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[reporter] Dewsbury Moor will forever be associated

with what happened all those years ago.

[investigator] A missing child is as serious as it gets.

[detective] The biggest job since the Yorkshire Ripper.

-[dogs barking] -[siren wailing]

[resident] What came next, we didn't expect.

[Jeremy Vine] What's the difference between Madeleine McCann

disappearing and Shannon Matthews?

Class.

[neighbour] There was a lot of anger.

Everybody felt betrayed.

[Vine] Karen was from the wrong side of the tracks.

[Baroness Warsi] The Shannon Matthews case became shorthand for Broken Britain.

[resident] Will we ever get the truth?

[neighbour] This is the Moorside Estate.

This is where all the commotion went on.

Moorside Estate itself is, like, 220 houses.

It is a council estate.

Lots of families, lots of kids.

Some workers.

Some people who don't work.

Your typical council estate like there is all over Yorkshire.

[reporter] The Moorside Estate, this is one of many in Dewsbury.

Dewsbury is quite a decent sized town.

It's a former industrial town.

[Baroness Warsi] Dewsbury is my hometown,

and in the past has been at the centre of so much success and wealth.

But over more recent times

has struggled to find its economic identity.

[Vine] Industries went

and you ended up with the guts being pulled out of these places.

And you can sort of see life is hard.

There's definitely pockets of deep inequality and deprivation.

They don't have a lot,

but what they do have is great sense of community.

This is side of the road where Karen, Shannon and family lived.

Me and Karen knew each other because the kids went to the same school.

She lived two doors down from me

and we've become close friends.

At the time, Karen had a boyfriend called Craig Meehan.

He was Shannon's stepdad.

Shannon was quiet, pleasant, lovely girl to have around.

Never a minute's bother.

She would play in the garden with her siblings.

She never wandered far.

It was just another council estate.

And then you woke up one morning

and your street were full of reporters, press.

And Moorside were a worldwide name.

[friend] I do remember that day often.

Was just a normal day of school.

End of day, we'd get our coach, go and do a swimming lesson,

come back and we'd all go home.

So we ended up back at school. We've jumped off coach.

I asked Shannon who were picking her up

because normally it'd be her mum or her stepdad,

and she turned round and said that it were her brother.

I've seen my dad waiting at the gates for me

and there were no one who stood with him,

and she turned around to me and she's like,

"Oh, my brother's meeting me outside the shop."

I've said bye to her.

I've taken a left

and Shannon took the right and walked the opposite way to me.

I just remember turning round

and watching, just walked towards the shop.

And that was the last time I ever saw her face. Ever.

[siren wailing]

I was about to leave the force after 34 years

when I got the phone call

to say this little nine-year-old girl was missing.

A missing child is as serious as it gets.

We can't sit on our hands here.

We've got to find this child.

We've got to mobilise our team quickly.

Led by an experienced senior investigating officer.

[siren wailing]

At the outset, we didn't know what had happened to Shannon.

All we knew was that she hadn't arrived home.

And that's the starting point.

Where was she last seen and who with.

[Megan] I'd gone to bed and I just remember my dad coming in.

"Megan, the police are downstairs. They want to speak to you."

Police were stood at front door

and one turned around and goes, "Have you seen Shannon?"

At that point, like, my whole heart dropped.

I just broke down crying on my dad.

I didn't end up sleeping for the rest of that night.

I had so many questions.

What if she'd been hurt?

Where was she? Who was she with?

[detective] The wheels started turning quickly.

Certainly after midnight, when she'd not returned.

It was considered from the get go a very, very serious case.

It was one of the coldest nights over the winter period.

And this girl hadn't been seen since leaving school.

How would you explain that? Has she been abducted?

Has she just wandered off, has she been hit by a car?

Or is she in a ditch somewhere?

There's all sorts of different potential scenarios.

But also, the Madeleine McCann incident was still fresh in people's minds.

Was this another Madeleine McCann?

[Townsend] The following morning, the briefing was about 8:30.

I remember us all flying across to Dewsbury

and we ended up having to do the briefings in the church

next to the police station

because the incident room wasn't big enough.

[Gregg] First thing, get people out there.

