Cop relives finding Shannon Matthews under bed in Michael Donovan’s house where she was kept prisoner
ALMOST nine years to the day since Shannon Matthews disappeared on her way home from school, cops have relived what it was like to find her alive after 24 days of searching for her.
In a BBC Panorama special report, Detective Constable Paul Kettlewell went back to Michael Donovan's flat to retrace the moment he found Shannon hiding under a bed, tied up with a rope and drugged.
Walking through the dingy flat, DC Kettlewell says: "When we gained a landing we found a further door that was locked. And then I heard Shannon's voice from within this bedroom. I clearly heard her say 'stop it you're frightening me now'.
"Although I knew I'd heard her, I didn't know where she was. And then I became aware of movement within the bed.
As I went across to the far side of the bed, Shannon's head appeared on that side. I reached over, picked Shannon up and carried her out. I couldn't believe that I'd found her. We had Shannon and she was alive, I just couldn't believe it."
The policeman adds: "I asked her where Mike was. She said: 'He was where I was.' I said: 'In the house?' And she said: 'Under the bed.'"
Images’ showing the conditions of the flat Shannon was held in for more than three weeks, while the local community in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, desperately searched for her, were revealed.
The disturbing pictures, presented to the jury at the trial of her mum Karen and Mick Donovan in 2008, show the rope used to tie Shannon to a bed in Donovan's dingy flat in Lidgate Gardens, Batley Carr, West Yorkshire, which sported threadbare carpets and dirty walls.
An elasticated strap with a noose on the end was found in his loft and may have been used as a method of restraint when he went out shopping.
With it around her waist, Shannon would have been able to use the toilet and certain rooms, but not get out of the flat.
Hundreds of neighbours joined the search which cost West Yorkshire Police £3.2million and lasted 24 days.
The nine-year-old was found tethered and drugged inside the base of a double bed at relative Michael Donovan’s grotty flat almost a month after she disappeared.
It later emerged Karen Matthews, Shannon’s mum, who was going out with Donovan’s nephew Craig Meehan at the time – had devised the elaborate plot with her accomplice in a bid to claim the £50,000 reward money for finding Shannon.
They had planned to release the schoolgirl, "discover her" then take her to a police station and claim the reward before splitting.
She is said to be convinced she was taken on a day-trip to the seaside while she was being held.
Shannon's ordeal, and the massive search involving the whole of the local community when she disappeared, is now the subject of BBC drama The Moorside, the first part of which aired on Tuesday.
When is The Moorside next on BBC and what is it about?
Episode two of The Moorside will air on Tuesday 14 February at 9pm.
For anyone who missed the first part of the show, you can catch up now using BBC's iPlayer.
The Moorside retells the story of the manhunt from the perspective of the friends of Karen Matthews.
Sheridan Smith plays neighbour Julie Bushby, the chair of the Moorside residents and tenants association that helped trace Shannon.