Father’s search for truth after daughter killed in Britain’s deadliest terror attack
“All I was after was the truth,” says Dr Jim Swire.
The retired GP’s 35-year search for answers has seen him board a US-bound flight from Heathrow carrying a replica bomb, hold a secret meeting with Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, and collapse in shock after a criminal trial at a former military base in the Netherlands.
His 23-year-old daughter was among the 270 people killed in the Lockerbie bombing on 21 December 1988 – the deadliest ever UK terrorist attack.
“I think I know who was responsible for killing her and I think I can prove it,” the old Etonian, now 87, says in a new four-part Sky documentary.
He keeps the evidence he has collected in cardboard folders in a metal filing cabinet in an office in the Cotswolds home he shares with his wife Jane.
‘No one had really heard of Lockerbie’
Flora “was everything a parent could wish for,” says Mrs Swire.
She was about to turn 24 and studying medicine when she set off to the US to meet her boyfriend for Christmas.
“Everything was booked up, except there were plenty of seats available on a certain flight known as Pan Am 103,” says Dr Swire, sitting in a leather armchair in his cottage, overlooking the rugged coastline on the Isle of Skye.
Less than 40 minutes after taking off from Heathrow on the transatlantic leg to New York’s JFK, the Boeing 747 was 31,000ft over the Scottish town of Lockerbie when the aircraft was almost instantly destroyed by a massive blast.
The wrecked nose section of the Pan-Am Boeing 747 lies in a Scottish field at Lockerbie, near Dumfries
Residents remember “a huge explosion” before the sky lit up with “bright red flames” and a “great big mushroom ball of fire”.
“Before 1988, no one had really heard of Lockerbie,” says Colin Dorrance, who was a young 19-year-old recruit just three months into his police career at the time.
“Life here was just undramatic.”
That all changed at 7.03pm that evening. All 259 passengers and crew members on board the plane were killed along with 11 people in the town as windows were blown in and wreckage destroyed their homes.
Locals are still haunted by images of the bodies that fell from the sky, some still strapped in their seats as they landed in gardens and fields.
The smell of aviation fuel hung thick in the air as they surveyed the carnage strewn with luggage and the Christmas presents victims were carrying for loved ones.
270 people died on 21 December 1988
Peter Giesecke can’t shake the image of the woman still wearing one high-heeled shoe, while Margaret and Hugh Connell became “attached” to the man they found in a field near their home, watching over him for 24 hours until his body was recovered.
“We developed quite a love for ‘our boy’, not knowing who he was,” says Mr Connell.
As news of the disaster broke, relatives were desperate to know whether their loved ones were on board.
Unable to get through to Heathrow, Dr Swire rang the Pan Am desk in New York and could hear “chaos in the background and women screaming” as families of the victims, many of whom were American, received the terrible news.
Dr Swire, tall and slim with a full head of white hair, is measured as he recalls the kindness of the pathologist who allowed him to see his daughter’s body in the local ice rink, where the postmortems were being carried out.
“She was barely recognisable,” he says, the grief which still bubbles just under the surface after all these years coming to the fore as he tells how he was allowed to take a lock of Flora’s hair.
“Human kindness can be very important when these things happen,” he adds, with tears in his eyes.
Jim and Jane Swire
‘Nothing quite adds up’
It took investigators a week to discover the disaster was caused by a bomb in a terrorist attack against the US – the biggest in the country’s history until 9/11.
“My first reaction was of fury, which led me to want to find the truth,” says Dr Swire. And that did a lot to help with the grief because I was busy doing things. It was rather how, I think, Flora would’ve reacted.”
The prime suspect was Iran, but they have always denied any involvement in the attack.
Iran had vowed to take revenge for the accidental downing of an Iran Air passenger flight by the US Navy in the Gulf in July 1988, which killed 290 people.
But the sprawling international investigation was just beginning.
“Nothing is what it seems in the Lockerbie story, nothing quite adds up,” says local reporter David Johnston, one of the first journalists on the scene.
