Original subtitles

This programme contains strong language and adult themes.

(FOOTSTEPS APPROACH)

(GRUNTS LIGHTLY) I've never done this before.

I've never ever told my story.

I've had offers from the press to do it and...

I just never have,

because people don't believe it.

I sit there sometimes at home by myself...

and I can't believe it's happened.

I just think I've just woken up

and I've just dreamt it.

Then reality strikes and, you know, it wasn't, it was a nightmare.

(TENSE, DRAMATIC MUSIC) Would you like your fucking family

destroyed, buddy? Would you like it destroyed?!

No!

My name is Steve Sabine.

I'm one of five,

and I'm the second eldest.

My name is Jane Sabine.

My name's Lee-Ann Sabine.

I'm the youngest of five children.

JANE: I am the second youngest daughter

of Leigh and John Sabine.

REPORTER: Are you their mother? No, I am not their mother.

I've answered that one before!

Nah, bullshit. The whole thing was a lie.

Her whole life's been a lie, really.

(STATIC CRACKLES) You can move that off here, please.

JANE: They left us with nothing.

(DISTANT SHOUTING) We had to fight.

(MUFFLED SHOUTING CONTINUES)

Where are you taking Jane? Where are you-

Henderson Police Station. Henderson Police Station.

LEE-ANN: She was the lady that gave birth to me and gave me life...

but she was not my mother.

It was always about her.

Everything she did was about her.

JANE: My mother...

was... a nasty,

horrible...

heartless bitch.

(MUSIC FADES)

(MELANCHOLY MUSIC & VOCALISING)

(OMINOUS MUSIC) (BIRDS CAWING)

REPORTER: Police were called here after human remains

were found within the grounds.

They say a man's body was found

above ground outside the flats,

concealed in plastic wrapping.

It's unprecedented, isn't it?

You know, uh, you don't hear

of this sort of thing in your own little village.

REPORTER: People living here have been shocked by the discovery.

MARY: I went to the doctor's and then I said,

"Can you just give me a short dose of sleeping tablets?"

And he said, "You and most of the people in Beddau,

they've all been here asking for sleeping tablets."

(TENSE INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC)

(DOG BARKS)

LYNNE: It was a very eerie

feeling over the village;

to think something like this has happened

and nobody knows anything about it.

(BIRDS CAWING)

What we knew in this case was that the victim was a male.

We didn't know much else at this time.

We couldn't identify who the person was,

how they'd come to pass, who else could have been involved.

It was a real mystery, if I'm honest.

Our only suspect at this stage was Leigh Sabine.

But Leigh Sabine, she'd been ill for quite some time

and had died about a month earlier.

You know, everything was giving us the indication

that that body was reasonably fresh.

So, how on earth could this elderly woman, who lived alone,

be involved in what had happened?

It didn't make sense.

Did she have capability to commit a murder?

Did she have capability to wrap that body,

to move that body, to store that body?

She didn't fit the profile

of a killer, you know, but...

you've got to keep an open mind.

(SOLEMN MUSIC) (KEYBOARD CLACKING)

We knew very little about Leigh Sabine

and we weren't really making much progress.

A lot of the information we had on her

was stuff she'd originated and just told people

in the Beddau community.

She was a likeable person,

very welcoming.

She was more than happy to invite us into her flat,

would offer us a cup of tea or a cup of coffee

and was happy, really, to...

to sit with you and-and just tell stories.

LYNNE: She liked to know our business.

She wanted to know about, you know,

how many children we'd got

and you know, have you got any grandchildren?

But if you started to probe a little bit more about her life,

she would shut the conversation down.

(MUSIC SWELLS)

OK.

Pretty soon after I started visiting Leigh in hospital,

she started telling people

that I was her executor.

Now, obviously I felt uncomfortable about this,

because I knew she had five children.

I found the fact that she had no contact with them strange,

but she certainly spoke of them in a very unemotional way.

There didn't seem to be any warmth or any connection.

So, I told the police this.

(GENTLE INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC)

LEE-ANN: So, a month after I heard

our mother had passed away,

I get this phone call out of the blue from the police.

