THE dad of a lacking schoolboy – who vanished 18 years in the past – has revealed how cops initially pointed the finger at him earlier than arising with a weird second concept.
Kevin Gosden claims he was informed by investigators Andrew, 14, might have grow to be a jihadi fighter and fled the UK attributable to some books he’d checked out from the library for a college mission.
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Andrew vanished with no hint after skipping faculty and taking a practice from his hometown of Doncaster to London on September 14 2007.
Weeks later, detectives have been capable of monitor down CCTV exhibiting {the teenager} in King’s Cross station – however from there the path has run chilly.
In December 2021, two males have been arrested on suspicion of kidnap and human trafficking, however police confirmed no additional motion was being taken in September 2023.
Dad Kevin has informed The Sun how within the early weeks of the investigation, officers put the household via “traumatising” questioning through which he claims the finger was pointed at him for doable homicide.
“They solely wished to pay money for the station CCTV to show he wasn’t buried within the again backyard,” Kevin mentioned.
Asked if cops ever instantly accused him of killing Andrew, he added: “That was their assumption. They’re actually good at inventing tales.”
At one level Kevin and spouse Glenys went to a gathering with investigators through which it was proposed their son could have grow to be a jihadi – which refers to armed militant Islamic actions that search to determine states primarily based on Islamic rules.
Kevin mentioned: “They got here up with some actually weird concepts.
“He’d taken out some books from the library about Islam they usually’d give you the concept that maybe he was becoming a member of some type of jihadi group.
“We had this assembly and received again within the automotive – we checked out one another and mentioned ‘is that probably the most ridiculous factor you’ve heard in your life?’
“He was doing a college mission.”
Kevin mentioned the jihadi concept was an instance of “this horrible spiral, that was completely unhelpful and non-productive”.
He mentioned it was extraordinarily irritating coping with cops within the early weeks and months of the investigation.
“They’d give you one thing insanely unlikely, that it was laughable,” he defined. “It actually wasn’t good in 2007, initially.”
He felt such traces of enquiry gave the impression to be distracting from following extra apparent leads and when detectives lastly did attempt to monitor down CCTV, a lot of the footage had already been wiped.
Investigators questioned each of Andrew’s dad and mom, and older sister Charlotte previous to releasing the station video, a month after the disappearance.
Describing his personal interrogation, Kevin mentioned: “I did get the great cop dangerous cop routine.”
He added: “A few officers concerned have been in our home for 5 minutes, 10 minutes…
“They turned to us and mentioned ‘how did you self-discipline him?’
“We mentioned ‘we didn’t, we by no means had issues with him’.”
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Referring to the household’s remedy, he mentioned: “It’s flawed. I nonetheless don’t know what they mentioned to Charlotte.
“She got here again (from police questioning) actually shaken and mentioned ‘simply don’t ask as a result of what they requested me was disgusting’, so we will guess.”
He continued: “There have been too many statistics and assumptions.
“They traumatised all three of us, however simply because I’m a person I received the worst of it.
“It was so off track and so flawed, that it did find yourself with a suicide try as a result of I simply thought we’re by no means going to search out him like this, I simply have to be out of the way in which as a result of clearly they’ve received this concept of their head.
“I do know it’s not true however they’re by no means going to search out him if that’s the place they’re placing their time and assets.”
Referring to the concept he or anybody else within the household had damage Andrew, Kevin went on to say: “I mentioned to them greater than as soon as, for those who discover him, you’ll be able to ask him and he’ll let you know it’s garbage.
“You’ve requested my daughter and my spouse, the neighbours, his lecturers, faculty associates and also you’ll have come throughout no trace that there was ever an issue.”
‘All we will hope is one thing comes up’
Andrew, if he’s nonetheless alive, could be 32 now.
Kevin mentioned: “All we will hope is that one thing comes up and somebody volunteers one thing and remembers one thing, anonymously if obligatory, and provides us one thing revolutionary.”
The dad-of-two, 59, is at present refurbishing the household dwelling, together with repainting Andrew’s previous bed room, which is adorned with pictures of the then-schoolboy.
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Kevin mentioned: “It by no means will get any rattling simpler… nightmares and flashbacks in a single day. I lastly get to sleep and I’m like ‘how have I woken up at one within the afternoon?’”
The refurbishment is addressing “all of the stuff I haven’t paid discover to for the final 30 years”, he defined.
Asked if preserving his thoughts occupied has helped him to course of what occurred to Andrew, he mentioned: “I don’t find out about processing issues. It by no means will get any simpler.
“I’ve by no means made the psychological sickness stuff a secret.”
