Killer at the Crime Scene - Season 4 Episode 5 - Connor Lyons - video Dailymotion

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Killer at the Crime Scene - Season 4 Episode 5 - Connor Lyons #CinemaJourney

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00:00I'm sorry, please, what's your emergency?

00:02I think I found a dead body.

00:04A dead, sorry?

00:05Dead body.

00:06There's a dead body?

00:07Yeah.

00:09Is that someone slipped in and drowned?

00:11Or actually, is this a murder scene?

00:13It looks like it's a teenager.

00:15Looks like a teenager.

00:16Why was a young man's life taken in such a tragic way?

00:21There's something dark going on underneath that relationship.

00:24It's about status, power, control.

00:28It's reckless and it's intentional.

00:31We have a two-hour time period when we don't know where they've been and what they've done.

00:35Is Red Killer on the loose?

00:37We need the evidence to tell us.

00:58A dog walker going along the banks of the River Hull spotted something which looked to them suspicious.

01:19Can you tell if it's a male or a female?

01:22It's a male, I think.

01:23When they took a closer look, they could see that it was the body just on the edge of the riverbank.

01:34It's obviously a young person, probably aged between 16 and 20.

01:46Police cordoned off a stretch of the River Hull.

01:49It's not yet clear how the teenager died.

01:52The body isn't fully submerged.

01:53The head is slightly, but the majority of the body is just lying on the riverbank.

01:57Supposed to pass by, it may have appeared as if this is somebody who had got into difficulties in the river itself.

02:05No obvious signs of murder.

02:08No visible signs of a struggle or stab wounds or anything like that.

02:15A whole number of options come to mind.

02:20But you must go with what the forensics tell you.

02:24You always have to treat any scene where a body is as a suspicious scene.

02:28Is the death natural causes?

02:31Is it suicide?

02:33Has someone fallen in the river?

02:35Have they been drunk and fallen in?

02:37Or is it murder?

02:39The role of a crime scene manager is to rule out the different hypotheses.

02:42A pathologist is called to the scene.

02:45The first thing to do is identify the body.

02:47Often, once you know the identity of a body, the rest of it falls into place.

02:52CSIs search the cordon, but find no personal belongings.

02:57The main way that we can identify someone quite quickly is on fingerprints.

03:00If someone's known on police record, you only need a small bit of fingerprint to be able to identify who they are.

03:06The teenager's fingerprints are sent off to be run through the database,

03:10while police check missing persons reports and call on nearby homes.

03:16There's quite a large housing estate on one side of the riverbank.

03:20Your job, as well as to investigate and bring closure for the loved ones,

03:25is also to, if you like, reassure the public.

03:29Just hours after finding the man, the fingerprints hit a match.

03:34He's identified as Connor Lyons.

03:39He was 17, but probably looked about 15 or 16.

03:42He's extremely a popular young lad.

03:45He was a local boy, a local teenager, really at the cusp of adulthood.

03:49He was just about to make those big moves, leaving school, starting work.

03:55We knew that there would have been a lot of interest in the area from that community

03:59because it wasn't really clear how he was there, why he was there.

04:06He's on the fingerprint register, so he's got a criminal conviction.

04:10But the criminal conviction is for low-level social crime,

04:15so nothing earth-shattering. He's not a career criminal.

04:19He's just a young lad that's probably lost his way a little bit.

04:24He'd turned a bit of a corner and was more focused on what he wanted to do,

04:29and he was going to go to college and learn to be a plumber.

04:32So he had a career in mind, a well-paid career as well.

04:38He was kind-hearted and no-one had a bad word to say for him.

04:44Connor lives less than a mile from the crime scene.

04:47The police have the awful job of going round to his parents

04:50to confirm that they've found his body.

04:54It's very difficult to tell the family that their loved one

05:00has died in suspicious circumstances and you haven't come to any conclusions yet

05:06because they want answers, they want to make sense of it.

05:09Connor's family tell them he went out around 8pm.

05:13He was riding his bike with his loyal companion Callie by his side.

05:18From speaking to family, Connor had a dog called Callie

05:21and his dog literally was by his side day and night and he had a lead for him.

05:27The time that Connor went missing, the dog also goes missing.