(PHONE RINGS)

And they said that they found

a body in the garden,

but they didn't know who the body was.

I was taken back a bit.

I hadn't seen my mother in...

oh, a long time.

Like, a long time.

(IDYLLIC MUSIC)

JANE: Within the family, there is

our oldest sister, then there's Steven,

then there's Marty,

then there's me, and then there's Lee-Ann.

My earliest memory would be

my father gathering up the kids

and taking us for a walk down the road...

carrying me on his shoulders.

And I felt so special.

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

STEVE: Where we lived, there was creeks.

Our father taught us to swim.

We used to swim a lot.

And I used to go alright at breaststroke, was my stroke.

(CHUCKLES)

The only one I didn't sink in, I think.

(UPBEAT JAZZ MUSIC)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

I remember my mum wanted to be...

make it as a cabaret singer.

She just thought she was Shirley Bassey or something.

And I remember going to at least a couple of gigs.

# Nothing else feels like Getting enough

# Sunshine...

One in Auckland where we had to sit around

and wait for her to perform.

I would only have been five or six.

# Feeling on top...

Just sat in the end behind the stage.

# I never let this feeling

# Pass me by

# Never felt happier... # (MUSIC FADES)

I was a pretty happy chappy at that point.

And then, this one day,

I remember seeing suitcases packed...

(OMINOUS MUSIC)

..then hopping in a taxi.

STEVE: My parents dropped us in a day care in Auckland.

I just remember us getting there and them saying,

"We'll be back in a couple of days to grab you."

Just got in the car and drove away.

They were just gone.

Boom, gone.

I would have been seven years old.

Martin would have been five,

Jane would have been four,

Lee-Ann would have been over a year old.

The first few days after that,

we used to get out the gate and watch for them to come.

(GENTLE, SOLEMN MUSIC)

We all used to think that every plane, every taxi,

carried our parents, you know?

Every day you'd be looking, "Oh, they're coming, they're coming."

But they just never did.

They never came back.

(SOFT, OMINOUS MUSIC)

I always wondered why they left,

but I used to believe

we had done something wrong to upset them and they'd gone,

because why else would your parents drop you and run, you know?

(MUSIC FADES)

(AMBIENT STREET NOISE)

(INQUISITIVE MUSIC)

The discovery of these children opened up

loads of opportunities for us from an investigative point of view,

so we wanted to take advantage of that.

We made an approach to the authorities

in New Zealand, um, asked for their assistance and support.

Looked into their archives, their records.

And that's when we started to pick up a number of headlines.

(MUSIC INTENSIFIES)

The headlines caused me real concern.

When our parents abandoned us, it was the...

one of the first cases of that kind of thing

in New Zealand at the time, and it made all the papers.

Reporters turned up.

We didn't totally understand what was going on.

As a couple, John and Leigh Sabine

were sought after by the authorities for some 18 months.

(FRANTIC MUSIC)

Trying to locate them to bring 'em back,

hold them to account for what they'd done.

They were in a nationwide manhunt.

The police were looking for them everywhere, here and Australia.

(PHONE RINGS)

It was also apparent that the Australian and New Zealand police

had had real difficulties in tracing John and Leigh Sabine,

mainly due to the fact that they were using aliases.

John and Lee Jones, John and Lee Martin.

They're going from one country to another...

so that she could pursue her cabaret singing career.

(PENSIVE MUSIC)

When Leigh introduced herself to us the first time we met her,

she couldn't wait to tell us about her past.

(CABARET MUSIC)

She'd been a successful singer back in New Zealand.

She said that she'd done many cabaret acts

and she loved the high life.

# ..Still think That life could be...

One day, I'd been up in Beddau doing my local rounds.

Leigh said that she had to go

because she was going to the hairdresser's

to have her hair done and makeup done

because there was a film crew coming from New Zealand.

They were doing a programme called "Where Are They Now?"

about famous people.

It was for a documentary they were doing in New Zealand,

who were looking for,

basically, older famous people

that have seemed to have just drifted off the scene.