It soon emerged a call was made to the US embassy in the Finnish capital that a Pan Am plane from Frankfurt to the US would be bombed in what was known as the “Helsinki warning”, with American diplomats in Europe told of a threat.
Passengers and luggage were transferred at Heathrow to Pan Am 103 from a feeder flight originating in Frankfurt and Dr Swire believes the plane was only two-thirds full because people were “warned off”. “We weren’t warned. Nobody told us,” he says.
“I felt I had a right to know the truth about how my daughter had come to be killed and why she wasn’t protected against being killed. And those were the bases on which we very soon found we were being richly and profusely deceived by the authorities.”
Flowers at the 2018 commemoration service
The ‘biggest crime scene in history’
Wreckage from the plane was spread over 845 square miles in what Richard Marquise, who headed up the FBI Lockerbie taskforce, describes as “the biggest crime scene in history”.
Investigators concluded the bomb was in a cassette player that was wrapped in clothes and put inside a brown hard-sided Samsonite suitcase.
A fragment of Toshiba circuit board pointed to possible links to tape recorder bombs made by Iran-backed PLFP-GC, a Palestinian terror group active in the 1970s and 1980s, who were suspected of carrying out the attack for the Iranians.
Dr Swire took his own replica bomb – the explosive material substituted for marzipan – on a plane from Heathrow to the US to highlight the security flaws.
“It was an obsession,” he admits. “All I was after was the truth of why our beautiful daughter had been murdered and I was bloody determined to find out who did it.”
The kindness of the women in Lockerbie
Meanwhile, in Lockerbie volunteers were cleaning the mud, blood and aviation fuel from the victims’ belongings left scattered amid the wreckage and bodies.
Clothes were washed, pressed and folded, jewellery was polished, and the pages of a tattered bible were individually ironed.
Miami-based Victoria Cummock, whose husband John died on board, was surprised to receive his clean laundry.
“I got back his personal effects due to the kindness of the women in Lockerbie,” she says.
Victoria Cummock
The Malta connection and the Libyans
Charred clothes which were packed with the bomb were traced to a shop in Malta, and two Libyan suspects came into the FBI’s sights.
Colonel Gaddafi’s Libya had a motive for the attack after an American bombing in capital Tripoli and a tiny fragment of circuit board, called PT35, found embedded in a shirt collar 20 miles from Lockerbie, was traced to Swiss electronics expert Edwin Bollier, who said he sold a batch of timers to the rogue state.
After CIA asset Majid Giaka, a Libyan double agent codenamed “Puzzle Piece”, said he saw the suspects with a brown suitcase at Malta airport the day before the bombing, two men were charged.
But there was little hope of Colonel Gaddafi handing over Abdelbaset al Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer, and Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, a security official for Libyan Arab Airlines, to face trial.
Telling only his wife for fear he would be intercepted by the security services, Dr Swire travelled to Libya to meet the dictator face to face in an attempt to persuade him.
“I was pretty crazy at that time,” he says. “I was so determined that I wasn’t scared, nervous yes, but not scared.”
Dr Swire says he heard the “click, click, click” of Gaddafi’s female soldiers readying their AK47s as he opened his briefcase to reveal pictures of his daughter, then again at the end of the meeting when he pinned a badge reading “Lockerbie the truth must be known” to the Libyan leader’s lapel.
The meeting had no obvious impact, and it was not until 11 years after the bombing that Gaddafi finally agreed to extradite the suspects in the face of tough economic sanctions imposed in response to the atrocity.
Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed by rebel forces in 2011
‘The shock was so great I collapsed’
The trial was held at former US Airforce base Camp Zeist, in the Netherlands, under Scottish law, and Dr Swire rented an apartment with Rev John Mosey, whose 19-year-old daughter Helga died on board Pan Am 103, to follow the evidence closely over 84 days.
Supergrass Giaka crumbled in the witness box as he was shown to be a liar and a fantasist, while Bollier couldn’t confirm he supplied the bomb timer to Libya.