05:32Callie was found alone later that night, hungry and nervous,

05:37helping narrow down Connor's final movements.

05:41CSIs at the river look for clues as to what has happened.

05:45The victim Connor was missing a gold bracelet, bike and his mobile phone.

05:51There was a gold bracelet that had been bought for him as a present.

05:54It did raise a suspicion as to whether or not there had been some form of foul play.

06:01The fact that these are missing then tends to point towards, was this a robbery?

06:07Amid the uncertainty, speculation is rife.

06:11This would have caused a ripple effect within the community,

06:14hearing the news of a young person known well within the community,

06:18knowing the family within the community.

06:20People start talking and people start coming up with their own theories

06:23and their own conclusions to what was going on in that situation.

06:28There'll be all sorts of stuff on the rumour mill. It's a two-way street.

06:32The public want to know what's going on but equally the police want to harvest

06:36any information or intelligence there is that might help their enquiry.

06:40There was a rumour circulating, he was talking about suicidal tendencies.

06:45There was this seed of potentially Connor got into problems with others

06:51potentially involving drugs and that he may have been harmed by those people.

06:57With rumours swirling, the team urgently needs to determine how Connor died.

07:03If this is murder, how can the crime scene tell us the story as to what's happened?

07:08Is it a suicide? Is it foul play?

07:11Lots of question marks at the moment and no real answers.

07:16The body of 17-year-old aspiring plumber, Connor Lyons,

07:20has been found on the banks of the River Hull.

07:23The reaction in the newsroom was obviously one of sympathy for the people involved

07:28but also you switch into a professional gear.

07:31It's a big news story with a lot of interest in the area

07:35because even though it's a big news story,

07:38it's a big news story for a lot of people.

07:41It's a big news story with a lot of interest in the area

07:44because he formed part of the community where, sadly, he died.

07:48The questions being asked were, how on earth did it happen?

07:52Why did it happen? And really, is it a safe place for my children to go?

07:57But after finding no obvious injuries,

08:00forensics still need to determine how he died and if anyone else is involved.

08:05Until you've had a post-mortem examination on the body,

08:08you don't really know what you're looking for.

08:10You have to set your parameters quite large.

08:14There's a lot of mud around.

08:16I would expect that the suspects would be covered in mud

08:21or at least have mud on their lower clothing, their footwear and the bottoms of their trousers.

08:27Soil samples are a really important sample to take from these kind of crime scenes

08:31because they may link back to an offender.

08:34If you find a pair of shoes or clothing with soil on them, you can match that.

08:38Soil can be really distinctive to a particular area.

08:42The soil samples will be taken from multiple areas around where the body's been found.

08:47You're not looking at a really deep soil sample

08:49because if there's any transfer of material, it's going to be the top surface.

08:53They also focus on finding Connor's missing phone, bike and a gold bracelet he was wearing.

09:00There is a possible motive of robbery.

09:03If someone's been found on a riverbank,

09:05there may be items that have been thrown into the river close to where that body is

09:09or items might have fallen off the body.

09:11Police divers enter the water.

09:14Searching a riverbed in the UK is very difficult.

09:18It's a long, laborious process.

09:20The visibility in the water is virtually zero

09:24and so the police divers would be doing a fingertip search.

09:28It's a scientific process to try and determine how wide an area they need to search.

09:33Depending on how fast the river's flowing and how strong the current is,

09:36that could wash away evidence, it could move evidence.

09:39With rumours flying around about how Connor died, they need to know more about his life.

09:45Straight away, the police have got to do an intelligence search

09:50to find out what they know about Connor and who his known associates are

09:54because that may well point to foul play.

09:58There's clearly evidence that Connor was a very popular, nice young man.

10:04Connor moved to the Bransholm Estate in Hull three years ago.

10:09The Bransholm Estate sits on the outskirts of the city to the east of the River Hull.

10:14The estate was built in the 1960s and 70s

10:19and at the time it was described as the biggest council estate in Europe.

10:24But despite its size, I would say it still retains a village feel.

10:30It had its own shops, had its own pubs, had its own churches, schools.

10:34There is a strong community identity.

10:37It tends to be very much a case of everybody really knows everybody else.

10:43Connor was a very well-known character on the Bransholm Estate.

10:48We quickly became aware of his popularity through social media.