Me thinking, was she ever really that famous

as a cabaret singer and dancer

that they would want to be finding out where she is?

# I kept my stiff upper lip...

And she was like, up on the- with the pillars, you know.

Her hands up and, like, giving the pose and everything.

# Then you came along

# And you showed me they way... #

(LAUGHS) And yeah, so, yeah, God she was loving it.

I thought then, "Oh my God, she was bigger than what,

you know, what I thought she was."

(MUSIC CONCLUDES) (APPLAUSE)

GARETH: Was she a cabaret singer?

You know, was that actual truth or was that another story

that she'd spun?

But they got found by the press,

and they ended up

talking to the press and giving their side of the story.

(URGENT MUSIC)

STEVE: (READS) "Lee Jones

broke down and cried in Perth yesterday

as she told about the five young children

she and her hu- her husband

left in New Zealand 15 months ago.

We never intended to desert our children.

We hoped to give the kids the good life."

That's just bullshit.

There's nothing else to say on that. It's just crap.

JANE: Then it hit the newspapers

and it all came out.

I can't imagine

how my parents just didn't come back.

It's like, who did they think was looking after us?

How do they carry on with their life

knowing they've got five children

running around, could be hurt,

you know?

Just don't know what kind of human beings do that.

Just to be famous?

Oh, she dumped us for fame, alright.

That's what she thought she was gonna get.

(APPLAUSE)

She wasn't.

(LAUGHS) She wasn't that good.

So, she wasn't a famous, successful cabaret singer.

Um, yes, she sang in the odd bar and nightclub

for not a lot of money.

So Leigh Sabine, despite giving the persona

of a cabaret singer,

someone who loved to tell a story...

had a real selfish side, a dark side.

You know, a mother who was able to abandon her five children,

move to another country,

and not really give them a second thought.

But we need evidence.

We need hard evidence to prove

that the killer is Leigh Sabine,

if-if it is Leigh Sabine.

(INVESTIGATIVE MUSIC) (KEYBOARD CLACKING)

(PHONE RINGS)

GARETH: Forensic examination of the packaging

was going to be really important

to see if there's any opportunity

to yield any forensic evidence which will take the case forward.

It was significant packaging;

14 sheets...

wrapped around 41 times.

So it was a really challenging and difficult job.

(TENSE, OMINOUS MUSIC)

We were mainly looking for fingerprints of the perpetrator,

you know, the person who had wrapped

this poor victim up multiple times, really.

We underestimated, I suppose, the size of the wrappings.

They were so big; I'd say about 12-foot long.

How on earth would we...

How would we deal with something like that?

SAMANTHA: Our fingerprint lab wasn't really

equipped for that kind of exhibit size,

so we was almost thinking off the spot and creating a mini lab.

(SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC) (SHUTTER CRANKS)

JOANNE: We had a garage at the time.

It had roller shutter doors at the end.

That was good for ventilation.

So, we decided to move the wrappings

and put them in there.

It was Samantha who came up with the idea of making a washing line

that went from one side of the garage to the other.

Best idea ever.

We were able to put these layers over the top of this line,

which took up the width of most of the garage,

to be honest, just to give you the scale.

(TENSE MUSIC)

JOANNE: You have to meticulously

look in every crook

and every cranny for fingerprints.

I don't think we ever realised

the enormous task that was ahead,

and this wasn't just a couple of days,

this was gonna take weeks.

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

(SHEEP BLEAT)

(SOLEMN INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC)

STEVE: So, my brothers and sisters,

we bounced between homes a fair bit.

I'm not actually sure how many

homes or places I went to,

but it felt like a lot.

We never got any nurturing or anything like that.

I can still remember talking to a foster parent, and, um, I says,

"Oh, when my parents come back," and she says, "They didn't want you.

No one wants ya."

JANE: There was no love. There was no...

attachments.

We didn't get shown the necessities.

Like, we didn't get shown how to brush teeth properly.

Yeah, you always felt like a second-class citizen.

Mm.

