by Wade, Calvin
“Would Carole Watkinson say things like that or is that exactly what she would say to her children?”
“Exactly what she would say except it obviously wasn’t always Johnny, it could be Frank or Ken or Peter or whoever.”
“Did you ever hear her hitting the girls?”
We heard noises. Wally and I presumed they were the noises of Carole striking her children, but as we could not see what was going on, we couldn’t exactly be sure.”
“So you thought the victim was striking the defendant but you cannot be sure?”
“No.”
“How often did you presume she was hitting her children?”
“Recently. At least once a week.”
“But you cannot be sure.”
“No.”
“OK. So just to re-cap, how well did you know the defendant, Jemma Watkinson and her sister, Kelly Watkinson?”
“As I said earlier, I did not know the family very well at all. We did not socialise with them. We often saw them coming up and down the path and not long after we moved in, there was a memorable, amusing period, when a young man in swimming trunks, kept singing at one of the girls windows every morning., but that soon stopped and he then started to arrive fully clothed. He appears to be the younger girl, Kelly’s gentleman friend.”
“Would you know Jemma and Kelly to speak to?”
“Only to say hello to.”
“Could you differentiate between their voices?”
“I beg your pardon.” Wally had advised me if I was asked any question that I was unsure how to answer, just to pretend I did not hear it properly. Wally said it would allow me some thinking time.
“Could you differentiate between Kelly’s voice and Jemma’s voice? If I blindfolded you, Mrs McGordon and played a tape recording of Jemma’s voice and then Kelly’s voice, could you tell them apart?”
“Yes.”
“Could you really? I must congratulate you on having the capacity to do that, because I can’t. I had to listen to the playbacks of their statements many, many times to enable me to tell the two sisters apart. They have very similar voices, don’t you think?”
“Yes, they do, but Jemma’s the older one, she tends to have more authority. We could often hear them and Jemma tended to mother Kelly somewhat, as an older sister does. Wally and I found Paula used to do that with Karen.”
“So, given their voices are so similar, how can you be sure it was Jemma who confronted her mother, not Kelly?”
“Jemma told Kelly to get out of her room.”
“How can you be sure it was Jemma telling Kelly to get out though, not the other way around?”
“Because it sounded like Jemma.”
“But we’ve just established the two girls sound very similar.”
“Yes, but I also said Jemma was the bossy one.”
“So your judgement was formed on the basis that you could hear one girl bossing the other and as Jemma was normally the bossy one, she was probably doing the bossing on 16th April?”
“Yes.”
“But you couldn’t see the events taking place, could you?”
“No, we were in bed.”
“And you said before that you could not be sure that Carole
Watkinson used physical force on her children, because you could not see her. How could you be sure Jemma was the bossy one because you could not see them?”
“Because she was the older one and they referred to each other by name.”
“OK. That makes sense. Just suppose though, on the night in question, Kelly bucked the trend. Just suppose it was Kelly that was annoyed with her mother. Would it not have been possible for Kelly to have told Jemma to go and then confronted her mother?”
“It’s unlikely.”
“Why? Did you clearly recall the sisters referring to each other by name? Did you hear Jemma say ‘Get out, Kelly!?”
“No, I don’t recall that, but Jemma was always arguing with her mother.”
“Yes, I appreciate that Mrs. McGordon, but I am asking you whether it was possible on the 16th April, for you have jumped to the conclusion that it was Jemma confronting her mother, because, as you said it had always been Jemma arguing. Could you and Wally not have been woken up, in the early hours of the morning, and naturally presumed, based on past history, that it was Jemma arguing, even if it was actually Kelly?”
“I suppose so. It seems very unlikely though.”
“But not impossible. There were two girls in that house, two girls who sounded very much alike. Is it possible that it was, in fact, Kelly who confronted her mother, not Jemma?”
“It’s possible, but….”
“Thank you, Mrs. McGordon. You’ve been very helpful. No further questions.”
