All language subtitles for The Truth About My Murder S01E10 1080p WEB DL H264 BTN_track3_[eng]

When a murder is committed
it's always a race against time

to find the truth,
to separate fact from fiction.

To catch the killer and to make sure
that justice is served.

But what happens when
the truth vanishes with the victim?

I'm Dr Richard Shepherd

and I've spent my entire career
as a forensic pathologist

performing nearly 23,000 autopsies,

including on some of the most
high profile cases of recent times.

I've learnt that the dead don't hide
the truth and they never lie.

Through me you'll be hearing
directly from the victim.

From a state of the art laboratory
with ground-breaking technology

that uses
digitally scanned sample bodies.

I'll be investigating a series
of intriguing murders

where, from the victim's bodies,

I'll be revealing to you the truth
behind those horrific crimes.

The start of August 2019
and it was the height of summer.

In the small Cheshire village
of Padgate,

Mark Bradbury is a popular figure...

but it's been a few days
since anyone's seen him.

This is the kind of place
where everybody knows everyone else.

It's hard to keep secrets.

So when Mark was found murdered
in his flat,

police quickly realised they had
a real mystery on their hands.

Would Mark's body help them
to find out the truth

about what really happened?

Most murders in the UK
are committed by people

who are fairly quickly identified.

It's gonna be
the person responsible,

whether it's domestic
or gang related.

Mark's murder was different.

That scenario, whereby somebody
has not been seen for a few days

and they're found dead...

We don't know why,
we don't know who they,

what their circumstances are,
what their issues would be.

Where do we begin looking
for a suspect?

That is really quite rare and
presents a significant challenge.

Mark Bradbury was retired
and lived on his own,

but he was by no means a loner.

He was very sociable, with lots
of friends and a close family.

Mark was a Warrington man
through and through.

He had been born here,
he'd been brought up here.

You know, still in touch
with school friends,

still in touch with people
that he'd known for 25 years

and really grounded in this area.

He lived in a small flat right
in the heart of his local community.

It was just him on his own
and it was the ideal spot to be in.

Everyone that he knew and loved
was all kind of around the area.

I would go there
after school quite a lot.

Treated like a princess.

He would bring me my tea on a tray
to sit and watch the television.

These little Polaroids
are all just memories.

My dad and his brother Lee.

My dad was fun-loving, happy-going.

He loved a party.
He loved travelling.

My dad used to take me away
on holiday.

We went to Paris and Rome,
Barcelona and Prague.

With hope that in 2021

we would go to New York
for my 21st and his 60th.

This is really how
I'd like to remember my dad,

walking across the beach
with Barney.

Everyone trying to persuade my dad
not to get Barney,

a great big golden retriever,
for his tiny little flat.

He disregarded all that.
That was his dog.

And that's really
how I'd like to remember him.

Hopefully he is walking
on a beautiful beach somewhere.

Mark's brother Lee
lived on the same road

and they ended up sharing the dog.

My dad had a lovely relationship
with his brother.

Lee was retired as well, so he had
a bit more time on his hands.

So they just decided that
when my dad was at golf

or he wanted to go
to the rugby match,

that Lee would have Barney.

They'd always be up and down
Station Road, swapping the dog over.

I think that was really nice for
them, to have that brotherly bond.

On 1st August Mark took Barney
through the underpass,

met Lee, handed Barney over,

with the agreement that
Mark was coming back

to take Barney off him the next day.

But Mark never turned up.

The next day, Friday 2nd August,

Mark had a dental appointment.

Being the massive golf player
that he was,

he'd cancelled playing golf
that Friday

to go this dental appointment.

So the consensus of opinion
amongst his golfing friends was,

"This is serious.
This is a real toothache

because he would never cancel golf,
for anything."

But he didn't appear
at the dentist either.

On the Sunday I got in from work

and my uncle had sent me a text

just to say, you know, "Hi, Hannah,
have you heard off your dad?

I've not heard off him.

He was supposed to get the dog,
but he never showed up.

Let me know if you get in touch
with him."

I was, "Oh, for God's sake.

He's probably off in golf and
just not wanting to have the dog."

But I was due to ring my dad anyway,
so I started ringing him

and I just got no answer.

I thought, "God, that's weird."

He used to sleep with
his phone underneath his pillow,

so if he was asleep and I ever rang,
he was always there to answer it.

