked out and she vanished."
07:51 On August 7th a press conference was held. DCI Nick Scholar gave the press and public a description of the missing Tia.
07:58 CCTV image of Tia that was taken on Thursday evening, Thursday the 2nd before she went missing.
08:05 And in it she's wearing the outer clothing that we believe she was wearing when she went missing.
08:11 The only difference is the footwear.
08:13 I'll hold it up. You'll see it's slightly different to the description that was initially released.
08:19 In as much as it's not a yellow tube type top. You can see it's a yellow vest top.
08:25 On the front of it there's a pattern. It's an animal of some description, possibly a dog or a cat.
08:32 The tight faded jeans are the same description and she's wearing UGG boots in this photo but she was wearing the black Nike trainers with the pink Nike swoosh on. So that's a slight difference.
08:50 Tia's uncle David Sharp also made an appeal, begging for her to come home.
08:57 Tia's a 12 year old normal girl. She has never run away. She's got no reason to run away.
09:06 She is a playful child. She's not on adult form of any way but she is very clued up in travelling and local areas and people she knows.
09:18 Come to us. Come home. Phone the police. Anything. And I want to say thank you to the police for doing everything that they can.
09:29 And the public for being our support and being out there day and night. I urge you not to stop. I want Tia found. So please do what you're doing.
09:43 There were 55 different sightings reported by members of the public but the police weren't able to substantiate any of them.
09:50 As Stuart Hazel was the last person to see Tia alive, he felt as if that made him a potential suspect and so contacted ITV to give an interview and clear his name.
10:00 On August 9th he gave an interview to Mark Williams Thomas, an investigative journalist and former police officer for ITV News, denying that he had anything to do with the disappearance of his step-granddaughter.
10:13 If they believe what they read in the papers they can do whatever they like.
10:16 Because I know deep down in my heart that Tia walked out of my house. She walked out of there and I know damn well because she was seen walking down the pathway.
10:24 I know she made that trek down to that way. What happened after that is I don't know.
10:29 We're stuck inside here, do you know what I mean? We've got all the papers outside all putting accusations down and bad mouthing everyone.
10:38 It's just what you don't need. I know they're trying to help in that but they can help in other ways, do you know what I mean? By finding her back, get her home.
10:45 In the middle of his interview, Christine came home and Hazel removed his microphone to pause the interview and offer her comfort.
10:52 As there was still no sign of Tia, the police decided to conduct another search of the house, this time with the assistance of police dogs.
11:01 But still, no trace of Tia was found.
11:05 A week after she had been reported missing on Friday 10th August and a day after he had given the interview with ITV, Stuart Hazel got up early and left the house.
11:16 When Christine later woke up, she smelt something in her house but couldn't locate where it was coming from.
11:23 When the police arrived they asked her to leave the house immediately so they could conduct another search.
11:28 That afternoon, a fourth and final search was conducted of the house in New Addington. In the attic, they found a body.
11:37 Due to the heat and the fact the body had been wrapped up and stored in the attic, the body had decomposed to the point where the person was visually unidentifiable.
11:48 Croydon Central MP Gavin Barwell said "The police have yet to formally confirm that the body is Tia's, yet this devastating development will come as a huge blow to her family and the community in New Addington, all of whom have worked tirelessly to try and find her over the past week."
12:07 A post-mortem on the body began the same day the discovery had been made, August 10th, and was paused later that day.
12:14 By the 16th of August, the post-mortem still had not been completed, however at an inquest into the death which opened that day, it was confirmed that the body was that of Tia Sharp.
12:26 Due to the state of decomposition, dental records had to be used to identify her.
12:32 The post-mortem was later concluded without establishing a cause of death.
12:38 Experts told This Is Croydon Today that the delay in finding the body had made it much harder to determine exactly how Tia had died, and without a cause of death, the prosecution would find it much harder to build a case.
