What happened to Rikki Neave?

A man who is on trial for the murder of a six-year-old boy nearly 30 years ago has told an Old Bailey jury how his DNA came to be on the dead boy’s clothing.

James Watson, 40, is accused of murdering Rikki Neave in November 1994, when Watson himself was 13. Rikki’s naked body was found in woodland five minutes’ walk from his home in Peterborough. Watson’s DNA was allegedly found on Rikki’s clothes and he was charged with his murder in February 2020. He denies the charge.

Rikki’s mother Ruth Neave, who had reported Rikki missing the evening before his body was found, was initially charged with murdering her son, but she was acquitted in 1996. She was, however, found guilty of child cruelty and sentenced to seven years in prison.

Watson was interviewed during the original investigation into the murder but “did not mention” to police that he had physically “picked up” Rikki on the day he died, said The Guardian.

In his statement at the time, Watson said he had gone to the estate where Rikki lived and was watching construction workers “when Rikki approached him at 12.30pm”, ITV News reported.

“He said he spent four minutes with Rikki and only remembered years later that he had picked him up during the encounter,” the broadcaster continued. Watson said he picked up Rikki “to look at the workmen working beyond”.

‘Short life had been brutal’

At Ruth Neave’s trial in 1996, “it was revealed that Rikki’s short life had been brutal”, said The Times. “Jurors were given details of extensive abuse, including that Mrs Neave laughed as a friend dangled him from a bridge by his ankles and that she beat him and shook him and sent him out at night to buy amphetamines that she would inject.”

The murder inquiry was reopened almost 20 years later following a 2015 BBC Crimewatch appeal, which led to reports that Rikki had been seen with two teenage boys. At the time, Cambridgeshire Constabulary said it “strongly believed” the key to finding his killer lay with the public.

“To think that someone has took my brother away – part of my family – and is still walking around living a lie is unbelievable,” his sister told the BBC.

‘DNA breakthrough’

That same year, a “DNA breakthrough”, as The Guardian described it, revealed a match for Watson on Rikki’s clothing using techniques not available in the mid-1990s.

Article source: https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/crime/955926/what-happened-to-rikki-neave