The search teams, the house-to-house teams,

the intelligence gathering teams,

the operational support teams which cover dogs, horses, helicopters.

You know, there's a lot going on here.

[anchor] The search started last night and continued today.

Officers moving from door to door, street to street.

I also had to analyse the premises that needed to be searched.

We had what we called the Red route,

which was basically the route that Shannon took

from when she got off the bus.

There was over 500 premises on that particular route alone.

[Townsend] We've got to clear a lot of ground in the initial stages,

because stats would suggest or indicate

that you've got 24 hours basically,

and beyond 24 hours, they're not coming back.

[anchor 2] More than 200 police officers have just one thing on their minds.

Where is nine-year-old Shannon Matthews?

[officer] In February 2008, I was a family liaison officer.

The first thing as a family liaison officer,

when you go out to a house to meet a member of the family,

it's really to try and put them at ease.

When I first walked into Karen and Craig's house,

Karen came across as a grieving mum.

Her eyes were blackened underneath as if she had not slept.

She did have my sympathy.

Her support network consisted of Shannon's stepdad Craig,

and a few friends locally.

We didn't see anything of Karen's close family members,

but the community themselves came together magnificently.

[Bushby] It was a relatively normal day doing my ironing

and then one of the neighbours off the estate

was outside my house window,

so I opened my window and just said, "What you stood there for?"

And she went, "I've heard Shannon's gone missing."

From then on, it's just a case of, "What can we do as a community?"

So that's when we opened the community house.

We opened it because it's like the centre hub of that community.

Everybody knew where Moorside Community House was.

Now, we didn't expect the response that we got.

It were unbelievable.

Everybody was just searching for Shannon, because it's a child.

[Jamieson] My immediate priority was Karen

and making sure she was all right,

making sure her youngest kids were okay.

She looked lost.

I can remember giving her a hug and saying, "No, we'll find her.

We'll find her soon.

The police are brilliant. They're looking for her."

[anchor] The search for Shannon is now an urgent one.

The schoolgirl's family have been with police all day,

and though it emerged that her older brother

had run away in the past,

she never has.

Fairly quickly we got some CCTV footage of Shannon leaving school.

It showed her in a primary school uniform

and the Bratz boots which were her favourite footwear.

And one of the significant things about her description was that

she took little short footsteps, like a toddler.

She walked on her toes a little bit tippy-toed

and had a particularly unique gait.

[Edwards] On the day that Shannon went missing, I was a duty reporter.

A couple of other reporters had got there before me,

and there were national news reporters as well.

And I thought, wow, interesting they've been sent so quickly.

[anchor] The missing schoolgirl disappeared close to this park.

Her school is less than a mile away and her home is also nearby.

[Edwards] There were so many friends and neighbours out on the street

and were willing to talk to us.

We were made to feel so welcome.

It was making our job on that first day really, really easy.

Been out all night. It's minus six last night when we were out.

I mean, we were freezing when we were walking around at four o'clock.

What's going to be like if it's a little nine-year-old girl out there?

The key thing to understand about the Matthews case

is it followed on from the McCann case.

Please, if you have Madeleine,

let her come home to her mummy, daddy, brother and sister.

The disappearance of Madeleine McCann was the first one to happen.

While they were abroad, somebody took her

and there was a massive outpouring of concern.

[reporter] Fifty balloons, each with a photograph

of the missing four-year-old tied to it,

released by Madeleine's parents, Gerry and Kate McCann.

[Vine] The McCann case had generated the most gigantic publicity,

and it resulted in there being an enormous spotlight

on the case of Shannon Matthews.

If anybody's got her, just let her come home.

Just let her come home.

[Bushby] I did go see her, Karen.

But what do you say to somebody whose child's missing?

It were just, like, a quick chat and out

because there was not a need for me to be at her house.

The need was doing stuff down at the community house,

organising, searching for Shannon.

Right, can you just come in so they can tell you where to search?

Most people came to the community house first

and asked us, "Where would you like us to go?"

We had a map on the wall

and we were colouring in the areas where people had searched.

[reporter] In the absence of any firm information,

the search for Shannon goes on.

A community working together,

checking everywhere to find one little girl.