(MUSIC FADES)

I mostly watched my brothers and sisters

getting beaten up,

thrown on walls and...

and I would just cry,

watching, terrified, scared that they were gonna get killed.

One foster father...

in particular was very abusive,

mentally and physically.

(GARAGE DOOR SQUEAKS OPEN)

Marty and I had pet mice.

One was a white one.

One was a brown one.

Any bit of pocket money we got, we'd buy the little wheel

that they swing around on,

all the bells, all the balls.

It was just something we had, you know,

that... that we could love.

And this one day,

this foster father said,

"Come to the garage."

(OMINOUS MUSIC)

And he gave us a hammer each,

and he said, "Now...

kill them."

Well, there was no way I was gonna kill that mouse.

And I started crying.

Marty just took my hammer...

and he killed both the mice.

(GARAGE DOOR SQUEAKS)

(THUDS CLOSED)

The foster father, he ruled that house

with fear and intimidation.

Just a horrible man.

Horrible, horrible man.

Very violent.

(SINISTER MUSIC)

He did some horrible things to Jane

and LeeAnn. Um...

And, you know, and...

there's nothing I can do about that.

I remember the f- very first time

that the sexual abuse happened.

LEE-ANN: I thought it was just normal, you know.

The foster father would...

pull me into his room,

um, and shut the door,

or he would come into my bed

after he had finished night shift.

No one believed us.

I mean...

they just told us we were lying, making stuff up,

and it happened all the time.

I was just holding out for the day that

our parents would come back and save me

from what we were going through.

(INHALES DEEPLY)

(BIRDS CAWING)

(FOREBODING MUSIC) (DOG BARKING)

(MUSIC INTENSIFIES)

The wrappings ended up taking so much longer

'cause you would open the exhibit bag...

and you can see the effort that someone's gone into

to try to conceal this body.

Inside, you would have hundreds and hundreds of different

pieces of extra tape,

you know, you've got rope, bungees.

JOANNE: We had tin foil, Tesco carrier bag.

We had to examine each and every one of them many times.

Itemising everything that we've found.

Every wrapping that we opened got worse and worse;

very heavily contaminated

with what I believe is body fluids.

So it was very hard to pick it up

'cause it was falling through your fingers.

And it was hard to examine 'cause it was so thick and, like, gloopy.

(SINISTER MUSIC)

JOANNE: We found fingerprints.

We got excited. We thought it was brilliant.

(CAMERA CLICKS)

This is a piece of adhesive tape

that was originally on the body wrappings used to conceal the body.

You can see there's some areas that have been picked up

that look like a fingerprint.

But we needed an expert

to confirm if this was a fingerprint or not.

It was a really exciting time then,

sending off that... that-that forensic evidence

and hoping that this occasion

we were gonna be able to identify

Leigh Sabine as a suspect in this crime.

(MUSIC FADES)

(AMBIENT STREET NOISE)

(SINISTER MUSIC)

JANE: When we were discharged from care,

I was dropped at a homeless shelter

in Auckland City.

STEVE: I-I got a job. I left school.

Got locked up a few times.

We were sort of in and out of each other's lives a little bit.

JANE: Me and Marty had always stayed close.

There's only, like, 13 months between me and Marty,

so we were pretty much connected.

Jane and Martin, they were tight.

Marty was my...

partner...

in crime, so to speak.

He met me one day

and he was with this beautiful girl,

and her name was Jodene.

My name's Jodene Harris

and my first ever boyfriend was Martin Sabine.

Love of my life.

He was a cutie, cutie patootie.

When he walked into a room, he would just light up the room.

He just had the biggest, cheekiest smile.

That's what, um, you know,

I fell in love with straightaway.

As I got to know him,

he sort of would tell me stories about his childhood.

He would often...

think that he was bad

because...

some of the things that he was forced to do

when he was in foster care,

like having to kill their pet... mice.

He wasn't a bad kid at all. He was...

just troubled, you know?

(SIGHS)

So, Martin and I had been together...

about...

nearly two years,

and Martin came home one day and said that

he'd had a phone call from his mother.

And I said, "Your mother?" And he said,

"Yeah, my mum. My mum, my birth mum."