12:51 However, detectives suspected, and it was widely reported, that Tia Sharp had potentially been smothered, although this was not officially proven to be the cause of death.
13:02 Area Commander Neil Basu said the priority was now to support her devastated family as they tried to ascertain exactly what had happened.
13:12 With Tia's body now being found, the eyes of investigators quickly fell on one person.
13:19 Christine's partner, Stuart Hazel.
13:24 But officers soon realised that Hazel was on the run.
13:30 He was picked up on CCTV buying a bottle of vodka from a shop on Canning Hill Lane in South London.
13:42 They warned the public not to approach him if they saw him, and to instead call 999.
13:48 The police quickly mobilised and launched a search to try and find him.
13:53 Following a tip-off from a member of the public who had spotted him, he was arrested at 8.25 on Cannon Hill Common in Morden.
14:01 As he was taken away in a police van, members of the public hurled abuse as it went past.
14:12 The police also announced soon after that they had made two further arrests.
14:17 Later that evening at 11.55, Christine was arrested on suspicion of murder, and her neighbour had been arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender.
14:28 While Christine was being questioned, Natalie had to watch on television as her daughter's body was removed from the home.
14:35 Due to the state of decomposition, Natalie was not allowed to see her daughter's body.
14:43 Since news of the discovery broke, several people laid tributes for her near a garage close to her grandmother's house, which still had a cordon in place on the approach to it.
14:53 Christine was later released on bail but would not be allowed anywhere near Natalie or her other grandchildren.
15:01 The police soon started to learn the sinister truth about the man Tia had called 'Grandad'.
15:07 Stuart Hazel came from a highly dysfunctional background and had a troubled relationship with his parents.
15:12 During his childhood he was on the radar of social services, as his father was in prison and his mother was a sex worker.
15:19 He would also soon end up in care.
15:21 He struggled in school and would often skip classes, and according to Dr Kerry Nixon, it was also clear that he had a low IQ.
15:28 Hazel would later say that he had been raped when he was 16 years old.
15:33 He had 30 previous convictions and had been to prison three times.
15:38 His convictions included dealing drugs, burglary, criminal damage, theft, as well as racially motivated violence and grievous bodily harm, also known as GBH.
15:58 As Hazel was still using drugs, this would often lead him to continued reckless behaviour.
16:03 For example, in 2010 he was convicted of carrying a machete and was subsequently given a 12-month custodial sentence.
16:10 Despite this, Christine stood by him and said she never saw any violent behaviour in the home.
16:16 She said although he drunk and had a criminal record, he was a gentle giant.
16:21 She was prepared to put his past from before they met behind them.
16:25 She was, however, unaware of the extent of his drug abuse and his increasingly sinister thoughts.
16:32 As Tia continued to grow up, little did she or her family know that Hazel was having sexual fantasies about her.
16:40 He was fascinated and fixated with her and was convinced that she loved him.
16:46 He became infatuated with her and as she started to develop into a young woman, these feelings started to intensify.
16:54 In the last year of her life, he became increasingly more voyeuristic and started filming her in secret.
17:00 On one occasion she came home from school and started to put cream on her legs as they were dry, and he started to secretly record her.
17:09 His filming of Tia was growing increasingly sinister and he started filming her while she was asleep.
17:16 Nick Scola, who was the senior investigating officer, described one of these occasions.
17:22 Hazel had filmed her while she was asleep, getting very close to her but then pulling back when she stirred.
17:28 He then panned the camera up to the wall momentarily to film his shadow looking over her.
17:34 He removed the door on the bathroom and messed with the light fitting in her bedroom,
17:38 which police later believed was so he could use that as a spyhole to watch her.
17:43 He also began watching and searching for more extreme and violent pornography on his phone, including paedophilia.
17:50 It has been suggested by forensic psychologist Dr. Kerry Nixon that Hazel may have made sexual advances towards Tia
17:57 and murdered her when she rejected said advances and threatened to tell her mother.