[Jamieson] Everybody got together. It was nice.

It was overwhelming that so many people wanted to help a child

that maybe half the people didn't even know who she was.

[Edwards] Shannon had been missing, knocking on for 24 hours,

and Karen did an impromptu press conference outside her house.

Please come home, Shannon, if you're out there, come home.

If anybody's got my daughter, my beautiful princess daughter,

please bring her home safe.

[Townsend] As a parent, you felt her distress.

You put yourself in her position.

If you've ever lost a kid in a supermarket

or a shopping mall, it's terrifying.

So, yeah, I felt her pain.

[Jamieson] She looked distraught.

I'm a mum, myself, I've never been in that position.

I couldn't put myself in that position.

I can only imagine she was terrified that her daughter had gone missing.

I felt sorry for her.

You just see the mother that's got a child missing.

Your kids are your world.

I'd do anything for my girls.

So having a daughter missing…

from my perspective, is like having your heart ripped out.

We honestly thought by the end of that first day, she'll have turned up.

You're waiting for that call, right? "Stand down, stand down.

She's been found at her auntie's address.

She'd been found at her mate's address." La-di-da.

And that wouldn't have been any surprise to us whatsoever.

But when there was no sign, no indication whatsoever…

The fear is, then, that she'd come to some harm.

The problem was we had no evidence or information of an abduction.

If a child's been taken against their will,

you'll get witness evidence.

You'll get CCTV evidence of an actual abduction.

But we had nothing like that.

Shannon had simply just disappeared off the face of the earth.

So the intelligence side of things

was the most crucial part of the investigation.

[Freeman] We were tasked to build a family tree.

Statistics show that when a child does come to harm,

the perpetrator is usually within the family or known to the family.

What we didn't realise was, it was such a big family.

Karen's Mum and Dad.

Craig's Mum and Dad.

Brothers and sisters.

Nieces. Nephews. Cousins.

Aunties, uncles.

You can see it filled, you know, one wall of the incident room.

The tree became almost a forest.

There were so many people.

[Gregg] There were seven children to five different fathers.

I think it's fair to say

that there were some challenges within the family unit.

And Shannon was in the midst of this.

[Townsend] And then in amongst all that,

you've got all the potential suspects on the sex offenders register.

And fears for her safety won't have been helped

by the disclosure that living within 25 miles of this,

Shannon's home and her estate,

there are 1,400 registered sex offenders.

[Gasson] We had our categories of sex offenders

that we had to immediately get started on and eliminating.

Plus, on the day that Shannon went missing,

two of the local bail hostels were holding sessions for sex offenders,

so we had to really get on with knocking on the doors.

The pressure on the investigation was massive.

We're not going to lose hope.

My priority has been the same right from the very outset is,

we are doing our best to locate Shannon safe and well.

We were left in no uncertain terms

of just how seriously the police were treating it.

[Lee] There were police officers from all over.

We had all the homicide and major enquiry team.

People from training school were doing the job.

They were trained forensics officers.

Dog men come in to do the searches.

It were incredible.

[anchor] The super sniffer dogs have been brought in from as far afield

as Strathclyde and Surrey.

There's no letup in the search for Shannon.

[Townsend] It were massive undertaking, absolutely massive.

The biggest undertaking since the Yorkshire Ripper.

[Megan] It went from being very quiet

to police officers knocking on everyone's door,

constantly seeing police cars.

[Bushby] The police came on to the estate,

and they were searching everybody's bins and outhouses to start off with.

And then it went on to them searching us lofts and us houses.

[anchor] Wearing masks and rubber gloves,

specialist search teams have worked their way

through thousands of rubbish bags.

The estate doesn't really have a relationship with police,

so obviously, people had the walls up about letting the police into their house,

letting the police into the garden.

But what could you do when it wasn't about your relationship with the police?

It was about the child.

[anchor] More than 200 police officers are involved.

Every inch, every corner is being examined.

The community here is rallying too.

On the street where Shannon's family live, they've printed T-shirts

and posters are in every window.

[Townsend] Very, very positive response.

"Do you mind if we come in, have a look around?"

"Yeah. Come in, officers, yeah. Not a problem."