So, yeah, there was no answer,
so I rang again.

There was no answer.

And at this point I'm now starting
to become increasingly concerned.

Lee and Mark's friend Paul,

they went round to the flat...

...and they found it locked.

The curtains were drawn
and it was clear that there was...

There was nothing happening,
there was no movement there.

So I went down to the vending
machine, where I was living,

and I was just contemplating

all the reasons why
he would not answer his phone.

Nothing was quite making sense.

So I typed in the number
in the vending machine

and this bottle of pop
fell to the bottom.

As it did...

...I really felt a pain
that was kind of indescribable.

I raced back upstairs

and I said to my boyfriend,
I said, "My dad's dead."

And he went, "Oh, Hannah,
don't be so ridiculous."

I said, "I can feel it."

I said, "I can really feel
that he's gone."

Mark's former wife had a spare key,

so they contacted her

and at the same time
contacted the police

to say, "Look, we're worried.

We're gonna go in
and see what's happening here."

Lee sent me a text, he said,

"I'm on the way now.
I've got the spare key."

So, Lee got there
and I waited about 40 minutes.

I said, "Jack, this is not right.

Something is really going on.

Like, I'm not there,
I don't know what to do."

Officers arrived
pretty much as they came out,

having found Mark,
and they were traumatised.

I rang my mum
and she just burst out crying.

She said they'd found him...

...on the floor.

My mum just kept on saying,
"Thank God you weren't here"

because my mum was so worried
that if I was back in Warrington,

it would've been me that would've
seen the chaos that was left inside.

I went straight back to Warrington

to go and see, you know,
what was going on

and at that point
I met Sarah Oliver.

She took me into her car

and she said, "The police officers
that were first at the scene

can't quite work out
how this has happened

and that's why I get called out."

That's really stuck with me.

I felt, in that moment,
that my life was gonna totally turn.

It was like being in a film.

I felt like
I was watching this happen to me,

rather than actually living in it.

And when the police left...

Still to this day
I don't know why I did it,

but I rang my dad's phone
and I left him a voicemail...

...just saying,
"Can you please explain to me

how this can possibly happen?
And how we are going through this?"

Obviously, I was never gonna get
a response,

but that's all I wanted
in the moment.

Just an explanation.

When I first walked
into Mark's flat,

he was lying on the floor
underneath a loft hatch.

There was also
some loose change lying around,

there was a TV still present.

The premises
had been locked and secured.

There was no obvious sign

that this was maybe a burglary
on an intruder.

There was a possibility

that he might have fallen out
the loft hatch

and yes, the blood was unusual.

It was difficult to explain.

But nevertheless,

at that time it was determined
as suspicious rather than homicide.

So it became apparent

that it was going to be
a massive forensic undertaking.

Mark's flat is very small.

At ten o'clock on the Sunday night
it was quite gloomy.

You couldn't really make
much of an informed assessment

until I'd been able to get
a forensic pathologist

out to the scene, in daylight,
to have a look at Mark's body.

The main thing
about preserving a crime scene

is that you don't let
a horde of people go in there,

especially in a small space,

and that you know exactly
who went in.

So, if you get, for example,

an unexplained print or mark
of some kind,

or a trace of some kind,
you can then go back

and get reference samples
from the people who were there

and check them against them,
in case it was one of them.

The next morning I went
into the scene with the pathologist.

It was light,
it was possible to see Mark.

It was possible to see
the injuries that he had sustained.

That's when it was escalated
to a murder.

An autopsy was performed,

which showed that Mark had suffered
a sustained beating,

which I can show you
on this sample body.

He had quite widespread
blunt force trauma

to his head, his body,
with lacerations to the scalp.

As a pathologist, one thing
I would always look for, also,

is whether there were any injuries

that were caused
when Mark tried to defend himself.

These are called defensive injuries.

In Mark's case it was possible
to see that there was bruising

on the outer side of the arm,

as the hand is raised
to protect the body.

The other thing
we'd need to look at

is to see whether Mark had actually
been delivering blows himself,

so we look at the knuckles
and the backs of the hands

to see if
he had been punching people.

There were no obvious marks found

and although some of the injuries
could've been caused by a weapon,

no weapon was ever found.

The evidence was clear.

Someone was responsible
for Mark's death.