Kevin tried suicide early within the seek for Andrew, saying he was tipped over the sting by cops implying he was concerned in his son’s disappearance.
It by no means will get any rattling simpler… nightmares and flashbacks in a single day. I lastly get to sleep and I’m like ‘how have I woken up at one within the afternoon?
Kevin Gosden
“Sadly, I had reached the conclusion that it isn’t going to get any higher.”
He left his job on the NHS after Andrew disappeared and was doing part-time cleansing work earlier than being made redundant.
In November, when he turns 60, Kevin is due a “large payout” from the NHS, having been employed there for 20 years.
He mentioned preserving himself occupied with any little tasks is important.
“I do know an terrible quantity of individuals retiring, I can’t,” he admitted. “All of this distracts.
“Since Andrew disappeared, my focus, reminiscence, all that stuff… temper and anxiousness particularly, it paralyses your mind.
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“All of that has been fixed so I wrestle to assume straight.
“Things like refurbishing, you must pay sufficient consideration on it to not ruminate on issues. I’ve a number of little tasks on the go.”
He went on to say: “I do most days get up in a little bit of a panic, pondering I have to get this executed, I have to get that executed.
“My spouse goes, ‘you by no means sit nonetheless’. You propel your self into doing stuff with far an excessive amount of anxiousness behind it and rush it. That tends to be the way it goes.
“You get the times when melancholy will kick in and I simply can’t do something. It’s consistently powerful.
“Every day it’s a wrestle. Partly I simply hold doing this stuff, you must persevere, or I do, simply to maintain going. As against giving up.”
Sick trolls posting faux updates
Most lately, Kevin and his household have been pressured to seek the advice of with police over sick clickbait articles falsely claiming that Andrew has been discovered, or additional CCTV footage has been unearthed, and a few embrace falsified statements from his family members.
“That’s been inflicting me loads of anxiousness,” mentioned Kevin. “What I fear about is, you simply don’t wish to find yourself going via the identical factor Nicola Bulley’s household went via.”
Nicola Bulley was a mum-of-two younger youngsters who vanished aged 45 in January 2023 throughout a canine stroll in St Michael’s on Wyre, Lancashire, earlier than her physique was discovered weeks later within the river.
However, the seek for the mum noticed a media frenzy, with TikTokers and different social influencers flooding the scene and a few spreading misinformation on-line.
Kevin has been alerted to numerous doable sightings of Andrew over time, and at one stage the household had age development pictures executed exhibiting what he may appear like now.
“One of my fears is I might stroll previous him on the street, if he’s alive,” he mentioned.
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“He might need grown a beard, he would look so completely different. You fear you would journey over him on the street and don’t know.”
Asked what he believes grew to become of Andrew, Kevin mentioned he, his spouse and daughter have “fluctuated on this for years”.
He continued: “None of us can think about that the Andrew we knew wouldn’t have made some type of contact sooner or later as a result of we by no means fell out, we by no means argued.
“It nonetheless boils all the way down to we’re nonetheless completely clueless, however that makes us assume he in all probability isn’t alive however that makes you assume how come we’ve by no means discovered stays and nobody ever noticed him or observed something.
“It turns round in your head and you may by no means come to any particular conclusion, which is the entire drawback with ambiguous loss and why the psychological well being points by no means resolved.”
He added: “We attempt to preserve hope, there’s that little voice in your head that claims somebody someplace should know one thing, absolutely.”
Kevin mentioned it will be simpler, in a way, if it could possibly be confirmed both means what occurred to his son.
“If we had a bag of bones or one thing that will be extremely powerful, and clearly would elevate an entire lot of different questions as to how we’ve ended up with that,” he mentioned.
“It’s a double-edged sword, it’s the reply you simply don’t wish to know. But alternatively, it appears like figuring out could be higher than not figuring out.”
Andrew went lacking at a time earlier than the good telephones craze, the primary iPhone was launched the identical yr as his disappearance, and he didn’t also have a cellular.
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Kevin mentioned: “You are going again to the times of so much much less social media and web. People weren’t carrying round a pc of their pocket the entire time.”
However, he mentioned the truth that it appeared to go “pear-shaped” when attempting to retrieve additional CCTV at one in every of Europe’s most closely surveillanced areas, “remains to be moderately upsetting”.
Kevin mentioned he and his household informed investigators, after witnesses got here ahead, that King’s Cross was unlikely to be Andrew’s ultimate vacation spot because it’s a “transport change with hyperlinks to in all places”.
But he mentioned the sluggish begin meant the golden window of accumulating proof inside the first 48 hours was missed.
