Woman identified by police investigating Sian O'Callaghan murder was killed shortly after estrangement from family
They had not seen her for around eight years, but they clung to the hope that one day they would be reunited with her. Now relatives of Rebecca Godden-Edwards are trying to come to terms with the shattering news, delivered on what would have been her 29th birthday, that she was murdered shortly after she vanished from their lives.
Godden-Edwards's body was finally identified nine days after being found in a shallow grave in a farmer's field by detectives investigating the killing of another young woman, Sian O'Callaghan, who vanished after leaving a nightclub in Swindon last month. Officers are waiting to question Swindon taxi driver Chris Halliwell, who has been charged with 22-year-old O'Callaghan's murder, over Godden-Edwards's death. Meanwhile, a tragic story of how a young girl who became estranged from her family, and then simply disappeared, began to emerge.
Police sources were at pains to make it clear that Becky, as she was known to her friends, was from a good, hardworking Swindon family. By all accounts, she was a bright, bubbly schoolgirl. When she was in her mid-teens, however, family and friends say she fell in with the "wrong crowd" and began using drugs.
In May 2002, when she was 19, she broke into a pub, the historic Trout Inn in Lechlade, 12 miles from Swindon – and, coincidentally, close to where her body was found – and stole cigarettes and cash. Her lawyer told Swindon magistrates that she had been taking class A drugs since she was 15, having been introduced to them by a boyfriend. Another boyfriend had demanded that she break into the pub with him after holding a knife to her throat.
Home was a comfortable house in a leafy road on the edge of Swindon. But her life was becoming increasingly chaotic. Around a year after the burglary, Godden-Edwards vanished. Her family say they thought she had gone to Bristol, but police sources say that by this time she was "disconnected" from them.
The family attempted to find her. In 2007 they contacted the missing persons helpline and asked for help. A "vague" report was made to a police station in Wiltshire, but she was not put on the missing person's list. The family discussed hiring a private detective. And there was one red herring – a grandparent thought he had seen her two years ago. But it must have been a false sighting: she had already been dead for years.
Only last year, her mother tried to find out what had happened to her daughter by posting a message on the Missing You website: "Karen Edwards is trying to trace the location of Becky she has been missing for 8 years, and I need to contact her urgent or just to know that she is ok! can anyone help?"
The family finally came to know at least something of what happened to the young woman when a DNA match established the identity of the remains found in a field at Eastleach, Gloucestershire.
Many questions remain. A postmortem has yet to establish the cause of death and police are appealing for people who knew Godden-Edwards from 2002 onwards to come forward. They are asking people to think back in case – perhaps without realising it – they saw her being abducted or attacked.
Her family have asked to be left in peace by the media. A note pinned to the gate of the family home read: "Please respect our privacy and let us grieve in peace."
Halliwell, 47, who is being held at Long Lartin jail in Worcestershire, is due to appear at Bristol crown court for a preliminary hearing relating to O'Callaghan's murder on Friday.
Wiltshire police sources said detectives working on the murders of O'Callaghan and Godden-Edwards were continuing to liaise with other forces over unsolved killings.
Wiltshire detectives are known to have met with Avon and Somerset officers to discuss possible links with the murder of Melanie Hall, 25, who went missing after leaving a nightclub in Bath in 1996.