You can't fault the community in Dewsbury Moor.

[reporter] At Shannon's school, parents are understandably worried.

The very idea of one of their own missing is frightening.

You just can't explain what people are feeling

because, it's like you say, you don't expect it on your own doorstep.

And poor little love, you know?

Just hope she comes home safe and sound.

You started seeing less kids playing out

because people were just too scared to let the kids go out of the house.

[Jamieson] Everybody were cautious and vigilant,

because we all assumed that some stranger had picked Shannon up and taken her.

So we was all cautious where your kids were.

It's the not knowing.

We didn't know whether she had been taken or anything, so it was the not knowing.

[Edwards] It was another very, very cold night.

But the community were prepared to be up all night if they needed to be.

Some of them had not been to bed.

I'm at the local community centre.

As you can see, no one is going to rest until they find this little girl.

[Bushby] There were a couple of us that stayed

down at community house for the first few nights,

just in case she came back.

We put every single light on so that she could see

that there was somewhere for her to go.

[reporter] This was the second underwater operation at this small pond

during the search for the missing schoolgirl.

[Gregg] During the investigation,

we want to get a feel as to what's actually happening

behind closed doors.

It's critical that we find out

everything we need to know from that family, the background,

and also, what are the dynamics of the family.

[Freeman] There was a search of the house.

It was very, very untidy.

Not a lot of organisation to it.

Shannon's bedroom was fairly stark,

painted pink and barely sufficient really,

for a young girl of nine years old.

It was pretty meagre.

[Jamieson] Karen was just like any other normal mother.

Her house wasn't fancy.

If she had money, she'd spend it on what was necessary.

If she didn't, she couldn't spend money.

She didn't have a lot.

But from my perspective, her kids were clothed, fed, looked after.

She just… just like me, you know, a mum.

[Bushby] I used to just acknowledge Karen.

Didn't know her as a friend.

And then we got put on a parenting course

because I had problems with one of my kids,

and she had problems with one of her kids.

And that's when we first got talking properly.

Karen was quite quiet and quite reserved.

It took a couple of meetings for her to actually open up that little bit more.

But in the end, we ended up having a laugh and a giggle.

It was always me and Shannon together.

Couldn't separate us. We were literally joined at the hip.

She was a very quiet girl, very, very quiet.

But whereas if it came to, like, me and her,

we could sit there for hours just talking about anything.

She was more like a sister than a friend.

She actually understood where I was coming from with things like,

she used to get bullied at school, so did I.

We were both kind of going through the same stuff,

so she kind of related to me in a way.

We'd just became best mates, like, from there onwards.

We were both obsessed with Bratz dolls. Literally.

We had the whole collection and everything.

Clothes, bedding…

Every single doll that got brought out, you name it, we had it.

We were just Bratz mad.

We did everything together. We were inseparable.

[Gregg] It's normal practice for family members

to be interviewed as witnesses.

And Karen was interviewed more than once.

It feels empty now in the house without her.

It's not like Shannon, which it's not.

She's timid, she's scared of the dark and everything.

[Freeman] And it was during that interview

that she said she felt that Shannon was somewhere warm,

that somebody was looking after her, but they had not brought her forward.

She's out there somewhere in a nice warm environment.

But the person who's got her is not coming forward, which…

That's what we'd like, really.

She was convinced Shannon was fine.

The rest of the investigation team,

we were convinced that Shannon was in danger.

And if not, actually, you know, it was too late.

I constantly tried to say to her, you know,

"Karen, we need to prepare for the worst."

I don't think Karen had any grasp at all

of the possible dangers for her child.

She just didn't seem aware of it

or didn't seem willing to accept the possibility.

It was hard to control your own emotions,

feeling there may well come a time

that I have to bring Karen really down to earth

by telling her that something terrible has happened to her daughter.

[Jamieson] It was a strange, strange time for Karen.

It was scary.

She were just getting through every day as best as she could.

[Freeman] There were all sorts of possibilities unfolding

during that investigation.

[Gregg] It could be an opportunist. It could be planned.

It could be that there's somebody in the family.

It might be not quite as involved as a stranger involved.

It might be closer to home.