And I said, "What?!" Couldn't believe it. "WHAT?!"

STEVE: I was living in a halfway house in Grafton.

I was 22 years old

and I hadn't seen any of my siblings for a while...

and someone said, "The phone's for you."

I went down...

and answered the phone,

and it was a guy and he goes,

"Steven, this is your dad, John."

And I says, "This better be not a fucking joke,

or I'll hunt you down."

And he goes, "No, it's no joke."

He told me the story that,

you know, they were too scared to come back,

but, um, "Now...

we wanna get the family back together and we wanna start again."

And I... Then I just went numb.

Oh, Martin was beside himself.

He was SO happy and he couldn't wait to, like,

get the girls together, the family together.

I didn't believe Marty when he told me that our parents were back,

because he was a bit of a joker and that.

Well, I just was like...

so excited.

We get there, and Marty says, "Come on,"

and he's first out of the car, and I follow him up the steps.

And I walk down the hallway

and then I bump into my mother,

and she says...

"Oh, my...

darling baby."

She went to give me a hug

and I stepped back.

I was like... you know?

Feel like a stranger had just come up to me.

I didn't feel like it was real.

JANE: They had said that we were welcome to come and stay.

I thought, "Yes!"

I moved back first

and then Martin was like a day or two after me.

Then Jane and Leanne moved back in,

and it was quite cool, actually.

Finally, I actually had a...

my own home.

Marty... was so happy.

All he ever wanted was that family,

that mum, that dad, and live happily ever after.

You'd sort of dreamed about what it would be like

and what would happened if they come back

and things like that.

I thought, "Well, this is meant to be," you know?

(BIRDS CHIRPING)

JANE: It was all really good. My mother would get up at like,

about like four o'clock in the morning

and start cooking dinner for that night.

(GENTLE MUSIC)

She would cook the dinner with a cigarette in her hand

and a wine in the other hand.

And I used to think, "I hope that ash

doesn't fall in the food!" (LAUGHS)

She used to smoke, like,

those long cigarettes

and she used to...

you know, the way she talked, "Oh, darling...

tell me how your day was."

JANE: She had this sort of, like,

posh kind of persona.

I found her very...

over the top, like,

I think I felt like she was... fake.

I didn't really think about that, I just thought

my mum and dad are back

and we can be a family again.

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

So, for the first week or two,

it was really nice.

It was... it was everything you'd ever want.

But then that ended.

I... would tell our mother

about things that happened to us,

abuse that had happened

in the homes that we were in.

At the time, when I felt

unable to tell people about the abuse

that was going on...

I wrote poetry.

I...

wrote a poem...

that said:

"Is the big bad wolf false or fiction?

He's entered my world.

I see his picture.

He enters my room,

wide, smiling face.

He silently whispers,

"Move over, make space."

I cannot explain Mr. Wolf's charm,

for although he is gentle

I know he means harm.

He leads me, he guides me,

he shows me the way.

But his only motive is to make me his prey."

I remember the look on her face

was...

like, "I don't wanna hear it," type look.

She didn't wanna talk about how we were brought up.

Although I was happy for them to be back

and it was all I had hoped for...

I needed answers.

I wanted to... to know

what was their reason for leaving, and not coming back.

And she quite bluntly said...

"Oh, I don't feel we owe you an explanation."

And I'm sitting there thinking, "What the..."

I don't know what they expected.

Did they not think that we were going to ask,

"Where have you been?"

I just didn't wanna rock the boat.

I just wanted to get this family thing sorted and...

life would move on, you know?

But Jane wasn't scared to rock the boat.

She could have said anything. She could have said, "I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry" would have been great.

There was no smidge of a acknowledgement whatsoever.

I wasn't prepared to accept that.

When I asked again,

"Why did you leave us?"

she'd had enough.

And she kicked Jane out.

And then she kicked me out!

(DOOR SLAMS)

I still wanted those answers

and I was gonna do anything to get them.

And that's when it all blew up.

(DRAMATIC MUSIC)

I felt well going to the media would give me some answers.

