Latest / The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories / Serial Killer Documentary - Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh

Transcript

Serial Killer Documentary - Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh · The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories

0:06
Speaker 1: January the 7th, 2016, Helmshaw, Lancashire, England. 60-year-old Sadie Hartley
0:15
Speaker 1: was home alone around 9 p.m. in the evening when
0:18
Speaker 1: she answered the doorbell. Standing there with a bunch of
0:23
Speaker 1: flowers was Katrina Walsh, a woman Sadie had never met.
0:28
Speaker 2: Sadie asked her who the flowers were from, and Walsh
0:30
Speaker 2: just kind of uttered something like,' I don't remember,' and
0:33
Speaker 2: then scuffled away.
0:35
Speaker 1: This was a dry run for a murder plot meticulously
0:38
Speaker 1: planned by two women.
0:40
Speaker 3: And all the while, Sarah Williams was hiding behind a
0:43
Speaker 3: parked car, watching her prey.
0:45
Speaker 1: Seven days later, when Sadie answered the doorbell again, 500,000
0:50
Speaker 1: volts of electricity knocked her to the floor.
0:54
Speaker 4: Essentially, there was no chance that she would survive it.
0:59
Speaker 1: Sadie Hartley lay helpless as she was stabbed to death
1:02
Speaker 1: by Sarah Williams.
1:04
Speaker 5: It was a crime of obsession, of arrogance, of barbarity.
1:11
Speaker 5: But above all, it was a crime of pure evil.
1:16
Speaker 1: In four minutes and 40 seconds, Sarah Williams had dispensed
1:21
Speaker 1: of Sadie Hartley. She calmly left the scene and returned
1:25
Speaker 1: to her accomplice, Katrina Walsh. After 17 months of planning,
1:30
Speaker 1: an innocent woman lay dead. A woman Sarah Williams and
1:35
Speaker 1: Katrina Walsh didn't even know, making them two of the
1:39
Speaker 1: world's most evil killers. 1993, the Wirral, Northwest England. 12-year-old
2:10
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams was passionate about horses and a very good
2:14
Speaker 1: equestrian sportswoman.
2:17
Speaker 5: She met a riding instructor much older than she was,
2:21
Speaker 5: a good 20 years or more older than she was,
2:23
Speaker 5: called Katrina Walsh, at a local riding stables.
2:27
Speaker 1: Despite the age gap, the two women bonded through their
2:31
Speaker 1: shared love of horses... and became firm friends. Over the
2:36
Speaker 1: next few years, they formed an intense, almost inseparable relationship.
2:43
Speaker 2: When people saw the friendship, the very close friendship between
2:46
Speaker 2: Williams and Walsh, because they spent so much time together
2:51
Speaker 2: in and out of each other's houses, in each other's
2:53
Speaker 2: pockets all the time, I think there were some suspicions
2:57
Speaker 2: that they were more than just friends, that this was
2:59
Speaker 2: an intimate relationship.
3:01
Speaker 1: As Williams grew up, she became known as an incorrigible
3:05
Speaker 1: flirt and had a series of male lovers.
3:08
Speaker 2: I think Williams does very much see men as a challenge,
3:12
Speaker 2: especially married men. I think this idea of going out
3:16
Speaker 2: and turning on the charm and having somebody fall for you,
3:20
Speaker 2: it's something that she finds quite appealing.
3:22
Speaker 1: When Sarah Williams set her sights on a man, no
3:26
Speaker 1: one was going to get in her way. Her best friend,
3:29
Speaker 1: Katrina Walsh, was only too willing to help her get
3:33
Speaker 1: what she wanted. And what Sarah Williams wanted was a
3:37
Speaker 1: man called Ian Johnston, whom she was in a relationship with.
3:41
Speaker 4: He describes her being really friendly and them getting on
3:46
Speaker 4: straight away. And then one night, after they'd known each
3:50
Speaker 4: other For a few months, she turns up at his
3:53
Speaker 4: house in a short skirt, red heels, and the intimacy
3:59
Speaker 4: was immediate, and the relationship was physical straightaway.
4:05
Speaker 1: Williams had met the man she wanted to marry, but
4:08
Speaker 1: he and Johnston had a long-term partner called Sadie Hartley.
4:13
Speaker 1: Williams and Walsh decided that Sadie Hartley was a problem
4:17
Speaker 1: that needed to go away.
4:20
Speaker 3: This didn't happen in the heat of the moment. This
4:22
Speaker 3: was a murder plot that these two women had spent
4:26
Speaker 3: 17 months planning, and I think that's what makes it
4:30
Speaker 3: so horrific. This wasn't a crime of passion. This was
4:36
Speaker 3: a crime of obsession. She was obsessed with Sadie Hartley's partner,
4:41
Speaker 3: Ian Johnston. She wanted to get rid of her, and
4:45
Speaker 3: she did.
4:46
Speaker 1: Williams and Walsh thought they'd committed the perfect murder. They
4:50
Speaker 1: were in it together until they were caught.
4:54
Speaker 5: Williams maintains her innocence steadfastly and Walsh confesses but doesn't
5:00
Speaker 5: confess to killing Hartley herself. She says Williams did it.
5:05
Speaker 5: The friendship is fractured. Williams absolutely brazenly fronts it up
5:13
Speaker 5: and says, nothing to do with me. Williams is still
5:18
Speaker 5: living in her own parallel universe.
5:24
Speaker 1: These killer stories begin in 1960. Katrina Walsh was born
5:29
Speaker 1: on February the 4th in Middlesex. Sarah Williams was born
5:35
Speaker 1: 21 years later on the 8th of May, 1981, in Merseyside.