We don't know yet, so you have to keep all the plates spinning.

And then when Karen's parents went to the press

with concerns about Craig

and how he was treating Karen and the children…

When-- When's this being said?

"Karen's mum has claimed that Karen's children

were physically abused by fishmonger Craig,

allegations which Craig last night said was bullshit."

-It is bullshit. -Well, yeah, it is.

"Another of the children also said Craig had hit them.

They said, "Grandma, he's hit me. He's hurt me."

"A child doesn't run away from home for nothing.

They run away because they're really frightened."

That's fucking crap.

I really hope I don't see your mum.

Do you's really think that I want to?

[Freeman] You can see Karen was really angry about it.

Karen didn't have a good relationship with her own parents.

Craig rang me and said, you know, "I want to tell my side of the story."

And I actually talked him out of it.

But I would say there were times that I was concerned for Karen.

I think it wasn't easy for her with Craig.

He was like having another child,

but also he was quite controlling of her.

And she never seemed able to stand up and say what she wanted to do.

[reporter] Are you still hopeful?

We know she's out there.

We know she's still alive.

[Edwards] The relationship between Craig and Karen,

it was not one of obvious warmth or intimacy in any way.

They appear too quite awkward around each other.

It was almost like two unusual people

who just happened to find themselves in one another's orbit,

for reasons unknown.

They didn't even appear to really like each other.

[Jamieson] I didn't get on with Craig.

We didn't have a relationship like me and Karen had.

All day long, just sit there on his computer.

I didn't like the guy, not for any personal reason.

I just thought he was a bit weird.

[Freeman] It felt that Karen tried to please.

She wanted to please the people around her.

She wasn't the brightest girl.

Quite childlike.

And she totally denied the allegations about Craig.

I know it's nothing to do with him.

He won't hurt no one.

Not even one child, he'd never hurt.

Not really taking much notice. All I want is Shannon back.

[Freeman] Despite the fact that suspicions were raised,

the community still turned out in all weathers

to try and search for this… for this little girl.

They really were impressive.

[reporter] The local community have been very supportive.

They've helped in the search, handed out posters,

held a candlelight vigil,

and they say they're now going to do something at 6:00 p.m.

every Tuesday for as long as it takes.

[Bushby] We just had to do something just to keep it in the papers.

We used to have meetings morning and night,

you know, like updates for everybody.

We just did whatever we could, what people suggested.

We went to a Leeds match at home on Saturday

to hand flyers out to Leeds United fans.

And then yesterday, we just stayed close-by

just going to parks and searching for her there, but still no news.

[Bushby] When we did the walk,

it just started off at the community house

and it went up to Karen's house.

There were people there that they weren't even off our estate.

[crowd] We want you home, Shannon!

[reporter] "We want you home, Shannon."

Tonight, families, friends and neighbours marched together.

There was big numbers there.

And you look back on those pictures. It's really, really moving.

And there was children there,

and Karen and Craig were there in the middle of the procession.

Very well protected by Julie and the other campaigners.

People really did put their lives on hold

and almost put their own kids second to do what they needed to do.

The community could not have done any more than what they did.

[local minister] In these days that we wait for Shannon,

we might all feel that we're in the darkness…

[Gregg] People spending 24 hours a day

doing whatever they could to find Shannon.

[Edwards] From a publicity point of view for the search,

it was really effective.

But it must have been so hard for the community,

because when you open your curtains in the morning

and then you've just got these rows of media trucks there,

your community is not your own at that point.

[Bushby] The reporters were just everywhere and anywhere.

You couldn't turn a corner without one being there.

All these reporter vans, big lights on and cameras.

It were like, the circus had come to town

and everybody wanted to chat to you.

If you knew Karen, if you knew Craig, what they were like as a family.

Like being at a cattle market.

Sometimes it was hard.

Sometimes you'd just literally open your eyes and get out of bed

and there'd be some reporter right on your door.

[Edwards] There was a definite reduction in the level of coverage in the story

about seven to ten days in.

By this point, there was nothing, like, new,

so they had focussed upon the estate.

[Jamieson] As the days went by,

Dewsbury Moor wasn't portrayed in a good light.

