Stepdad who murdered teenager over sexual abuse claims jailed for life
A man who murdered the teenage girl who called him her father after she claimed he had sexually abused her ‘over a number of years’ has been jailed for life.
Scott Walker, 51, has not revealed where he disposed of 17-year-old Bernadette Walker’s body, which has not been found despite several searches, and it remains unknown how she was killed.
Sentencing him to a minimum term of 32 years at Cambridge Crown Court, Mrs Justice McGowan said Walker’s refusal to tell police where Bernadette’s body is ‘means she can’t be shown the respect she deserves’.
The senior judge added: ‘Cruellest of all it’s likely to mean some members of her family and friends will go on hoping she might be alive and might someday come back into their lives.’
Photography student Bernadette was last seen alive on July 18 last year when Walker, who was not her biological father, collected her from his parents’ house in Peterborough.
Jurors were told she had written harrowing diary entries setting out how she had told mum Sarah Walker about the abuse, only to be called a liar.
She wrote: ‘Told my mum about my dad and the abuse. She called me a liar and threatened to kill me if I told the police.
‘Ifeel nothing right now cause I always thought mum would deal with [sic] and it would all go away.
‘But no, he’s still here telling me I made it up. What kind of parent wouldn’t believe their daughter?
‘But it’s fine, I’m going to pretend it’s okay til I leave home then I will block them out of my life.
‘I’d rather say I’m an orphan than say I have abusive parents who couldn’t give a s**t about me or what happens to me.
‘If I was brave enough I probably would have already left, or just killed myself.’
Prosecutors said Scott Walker killed Bernadette to ‘prevent her pursuing her allegations of sexual abuse any further’.
Walker claimed that Bernadette ran away from his car when he pulled over, but jurors at Cambridge Crown Court rejected his account and found him guilty at an earlier trial of murder.
Lisa Wilding QC, prosecuting, said that Scott Walker formed an ‘unholy alliance’ with Bernadette’s mother, his ex-partner Sarah Walker, to cover up the girl’s death, sending messages from Bernadette’s phone to lay a false trail and give the impression she was still alive.
Sarah Walker, 38, was convicted of perverting the course of justice and sentenced to six years in prison.
The judge said she was sure Sarah Walker was ‘the guiding mind behind the detail of (the) plan’ to cover up Bernadette’s death, adding: ‘Each defendant was a willing party in that enterprise.’
The prosecution said Bernadette had told her mother on July 16 that Scott Walker had sexually abused her ‘over a number of years’, but that Sarah Walker did not believe her daughter’s allegations.
Scott Walker told jurors that Bernadette’s allegations of sexual abuse were ‘untrue’.
The court heard Bernadette was sent to stay with Scott Walker’s parents overnight on July 17 ‘while things calmed down a little’, with Scott Walker collecting her the following day.
Ms Wilding said that Scott Walker’s phone, ‘which was usually in regular use’, was off between 11.23am and 12.54pm on July 18, adding: ‘The prosecution say that in that hour-and-a-half he killed Bea.’
She said that when his phone reconnected to the network at 12.54pm, the first call he made was to Sarah Walker, which lasted for more than nine minutes.
The prosecution suggested the pair ‘concocted’ a story during this call to cover up Bernadette’s disappearance and death.
Sarah Walker reported Bernadette as missing to police in the early hours of July 21.
Jurors heard she was not married to Walker but had changed her surname by deed poll.
At the time of Bernadette’s disappearance, both defendants were living at the same address but Sarah Walker was in a relationship with another man.
She was found guilty of two counts of perverting the course of justice ‘knowing or believing’ Bernadette to be dead, having already admitted two counts of perverting the course of justice.
Scott Walker was found guilty of murder and of two counts of perverting the course of justice.
They remained silent as they were led to the cells.
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