10:54Shocked by his death, Connor's devastated friends post tributes to him on social media

11:00and flowers from the community build at the crime scene.

11:04The support Connor's family gave to each other and from the community

11:10was a lot of sympathy as well, losing somebody so young.

11:15He turned his life around from having difficulties.

11:19He'd had a nasty accident a couple of years beforehand.

11:24Police discover that Connor was badly injured in a serious bike accident.

11:31Somebody's going through a traumatic experience, their vulnerabilities are going to be heightened.

11:36That accident had a significant impact on his body

11:39and would have had a significant impact on his mental health

11:42and through that traumatic experience we've seen a decline and a change in Connor's behaviour.

11:48And what we start to see is a trajectory of change, getting involved in things that they shouldn't.

11:54They've shut down all the youth clubs and there's nothing for kids to do.

11:58Boredom amongst young people is an interesting factor.

12:01We're talking about economic climates and we're talking about lack of opportunity,

12:06we're talking about lack of resources that unfortunately sometimes get them caught up in the law.

12:11Connor's family tell police he's been putting the past behind him,

12:15but in recent weeks he hadn't been his usual self.

12:19Connor was distracted, that could indicate he was having some difficulties with friends.

12:26It's important to speak to their peer group to find out what they were interested in,

12:33who their friends were, because normally if someone's murdered they will be known to the perpetrator.

12:43To build up a picture of who was in Connor's life,

12:46detectives take statements from his associates and study their social media and quickly have a lead.

12:54There was a social media post in relation to the sale of Connor's missing bike.

13:00Connor had a quite distinctive bicycle that he took everywhere.

13:04Everyone knew what it looked like.

13:07Digital experts trace the seller.

13:10Comes back to a guy called Cole Jarvis.

13:16Jarvis lived on the Brownstone Estate in the same area as Connor.

13:22They were in fact living quite close to each other.

13:26He was somebody who had a group of friends, many of whom were significantly younger than he was.

13:33Connor was one of them.

13:34Police learn Connor met 21-year-old Jarvis around six months ago,

13:39after approaching him for help fixing up a dirt bike.

13:42Young people make relationships quite quickly.

13:45Both of them like bikes, both of them like motorcycles,

13:48and it's those things that may have that initial connection.

13:52They're members of the same peer group,

13:54and it would seem that the common interest they had is playing video games,

13:59lamping, which is hunting for things like rabbits and stuff like that.

14:07Digital forensic investigators find Jarvis has made several attempts to sell Connor's bike on social media.

14:15On the face of it, it's evidence of suspicion of theft.

14:19So let's get him in, hear what he has to say.

14:22And it's very important in a murder investigation, you get a story from suspect as quickly as you can,

14:27so that you can either corroborate it or otherwise.

14:33Cole Jarvis is arrested on suspicion of theft.

14:36He said, well, I don't know what you're talking about.

14:38I haven't got the bike, and says, I don't know Connor that well at all.

14:41He's, you know, moved in beside me, and we're acquaintances more than friends.

14:46It's when the police start delving into the peer group,

14:50and what they've witnessed, and what they've heard from Jarvis,

14:53they realise that Jarvis is telling a pack of lies.

14:57With Jarvis in custody, an associate gives a statement.

15:02He saw Jarvis after 11pm, wearing wet and muddy trainers, riding Connor's distinctive bike.

15:10One of the peer group says that he had squelchy shoes, which indicates he's been near water.

15:17His explanation for that was, oh, because I'd taken the dog out for a walk.

15:22What is damning for him, he was seen riding that bike on the evening.

15:27When confronted, Jarvis' account takes a U-turn.

15:31He then changes his tune, and he tries to change the narrative in another direction.

15:37Now Jarvis tells police he and Connor are in fact friends.

15:41And he did have his bike, because Connor sold it to him.

15:47Of all the items that went missing, this was the, in many senses, one of the more important ones,

15:52if not the most important, because it was a bike that was important to Connor,

15:57and would have been unlikely that he would have been trying to sell it.

16:03What we see with Jarvis, he's continued to go out into the community and try and sell the bike.

16:09It suggests that he may be involved.

16:12Why else did he sell the bike? Because he knows Connor won't need it, because he's dead.

16:16That's my conjecture.