5:41
Speaker 5: Sarah Williams was an only child, daughter of an electrician,
5:47
Speaker 5: Perfectly reasonable, apparently, as a girl. Had a lazy eye.
5:51
Speaker 5: We saw her get bullied a bit at school. She
5:55
Speaker 5: went to a private school. Well-educated and capable. Very capable.
6:02
Speaker 2: But when she got into her teens, as she grew older,
6:06
Speaker 2: she realised that she was quite attractive to men. And
6:09
Speaker 2: this was something that she really seized upon. So those
6:13
Speaker 2: feelings of shame and inadequacy that she'd had when she
6:16
Speaker 2: was younger, they were counteracted by this validation that she
6:21
Speaker 2: got from the attention of men.
6:24
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh met in 1993. Williams loved
6:31
Speaker 1: horses and went to the riding school where Walsh stabled
6:35
Speaker 1: her own horse and was a riding instructor. They became
6:39
Speaker 1: firm and enduring friends.
6:42
Speaker 5: Was there a sexual relationship between Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh,
6:45
Speaker 5: a woman much, much older than her, who suffered from
6:48
Speaker 5: terrible alopecia and almost no hair? She was almost always
6:52
Speaker 5: wearing a bandana or a hat or a cap. If
6:55
Speaker 5: you look at the pictures of them both, they couldn't
6:58
Speaker 5: be more different. But there was something very strong, something
7:02
Speaker 5: very powerful keeping that relationship together.
7:06
Speaker 2: When Williams was 13 years old, she claimed to have
7:10
Speaker 2: been assaulted by a man who had stopped to fix
7:14
Speaker 2: his car. And this was an allegation that the police
7:17
Speaker 2: took very seriously and they investigated it. There were appeals
7:22
Speaker 2: for information from the public put out at the time.
7:26
Speaker 2: So this is a very pivotal moment in Williams' life,
7:30
Speaker 2: whether or not this story was a true one.
7:34
Speaker 1: Nobody was ever charged with the abduction, and there were
7:38
Speaker 1: suspicions that Williams had made the whole story up. In 1999,
7:46
Speaker 1: when Sarah Williams was 17 years old and still at school,
7:50
Speaker 1: she met 57-year-old married father David Hardwick at the riding school.
7:57
Speaker 5: Hardwick is a shadowy figure throughout this story. Hardwick is
8:01
Speaker 5: her benefactor, her sugar daddy, He gives her enormous amounts
8:05
Speaker 5: of money over the years. He's married to someone much
8:08
Speaker 5: more of his own age. They never divorce. Williams knows
8:12
Speaker 5: from a very early age that the power her sexual
8:15
Speaker 5: drive has, and she uses it to her full advantage.
8:21
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams left school at the age of 18. From
8:23
Speaker 1: 2005 to 2013, she worked for a bank selling personal insurance.
8:32
Speaker 1: In 2006, she moved away from home and bought her
8:36
Speaker 1: first house, largely bankrolled by David Hardwick, who also paid
8:41
Speaker 1: her a weekly allowance of 320 pounds.
8:46
Speaker 5: Hardwick is a consistent support to Williams throughout her life. Now,
8:52
Speaker 5: you can speculate about why. You can speculate about what
8:56
Speaker 5: was Hardwick getting out of it. On the surface, not
9:01
Speaker 5: very much. apart, I suspect, from a great deal of sex.
9:08
Speaker 1: William's best friend, Katrina Walsh, married her husband, Kevin, in 1984,
9:15
Speaker 1: nine years before she met Sarah Williams.
9:18
Speaker 2: Walsh was quite an eccentric character. She was somebody who
9:23
Speaker 2: shared William's love of horse riding, and that is how
9:27
Speaker 2: they met. She was into tarot cards. She was quite
9:30
Speaker 2: heavily tattooed. And she was a biker. She was interested
9:34
Speaker 2: in motorbikes. And these were some passions that she shared
9:38
Speaker 2: with her husband, Kevin.
9:41
Speaker 5: And Kevin and Katrina, and then, believe it or not,
9:44
Speaker 5: Hardwick and Williams, develop a sort of foursome. And they
9:49
Speaker 5: go on expeditions together. In a horse box, they take
9:53
Speaker 5: their horses. It's got sleeping accommodation. It's a very big
9:57
Speaker 5: horse box. And at one point, Kevin Walsh, Katrina's husband,
10:02
Speaker 5: describes it as a purple passion wagon. And then in 2008,
10:08
Speaker 5: Katrina Walsh and Kevin divorce. He's had an affair with
10:10
Speaker 5: somebody else. He goes off. He moves to Kattrick in
10:13
Speaker 5: North Yorkshire and leaves the Wirral behind him.
10:16
Speaker 4: He felt that the relationship between Sarah Williams and Katrina
10:20
Speaker 4: Walsh was dysfunctional.
10:23
Speaker 5: There was always this.
10:24
Speaker 4: Thing where he felt like if he hadn't left, Katrina
10:28
Speaker 4: would never have got as close as she did with
10:31
Speaker 4: Sarah because he would have been there to stop that
10:33
Speaker 4: from happening.
10:34
Speaker 5: But Williams was also a long way from being monogamous.
10:39
Speaker 5: I think she had a great many affairs, probably to
10:42
Speaker 5: the consternation or perhaps to the amusement of Hardwick. He
10:47
Speaker 5: certainly didn't seem to object.