A film crew came over from Australia, Channel 9.

They had asked

if we would take them into the property, which we did.

Well, I went along with Jane

and the film crew

to our parents' house, and...

they get us to go and knock on the door.

(KNOCKING ON DOOR)

Anyone home?

Hi. Hi.

Mr Sabine. Wait!

Mr Sabine, we are from the Michael Willesee Show

in Sydney, Australia, sir.

Mr Sabine? The police are on their way.

Mr Sabine, we only want to have a chat to you, sir.

Not the way you're doing it. Sorry. We'll turn the cameras off, sir.

No one's hurting you, but me and Lee-Ann

and that's because you hurt us.

My father kept telling them, "Just go away, just go away."

Right there was a window that was wide open

that I could fit through.

These journalists wanted a story.

They noticed the window, actually,

and said, "Would you be prepared to climb through there?"

Me wanting to be a pleaser

and get the answers I wanted, "Yeah, I'll do that."

So, when I climbed through the window,

I opened the door.

That allowed the film crew into the house.

They just kept filming the whole time.

(OVERLAPPING ARGUING)

You owe us an explanation.

If you'd done it properly, I would have done.

No, you wouldn't. Yes, we would.

We stood at the door- I tried to get a reconciliation.

Why did you call us mental retards? Stop touching my sister!

Why did you call us mental retards...

'It turned into a screaming match.'

(ARGUING CONTINUES)

Please get out the house. I'll tell the police.

(DOOR SLAMS) My mother saying,

"Who are you? You're not even my daughter, go away."

So, my mother, she rang me and she said,

"You've got to get home. Journalists everywhere."

You can do me for assault but if that cameras don't stop,

it'll go down your fucking throat. Hold on, mate, it's a public- I was angry, alright.

Would you like your fucking family destroyed, buddy?

(STATIC CRACKLES) Much too... You can move that off here, please.

(SCREAMING AND SHOUTING)

It got heated and I threw a punch

that connected with my mother.

(SCREAMING AND SHOUTING)

And she rang the police on me.

Where are you taking Jane? Where are you-

Henderson Police Station. Henderson Police Station.

And you can't tell us any more about that?

Leigh was really angry with Jane.

"How could you do that? That bloody little bitch," you know.

Jane had challenged her...

and my mother was that angry.

You could see the rage in her.

And I sort of looked at her and I thought, "My God...

she could kill someone."

(BIRDSONG)

(UNSETTLING MUSIC BUILDS)

REPORTER: Police in Pontypridd are continuing a murder investigation

after a man's body was discovered hidden

in plastic wrapping at a block of flats

in the Beddau area of the town.

(KEYBOARD CLACKING)

Obviously, a lot of work was still ongoing in the background,

particularly around the forensics.

I receive a phone call then, and an update from our team.

They'd done significant work, going through the packaging,

detail, inch-by-inch...

but they'd unfortunately not been able to recover

any fingerprint evidence

which was going to help us identify a suspect.

SAMANTHA: It was a tricky one.

The ones we found that looked like fingerprints

turned out not to be.

JOANNE: At the end, they decided that it was the adhesive

mixed in with the body fluids,

rather than a fingerprint mark.

Of course, it's a real blow, but it wasn't all bad news...

because within that packaging,

there was a number of things they had picked out;

certain fibres and other things of value.

But the most significant find was a piece of hair.

That was a major bit of information.

(LOCK BEEPS)

We were quite keen to understand who that belonged to.

It was compared for the DNA of the victim,

and it was found not to be a match.

That again brought additional excitement in the investigation team

'cause what we've got there is a foreign piece of DNA,

potentially belonged to Leigh Sabine.

(AMBIENT STREET NOISE)

(CAMERA CLICKS)

REPORTER: Jane, how do you feel now that

today's events seem to be over?

Um, I don't know.

When I got arrested,

I was furious.

And I wrote a letter

to the Minister of Social Welfare.

I wanted them charged with child abandonment

because I feel they should be accountable.

Steven and Martin were pissed off.