“I couldn’t continue to believe that there was a cogent body of evidence that justifies the finding of either of those two men guilty,” says Dr Swire.
John Mosey
The Scottish judges cleared Fhimah but found al Megrahi guilty of 270 counts of murder for which he was later handed a life sentence.
“The shock of the verdict initially was so great I collapsed,” says Dr Swire.
Families of the American victims were pleased with the guilty verdict and FBI agents felt vindicated by the finding Libya was behind the bombing.
But Dr Swire “couldn’t believe three senior Scottish judges could convict someone on that evidence”, which he believes to be “false” in order to frame Libya to protect the West’s fragile relationship with Iran.
“I wasn’t prepared to have anything associated with Flora’s death as untrue and debasing as the story that was raised by the authorities against those two men,” he says.
“I was very shaken up psychologically by the fact I knew al Megrahi was innocent, and the authorities protected her killers.”
Sky News has contacted the Scottish Crown Prosecution Service for a response.
The cockpit section of the Pan Am Boeing 747 lies on Banks Hill near Lockerbie
‘The truth is very simple’
In 2009, al Megrahi was released from a Scottish jail on compassionate grounds after he was diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer, having spent just nine years behind bars.
But some believe he was freed in exchange for an oil deal with Libya.
He received a hero’s welcome when he landed back home with Scottish flags waved as he got off the plane.
Families of the American victims were disgusted but Dr Swire was happy and even visited him before he died in 2012.
From his Zurich office, Mr Bollier now claims the PT35 fragment is a fake and says he believes police tampered with the evidence.
He also says he was shown a brochure with two briefcases full of cash and offered 4 million US dollars by Mr Marquise, but the ex-FBI agent insists he didn’t offer him “one cent”.
For Dr Swire “the truth is very simple but the consequences of trying to conceal the truth are very complicated”.
“I think she (Flora) was killed by a bomb which was ordained by the Iranian authorities,” he says.
“They had had an Airbus destroyed by an American missile and 290 people killed. Therefore, they were lusting for revenge.”
Jim Swire
Former CIA operations officer John Holt, the one-time handler of Giaka, agrees. “I have no doubt it was Iran,” he says, adding that the PLFP-GC carried out the attack on their behalf.
However, most people still believe the official narrative and Libya has officially accepted responsibility, agreeing to a $2.7bn (£1.95bn) compensation deal with the victims’ families, albeit with expectations sanctions would be lifted.
Dr Swire’s search for answers continues as the alleged bombmaker Abu Agila Mohammad Mas’ud Kheir al Marimi is in US custody awaiting trial accused of being the third man involved in the terrorist attack.
Back in Lockerbie, the Connells did find out who their “boy” was – New Yorker Frank Ciulla.
The couple have formed a lasting friendship with his widow Mary Lou Ciulla and daughter Michelle Ciulla Lipkin, who are greeted with warm smiles and hugs as they step into their home from the Scottish drizzle.
“I felt that he was alone somewhere and yet when I came here, he wasn’t alone,” says Mrs Ciulla, her friend Mrs Connell’s arm around her shoulder. “Mine was actually… a nice story.”
The environment secretary has pledged to halve sewage pollution from water companies by 2030.
The target – which is compared to 2024 levels – is to be announced by Steve Reed on Sunday morning – when the Labour minister is also set to appear on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips.
The government says it is the first time ministers have set a clear target to reduce sewage pollution.
The target is part of the government’s efforts to respond to record sewage spills and rising water bills.
Ministers are also aiming to cut phosphorus – which causes harmful algae blooms – in half by 2028.
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Why sewage outflows are discharging into rivers
Mr Reed said families had watched rivers, coastlines and lakes “suffer from record levels of pollution”.
“My pledge to you: the government will halve sewage pollution from water companies by the end of the decade,” he added.
The announcement comes ahead of the publication of the Independent Water Commission’s landmark review into the sector on Monday morning.
The commission was established by the UK and Welsh governments as part of their joint response to failures in the industry, but ministers have already said they’ll stop short of nationalising water companies.