10:49
Speaker 1: The day before her 30th birthday, Sarah Williams was driving
10:54
Speaker 1: on the M60 motorway in Manchester when she passed the
10:58
Speaker 1: unique structure of the city's indoor ski center, the Chill Factory.
11:03
Speaker 1: She now knew what she wanted as a birthday present
11:06
Speaker 1: from her boyfriend, David Hardwick.
11:10
Speaker 2: Hardwick was not as enthusiastic about Williams' new hobby as
11:14
Speaker 2: she was, because he was slightly older, perhaps less inclined
11:19
Speaker 2: to engage in this kind of vigorous physical activity. But
11:23
Speaker 2: Williams dragged him along, and I think part of her
11:26
Speaker 2: enjoyed the attention that she got from men at the
11:30
Speaker 2: Chill Factory, but also the jealousy, I think, that Hardwick
11:34
Speaker 2: would have felt when he saw these relationships developing.
11:38
Speaker 1: Williams and Hardwick became regulars at the Chill Factory. Williams
11:43
Speaker 1: loved being there so much, she left her job to
11:46
Speaker 1: join a ski travel company based in the complex as
11:49
Speaker 1: a sales advisor.
11:51
Speaker 5: Williams, who is by now a rather athletic woman, she's
11:55
Speaker 5: more than 5'10, she's strong, big shoulders, muscular body, rapidly
12:02
Speaker 5: becomes a really rather good skier. She really enjoys it.
12:07
Speaker 5: It becomes her second home, almost. Selling insurance is not
12:13
Speaker 5: quite as much fun as the dry ski slopes.
12:16
Speaker 1: While working at the chill factory, Sarah Williams had several
12:20
Speaker 1: romantic affairs, mainly with married men who were ski instructors.
12:26
Speaker 2: The affairs that she has with married men, they only
12:29
Speaker 2: end when she decides that they have ended, and when
12:32
Speaker 2: the men decide that they've had enough, she reacts very
12:35
Speaker 2: badly indeed.
12:39
Speaker 1: In August 2013, Sarah Williams met 57-year-old retired fireman Ian Johnston,
12:47
Speaker 1: an expert telemark skier who was working as an instructor
12:51
Speaker 1: at the Chill Factory.
12:54
Speaker 5: He's actually been in a relationship for some time at
12:57
Speaker 5: this point, for a number of years, with a businesswoman,
13:01
Speaker 5: a tiny bit older than he is in her later
13:03
Speaker 5: 50s at this point, called Sadie Hartley. But it's been
13:07
Speaker 5: on and off. And Johnston, well, he falls for the flirt.
13:13
Speaker 5: He falls for the femme fatale, or as she was
13:17
Speaker 5: later to describe herself, the she-devil.
13:23
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams and Ian Johnston's illicit relationship was developing rapidly.
13:29
Speaker 1: Williams began telling her friends that she'd met her ideal
13:33
Speaker 1: man and she was determined.
13:35
Speaker 5: To keep him. We have an extraordinary series of relationships.
13:42
Speaker 5: We have Williams and Walsh, closer now that Kevin Walsh
13:47
Speaker 5: has gone off. We have Williams and Hardwick. We have
13:53
Speaker 5: Williams and Johnston. And we have Johnston and Sadie Hartley.
13:58
Speaker 5: A great amalgam of relationships. All of them in a
14:03
Speaker 5: way driven by Williams' sexual desire.
14:07
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams was besotted with Ian Johnston. Although he was
14:12
Speaker 1: no longer seeing Sadie when he met Williams, they remained close.
14:17
Speaker 4: He was definitely somebody who, you know, was very confident
14:22
Speaker 4: with women, was used to getting lots of attention, enjoyed
14:27
Speaker 4: that attention. And so the fact that he ended up
14:32
Speaker 4: having this affair with Sarah Williams felt like it could
14:38
Speaker 4: easily have happened with his sort of personality type.
14:41
Speaker 3: Sarah Williams would watch for when Ian Johnston would come
14:46
Speaker 3: to the Chill Factory. She would get colleagues to tell
14:49
Speaker 3: her if his car was in the car park. Ian
14:52
Speaker 3: Johnston was her perfect man. He was a man that
14:55
Speaker 3: she wanted to marry. So I guess she saw... Sadie
14:59
Speaker 3: Hartley as the obstacle to that. She was the enemy,
15:03
Speaker 3: and she had to be got rid of.
15:07
Speaker 1: Sadie Hartley lived in the village of Helmshaw in Lancashire.
15:13
Speaker 1: She was a divorced mother with two adult children, a
15:18
Speaker 1: successful woman who ran her own medical conference business, and
15:22
Speaker 1: she also loved riding her horse that she kept at
15:25
Speaker 1: a local stable. In September 2014, Sarah Williams sent a
15:32
Speaker 1: letter to Sadie Hartley.
15:35
Speaker 4: In this letter, Sarah Williams personally attacks Sadie Hartley and
15:42
Speaker 4: adds in that the sex with Ian is fantastic and
15:49
Speaker 4: they can't get enough of each other and essentially said
15:52
Speaker 4: they were having sex all the time. and it was
15:56
Speaker 4: the best sex she'd ever had.
16:00
Speaker 2: And what is actually said within the letter is very
16:05
Speaker 2: revealing about the kind of person that Williams is. She
16:09
Speaker 2: is not putting the responsibility onto Ian. She's putting all
16:13
Speaker 2: of the responsibility onto Sadie. This isn't about Ian's continual
16:17
Speaker 2: decision to engage in an affair with her. This is
16:20
Speaker 2: about Sadie acting as the barrier to her having a
16:24
Speaker 2: more full relationship with Ian Johnston.