16:18Detectives ask Jarvis if he went to the riverbank on the night of the 18th of January.

16:23He denies ever being there.

16:27Now, it's not an offence to tell a lie to a police officer,

16:31but what it is, is good circumstantial evidence if you can prove that that suspect has lied to you,

16:39that his account or his narrative can't be relied upon,

16:43because all these witnesses say this is actually what happened.

16:47Intelligence officers scrutinising the rumours spreading across the estate about how Connor died

16:53have found further evidence that Jarvis has been lying.

16:58When the police start questioning the peer group, it suddenly starts to dawn on them

17:03that the one starting these rumours is actually Jarvis, and why is he doing it?

17:08One involved the suggestion that he had been with Connor much earlier in the evening,

17:15when Connor had described wanting to hurt or kill himself.

17:20He also, to another friend, raised the possibility of Connor being looked for by people involved with drugs.

17:27There wasn't one clear picture.

17:29None of which was true, of course.

17:31He's sowing a seed of disinformation, if you like, to go along with his narrative.

17:38And in a sense, that implicated his role in this.

17:42We're starting to get a bit more of a picture about a possible suspect, or certainly a person of interest.

17:49Doesn't say he's a murderer, but he's got questions to answer.

17:54Needing to know more about Jarvis, detectives interrogate his digital footprint.

17:58He claims to have lost his phone, so they request his records from the network.

18:04Meanwhile, forensic search teams have recovered Connor's bike from inside a relative's shed.

18:16The problem with the bike is that it's free for other people to touch and handle.

18:22Jarvis was actually known to the victim.

18:25He had legitimate access to the bike.

18:27So finding their DNA and fingerprints on there isn't really going to take the case that much further forward.

18:33The team still needs forensics to tell them what happened to Connor on the riverbank.

18:38You have to prove the cause of death.

18:40And the only person that can say that person died as a direct result of that action is a pathologist.

18:49They're the forensic experts.

18:51The day after Connor was found, the results are in.

18:55The cause of death wasn't straightforward.

18:58The initial indication was that Connor had died by drowning, which remained the case.

19:04That is how he died.

19:06But as the post-mortem was carried out and took place, there were other findings as well.

19:13There was damage and bruising around the neck area, which indicated a ligature may have been used.

19:19He also had tachy eyes, so that's the little blood vessels around your eyes and inside your lip,

19:24which can rupture on pressure being applied to the neck.

19:28Those injuries were not immediately apparent on the surface.

19:33One possible scenario that the pathologist came up with was that Connor had been strangled and then left to drown.

19:40So he'd been left in the water, knowing that he was going to drown because he'd been rendered unconscious.

19:47The second possible scenario was that he'd been strangled and then held forcibly under the water to drown.

19:54Whichever way, the strangulation was an integral part to his death.

20:02Were they callous enough just to leave him there to die? It matters not. In law, there is no difference.

20:09Humberside Police officially have a murder investigation on their hands.

20:13Now this is a murder inquiry, there's a massive shift in the investigation.

20:18What was used to strangle Connor? It's really important to try and find the ligature.

20:24Being able to find that vital piece of evidence may lead them to the offenders,

20:29because they might well have their DNA as well as the victim's DNA.

20:34The pathologist suggests that Connor may have been strangled with a rope over his waterproof jacket,

20:41which would explain why there are no visible markings on his skin.

20:45A piece of rope had some significance because one of the witnesses had described Jarvis as making a reference to a piece of blue rope,

20:54in the context of using it to tie people up.

20:58Maybe Jarvis showing people the blue rope is just him showing what he's prepared to do.

21:03This time, when police ask Jarvis about Connor's death, he answers no comment.

21:08It can be tremendously frustrating, because they can't really get to the root of the murder.

21:17There's lots of circumstantial evidence pointing to him as a person of interest,

21:23and he can't be eliminated, but he's implicated, but there is insufficient evidence to charge him with murder.

21:30The team needs more time to find a forensic link between him and the crime scene.

21:35There's a sense of urgency now. They haven't got an open-ended clock.

21:40What you have to do is prove the lies and prove the truth.

21:51Police in Humberside are running out of time to question 21-year-old Cole Jarvis about the murder of his friend, 17-year-old Connor Lyons.