[radio reporter] Very kind of deprived area.

Dewsbury Moor, full of poor families.

Bad for car crime, lots of single mothers.

It's no middle-class suburbia, it's just an area full of working class,

often unemployed families, like Shannon's.

[Bushby] I mean, make your mind up.

We're either working class families or we're unemployed.

We can't be both.

I don't know why they kept saying stuff about the estate or the people on it.

[Warsi] The way in which the town was projected was quite negative.

The media were looking for fault lines all the time.

"Let's try and look at what's wrong with Dewsbury.

Let's see where the challenges are. Let's see where the problems are."

And it was in stark contrast to the Madeleine McCann case.

[reporter] They've been overwhelmed by the level of support

from around the world.

[Vine] The overarching thought about the McCanns is that,

middle-class parents, doctors…

"That could have been our child."

With the Matthews case, the initial reaction was,

"That family was from the wrong side of the tracks.

That couldn't have been our child.

This is just the kind of thing that happens

inside these disordered families."

[news anchor] There's been coverage of the fact that it is a complicated,

slightly chaotic sounding household.

[Vine] So we don't initially give it enough attention.

Then we think, now wait a minute,

what's the difference between Karen Matthews

and the McCann parents apart from class?

So once the media had that conversation with itself

about why are we not giving the Matthews abduction the same publicity,

the media then go completely over the top with the Matthews case

and it's wall to wall.

[Vine] Does it matter that yesterday she's photographed

bringing in a case of lager into her house?

[reporter] No, I don't think so.

I think that the McCanns would have probably consumed a bottle of wine a day.

[Warsi] There was this class issue that was bubbling underneath.

It felt like the Madeleine McCann case,

people felt like they were an integral part of it.

Whereas with the Shannon Matthews case,

it felt like they were looking in on a community,

almost observing this interesting community that felt different to them.

[reporter] Here's a community that is endlessly held

to be to blame for everything.

It's very interesting that people are so curious

about how many fathers there are of Karen Matthews children.

-[Vine] Is that relevant? -Completely irrelevant!

[Jamieson] They seem to want to bring all Karen's past up,

tarnish her, make her look like a bad person.

[Bushby] End of day, it don't matter how many kids you've got,

how many fathers you've got.

So what?

It doesn't matter. It was about the nine-year-old child.

Sometimes the comments hurt.

The papers weren't always on your side.

[Megan] The news reporters started contacting my dad,

asking for interviews because obviously, I was her best friend.

I was the last person to actually see her.

It was hard.

It was quite scary seeing all these people coming into my house

with big cameras and sticking them in my face at eight years old,

like, it is a scary thing.

But I just thought back in my mind, like, it's all for Shannon.

I'm really, really sad.

And if you know where she is, just call and tell us where she is.

I remember him asking me one time

if I thought Shannon was going to come home.

And I, in the back of my mind, I thought, no,

it actually, like, sunk into my head,

like, what if she's dead or she's seriously injured

and she can't get help or anything like that?

That's when I kind of lost all hope in Shannon being found.

[Gregg] Two weeks in and Shannon hasn't been found.

The investigation is rolling on on every front,

but there's still no indication as to what's happened to her.

So a press conference was held on Mother's Day,

and we thought it's a good opportunity

to get, you know, the message out there from Shannon's mum.

Whoever's got Shannon, just please let her go.

Her family's missing her. All her friends are missing her at school.

So if anybody's out there, can you let Shannon go, please?

[Freeman] It was during that press conference

that she came out with some things that were quite disturbing, really.

Well, I think that somebody out there will know Shannon.

I suppose they probably know me as well.

And it's just, I just want her home safe, really.

She said that she believed that Shannon

was being held by someone who knew her and knew Karen.

And that's the first time anything like that had ever been suggested.

After that press conference, I said,

"What do you mean, somebody that knows you?"

She said, "Oh, just-- just anybody."

She just pooh-poohed it, brushed it off.

"No, I don't-- I don't mean anybody in particular.

I just mean, you know, somebody that might know us."

It makes me think now,

I can't trust people who's really close to me anymore.

I can't trust them.

[Gregg] It was an interesting press conference.