16:28
Speaker 3: But the letter didn't work to split them up because
16:32
Speaker 3: it was just a few weeks later that, in fact,
16:35
Speaker 3: Sadie and Ian moved in together.
16:38
Speaker 2: She thinks that she's justified in behaving in this way.
16:42
Speaker 2: She feels entitled to this man. So all of the
16:45
Speaker 2: behavior that she engages in, she thinks is perfectly reasonable.
16:50
Speaker 1: The letter did not deter Sadie Hartley or disrupt her
16:53
Speaker 1: relationship with Ian Johnston.
16:56
Speaker 5: Well, that just makes Williams even more furious. She hasn't
17:00
Speaker 5: managed to split up Hartley and Johnston to get Johnston back.
17:05
Speaker 5: In fact, rather the opposite. I think probably Johnston felt
17:09
Speaker 5: more loyal now to Sadie Hartley than he had done before.
17:14
Speaker 1: In October 2014, before moving in with Sadie Hartley, Ian
17:19
Speaker 1: Johnston officially ended his relationship with Sarah Williams.
17:25
Speaker 2: What has just been a bit of fun, I think,
17:28
Speaker 2: on his part, he decides to call an end to this.
17:31
Speaker 2: But Williams doesn't accept this. She's the one who's in
17:35
Speaker 2: control in her relationship. She decides when they're over, and
17:39
Speaker 2: she simply does not accept his decision.
17:42
Speaker 1: Johnston's physical relationship with Williams was over, but they continued
17:47
Speaker 1: to text and see each other at the Chill Factory,
17:50
Speaker 1: where they both worked.
17:52
Speaker 4: These text messages were, like, quite explicit in nature. There
17:56
Speaker 4: were naked images in them. So although... Ian said their
18:01
Speaker 4: relationship had come to an end, there was an aspect
18:04
Speaker 4: of the relationship that was still going on.
18:06
Speaker 2: But she attached meaning to that communication that wasn't actually there.
18:10
Speaker 2: So it shows just how completely at odds both of
18:13
Speaker 2: these individuals were in terms of their understanding of what
18:16
Speaker 2: their relationship really was.
18:19
Speaker 5: At some point in the late summer of 2014, Williams
18:28
Speaker 5: and Walsh begin to have what are could only be
18:31
Speaker 5: called chilling conversations about getting rid of Williams's love rival,
18:40
Speaker 5: Sadie Hartley. Walsh starts to keep a diary of these conversations.
18:48
Speaker 5: At one point, I think she writes in it, she
18:51
Speaker 5: does sound like a totally evil bitch of Sadie Hartley.
18:56
Speaker 5: Nothing could, in fact, have been further from the truth
18:58
Speaker 5: But nevertheless, this is the venom that is supplied to
19:02
Speaker 5: Walsh by Williams.
19:05
Speaker 3: There were all sorts of things that Katrina Walsh wrote
19:08
Speaker 3: in that diary which really revealed, I suppose, what her
19:13
Speaker 3: true feelings were about what was going on.
19:18
Speaker 1: The fantasy of dispensing with Sadie Hartley became an obsessive
19:22
Speaker 1: pastime for Williams and Walsh.
19:25
Speaker 2: For this to go on for the period of time
19:27
Speaker 2: that it did, there were multiple opportunities for Walsh to
19:31
Speaker 2: put the brakes on it, to go and tell the police,
19:33
Speaker 2: to tell a friend, to actually get something done about
19:37
Speaker 2: what was going to happen, to basically stop this from happening,
19:41
Speaker 2: but she chose not to.
19:44
Speaker 1: By August 2015, ten months after Ian Johnston had officially
19:49
Speaker 1: ended ended his relationship with Sarah Williams, a murder plot
19:53
Speaker 1: that should have stayed in the realms of fantasy was
19:57
Speaker 1: becoming ever more real.
19:59
Speaker 5: In the late summer of 2014, Walsh suggests to Williams
20:02
Speaker 5: that she approach Walsh's ex-husband, Kevin, who happens to be
20:07
Speaker 5: a keen archer. to become, would you believe it, a
20:12
Speaker 5: hitman and kill Sadie Hartley. Well, Kevin Walsh is absolutely
20:19
Speaker 5: having none of it. Absolutely turns it down flat. It's ridiculous.
20:26
Speaker 5: By this point, they've begun to enter what you might
20:29
Speaker 5: describe as a parallel universe.
20:32
Speaker 4: There were burner phones acquired. It was something akin to
20:36
Speaker 4: a plot in a spy novel.
20:39
Speaker 3: And.
20:40
Speaker 4: Whilst they were planning all of this, at the same time,
20:44
Speaker 4: Katrina Walsh was detailing every single part of their planning
20:51
Speaker 4: in her diary. So literally every little thing that they did,
20:57
Speaker 4: she would put a note in her diary.
21:00
Speaker 5: So they've got burner phones. Now they know that Johnston,
21:04
Speaker 5: who moved in with Sadie Hartley in November 2014, but
21:07
Speaker 5: they don't know where He lives with her. They don't
21:10
Speaker 5: know where Sadie Hartley's house is. So, believe it or not,
21:14
Speaker 5: they buy a tracker device for his car, which Sarah
21:18
Speaker 5: Williams puts on his car.
21:20
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams bought the first tracker on Katrina Walsh's credit card.