I was angry alright,

because I actually felt like we had a chance to be a family,

you know, and that's all I'd ever wanted.

Steven and Martin, they were still living there.

They wanted to...

stay and be a family.

I was still clinging on, so was Martin.

REPORTER: For the first time, the sons who live here

with the long-lost parents spoke out.

Martin and I got an interview done

to say, "Hey, can you leave us alone?"

You can't keep dragging up the past.

Y-You gotta keep on going.

REPORTER: But they say they cannot forgive their two younger sisters

for going public about their parents' return.

Yeah, it was the boys against the girls.

I dunno, we seem to get along with them alright.

They just...

can't handle being told what to do.

You're living with your parents,

not-not relying on foster parents or anything,

which they never really treated you the same as their own kids.

It's just... It's just good to have your own parents.

REPORTER: They say their parents are living with a lot of shame

and fear and the hope they will

not be prosecuted for child abandonment.

The letter requesting that my parents be

charged with child abandonment...

was declined.

No charges would be brought against them,

due to the fact my two brothers

wished to remain and have some kind of relationship with them.

(SOLEMN, PENSIVE MUSIC)

But people were angry.

We only wanted to give you the right of reply.

You should have phoned before you... JANE: And people wanted

blood, basically.

And they too thought

our parents should be accountable.

And then it just blew up.

STEVE: They got hounded by the press.

My mother thought, "Oh, here we fucking go again.

The press are coming." You know?

And it was panic time, it really was.

And it spiralled out of control for her, you know?

REPORTER: Are you their mother?

No, I'm not their mother and I've answered that one before.

And then they ran away, and we're all left.

Leigh and John, I think their main

concern was ending up in jail,

so they left in the dead of night.

They went to the UK.

They were here one day, gone the next.

They didn't want us from the start, did they?

I mean, like, I feel like I've never had

a real sense of belonging,

and I may as well carry on... with that.

REPORTER: So, what are you gonna do now?

Just carry on my life,

just with me and Jane.

If they don't want us, then...

it's hard luck for us.

Yeah, it's pretty hard to comprehend what sort of people do that.

STEVE: That's how my mother was,

and it's what she did.

She didn't wanna be questioned,

she didn't wanna be made to feel accountable.

She didn't want to...

have to answer to anybody.

STEVE: Then if she got challenged...

she would run away.

(SOLEMN MUSIC)

Once we started to unpick the life of Leigh Sabine,

the picture we were getting better was someone who was actually

quite robust, quite selfish,

um, quite aggressive, uh...

and who had a willingness to, you know, do whatever it took

to protect herself.

Obviously, great news that we had found this forensic DNA...

but we needed to connect it to someone.

GARETH: Sadly, we didn't have her DNA on record

and that was a real challenge.

And then it occurred to me that she'd been

in palliative care prior to her death.

So I sent some detectives

to make some enquiries there with the doctors,

just to see if they retained any blood, any tissue samples.

And I was able to recover some slides

and derive a DNA sample

of Leigh Sabine, which we were able to compare

to-to the hair that was recovered from the packaging.

And we were lucky that when that sample did actually come back,

it was a positive match for Leigh Sabine.

So, that was a real breakthrough.

That instantly puts her firmly

as a prime suspect in the case.

REPORTER: This woman is now at the centre of a murder investigation,

but police can't arrest and question her

because she died from cancer two months ago.

GARETH: So far, Leigh Sabine was the only person that had

any association with the body found in the garden.

But we still didn't know who the victim was.

We had no idea who the victim was.

(SOLEMN MUSIC)

When my parents left for the UK,

Marty was really... broken.

He wouldn't speak to me after that.

Oh, he was devastated.

His world came crashing down around him,

and so he was just saying, you know, "Do you mind if I go?"

and "I'm gonna go, I don't wanna lose them"

and, you know, and I said,

"Yeah, go. Do what you need to do."

And so he did.

You're living with your parents,

not-not relying on foster parents or anything.

'Cause they never really treated you the same as their own kids.

It's just good to have your own parents.

And that's the last time I seen Martin alive.

(SOLEMN MUSIC)

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