On Friday, the Environment Agency published data which showed serious pollution incidents caused by water firms increased by 60% in England last year, compared with 2023.
Meanwhile, the watchdog has received a record £189m to support hundreds of enforcement officers for inspections and prosecutions.
“One of the largest infrastructure projects in England’s history will clean up our rivers, lakes and seas for good,” Mr Reed said.
But the Conservatives have accused the Labour government of having so far “simply copied previous Conservative government policy”.
“Labour’s water plans must also include credible proposals to improve the water system’s resilience to droughts, without placing an additional burden on bill payers and taxpayers,” shadow environment secretary Victoria Atkins added.
The Rivers Trust says sewage and wastewater discharges have taken place over the weekend, amid thunderstorms in parts of the UK.
Discharges take place to prevent the system from becoming overwhelmed, with storm overflows used to release extra wastewater and rainwater into rivers and seas.
Water company Southern Water said storm releases are part of the way sewage and drainage systems across the world protect homes, schools and hospitals from flooding.
Environment Secretary Steve Reed is due to appear on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips at 8.30am on Sky News.
UK
Detective who helped catch ‘sadistic’ serial killer Peter Tobin believes there are more victims out there
What started as a missing person case led to the capture of an “evil” serial killer who “got sadistic sexual pleasure” from murdering women.
Peter Tobin died in October 2022 at the age of 76 while serving three life sentences for the murders of Angelika Kluk, Vicky Hamilton and Dinah McNicol.
Former detective superintendent David Swindle helped to unmask the murderer and has always believed there are more victims out there.
Peter Tobin. Pic: PA
Mr Swindle told Sky News: “Peter Tobin was evil. And, you know, there’s a lot of speculation – nature, nurture or born evil. He’s evil. This is someone that got sadistic sexual pleasure from killing people.
“And when we look back at his life, we see that he cut the head off a dog. He tortured animals – a trait that featured with Ian Brady killing a cat.
“This kind of stuff – he was progressing, he had all the traits early on. And then we traced various partners that he had, and they describe horrific, violent domestic abuse.
“This is someone progressing towards it. And Tobin is evil. He’s killed other people, but we don’t know how many else he’s killed.
“And the reason we don’t know it, is because he targeted vulnerable people and he was forensically aware. So, there could be others, there will be other cases.”
Former detective superintendent David Swindle
Tobin’s secret reign of terror was unveiled following the disappearance of Polish student Angelika Kluk in September 2006.
The 23-year-old had been enjoying her second summer at St Patrick’s Church in Glasgow, where she was living and working as a cleaner to help finance her Scandinavian studies course at the University of Gdansk.
She was reported missing after failing to turn up to work and was last seen alive in the company of the church’s handyman, “Patrick McLaughlin”.
Angelika Kluk. Pic: PA
The caretaker initially spoke to police before sparking suspicion by disappearing himself.
Following a public appeal, the force discovered “McLaughlin” was instead registered sex offender Tobin.
In 1993, Tobin attacked two 14-year-old girls while living in Havant, Hampshire.
He attempted to evade justice for the horrific sex assaults but was jailed the following year and spent a decade behind bars before returning to his home county of Renfrewshire in 2004.
In 2005, he fled Paisley after being accused of attacking a woman and managed to avoid detection until Angelika’s case.
St Patrick’s Church in Glasgow. Pic: PA
Mr Swindle said he can still remember the day he was brought onto the case after Tobin’s true identity was discovered.
Angelika instantly became a high-risk missing person as she was last seen in the company of a registered sex offender.
Officers were sent back to search the church, where Angelika’s body was thereafter discovered under the floorboards.
A picture of a hatch at St Patrick’s Church, which led to the underfloor passage where Angelika’s body was hidden. Pic: PA
Forensic scientist Carol Rogers ordered for the body not to be moved and crawled under the floorboards to collect vital DNA evidence from the bloody crime scene.
Angelika suffered a violent death in the sexually motivated murder. A post-mortem examination revealed she had been bound and gagged, raped, beaten with a piece of wood, and stabbed 16 times in the chest.