21:25
Speaker 1: The tracker led them to the house Sadie Hartley now
21:29
Speaker 1: shared with Ian Johnston in Helmshaw. the two women embarked
21:34
Speaker 1: on several reconnaissance missions to familiarize themselves with the property
21:39
Speaker 1: and surrounding location.
21:43
Speaker 5: So the plan is escalating quite steadily. There's been the
21:49
Speaker 5: poison pen letter, the attempt to hire Kevin. We've got
21:54
Speaker 5: the burner phones. We have the tracker device on fire.
21:58
Speaker 5: in Johnston's car. We now know where Johnston and Sadie
22:02
Speaker 5: Hartley live. So they decide, and I think this is
22:07
Speaker 5: a time when perhaps Katrina Walsh makes a bigger contribution.
22:12
Speaker 5: Katrina suggests to Sarah Williams that it's gonna be much
22:16
Speaker 5: easier to kill Sadie Hartley if she has a stun gun.
22:23
Speaker 1: Second of December, 2015, Greater Manchester. It was the night
22:28
Speaker 1: of the Chill Factory's Christmas party. The first tracker placed
22:33
Speaker 1: on Ian Johnston's car had failed. While the party was
22:38
Speaker 1: in full swing, Sarah Williams left the party and attached
22:42
Speaker 1: a second tracker to Ian Johnston's car.
22:46
Speaker 2: So she buys this tracking device that she puts on
22:48
Speaker 2: Ian Johnston's vehicle, and there are times when she has
22:52
Speaker 2: to remove it from the vehicle, and when she does,
22:55
Speaker 2: she's carrying it around in her own handbag And what
22:57
Speaker 2: she doesn't realise is that the company she's bought the
23:00
Speaker 2: tracker from are also able to access the data that
23:04
Speaker 2: the tracker is sending out. So this is a really
23:08
Speaker 2: ill-conceived plan. It's very badly thought through.
23:12
Speaker 5: The two women, Williams and Walsh, spend hours together plotting
23:17
Speaker 5: what they think and hope will be the perfect murder.
23:20
Speaker 5: Walsh is overjoyed at the involvement and Williams is utterly determined.
23:25
Speaker 5: They're going to kill. Sadie Hartley, come what may.
23:30
Speaker 1: On the 9th of December 2015, Sarah Williams and Katrina
23:35
Speaker 1: Walsh boarded a ferry from Hull to Rotterdam and drove
23:39
Speaker 1: to Germany to buy a stun gun.
23:42
Speaker 4: Then it starts to really feel like they're actively thinking
23:46
Speaker 4: about doing it because now they're purchasing weapons.
23:52
Speaker 1: Early in the new year, on January the 4th, 2016,
23:55
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams sent a text to Katrina Walsh.
24:01
Speaker 5: Williams says to Walsh, the time's coming, go and do
24:05
Speaker 5: your shopping. And so Walsh goes to Tesco and buys
24:08
Speaker 5: a considerable kitchen knife and uses her club card, so
24:12
Speaker 5: there can't be any doubt about who bought the kitchen knife.
24:15
Speaker 1: Walsh was captured on CCTV at a Tesco supermarket in Broughton,
24:20
Speaker 1: buying a large kitchen knife. The following day, on January 5th,
24:26
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams retrieved the tracker from Ian Johnston's car. Again,
24:32
Speaker 1: she placed the tracker in her handbag without turning it off.
24:40
Speaker 1: On January the 6th, Ian Johnston went to Switzerland on
24:44
Speaker 1: a skiing holiday. Sadie Hartley was going to join him
24:48
Speaker 1: ten days later. Until then, she was home alone in Helmshaw.
24:55
Speaker 1: Williams and Walsh knew Ian Johnston was out of the way,
24:59
Speaker 1: safely in Switzerland. They knew where Sadie Hartley lived, but
25:04
Speaker 1: neither of them knew her by sight. they decided that
25:09
Speaker 1: a final reconnaissance mission was needed, a dry run for
25:13
Speaker 1: the murder.
25:15
Speaker 3: The pair decided that they would drive up together to Lancashire.
25:20
Speaker 3: They bought a cheap bunch of flowers from Tesco, and
25:27
Speaker 3: the pair drove up.
25:29
Speaker 5: To her road.
25:31
Speaker 3: They got out of the car, walked up the street,
25:37
Speaker 3: And Katrina Walsh walked up to Sadie Hartley's door, knocked
25:43
Speaker 3: on the door and delivered these flowers in person. And
25:49
Speaker 3: all the while, Sarah Williams was hiding behind a parked
25:52
Speaker 3: car watching her pray. And when Sadie Hartley asked who
25:59
Speaker 3: the flowers were from, Katrina Walsh said she couldn't remember
26:03
Speaker 3: and she ran off.
26:05
Speaker 2: Here you have this person in front of you who
26:08
Speaker 2: is a human being, somebody who's asking you a question,
26:12
Speaker 2: and I think this is the first time that Sadie
26:15
Speaker 2: becomes that real living, breathing person that Walsh has been
26:20
Speaker 2: writing about quite abstractly in her diaries.
26:25
Speaker 1: Sadie Hartley was unnerved by the delivery of the bunch
26:29
Speaker 1: of flowers and the strange woman who delivered them. She
26:33
Speaker 1: contacted Ian Johnston in Switzerland, who knew nothing about the
26:37
Speaker 1: creepy delivery as Sadie described it to him. For the
26:44
Speaker 1: practice run, Katrina Walsh had driven to Helmshaw in her
26:48
Speaker 1: own car. Williams decided it would be unwise to use
26:54
Speaker 1: their personal vehicles on the night of the real event.