Richie
Mr.Davenport, the urologist, told me the operation would be pretty routine. He indicated that I would have the operation on Thursday morning and all being well, I could even be home that evening. It turned out that I only returned home on Friday morning as I had a bit of a reaction to the anaesthetic, when they were taking me to Philip Ward from surgery, I was taken back in an ambulance. In my drugged up state, I saw Andrew Prescott, an old neighbour of mine who had moved to Elland when I was five. Andrew was sitting next to me, as I was sprawled out on the trolley and he had a white rabbit on his lap that he was stroking. A white rabbit that developed, Kelly’s head and it began to speak to me.
“I’m watching you, Richie Billingham! Never forget, I’m always watching you! You wouldn’t grass me in, would you? Of course not, you’ve got no balls! If you’d have eaten more carrots, this would never have happened! Never!”
I’d obviously watched too many horror films as a kid! The hallucinations and general feeling of grogginess continued into the evening and my random incoherent mutterings towards apparitions were enough for the Senior House Officer to deem me unfit to return home. By the following morning, the drugs had worn off and I was just left to contend with an aching groin, a sore scrotum and a throbbing pair of balls, a real one and a sparkly new false one.
The week before the operation, Mr. Davenport had sat me down and explained what the procedure was and provided me with a couple of options on how we would take things forward. The operation itself was a unilateral inguinal orchidectomy. Mr.Davenport explained that he would be making a three inch incision into my groin to remove the testicle and that he would also be removing the entire spermatic cord too. I had no option but to trust him as I was totally oblivious to what spermatic cord was, it sounded like something you’d buy at a DIY shop or an Ann Summers party or was a technique learnt by a lecherous guitarist.
I would never have asked why the spermatic cord had to go, but Mr. Davenport obviously felt a duty to explain, as he went into great detail about how it was absolutely necessary to remove it, as often testicular cancer would spread from the cord into the lymph nodes near the kidneys. In total, he thought the operation would not last much more than hour. I expect it didn’t, but as I was as high as a kite, I didn’t have an opportunity to start and stop my stopwatch.
Despite knowing very little about the spermatic cord, I had, at this point, developed a vague comprehension of my illness. Mr. Davenport always went to the trouble of trying to explain it and coupled with the books I had been getting from Ormskirk library, my understanding was gradually improving. Mr. Davenport had explained that the tumour will have started from one abnormal cell. He said it was impossible to explain why that cell had become cancerous, but once it had, it basically went out of control and kept multiplying. My analogy, which I did not share with Mr.Davenport, was that it spread like the news of a teenager’s house party when their Mum and Dad were away. It seemed to be a good one as both scenarios involved sex, wankers, pricks and knobs! A juvenile analogy perhaps, but I was little more than a juvenile at the time.
Mr. Davenport had gone on to say that there were certain groups of men that were more likely to develop testicular cancer than others. Men with undescended testes
were one group, a group I did not belong to. A second group were men with a family history of testicular cancer. As far as I was aware, I did not belong to that group either. Mr. Davenport explained though, that because of my illness, Jim would now be deemed as being more at risk than someone whose brother did not have testicular cancer and on that basis, Mr. Davenport felt that it would be sensible for Jim to be screened. He would love that news, I thought at the time, but to be fair to Jim he took it in his stride and was given a clean bill of health. The third group, was the one I did fall into, this was the geographical one. For some reason, young, white men in Northern Europe tend to develop a higher rate of testicular cancer than anyone else in the world. I concluded there was, therefore, some truth in the phrase, “Freezing your balls off!” Once again, I did not share my witty sexual observations with Mr. Davenport!