The underfloor passage where Angelika’s body was found. Pic: PA
Mr Swindle said the “ferocity” of what had happened to Angelika was “absolutely horrendous”.
He said: “I’ve worked on hundreds of murder investigations in my long time in the police, mostly in the CID. This was horrendous, absolutely horrendous, and it was organised.
“The way he had put poor Angelika under the floor and concealed her remains and stayed at the scene – this is someone that’s cool, calculating, someone that knew what he was about.”
A manhunt was launched for Tobin, who had absconded to London.
He was eventually captured after admitting himself to a hospital under the name “James Kelly”. His deception was foiled after a staff member recognised Tobin from the media coverage.
Tobin was initially brought back to Scotland for failing to comply with his sex offender requirements.
Mr Swindle said: “So, you’ve got the person, you’ve got the individual, but you need to work round it all.
“Meanwhile, it’s very fast moving. There was huge media interest, rightly so, and you’re always thinking, ‘okay, it’s him, we’ve got to prove this’.
“And you have to prove it beyond reasonable doubt, and that was the issue. And then later on that week, we got the DNA. It was Tobin’s DNA. That is a significant development.”
Tobin denied any wrongdoing and went to trial despite the DNA evidence stacked against him.
Dorothy Bain KC, Scotland’s now lord advocate, was the prosecutor in the case.
Jurors heard how semen recovered from Angelika’s body linked back to Tobin, as did fingerprints on tarpaulin left at the scene of the crime. The victim’s blood was also found on a wooden table leg and on Tobin’s watch.
The defence, led by Donald Findlay KC, claimed any sex was consensual.
Suspicions were instead cast on to the parish priest at the time, who claimed he’d had a sexual relationship with Angelika, as well as a married man the victim was having an affair with.
Aneta and Wladyslaw Kluk, Angelika’s sister and father, at the High Court in Edinburgh in 2007. Pic: PA
Mr Swindle said: “What happened very early on with the murder of Angelika Kluk was what you see so many times in cases – victim blaming and victim shaming.”
Jurors saw through Tobin’s lies and found him guilty.
Judge Lord Menzies described the rapist and murderer as an “evil man” as he handed down a life sentence with at least 21 years behind bars in May 2007.
The killer kicked a press photographer to the ground as he was led from the High Court in Edinburgh.
Tobin at the High Court in Edinburgh in May 2007. Pic: PA
Following Tobin’s conviction, what was then Strathclyde Police launched Operation Anagram to investigate his life.
Mr Swindle said: “As soon as I saw what Peter Tobin had done to poor Angelika – how organised he was, how methodical he was, the fact that he was using a false name, the fact that he gave a statement to the police in a false name before the heat was on him.
“He was 60 years of age. He’s done this before.”
Mr Swindle said “fortunately” there aren’t many serial killers in the UK.
He added: “Serial killers – they’re cunning, they’re controlling, they’re conniving, they can be charming, and that’s what we actually found out about Tobin, and they can be clever.”
Mr Swindle likened Tobin’s traits to that of Moors murderer Ian Brady and fellow Scot Dennis Nilsen, who admitted murdering at least 15 young men between 1978 and 1983.
Mr Swindle said: “And that’s when I thought we have to look at his whole life.”
As officers mapped the thrice-married Tobin’s movements over the years, it was discovered he was living in Bathgate at the time of Vicky Hamilton’s disappearance in February 1991.
Vicky Hamilton. Pic: PA
Vicky was just 15 when she went missing from a bus stop in the West Lothian town.
The teenager had been staying with her older sister in Livingston and vanished during a cold weather snap while making her way home to Redding, near Falkirk.
She was last seen alive eating from a bag of chips while waiting for her connecting bus.
The case was one of Scotland’s most high-profile missing person enquiries.
Sadly, Vicky’s heartbroken mother, Janette, died in 1993 without knowing what happened to her daughter.