26:58
Speaker 1: On Sunday, January the 10th, 2016, Sarah Williams set about
27:03
Speaker 1: looking for a suitable second vehicle.
27:07
Speaker 5: So they have to buy a car that won't be
27:10
Speaker 5: identified as belonging to either of them. Williams and Walsh
27:14
Speaker 5: search for one and eventually purchase an elderly Renault Clio.
27:19
Speaker 5: But they do more than that. They also make sure
27:22
Speaker 5: that the number plate, which is on the Clio, is
27:26
Speaker 5: changed so it doesn't get recognised by the automated number
27:30
Speaker 5: recognition system used by most British police forces. And Walsh
27:35
Speaker 5: does quite a clever job of turning the number three
27:37
Speaker 5: into the number eight within a black tape.
27:41
Speaker 1: On Tuesday, January the 12th, 2016, Sarah Williams made what
27:46
Speaker 1: she thought was another clever move.
27:50
Speaker 2: Williams purchased a pair of boots that were several sizes
27:53
Speaker 2: too large for her so that that would throw the
27:56
Speaker 2: police off the scent and they would think that the
27:58
Speaker 2: perpetrator was somebody who was male or at least somebody
28:01
Speaker 2: who was much bigger than she was.
28:04
Speaker 1: On the 14th of January, Sarah Williams went to work
28:08
Speaker 1: at the Chill Factory as normal. At 3pm, she texted
28:13
Speaker 1: David Hardwick to tell him she was feeling unwell and
28:17
Speaker 1: going home early. An hour later, Hardwick visited Williams at
28:25
Speaker 1: home and left soon after. A little while later, Hardwick
28:31
Speaker 1: received a text from Williams. Just had another cup of tea.
28:37
Speaker 1: Going to switch light off and have a nap now.
28:40
Speaker 1: Will ring when I wake up as long as not late.
28:44
Speaker 1: Katrina Walsh arrived at Sarah Williams' home. Several minutes later,
28:50
Speaker 1: the two women emerged from the house and walked to
28:53
Speaker 1: the parked Renault Clio. Walsh returned alone to Williams' home.
29:03
Speaker 5: On the night of the 14th of January, 2016, Walsh
29:08
Speaker 5: drives to Williams' home and stays there, incidentally, to look
29:14
Speaker 5: after Sarah Williams' dog as well as everything else. while
29:18
Speaker 5: Sarah Williams takes the Renault Clio, which has been hidden
29:22
Speaker 5: in a car park nearby, and drives it from there
29:26
Speaker 5: to Sadie Hartley's house. Sadie Hartley that day has been
29:32
Speaker 5: at work in a perfectly normal way in her office.
29:37
Speaker 5: She goes home at the end of the afternoon and
29:38
Speaker 5: in fact goes out to tend to her horse in
29:41
Speaker 5: the Sables. She gets back to the house about half
29:46
Speaker 5: past seven.
29:49
Speaker 3: Sarah Williams parked her car and very calmly walked up
29:54
Speaker 3: to Sadie Hartley's door. And as soon as Sadie Hartley
29:59
Speaker 3: opened the door, She lunged at her with this stun gun,
30:04
Speaker 3: incapacitating her. And then she stabbed her over 40 times.
30:13
Speaker 3: And the whole murder, the whole attack took just four
30:16
Speaker 3: minutes and 40 seconds.
30:23
Speaker 1: After 17 months of meticulous planning, Sadie Hartley, the woman
30:28
Speaker 1: standing between Sarah Williams and the love of her life,
30:31
Speaker 1: Ian Johnston, was dead.
30:34
Speaker 5: So in four minutes, she has ended the life of
30:38
Speaker 5: Sadie Hartley with 41 stab wounds. It's the most depraved, disgusting,
30:46
Speaker 5: horrifying crime. You cannot imagine the brutality of that.
30:51
Speaker 1: And yet.
30:53
Speaker 5: Sarah Williams is as cool as could be. She's very careful.
30:56
Speaker 5: She closes the door. She takes the murder weapon with
30:59
Speaker 5: her and, of course, the stun gun back to the car,
31:04
Speaker 5: gets in the car, drives back to Katrina Walsh.
31:09
Speaker 1: Williams met Walsh at a designated rendezvous in a car
31:13
Speaker 1: park at Ellesmere Port. They abandoned the Renault Clio and
31:18
Speaker 1: drove home in Walsh's car. Once home, Williams had a
31:25
Speaker 1: plan to cover their tracks.
31:27
Speaker 2: She gave all of the evidence, all of the incriminating
31:32
Speaker 2: evidence to Walsh to get rid of. So she just
31:35
Speaker 2: wants it off her plate. She doesn't want any connection
31:38
Speaker 2: with these items. And she believes that Walsh is just
31:41
Speaker 2: going to dispose of them. And Williams will later ensure
31:45
Speaker 2: that there is no forensic evidence on her. She'll have
31:48
Speaker 2: a bath. She'll have a bit of a cleanup when
31:49
Speaker 2: she gets home. But all of that really compelling evidence
31:53
Speaker 2: is now in the hands of Walsh.
31:57
Speaker 1: The following day, Williams went to work at the chill
32:00
Speaker 1: factory as normal. Katrina Walsh also went to work at
32:06
Speaker 1: Collins Farm Stables, taking the incriminating evidence with her.