18:02 One thing that many people wanted answers to was why had it taken four searches to find her body in the attic?
18:09 Investigators apologised to the family, saying this was the result of human error.
18:14 Commander Neil Basu apologised to Tia Sharp's mother for the delay in finding her body.
18:19 He said that a review would be undertaken to ensure such a failing is not repeated.
18:25 On the 23rd of August, Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan Howe addressed the failure of his force to find her body.
18:32 He said, "If we thought it was an individual human error, then that would explain it.
18:37 But we're carrying out a review because we're not happy that explains it.
18:41 We're trying not to have a knee-jerk reaction.
18:44 We need some time to understand what happened and what failed to happen.
18:48 We want to learn lessons from this particular case.
18:51 We have apologised, and I repeat that apology to Tia's mum and family for not having found Tia's body sooner."
18:58 As Christine was released on bail, investigators turned their attention back to Stuart Hazel.
19:06 "So what can you tell me about the murder of Tia Sharp, Stuart?"
19:12 "Stuart?"
19:13 "Stuart?"
19:21 "I'll call the Ministry of Muscle and Surgery, please."
19:28 "Yeah, that's no problem. It's ten past one. We'll stop the tapes and we'll leave the room and give you a chance to have a chat."
19:41 He gave a defence case statement which said that he and Tia had been messing around and playing.
19:46 During this, he alleged that she had fallen down the stairs, but appeared to be unharmed and okay.
19:51 He then said that after drinking excessively through the evening, he passed out,
19:55 and upon waking up, he found her dead on the floor, and as a result hid her body in the attic.
20:02 Once in the attic, he put her between the rafters and pushed her tight against the roof,
20:06 where the roof met the floor, in a dark area of the loft, covering the body with debris from around the attic.
20:12 Next to the body, carefully wrapped in small plastic bags, inside a black bin bag,
20:18 were Tia's clothes that she was wearing that night,
20:21 as well as her broken glasses.
20:29 Christine was subsequently cleared of having any involvement in her granddaughter's killing,
20:34 and on 7 December, the Metropolitan Police announced that she would not face charges.
20:39 In a previous search, officers had found two memory cards,
20:43 one of which was very well hidden in a doorframe of a downstairs room.
20:47 The memory cards in question contained both deleted and undeleted material, made up of photos and videos.
20:54 The last shot on the memory card had been deleted, but officers were able to recover it.
21:02 The image was of Tia, who had been posed in a sexually suggestive position.
21:06 They showed the image in question to a pathologist,
21:09 who determined that she was likely dead when the photograph had been taken.
21:13 Other images showed Hazel posing naked in a similar position to the one she was seen in in the photograph.
21:20 The memory card also contained voyeuristic images of Tia, taken when she was alive.
21:26 In the early hours of 12 August, Hazel was charged with murder of the girl who had called him "Grandad".
21:32 He appeared before Camberwell Green Magistrates' Court on 13 August via a video link.
21:37 Dressed in a blue T-shirt, he was seen on the video link sitting at a table,
21:42 with a policewoman standing behind him.
21:44 He spoke to confirm his name, date of birth, and his address as "The Lindons, New Addington, South London",
21:51 where Tia had been found dead.
21:54 No plea was entered and the case was committed to the Old Bailey Courthouse in London for trial.
21:59 He was remanded in custody to Belmarsh Prison, where he was kept in isolation for his own safety.
22:05 While in prison awaiting trial, Stuart Hazel wrote a letter to his father, and he was sticking to his story.
22:12 He described her death as an accident and denied there was any sexual motive.
22:21 His main concern was that his father didn't think his son was a nonce, a slang term for a paedophile.
22:27 Tia Sharp was cremated on 14 September after a private family funeral.
22:34 On 5 February 2013, the neighbour who had been arrested at the same time as Christine was charged with wasting police time,
22:46 after telling the police he had seen Tia alive on the day she was murdered.