Police searching Tobin’s former home in Bathgate in June 2007. Pic: PA
Furniture was removed from the property. Pic: PA
In June 2007, police searched Tobin’s old Bathgate home and recovered a dagger hidden in the loft space. A piece of Vicky’s skin was recovered from the weapon.
Vicky’s purse, which had been discarded in Edinburgh following her disappearance in an attempt to fool police she had run away, was submitted for testing and found to contain traces of saliva linking back to Tobin’s then young son.
It is believed the toddler may have put the purse in his mouth while playing with it.
Police conducting a search in June 2007 near to Tobin’s former Bathgate home. Pic: PA
There was no sign of Vicky, but the mystery would soon unravel nearly 500 miles away.
In October 2007, a search was conducted at Tobin’s old home in Margate, Kent, where he had moved to a few months after Vicky went missing.
Aerial view of Tobin’s old home in Margate, third from left. Pic: PA
A major search was conducted at Tobin’s former Margate home. Pic: PA
Officers believed he may have been involved in the disappearance of 18-year-old Dinah McNicol.
The Essex teenager vanished in August 1991 after accepting a ride while hitchhiking home from a music festival in Hampshire.
Dinah McNicol. Pic: PA
Her male friend was dropped off by the man, but she was never seen again.
Following Dinah’s disappearance, large sums of money were withdrawn from her bank account along the south coast. The location of the ATMs linked back to places Tobin had lived.
Police searching Tobin’s former Margate home. Pic: PA
Police recovered Vicky and Dinah’s remains from the back garden of Tobin’s former Margate home. Pic: PA
After 16 years, the mystery surrounding the disappearance of both Vicky and Dinah came to a close with the discovery of their bodies in the back garden of Tobin’s old Margate home.
Vicky had been dismembered.
Flowers placed on the ground where Vicky and Dinah’s remains were found in the garden of Tobin’s former Margate home. Pic: PA
Ian McNicol, Dinah’s father, visiting the Margate home after his daughter’s remains were recovered. Pic: PA
Prosecutors argued Tobin drugged the teenagers with amitriptyline, which he was prescribed at the time, before raping and murdering them.
Tobin once again denied any wrongdoing – despite his fingerprints being found on the refuse bags used to wrap the bodies – but was found guilty of both murders.
In December 2008, he was sentenced to at least 30 years in jail for killing Vicky. The following year he received a whole life order for the death of Dinah.
Lindsay and Sharon Brown, Vicky’s sisters, making a statement outside the High Court in Dundee following Tobin’s conviction in 2008. Pic: PA
Michael Hamilton and Ian McNicol, the fathers of Vicky and Dinah, outside the High Court in Edinburgh in 2010. Tobin failed to appear and would later drop an appeal case. Pic: PA
Tobin died on 8 October 2022.
The HMP Edinburgh inmate had been receiving palliative care at the city’s royal infirmary following a fall in his cell the previous month.
A fatal accident inquiry was held last year, which revealed Tobin was suffering from bronchial pneumonia, vascular disease and prostate cancer at the time of his death.
The serial killer’s ashes were later scattered at sea as no one came forward to claim them.
Tobin has long been suspected by police of murdering other women due to the sheer amount of aliases, cars, and homes he held over his lifetime.
Mr Swindle said: “Tobin’s killed other people – there’s no doubt about it.”
However, Tobin took his secrets to the grave.
Mr Swindle said: “Police Scotland were at his bedside when he was dying and asked him to do the right thing. He didn’t.
“It’s the ultimate control. It’s like Ian Brady – a narcissist. They lack empathy, it’s all about them.”
In 2010, Sussex Police searched an old home of Tobin’s in Portslade. Pic: PA
Tobin’s name was linked to the disappearance of Louise Kay, 18, from Beachy Head in Eastbourne in 1988.
The murder of Jessie Earl, 22, in 1980 was also reinvestigated as part of Operation Anagram.
Her remains were recovered in 1989 in thick undergrowth on Beachy Head, a place she would often take walks and the same area Louise disappeared.