32:14
Speaker 2: Most of us, when we hurt someone, when we upset somebody,
32:17
Speaker 2: we feel guilty about it. We feel bad. We're not
32:20
Speaker 2: quite ourselves afterwards. But Williams is completely different. She's able
32:24
Speaker 2: to just pick up and get on with her life.
32:27
Speaker 2: And I'm sure she's thinking about the next stage of
32:29
Speaker 2: the plan here of getting Ian Johnston back.
32:34
Speaker 1: The day after the murder on Friday the 15th of January,
32:38
Speaker 1: a concerned colleague of Sadie Hartley's called the police, who
32:42
Speaker 1: went to the house in Helmshaw and found her lying
32:45
Speaker 1: dead in the hallway. Former Detective Superintendent David Swindle has
32:52
Speaker 1: been the attending senior officer at numerous murder scenes.
32:57
Speaker 6: One of the big things is looking at the victim,
33:01
Speaker 6: is to find out what there is in the victim's
33:03
Speaker 6: life that would lead to a possible motive, and the
33:07
Speaker 6: victim and the associates. So the victim's associate was Johnston.
33:14
Speaker 6: He was on a skiing holiday at the time, so
33:17
Speaker 6: he was contacted. And when he was contacted, he spoke
33:21
Speaker 6: about an obsessive ex-partner, and the police identified who that
33:28
Speaker 6: was with the assistance of Johnston.
33:31
Speaker 1: Johnston also told the police about the strange late-night delivery
33:35
Speaker 1: of flowers Sadie had told him about the previous week.
33:40
Speaker 1: The information provided by Johnston to the police was enough
33:44
Speaker 1: for them to bring Sarah Williams in for questioning. On Sunday,
33:49
Speaker 1: the 17th of January, 2016, she was arrested.
33:54
Speaker 2: Williams was arrested at 3 o'clock in the morning when
33:58
Speaker 2: she was at her own home. Her demeanor was quite calm.
34:02
Speaker 2: It was quite cool. She didn't appear to be freaking out.
34:06
Speaker 2: She didn't appear to be overly upset or overly distressed.
34:10
Speaker 2: And this was a persona that she maintained throughout her
34:13
Speaker 2: police interview. She seemed very unaffected by the fact that
34:17
Speaker 2: she was being arrested for the most serious of crimes.
34:21
Speaker 1: When questioned, Sarah Williams denied any knowledge or involvement in
34:26
Speaker 1: the murder of Sadie Hartley. After four interviews, she declined
34:31
Speaker 1: to answer any further questions and only replied, no comment.
34:37
Speaker 1: The police then began investigating the strange flower delivery on
34:42
Speaker 1: the evening of the 7th of January.
34:45
Speaker 2: The UK is one of the world's most watched nations
34:48
Speaker 2: in terms of the CCTV and surveillance that we have here.
34:53
Speaker 2: So every element of the planning of this murder was
34:56
Speaker 2: captured on CCTV. There was AMPR data as well, automatic
35:01
Speaker 2: number plate recognition. So there was this digital trail that
35:05
Speaker 2: these two killers left behind them.
35:07
Speaker 1: On the night of January 7th, the night of the
35:10
Speaker 1: dry run, CCTV from Sadie's neighbor's house revealed a figure
35:15
Speaker 1: of about 5'6 wearing a baseball cap. It was unclear
35:19
Speaker 1: if this person was male or female. Then the police
35:23
Speaker 1: traced the movements of a silver Vauxhall captured driving towards Helmshaw,
35:28
Speaker 1: stopping at a Tesco store in Haslingdon and arriving near
35:32
Speaker 1: Sadie Hartley's home. The owner of the car was Katrina Walsh.
35:38
Speaker 1: On Monday, the 18th of January, 2016, Katrina Walsh was
35:43
Speaker 1: arrested at the riding stables where she worked. Unlike Sarah Williams,
35:49
Speaker 1: Katrina was unable to stay quiet.
35:53
Speaker 2: Walsh absolutely spills the beans. Before she even gets into
35:56
Speaker 2: the interview room, she's telling the custody sergeant absolutely everything
36:01
Speaker 2: about what's happened, to the extent that the custody sergeant
36:05
Speaker 2: actually has to say to her, stop, save this.
36:07
Speaker 5: For the interview.
36:08
Speaker 2: So the contrast between these two suspects is really striking.
36:12
Speaker 4: She wants to frame me for it or kill me
36:14
Speaker 4: and frame me for it.
36:15
Speaker 1: Walsh claimed that Williams had committed the murder and that
36:18
Speaker 1: she had unwittingly been caught up in it. she accompanied
36:22
Speaker 1: the police to the stables where she worked and revealed
36:26
Speaker 1: where she'd hidden all the incriminating evidence.
36:29
Speaker 4: Everything that had been used in the murder was right
36:32
Speaker 4: there for them. So, in the ground, you had the knife,
36:38
Speaker 4: the stun gun and the boots, the boots which had
36:42
Speaker 4: some of Sadie Hartley's blood on them. And in the eaves,
36:46
Speaker 4: you've got Katrina Walsh's diaries which detail... in, you know,
36:50
Speaker 4: sort of minute detail of how they planned Sadie Hartley's murder.
36:56
Speaker 1: And the police also discovered that Sarah Williams hadn't been
36:59
Speaker 1: as clever as she thought in disposing of incriminating evidence.
37:04
Speaker 2: When she got home, she had a shower or a bath.