22:02A post-mortem has found that Connor was strangled before drowning in the river Hull,

22:07and circumstantial evidence points to Jarvis as his killer.

22:11But the team still needs a direct forensic link between him and the crime scene.

22:16There's loads of circumstantial evidence, but there's nothing to put both of them at the murder scene.

22:24There's very little evidence at that crime scene, so you have to then look at further types of evidence,

22:29so digital evidence, CCTV evidence.

22:32The clock is ticking all this time. You've got to be resilient. You've got to keep pushing away.

22:37Hull Magistrates Court grants the team a 36-hour custody extension.

22:42Using CCTV and phone data, police track Connor and Jarvis' movements.

22:48The pathologist determines Connor lay dead for several hours before he was discovered.

22:53Time of death is crucial for forming the parameters of harvesting CCTV.

23:00So instead of doing a wide sweep, almost a fishing expedition, you've got time parameters that you can go to.

23:09Unfortunately, there's no CCTV of the actual murder scene,

23:15but you can look at when was the suspect and the victim last seen.

23:20Were they seen together?

23:23After leaving home, Connor meets up with Jarvis and they're seen out on the estate together.

23:29At around 8pm, CCTV captures two figures walking towards the crime scene.

23:36The closest point to the river from the estate is only a 5-10 minute walk.

23:42You're able to see a dog there which matched by description, Connor's dog.

23:48It was not possible from the footage itself to necessarily make very clear identifications.

23:56A lot of time was spent analysing different pieces of CCTV footage to piece them together.

24:05You're able to see parts of the clothing which police were able to match up

24:12with some of the clothing that we know either Connor or Jarvis were wearing on the night.

24:18The figure that was identified was wearing a green parka-style jacket, but they had very distinctive trainers

24:25which covered reflective area that the CCTV picks up.

24:29When you put them all together, you can start to say, well, this must be Connor, this must be Jarvis.

24:37In this case, it indicates Connor would have gone there of his own volition

24:44and we know that Connor and some of his friends were into lamping, which is basically hunting wildlife at night

24:51and it may well be perfectly legitimate for him to go to that area by the riverbank late at night to do some lamping

24:59and I suggest that's how he was lured to that area.

25:04Officers continue to track the men on CCTV.

25:08Meanwhile, digital experts analysing phone data have discovered that Jarvis has been telling more lies about his friendship with Connor.

25:17The data indicated that there were quite abusive text messages, that the relationship was deteriorating.

25:26The relationship between Connor and Jarvis was a volatile one.

25:31Which was capable of erupting into violence at times.

25:37The overall picture we had was that Jarvis appeared on the evidence to be the dominant person within that dynamic.

25:48Jarvis is slightly older than the peer group he's mixing with

25:53and I think people can draw the conclusion that he was a bit of a bully,

25:58that he tried to coerce younger kids into doing what he wanted them to do.

26:04My conjecture would be that he mixed with younger boys because he liked to be in control.

26:15He liked to be the boss, if you like.

26:18He's going to have a little bit more knowledge as opposed to those young people that he may engage in.

26:23So it's almost like currency.

26:26Status hierarchy and control play a role in friendships.

26:30In every group and in every friendship group, there is going to be individuals that want to take lead, that want to be drivers.

26:37Jarvis being the leader of the pack in that type of environment, it would have definitely stroked his ego.

26:44Where Connor was slightly different is that he was an individual with a strong personality

26:49and we know of loads of incidents where they clashed.

26:53The team needs to find out if one of their fights turned fatal and why.

26:58Shortly after 8pm, the figures are captured again on CCTV crossing John Newton Way,

27:04heading towards the River Hull, before they disappear from view.

27:08At 10.20pm, only one figure reappears.

27:13Connor is not the same.

27:16Connor is not in that CCTV.

27:21There's a gap of two hours which is consistent with what the pathologist says at the time of death.

27:28You can conclude that Connor is either dead or dying by the side of the river.

27:37Detectives are convinced the grainy figure on CCTV is Jarvis fleeing the crime scene.

27:43He's seen heading back towards his home, but they still need further proof it's him.

27:49With the custody clock running out, a new key witness comes forward with incriminating evidence, just in time.