I think that what we saw was a mother

who perhaps wasn't behaving in a way

that most people would have expected.

[Freeman] I would say Karen's behaviour was a little bit strange at times,

although you've got to realise that you can't put your own standards

on somebody else.

In your head, you'd be thinking, well, would I be reacting like that?

But you don't know because you've never been in that position.

Is that a defence mechanism kicking in?

[Jamieson] I think she quite liked the attention.

I do think she liked the fact she can go into town

and everybody recognised her

and people had sympathy for her,

erm, and compassion and giving her hugs.

I think she liked that.

Erm, was that something she was missing at home from Craig?

Who knows?

[Freeman] One day, my phone started to ring

and I'd got some… some tune.

I can't even remember what the tune was,

but immediately, it started to ring,

Karen got up off the sofa

and started dancing and said, "Oh, I love… I love this song."

And I sort of-- I can remember looking and thinking,

"This is, this is not right. This feels strange."

But then almost giving myself a good talking to,

saying, "Don't be judgmental."

[Edwards] There was definitely a very extreme contrasts in her behaviour.

One time, we had a pre-arranged interview between me and her.

I turned up and at this point, because the relationship was good,

I was able to just knock on the front door and walk into the house,

and then the front door was open,

and then the door swung closed and Karen was behind the door,

and she jumped out behind me

and then tickled me from behind and shouted, "Boo!"

And it was such a weird thing,

and I just really didn't know how to react.

And I didn't reference it apart from to do a really awkward laugh.

Whereas what was in my head was, "Have you actually just done that?

We're here to do an interview about the fact your daughter's missing

and you're playing a strange game of hide-and-seek."

It was just odd.

[Jamieson] I think probably she's just painted on her smile.

She had three other kids at home,

so maybe she was just pretending that all was okay for them.

Thank you for joining us.

It's now the most high-tech police search Britain has ever seen.

There's also a reward of £50,000.

But 21 days after she disappeared, there's still no sign of Shannon Matthews.

It was such a high-profile investigation.

It had captured the nation's interest.

And one of the national newspapers put up a £50,000 reward

for any information which could help find Shannon.

[Townsend] We hoped it would ultimately lead to even a shred,

a tiny piece of information that might lead to where she was.

When she'd not been seen after three weeks,

you know, the feeling was that,

yeah, we were waiting for a call from a dog walker

or somebody saying that they'd found human remains or whatever,

because that 24-hour golden period had long gone.

Day 24. There were no specific lines of enquiry

that we felt were going to lead to finding Shannon.

But then DC Kettlewell and I were allocated an action

confirming the alibi of a low priority sex offender.

Our action was basically to go and speak to a lady

in order to verify his account of where he was at the particular time.

As it turned out, that lady was Craig Meehan's auntie.

Whilst we were at the address,

her partner indicated that he wanted to speak to us in private.

So we sat in the car with him and he said,

"Have you spoken to her brother?"

Meaning his partner.

They call him Paul Drake,

but he'd changed his name to Michael Donovan.

That name meant nothing to us.

They then told us that Michael Donovan

had been arrested for abducting his own child

from outside school and taking her to Blackpool.

So Paul and I went to his flat.

We went up a staircase to the right of where we are now,

and round to the back of these maisonettes.

-Banged on the door… -[banging on door]

…and there was no answer.

I knocked on the next-door neighbour and a lady came out.

She said, "Well, he won't answer his door.

He doesn't answer his door to anybody."

She said, "But he doesn't use this door."

She said, "He uses the door around the front."

So we banged on that door too.

Again, no answer.

The lady who lived below came out

and as her neighbour had said, she said,

"He won't answer his door to you, he won't answer his door to anybody."

So I said, "Well, why is that?"

She said, "Well, I think the police have been before and kicked his door in."

[sighs] Right.

So I said, "Well, do you think he's in?"

She says, "Oh, he's in. Yeah, definitely, he's in."

I asked, I said, "Have you heard anybody else moving about upstairs?"

She said, "Yeah."

I said, "What have you heard?"

"The tiny footsteps of a toddler."

[floorboards creaking]

And I just looked at PK and he looked back at me.

I said, "We need to get in here, pal."