That meeting, the week before the operation, almost passed with me having total faith in Mr. Davenport. Almost! Just before I left, however, having gone through everything in the finest of detail, Mr. Davenport explained that following the operation, my removed testicle would be sent to a pathologist for him to confirm it was cancer. Up until that point, I had every faith that this man knew what he was doing and I let everything go with a reluctant acceptance, but all of a sudden, I felt perhaps I was not challenging him enough. Had he not just said he would send my testicle to a pathologist TO CONFIRM IT WAS CANCER! Hang on a minute!
“Sorry! What was that, you just said? Why does my testicle need to go to a pathologist to check it’s cancer? Surely if you are removing my testicle, you are removing it because it’s cancerous, not to see whether it’s cancerous or not. I take it, if the pathologist confirms it is not cancerous, you don’t just open the stitches up on my groin and pop it back in?”
Mr. Davenport shook his head.
“No.”
“So why do we need confirmation its cancerous?”
Mr. Davenport could see my calm exterior had now evaporated and the fearful child I was, was now truly laid bare.
“Mr. Billingham, trust me, I would not remove your testicle if everything did not point towards your tumour being cancerous, but we will only know with complete certainty, once the testis is out. The ultrasound scan we did indicated that your lump is a solid mass, which is likely to be a tumour, now if it had been a benign cyst, which is more common, it would have shown on the ultrasound as a fluid filled lump. Once the testis is out, the pathologist will have a look at it under a microscope and in all likelihood, confirm cancer.”
“Will I need to have chemotherapy?”
“As yet, Richard, we do not know. Remember the blood test we gave you?”
I did. I hated bloody needles and the nurse had to sit me down on a bed as I had warned her that I may faint.
“Well, testicular cancers can often show the presence of certain chemicals in your blood. Your blood sample, did show these chemicals, so what we’ll do, after your operation, is take another blood sample. If it remains positive, it means some cancer cells have spread to somewhere else in your body, if it comes back negative, the cancer was probably contained to the testis. If it is positive, then we will have to look at radiotherapy or chemotherapy. Hopefully, it will be negative.”
“Could the cancer come back in the other testicle?”
“In a small number of cases it does, but it’s uncommon.”
My faith in Mr. Davenport was restored.
“Now then,” he continued, have you given any further thought to the prosthetic testicle? As we discussed, it will be very similar in size and movement to your natural testicle.”
I squirmed.
“I don’t know if I’m being daft, but I’d like to have it.”
“Why is that daft?”
“It just seems a bit pathetic having to have a pretend testicle put in there as a replacement, but I’ve thought about it and for some bizarre reason, I would feel better having it.”
“You don’t need to justify yourself to me, Richard. We would not offer prosthetic testicles if it was not common for people in your situation to want them. You are not pathetic. You are not bizarre. It’s natural to want this, don’t beat yourself up about it.”
“OK.”
“In most cases, Richard, testicular cancer is a cancer that is diagnosed, treated and then the sufferer returns to back to the life they had previously. If a prosthetic testicle helps return you to normality, then surely that’s a good thing. Try and retain a positive outlook. Keep thinking after the operation, we will get good news back from the pathologist and other than regular checks, that will be the end of the matter. Alright?”
“Yes, fine.”
“So, we’ll see you next Thursday.” Mr. Davenport shook my hand.
“If you could give yourself a good shave and get rid of all your pubic hairs before the operation, that would be wonderful, saves someone else having to do it for you when you come in. On countless occasions, young men have arrived at hospital with a cleanly shaved face and have had an awful shock when someone has arrived to chop their pubic hair off, so I tend to pre-warn people these days!”
“Fine. I’ll do it myself.”
I left Ormskirk hospital that day just wanting next Thursday to come and go as quickly as possible, so I could bring my plucked meat and two veg to surgery, swop a ball, get the all clear and get on with my life. I was trying to be positive, but the way things were going, it seemed certain a fresh disaster would be just around the next corner and sure enough it was! What I didn’t know though, was that when I finally managed to reach the light at the end of the tunnel, it would shine more brightly than the sun.