27:56There was an eyewitness who was driving along Thomas Clarkson Way on his way to work at around 10.20pm.

28:05He's driven past, he's seen this person with a dog.

28:09The area off Thomas Clarkson Way towards the river is pretty much open countryside, woodland if you like.

28:17No CCTV, no street lighting, large areas that isn't covered by any lighting at all.

28:24It's quite a desolate spot.

28:27There isn't any reason, good reason perhaps, to be in that area on foot at that time of night.

28:35He was able to give a description of a man wearing broadly similar clothing which was worn by Jarvis that night,

28:44and was with a dog that matched the description of Connor's.

28:48The eyewitness was able to pick out Jarvis on an identification parade, albeit he could not be sure.

28:56It fits the next sighting of the defendant on CCTV heading back towards his home area only minutes from that sighting.

29:05It was one of the most remarkable pieces of evidence in the sense of I've no idea how he remembered seeing this person and the timing.

29:14It was quite extraordinary.

29:17Investigators cross-referenced the CCTV and eyewitness testimony with Jarvis' phone data.

29:22At various stages on the CCTV footage you could see that the person was using the telephone.

29:29When they match the data he's trying to sell the bicycle on the mobile phone.

29:35Now that's very callous.

29:38Humberside police arrest Cole Jarvis on suspicion of Connor's murder.

29:43A warrant is secured to search his home and related addresses.

29:46There's certain things in an investigation that you would want to look for.

29:50In this case you'd be definitely looking for any muddy clothing, any muddy shoes,

29:56because potentially you can tie that muddy clothing up to the riverbank where Connor was last seen alive.

30:09If an item is really muddy or really wet, the DNA may be linked to it.

30:14If it's really wet, the DNA may be inhibited because of the contamination.

30:20The bacteria may be from the mud and also from the wet, say if it's been in water, a river or something.

30:28These shoes are quite heavily mud-stained.

30:32They've got quite a lot of soil on the tops, on the uppers and the lowers of them.

30:36The forensic scientists might be able to ascertain where the soil has come from.

30:40And if they've got a soil sample from a site, they can compare the two

30:47and see if this soil from the shoe has been at the scene.

30:51The trainers and mud samples collected at the crime scene are sent for comparison to soil expert Dr Rosie Everett.

30:58My role on the case is to understand whether there is any forensic ecological evidence

31:04that can help the police understand whether the suspect has been at the scene.

31:10The key pieces of evidence that I examined was a pair of trainers.

31:14They were caked in mud right up to the laces.

31:18We want to understand what is that mud, where has it come from,

31:23and whether there's anything microscopic that we can use to link the scene and the suspect.

31:30Back at HQ, the intelligence team are still trying to understand what triggered Jarvis to kill Connor.

31:37When you looked at the relationship between them and looked at the communications between them,

31:44what it did show is a volatile relationship,

31:48where they were capable of issuing threats to each other, at times fighting like cat and dog.

31:55The team discovers that three months ago tensions boiled over

32:00after Jarvis sold a bike belonging to Connor without his permission.

32:04Connor confronts him and says, where's my money for my bike?

32:08And Jarvis refuses to give it to him.

32:11So at that stage I would suggest it's when it really starts to turn toxic,

32:16because he's basically stealing from Connor for whatever reason.

32:20There were messages in which it appeared Connor was making quite significant threats towards Jarvis.

32:30What was also apparent is that when you look at the messages, Jarvis had no fear of Connor.

32:38And you had messages from Jarvis to Connor saying, carry on testing me, you'll see what would happen.

32:45There were text messages where Jarvis says that Connor is a cheeky, gobby little rat.

32:51I think that maybe his power was challenged.

32:56I think that he felt that control he was losing because he's seen in Connor

33:01that he's an individual that didn't want to toe the line anymore.

33:05But when you have another individual that then stands out from the pack and says, no, I don't like this,

33:10no, I'm not going to follow your instruction, I'll actually meet you at some point with conflict,

33:16it changes the whole dynamic.

33:18And when it changes that whole dynamic, then someone like Jarvis now has to demonstrate authority,

33:25now has to demonstrate control.

33:27A witness tells police Jarvis showed them a video of him whacking Connor on the leg with a boat paddle,

33:33causing Connor to cry while he laughed.