37:07
Speaker 2: She cleaned up with bleach. But there were things that
37:10
Speaker 2: she missed, so the police were able to get some
37:14
Speaker 2: trace evidence from the bath where there were traces of
37:18
Speaker 2: Sadie's DNA. They found on Sarah's spectacles some particles of
37:23
Speaker 2: blood that had been transferred during the murder. So she
37:27
Speaker 2: thought that she'd done a good cleanup, but she certainly hadn't.
37:30
Speaker 5: Williams is now in custody under suspicion. Walsh is now
37:35
Speaker 5: in custody under suspicion. And Walsh provides, essentially, the evidence
37:42
Speaker 5: to convict Williams. She has always maintained that throughout the
37:47
Speaker 5: plot that they hatched together, she was never going to
37:49
Speaker 5: be at what she called the sharp end of the killing.
37:52
Speaker 5: She wasn't going to do the killing. She was just
37:54
Speaker 5: going to assist. But of course, British law insists that
37:57
Speaker 5: if you are collaborative in a murder, you are equally
38:01
Speaker 5: guilty of murder.
38:06
Speaker 1: January 20th, 2016. Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh were charged
38:14
Speaker 1: with the murder of Sadie Hartley. Both women denied murdering her.
38:22
Speaker 1: On August 3rd, 2016, the trial of Sarah Williams and
38:27
Speaker 1: Katrina Walsh began at Preston Crown Court.
38:31
Speaker 3: They both pointed the finger at each other, but of
38:35
Speaker 3: course the prosecution gave a motive. Sarah Williams was to
38:42
Speaker 3: get rid of her love rival, who she thought was
38:44
Speaker 3: standing in the way of her being with her perfect man,
38:47
Speaker 3: Ian Johnston. And the motive they gave for Katrina Walsh
38:52
Speaker 3: was to help her friend, but also that she found
38:58
Speaker 3: the idea of plotting this murder very exciting.
39:03
Speaker 4: Just the salacious nature of it, everything that came out
39:07
Speaker 4: in court, the level of planning that they went through.
39:12
Speaker 4: And the fact that they were two women who murdered
39:17
Speaker 4: another woman, and for what really? A sordid affair that
39:22
Speaker 4: was no longer even happening. And the way that they
39:27
Speaker 4: kind of viewed it as some kind of game. and
39:30
Speaker 4: they forgot in all of that that it wasn't a game,
39:34
Speaker 4: and they weren't in a novel, and they weren't characters,
39:37
Speaker 4: and that she was actually a person.
39:42
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams decided to take the stand in her defense.
39:47
Speaker 5: There was.
39:49
Speaker 3: Absolutely no sense of remorse there. The prosecution, I remember,
39:55
Speaker 3: were trying to talk about Sadie Hartley's family, her daughter,
40:00
Speaker 3: who had just got engaged, and trying to get her
40:04
Speaker 3: to think about how the family would feel about their
40:08
Speaker 3: murdered mother. Sarah Williams stood in the dock, very calm
40:14
Speaker 3: and very arrogant, very nonchalant. and just denied having anything to.
40:20
Speaker 5: Do with it.
40:22
Speaker 1: Unlike Sarah Williams, Katrina Walsh chose not to defend herself
40:27
Speaker 1: in court.
40:28
Speaker 2: Walsh's conduct in court was quite different from that of Williams.
40:33
Speaker 2: Whilst Williams was quite confident, quite self-assured, Walsh just kind
40:37
Speaker 2: of shrunk into herself, and her conduct was quite similar
40:40
Speaker 2: to that of her early police interviews. So she didn't
40:44
Speaker 2: make eye contact with anybody. She sat with her head down.
40:47
Speaker 2: And this is a very kind of childlike response to
40:50
Speaker 2: the situation in which she finds herself. She just wants
40:53
Speaker 2: it all to go away and that if I don't
40:56
Speaker 2: look at people, they can't look at me.
40:59
Speaker 1: The trial lasted for seven weeks. On August 17th, 2016,
41:06
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams and Katrina Walsh were found guilty of the
41:10
Speaker 1: murder of Sadie Hartley.
41:12
Speaker 5: So Sarah Williams was.
41:14
Speaker 3: Sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 30
41:17
Speaker 3: years and another life sentence for Katrina Walsh, but a
41:21
Speaker 3: minimum of 25 years. And despite Katrina Walsh not actually
41:26
Speaker 3: being there at the murder scene on the night of
41:30
Speaker 3: the murder, she was found to be just as culpable
41:34
Speaker 3: and just as guilty.
41:37
Speaker 1: When handing down the sentences, the trial judge was unrestrained
41:42
Speaker 1: in his summations.
41:44
Speaker 5: Mr Justice Turner, in his sentencing remarks, points out that
41:51
Speaker 5: in contrast to the life-affirming good spirits of Sadie Hartley,
41:57
Speaker 5: these are two vile, despicable women. And he says, and
42:02
Speaker 5: I quote, but let no one make the mistake of
42:07
Speaker 5: thinking this is a crime of passion. It was a
42:11
Speaker 5: crime of obsession. of arrogance, of barbarity. But above all,
42:21
Speaker 5: it was a crime of pure evil.
42:27
Speaker 1: When Sarah Williams wanted a man, no one was going
42:31
Speaker 1: to get in her way. Any love rival.
42:34
Speaker 5: Became an enemy.
42:36
Speaker 1: Katrina Walsh was her willing accomplice, thrilled by the game
42:40
Speaker 1: of catching their prey. Sadie Hartley had no idea she
42:45
Speaker 1: was part of their sick game when she was ruthlessly
42:49
Speaker 1: murdered by these two women, making Sarah Williams and Katrina
42:53
Speaker 1: Walsh two of the world's most evil killers.