Godden-Edwards family pay tribute

Mother of woman whose remains were discovered in a Gloucestershire field pays tribute to ‘beautiful, intelligent girl’ The mother of a woman whose remains were found in a farmer’s field in Gloucestershire has spoken of how her daughter’s murder has devastated her family. Karen Edwards told a police press conference relatives were horrified to receive news of Becky Godden-Edwards’ death on what would have been her 29th birthday. “After everything she has been through in her troubled life. Life was hard before when she was … an addict but we really did think she was alive and that one day she would come back home. Becky has now been found and the news of her horrific death has devastated all her family.” She said her daughter had fallen in with the wrong crowd when she was a teenager and had started taking drugs. “Becky was a very beautiful, intelligent girl … [she] gave me so much love and joy as a child. However, as a teenager she got involved with people who introduced her to drugs. She left school and her life spiralled into some very dark places to feed her addiction. She became a very, very different person.” Karen Edwards, who remarried when Becky was 15, said: “During her teenage years we did everything we could to help her overcome her drug addiction. We sought help from drug charities, doctors, we also asked for help from MP Julia Drown. We then put her into a private rehabilitation centre. “We tried everything to stop her leaving home but on every occasion the pull of her habit was much stronger and she would do whatever she needed to do to get her next fix. It was not unusual behaviour for Becky to disappear for weeks and months on end. When she was in serious trouble she always phoned her mum, and usually my husband, my sister or her brother or me would go and get her. We would bring her home only for her to disappear again.” In 2001 Becky moved out of the family home, in Swindon, after a conviction for burglary and theft. Her mother said: “She told me once that she loved me so much, she couldn’t keep putting me through this hell and she was leaving and she would not come back to me until she was clean. I never saw her again but I thought she was living in Bristol as she’d lived there before. “Over the years I have tried to find her through the police, the hospital and other organisations that trace missing persons but to no avail. I was told by sources close to the family, time and time again, that they had seen Becky during the missing years, so I had a strong belief that one day she would come back home. “I continued to buy her birthday cards, Christmas presents and cards, so that when she did come back home she knew I had been thinking of her every year since she left, hoping for one day that I would be able to give them to her.” Police discovered Becky’s remains in a field at a farm in Eastleach after the arrest of Christopher Halliwell, 47, a local minicab driver. He had been held by detectives investigating the disappearance of Sian O’Callaghan from outside a Swindon nightclub on 19 March. On 4 April, which would have been Becky’s birthday, detectives had to break the news to Karen Edwards that the remains were of her daughter, who she had not seen for more than eight years. She said: “Becky has now been found and the news of her horrific death has devastated her family. If anyone has any information, anything at all – no matter how small – that may help the police to establish when Becky was murdered or to fill in those missing years, we plead with you to come forward.” She thanked Gloucestshire police and wellwishers for their support, adding: “I’d also like to send our sincere condolences to the family of Sian. We know what they are going through.” Halliwell, also from Swindon, has been charged with the murder of 22-year-old O’Callaghan and is due to appear before Bristol crown court on 14 July. Crime guardian.co.uk

Posted by on April 11, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.