33:35Jarvis was older and he was more well developed.

33:39There would also be a physical imbalance.

33:43There is evidence that he's stolen from Connor in the past.

33:48There is evidence of Jarvis's propensity to use violence

33:54and to be forceful in forcing Connor to do what he wanted him to do.

33:59If you put it all together, it's starting to show

34:02Jarvis's potency for violence and the violence is against Connor, who's younger and weaker.

34:10It shows some intent.

34:13With the theft of Connor's bike the possible motive,

34:16searchers at Jarvis's home move into the garden.

34:19Clearly you're looking for a murder weapon.

34:22A piece of blue rope was recovered, secreted or hidden in a garden area.

34:28Intelligence has revealed that the offender's been boasting about using a rope to injure somebody.

34:34Is this the same rope?

34:44You have to kind of put your mind in the mindset of the person doing the attack

34:49and think if I was going to strangle someone with a rope, how would I do it?

34:53And therefore that makes it easier for us to then

34:55target specific areas on an item for DNA transfer.

35:01The ends of the rope might have the offender's DNA on

35:06and then the center of the rope might have the victim's DNA on.

35:09The trouble with this is it's got mud on it and also it's been wet so it might inhibit any DNA

35:16so you need to try and avoid the areas of mud, which on something like this is quite difficult.

35:20Really get the swab into the nooks and crannies of the rope.

35:25DNA samples from the rope are sent for profiling.

35:30That rope was found to have the DNA of both Connor and Jarvis on

35:37but in locations which would have been consistent with it being held as a ligature

35:43and potentially used on Connor.

35:46A rope really is intimate, it's really close

35:51and he would have seen and heard every emotion that would have came with it.

35:55So that level of violence really stands out.

35:59That is evidence, good forensic evidence.

36:03If there's a rational or lawful explanation for that, don't you think he should have given it?

36:08Quite damning I would say.

36:10And it's becoming quite a compelling case for the prosecution.

36:15Cole Jarvis is charged with Connor's murder.

36:19But it doesn't stop there.

36:22The police up to the day of the trial are still investigating and still asking questions

36:28because he could come up with a cock and ball story saying well I've touched the rope

36:32and so has Connor because we're friends.

36:35With Jarvis changing his story at every turn, police can't afford to leave a jury in any doubt.

36:41They still need to forensically link him to the crime scene.

36:45If we don't get that crucial evidence at that scene, we potentially might lose the case at court.

36:50The initial thoughts are there's not much at that crime scene.

36:54But after examining Jarvis' trainers, Dr Rosie Everett has made a breakthrough.

36:59My particular case is a case where I've had a victim

37:04My particular field is an area called diatoms.

37:08Microscopic single-celled algae, so nothing you can see with the naked eye

37:13but a piece of evidence that forms in water and soils.

37:18The suspect was very clear that they'd never been to that part of the river hull.

37:24Actually this evidence proves that they have.

37:27It was a light bulb moment in the course of the investigation.

37:3221-year-old Cole Jarvis has been charged with murder.

37:37A rope recovered from his garden has returned a DNA match to 17-year-old Connor Lyons.

37:43Consistent with the pathologist's findings that he was strangled before drowning in the river hull.

37:49And now, microscopic forensic evidence has been found to suggest

37:53that Cole Jarvis may have been involved in the murder.

37:57Part of the reason that diatoms have become such an interest as a forensic evidence type

38:03is that if they come in contact with clothing, they get into the fibres

38:07and they lodge themselves between your fibres.

38:10And it's the same with footwear as well.

38:13We can look at them down the microscope to identify them to species level

38:18based on their shape, based on their size, based on their shape.

38:21And based on the features that they have as part of their structure.

38:25Diatoms are unique to particular habitats.

38:28So there are diatoms that are specific to the sea.

38:31There are diatoms that are specific to different river types.

38:34And there are different diatoms that grow within soils.

38:37So we can use that information to build a picture of where they've come from.

38:42The river hull is a really interesting environment.

38:45It's a really interesting place to be.

38:48The river hull is a really interesting environment from a diatom perspective.

38:53It's a big estuary system.

38:55So the fresh water runs into the Humber estuary,

39:00which then obviously runs out into the North Sea.

39:03And it's a huge tidal system.