He mentioned there gave the impression to be a scarcity of communication between South Yorkshire Police, with the Met and British Transport Police.
Kevin mentioned: “It’s price saying that policing remains to be inconsistent when on the lookout for a lacking individual, however it is vitally a lot improved.
“I’m fairly positive each police power has a devoted staff for lacking individuals now. Things are executed so much higher now.”
Andrew’s disappearance
Looking again to the time Andrew disappeared, Kevin mentioned it was a Friday they usually weren’t sure he’d gone lacking till the Monday morning.
The household spoke to coach station workers, together with a lady who mentioned she’d bought the schoolboy a one-way ticket.
They then trekked all the way down to London and commenced placing up posters in any locations they thought Andrew might need been.
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They have kin within the capital and he had been on journeys there earlier than.
“A few commuters noticed posters we put up and mentioned ‘we sat on the identical carriage’ and we established he received to King’s Cross,” Kevin mentioned.
The dad had additionally rung round Andrew’s associates and native hospitals, and even thought of his son could have gone to Whitby, one other place he preferred.
“Our intestine intuition was proper,” he continued. “We have been saying to police ‘we all know he went to King’s Cross, almost certainly he received a practice as a result of he was most accustomed to that transport’.
“The level is, it took them 27 days or one thing to get the CCTV of him strolling out of King’s Cross station, which is what we have been saying he would in all probability do from the beginning.”
But Kevin mentioned he doesn’t imagine cops on the time wished to imagine Andrew had merely gone lacking, and moderately the eye turned to one thing extra sinister involving the household.
He mentioned: “There have been potential sightings that sounded fairly believable however the police weren’t following these up.
“They weren’t liaising with the Met after which it’s six weeks later they usually’re saying ‘the CCTV’s been overwritten’, that was irritating on the time.”
Kevin and Andrew’s different family members nonetheless don’t know why the schoolboy even determined to skip faculty and head down south.
“This is why it was an entire shock to us,” Kevin mentioned. “It by no means occurred to us that he would go lacking in any respect.
“The entire factor was terrible and I can’t bear in mind what number of days, weeks it was and when sure occasions occurred.
“It was such a blur. You’re in such a state of panic. We have been all three of us very traumatised by the very fact of the matter that Andrew had disappeared and we had no clue why.”
At the time, there have been theories Andrew had maybe travelled down for a gig or to satisfy up with associates, and would immediately flip up.
“He was going to do one thing that he knew we wouldn’t need him to do – simply doing no matter it was,” mentioned Kevin.
“He perhaps thought ‘I can all the time get to my grandparents or my uncle’s and I’ll face the music afterward they usually’ll have an opportunity to relax.’
“We thought he’d present up someplace and say ‘I’ve executed one thing silly and I would like a little bit of assist’. It simply by no means occurred,” mentioned Kevin.
Other theories urged Andrew had been groomed on-line and had headed all the way down to London the place he was trafficked.
Kevin mentioned: “There’s no proof, not one shred of proof.”
Instead, he believes it was so simple as Andrew skipped faculty to do one thing in London he knew his dad and mom in any other case wouldn’t be joyful about, and he got here throughout the flawed folks.
“That’s what my intestine has all the time mentioned, actually,” Kevin admitted. “We introduced each youngsters as much as assume for themselves and be impartial they usually have been each extraordinarily succesful, greater than.
“Andrew was exceptionally gifted academically, so he could possibly be misplaced in deep thought.
“He was insanely clever, however you wouldn’t have put him within the hanging spherical road corners and being streetwise class.”
He added: “One day, we hope that we’ll discover out what occurred.”
DCI Andy Knowles, of South Yorkshire Police, who has led the investigation lately, informed The Sun: “I’m in common contact with the Gosden household and I’m extremely grateful for his or her help as we work collectively to reply the questions which have remained unanswered for therefore lengthy.
“We rigorously contemplate any data acquired making certain it’s recorded, catalogued and, the place there are affordable traces of enquiry, it’s pursued.”
Missing People charity
Since Andrew’s disappearance, his household has been supported by charity Missing People.
According to the organisation’s web site: “Going lacking is a matter of life or loss of life for tens of 1000’s of individuals annually.
“Missing People was based within the early Nineties by sisters Janet Newman OBE and Mary Asprey OBE, impressed by the tragic disappearance of property agent Suzy Lamplugh in 1986.
“Initially beginning a Helpline from their dwelling, they shortly grew to become a beacon of hope for households of the lacking.
“For over 30 years, we’ve been there for youngsters and adults who’re susceptible to hazard or hurt, and those that love them.
“We’ll all the time be there, for so long as it takes.”