Mr Swindle, left, at the police search in Portslade in 2010. Pic: PA
Mystery continues to surround dozens of pieces of jewellery recovered from Tobin’s possessions in Glasgow after he fled the church following Angelika’s murder.
Mr Swindle believes Tobin’s plan was to move Angelika’s body away from the crime scene – as what he did with Vicky – but police arrived before he could dispose of the evidence.
Mr Swindle said: “That phrase that’s used quite a lot – trophies. I don’t like that phrase. I think the word trophy sounds like a victory. I call it souvenirs from a horrible act.
“And Tobin, I thought, ‘he’s kept them, they’re souvenirs from a terrible act’.
“And to take it further, the jewellery is examined and there’s DNA profiles on that jewellery. Profiles of women, which we’ve never identified. Trophies is a horrible word.”
Read more from Sky News:
Man who had leg amputated after hit-and-run criticises sentence given to driver
Man stabbed to death by girl, 14, was ‘failed by state’, his parents say
Tobin at the High Court in Edinburgh in 2007. Pic: PA
Tobin has also been mentioned in connection with the Bible John killings, a series of murders that brought terror to Glasgow in the late 1960s.
The deaths of the three young women – who met their killer at the city’s renowned Barrowland Ballroom – remain unsolved.
Mr Swindle said: “I’m not convinced the same person was involved in these three murders.
“And there’s no evidence, I don’t think professionally and evidentially, that Peter Tobin killed these women either.”
Police outside Linlithgow Sheriff Court in 2007. Tobin was unable to attend the hearing linked to Vicky’s case due to an attack by a fellow inmate
Police Scotland has since scaled back Operation Anagram.
Mr Swindle retired from the force in 2011 but went on to set up David Swindle Crime Solutions.
As well as offering expert crime advice and spearheading independent case reviews, he can also be found on tour with his latest stage show, Murder: A Search For The Truth.
Mr Swindle additionally established Victims Abroad to help support families who lose a loved one in a foreign country due to homicide or suspicious death and are faced with confusing updates and legal processes in different languages.
Speaking of Operation Anagram, Mr Swindle said: “Throughout my long police career, I’ve worked in some big, big investigations.
“This, for me, is a career defining moment and also a personal and professional defining moment in my life.
“I’ve never worked on anything like it, and I hope never ever to experience it again. And I hope no other serving officers have to experience such horrendous things.”
UK
‘I think it’s appalling’: Man who had leg amputated after hit-and-run criticises sentence given to driver
A man who had his leg amputated after a hit-and-run has criticised the “appalling” sentence given to the motorist – as he backed a campaign to increase the “shoddy” penalties for uninsured drivers.
Ieuan Parry also suffered a fractured skull when he was struck by the driver of a white Mitsubishi fleeing police at high speed near Ebbw Vale, South Wales.
The uninsured motorist fled the scene and Mr Parry – who had been working on the roadside of a closed lane – was left with devastating injuries and the “agony” of “phantom pain” following his amputation.
The driver – who had reached speeds of more than 130mph during the police chase – later tried to blame the incident on his ex-partner by calling 999 and falsely claiming she had stolen his vehicle, according to reports.
He was jailed for three years and four months in February 2024 after pleading guilty to causing serious injury by dangerous driving and perverting the course of justice. It is understood he has since been released from prison.
The car involved in the collision. Pic: Motor Insurers’ Bureau
Mr Parry – who asked Sky News not to name the motorist – said he felt “extremely frustrated” and “angry” about the driver’s actions and believes he should have received a longer prison term.
“I think it’s appalling to be honest with you,” the 27-year-old told Sky News.
“(The sentence was) not harsh enough for the seriousness of his crime.”
The Motor Insurers’ Bureau (MIB), which has been supporting Mr Parry, is now calling for fines for uninsured drivers to increase from £300 to £1,200, saying the current penalty “simply isn’t enough of a deterrent”.
Mr Parry was 24 when he was struck by the car while working by the A465 Heads of the Valleys road near Ebbw Vale in November 2021.