22:50 He appeared at Croydon Magistrates Court on 28 February 2013, where he denied the charge against him,
22:57 and was released on bail for a one-day trial on July 29th.
23:00 On 5 August 2013, he was found guilty of wasting police time and was sentenced to five months in prison.
23:07 After an agonising investigation, it was soon time for the trial of Stuart Hazel.
23:14 And his plea was not guilty.
23:16 He showed no emotion during his trial and refused to acknowledge any of Tia's family.
23:21 The courtroom was shocked when they were shown the images that had been taken of Tia.
23:26 When the photo of her that had been taken post-mortem was shown to the jury,
23:30 her mother Natalie had to leave the courtroom, traumatised and in tears.
23:34 After four days of distressing evidence being given, Stuart Hazel changed his plea to guilty.
23:42 Tia Sharpe's father said hearing what Hazel did to his daughter shattered his heart.
23:48 Hazel will be sentenced tomorrow. In my opinion, it will not be enough.
23:52 He should serve his time, then be hung.
23:55 The police say Stuart Hazel must be removed from society.
23:59 Hazel is a violent and dangerous man who poses a significant risk to young girls.
24:08 However, he refused to reveal exactly what happened that night,
24:12 or why he had taken her life in the most brutal way imaginable.
24:15 When sentencing Hazel, the judge emphasised how the trust Christine and Natalie had placed in him had been shattered.
24:22 He received life in prison with a minimum term of 38 years that he must serve before he can even be considered for parole.
24:28 This will mean he will be 75 years old before he is eligible.
24:32 The judge, Mr Justice Nicholl, said that he would not be able to give a definitive answer.
24:37 In addition, Mr Justice Nicholl said he could not impose a whole life tariff,
24:40 as he was not sure Hazel's motivation was sexual or that it was premeditated.
24:45 He said, "Tia's mother trusted you to look after Tia.
24:49 You breached that trust in the most grievous way possible.
24:52 Your guilty plea came on day five.
24:55 You said you wished to avoid causing further stress to Tia's family.
24:59 That is commendable. But they have had to endure four days of a very public trial."
25:04 There were gasps from the public gallery. Tia's family was sobbing loudly.
25:13 And as Hazel was sent down, there was the cry of beast from a man in the public gallery.
25:20 Now the judge said that he could have imposed a whole life tariff on Stuart Hazel.
25:25 But to do that, he would have had to be absolutely sure that the murder itself was sexually motivated.
25:33 He had no doubt, he said, that Hazel had sexually assaulted Tia Sharp,
25:37 but he had to be sure that the murder itself was sexually motivated, and he was not sure.
25:43 Now in his sentencing remarks, he said to Hazel that Tia was a sparky girl who was full of life,
25:49 but you took that life from her.
25:51 All that lay ahead of her, a career, loves and family of her own, will now never be.
25:59 Now after the sentence was handed down, Tia's mother, Natalie Sharp, left the court this morning.
26:04 She was asked whether she was happy with the sentence, to which she replied no.
26:11 And an uncle of Tia also said that this sentence should have been longer.
26:17 The aftermath of Tia's death was felt by so many people.
26:23 The house that Christine and Stuart had lived in, and where Tia had been murdered, was demolished in 2013.
26:29 In July 2013, her father Stephen Carter said he backed a plan for websites to block certain search terms
26:37 and warn people when they try and view illegal content.
26:40 In November 2013, partly in response to the murders of Tia Sharp and April Jones,
26:47 a little girl who was abducted and murdered by a stranger,
26:51 the search engines Google and Bing modified their systems to block results from searches
26:55 aimed at producing child abuse images.
26:58 Tia Sharp was a confident, happy and feisty young girl,
27:03 whose trust was betrayed in the most appalling way imaginable.
27:07 Those who knew and loved her are determined that she will be remembered for the joy she brought to so many people,
27:14 and not by the tragic way that she left this earth.
27:17 [Music]