Richie
Jemma often says that she fell in love with me on the summer’s day in Coronation Park when my urologist, Mr. Davenport confirmed that, in all likelihood, we were dealing with testicular cancer. That was the point that Jemma says that she realised her feelings for me were more than just those you would naturally have for your sister’s boyfriend. I have always said that my feelings for Jemma changed from negative to positive around that time, but the first time I realised that I was starting to fall in love with Jemma was during her trial.
I was fortunate to be working at Andy’s Records in Preston during Jemma’s trial, so once it began, I would spend every lunch hour in the public gallery of Preston Crown Court. On a Thursday, which was my day off, I would travel up to watch the whole day’s proceedings. Looking at things retrospectively, the fact that I would spend my day off watching Jemma’s trial and had previously visited her at least once a month at Risley Remand Centre, showed my thoughts and feelings for Jemma were escalating, but at the time, I justified it as a way to maintain a link with Kelly.
Throughout the trial, there were only two other people providing moral support to Jemma, her grandmother, who was in attendance for every second of the seven week trial and also Jemma’s friend, Amy Perkins, who I knew from school. Amy probably attended a couple of times a week, perhaps a little more often as the trial neared an end. Amy’s Mum sometimes attended too, so I suppose you could argue that there were three people, other than myself, lending moral support.
As far as I could make out, as often the legal jargon was well beyond my comprehension, there did not appear to be a strong case for the prosecution. When Carole Watkinson had died, there were only two eye witnesses, one was on trial and was denying that she had seen the ill fated fall and the other was the defendant’s sister, who had vanished. I was in a select band of people who knew that Kelly had left the country, other than Amy, Jemma, myself, my family and Kelly’s grandmother, no-one was aware that Kelly had been in Rotterdam. The police had apparently been tracking activity on her bank accounts, but as far as I was aware they had not, at that stage, managed to trace her plane ticket to Amsterdam. If they had, it would, I imagine, have been mentioned in court, but it was not. It was just commonly known that she had disappeared. The defence team had tactfully latched on to the fact that Kelly had not stayed around and the impression I
was certainly given, was that Jemma’s barrister was indirectly pointing a finger of suspicion Kelly’s way, just by dwelling on her absence.
The only other witnesses were “ear” witnesses rather than “eye” witnesses. One Thursday, Wally McGordon, a charming, confident, old man in his late seventies, took the stand and succinctly described how he had heard Jemma send her sister to her room, then threaten her mother with a knife, before hearing a crashing sound, which could well have been the sound of Carole Watkinson being pushed down the stairs. Wally seemed such a genuinely good man that if I had been on the jury, I may have started to believe that perhaps Jemma was guilty after all. This man did not stand to benefit from lies, Jemma did though, so the fact that his statement contradicted Jemma’s, was certainly not re-enforcing her innocence.
When I returned home to Aughton, the Thursday night after Wally McGordon’s testimony, I was extremely concerned that Jemma would end up imprisoned for life for a crime I knew she had not committed. I felt particularly guilty as Jemma was aware that I could make a statement to police that would prove her innocence beyond reasonable doubt. As I sat and watched the trial turn against her, my feelings grew, more out of admiration than love initially, as she had never pleaded with me to make a statement shedding light on Kelly’s role. Jemma understood my loyalty was to Kelly, as was hers, and we both sought to protect the individual who had abandoned us.
The following lunchtime, when I arrived at court, Amy Perkins was in the public gallery, so I sat next to her. Every time Amy attended court, I would always seek her out. As had become customary in the previous five weeks when Amy had attended court and I had arrived at lunchtime, she brought me up to date with the events of the morning. Amy told me Margerita McGordon, Wally’s wife, had been questioned and was totally out of her depth. Jemma’s barrister, Amy believed, had certainly cast doubts about the accuracy of her statement and from what I could make out, had managed to discredit Wally McGordon’s statement from the previous day, by suggesting it would be impossible to differentiate between Jemma and Kelly’s voices.