Describing the incident, he said he was using a leaf blower on the roadside shortly after noon when he heard a “droning noise” and looked up to see the vehicle coming towards him at speed.
“Before I had chance to do anything or move, I was struck – hit off my feet,” he said.
“That’s where the nightmare started.”
Mr Parry underwent five surgeries following the collision. Pic: Ieuan Parry
‘Excruciating pain’
Mr Parry suffered a fractured skull and a badly broken left leg that later had to be amputated below the knee.
“(I was in) excruciating pain on the side of the road,” he said.
“I remember asking: ‘Is my leg okay? Will I lose my leg?'”
Despite the severity of his injuries, Mr Parry tried to reach for his phone to contact work colleagues while lying in the road.
“I was more concerned about how it had happened – because I was in a coned-off lane,” he said.
“I wondered, ‘would there be more cars coming behind this car?'”
Some of the damage to the car following the hit-and-run. Pic: MIB
Describing his feelings towards the driver, Mr Parry said: “Obviously extremely frustrated… angry.
“God forbid it never happens, but if I ever found myself in a situation where I’d injured someone, the last thing I’d be doing is thinking about fleeing from the accident.”
Leg amputated
Mr Parry spent 17 days at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff where he underwent surgery on five occasions.
Recalling the moment he was told his leg would have to be amputated, he said: “A lot of things went through my mind in terms of work, the relationship with my girlfriend… how everything in my life that I’ve worked towards thus far was going to be flipped round on its head.
“I did find that very difficult to deal with… losing your independence, not being able to go to the toilet on your own, not being able to wash yourself, not being able to do even the simplest of tasks.”
Mr Parry said his life ‘flipped’ following the hit-and-run. Pic: Ieuan Parry
Since the amputation, Mr Parry said he has dealt with the “weird sensation” of “phantom pain”, which he continues to face to this day.
“It’s basically the nerves that still reside in my amputated leg sending signals to the brain,” he said.
“It’s almost like you feel as if your amputated limb is still there and you can get various sensations, from pins and needles and numbness…. through to quite severe pain.
“It almost feels like someone’s got a set of pliers on your toe and is squeezing it.
“Those sorts of pains, although they are getting better now, are still fairly frequent and they can immobilise you with agony.”
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‘My life is never going to go back to normal’
Mr Parry has also faced feelings of anxiety over the “massive change” in his appearance and his inability to do tasks he once found “very straightforward”.
He said he was “eternally grateful” for the support of his close family – particularly his partner Sophie who he married in June last year.
“There’s no way on this I’d have been able to cope with it on my own,” he added.
Since the collision, Mr Parry has started his own fencing and groundwork company but said: “I’ve come to the realisation that my life is never going to go back to normal as it was before.”
Mr Parry said he was ‘eternally grateful’ for the support of his wife Sophie. Pic: Ieuan Parry
He added: “I’m always going to have disadvantages and issues with mobility and completing tasks, where I would not even have thought twice about it before.”
Campaign to increase uninsured driving penalties
The MIB is calling on the government to increase the current £300 fine for driving uninsured to £1,200 as part of its new five-year strategy, called Accelerating To Zero, which aims to end uninsured driving for good.
A YouGov poll of more than 2,000 people found 78% did not think a £300 fine was enough of a deterrent and three-quarters supported increasing the fine to £1,200, according to the MIB.
The MIB’s chief executive Angus Eaton said uninsured drivers “wreck lives”, adding: “We believe that the current penalty of £300, which hasn’t changed in over 10 years, simply isn’t enough of a deterrent.
“We’re calling for the penalty to be raised so that it is double the average premium, to help eradicate the issue.”
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Mr Parry has backed the campaign, saying a fine for uninsured driving “definitely needs to be a lot more than £300”.
“For the fine to be less than an average insurance premium for the year, I think it’s a bit shoddy,” he added.
A Department for Transport spokesperson said: “We take uninsured driving very seriously – it is dangerous and unacceptable.
“That is why the department is considering policy options on the motoring offences as part of the Road Safety Strategy.”
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