39:05And it means that you have quite a distinct diatom population

39:09from all three of those environments.

39:12What we can do, if an item of clothing or footwear has those diatoms on them,

39:18then we can try and make a link between, for example, a suspect and a scene.

39:23Samples from Jarvis's trainers are compared to mud and water from the crime scene.

39:28So when you're examining a piece of evidence,

39:31we have to be able to demonstrate if there are diatoms in that evidence,

39:36that it's not just a quick contact, that it's across the shoe.

39:41In total, there were six samples.

39:44So one from the sole, one from the toe cap, one from the rear of the trainer,

39:50and then three systematically moving up the laces.

39:56Looking at the trainers under the microscope, they were covered in diatoms.

40:01This demonstrated that this shoe had been absolutely caked up to the laces in wet mud

40:07and had come in contact with all of these different diatom populations.

40:12And these diatoms matched exactly to the scene.

40:17It's crucial because it directly points to Jarvis being at the murder scene,

40:23i.e. on the riverbank where Connor's body was found.

40:27It actually links him. The first bit of evidence actually links him physically to that riverbank.

40:34Eight months on from Connor's murder, Cole Jarvis's trial begins.

40:41The atmosphere in any case where somebody has died is always tense and intense,

40:51and a whole range of emotions from anger to frustration to anxiety to worry to fear floating around the courtroom.

41:02In a close-knit community like Branson, it's always very, very sad that a case like this can divide and split friendships.

41:12It does add to the pressure, and it's those emotions that are there we also have to try to shield the jury from

41:21because emotion isn't part of their decision-making.

41:25Decision-making?

41:28In court, Jarvis showed a lack of remorse.

41:31He was straight-faced, just stared at the wall, was totally disinterested in the proceedings.

41:39He thought he was going to get away with it.

41:41Jarvis's defense claimed he has nothing at all to do with Connor's murder.

41:45This case has got really good, compelling forensic evidence.

41:49You've got diatoms that have been found on the shoes and the clothing that was found in the river.

41:53You've got Connor's DNA on the rope, and also you've got CCTV that puts the victim with the offender at a certain time.

42:03All those three bits of compelling forensic evidence corroborate with each other,

42:08so you've got evidence that will link to other evidence to create a really compelling picture.

42:14The only people that know what actually happened on the riverbank is Connor, who's dead,

42:19and Jarvis, who's made no comment.

42:23Now, if he had an explanation, it would have been in his interest to give it, but he never did.

42:29After hearing the evidence for three weeks, it takes under five hours for the jury to come to a verdict.

42:36Jarvis is found guilty.

42:40When the guilty verdict was announced in court, there were gasps from the public gallery.

42:45There was also a lot of tears, and emotions were running high.

42:51And it spilled out after the court into words, shouts, screams, between the two sides on the courtroom steps outside.

43:03Jarvis is sentenced to a minimum term of 21 years.

43:08The judge, in his summing up, alludes to the fact that he believed that Jarvis lured Connor to the riverbank,

43:17probably saying, let's go lamping, which was popular with them both.

43:21He's gone there, and the intention was to rob him of his gold bracelet and his bicycle.

43:26But ultimately, we don't know what was in Jarvis' mind, because he's never told anybody.

43:32He was invited to, but he never did.

43:34He never gave evidence in his own defense.

43:37If he'd got away with this, I think he would have escalated his offending.

43:42When we think about toxic relationships in any form, people may ask the question, you know, why does a person stay?

43:49But oftentimes, there may have been elements where they did have, you know, connection.

43:53There may have been elements within their relationship where they had a bit of a laugh.

44:00This is very sad.

44:01This is very sad.

44:03Connor was loved and respected by all.

44:06That's, you know, replicated in the number of people that turned out at his funeral.

44:12You know, there were hundreds of people there.

44:14Amid COVID restrictions, 300 vehicles drive in convoy in his honor.

44:20The memory of Connor is one that is beautiful, one that is inspirational, one that shows change.

44:29He had plans for the future, and who knows where that have led.

44:34Sadly, we'll never know, because his life was taken from him before he could realize his ambitions.

44:58For more information, visit www.FEMA.gov

Killer at the Crime Scene - Season 4 Episode 5 - Connor Lyons

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