I was hoping that
there'd be no malice...

...and no ill intentions

and that it might have just been
an accident.

I was now having to not only
go through losing my dad...

...but it was actually
somebody's fault that he was gone.

But then,
two weeks into the investigation,

police discovered
a crucial piece of information

that would leave
Mark's family in shock.

No-one, despite what they've done,

deserves to be murdered
as brutally as my dad was.

In August 2019
a quiet Cheshire village was rocked

when Mark Bradbury,
a popular local man,

was found dead in his flat.

Mark had died
after sustaining a brutal beating.

But detectives had no idea
when this attack had happened.

They hoped that, at autopsy,

Mark's body would give them
some clues

about the timeline of events.

The main problem
for the investigators in this case

is actually quite simple.

Time is against them.

And as part of my role
as a pathologist attending a scene,

is to begin to make the assessments
as to the time of death.

We look at various features
of the body.

We look at, particularly,
the muscles.

We look at how stiff
the muscles have become.

Rigor mortis is the process
that occurs after death,

when the muscles stop
receiving oxygen.

That's a change that starts
immediately as someone dies

and is present in the hands
and the feet at about four hours

and spreads to the whole
of the muscle mass of the body

at about 12 hours.

And then stays there for another
24 hours, so 36 hours in all.

When we examine the body
and we look at the arms,

we look at the legs,
we look at the mouth,

we look at the jaw.

We assess the stiffness
of all of these areas

to get an assessment
of when that person died.

But later on other changes can occur
and that happens on the skin.

Green discolouration of the skin
to the abdomen

is just about the first thing
to happen,

as decomposition
internally changes the body.

And then other changes in the eyes.

Are they still firm and tense

or are they now beginning
to get a bit cloudy and a bit soft?

That too gives us an idea of
how long that person had been dead.

All of these changes
are temperature dependent.

The higher the temperature

the faster these changes
are going to take place.

In Mark's case,
he died in the summer,

locked into his flat.

And so temperature
is going to play a crucial role

in understanding what has gone on.

In the later stages of decomposition

hairs and fibres
and blood stains are lost

and that just makes
a difficult investigation

even more challenging.

After the postmortem
it was concluded

that the murder had happened

in the hours
between Thursday evening,

when Mark was last seen alive,
and Friday morning.

The police still had no idea
who had done it.

When Mark was first found

we were at a total loss
as to who could do this to him.

He was just a guy
who had a white van

and lived in a flat
in a quiet part of town.

We didn't know him.

We didn't know
who would want to harm him.

So, until you know him,
you don't know

what the circumstances are that
might have led to that situation.

So, that was kind of
the first steps, really,

is to understand who is this man

and why would anybody want
to kill him?

Police started examining
hours of CCTV,

trying to identify anyone
who'd been near Mark's flat.

It was a huge time window and,
you know, who was going through?

There were hundreds and hundreds
of people on CCTV,

on bikes, on foot.

So it was key to us
to get in touch with people

and get them to contact us,

so we could cross reference
against those people on the CCTV

and eventually be left
with the one man standing.

That went on
for what seems like forever.

The phone would ring

and my heart rate
would just sky rocket.

"Is this gonna be the day?

Is this gonna be the police?
Are we gonna find out new evidence?

Is somebody gonna be arrested?"

It was just living on the edge
all the time.

And it puts a lot of pressure
on your everyday life.

When is that phone call
going to come?

As the weeks passed,

police gradually began to learn more
about Mark's life.

There wasn't somebody here

with a long history
of criminal interactions

who might have enemies
and issues going on.

It took some time to build up
a picture of Mark's life

and start to establish

that, actually,
there's another side to Mark.

They discovered
he'd been hiding a dark secret,

which came as a huge shock
to his family.

In the weeks after Mark's death,

it became apparent
that he used cocaine

and he took cocaine in
and distributed it

to cover his own costs.

Mark had kept that below the radar.

He sold what he needed to sell
to cover his own usage.

He didn't get into trouble with it,

he didn't get involved
with violence.

He didn't bring attention
to himself,

which is how he'd managed
to stay unknown

to policing systems for so long.

He had that side of him going on,
you know,

and a family that knew nothing
about that

and friends who knew nothing
about that.

They were shocked.

That was the hardest thing,

that immediately it went from,
"Oh, poor man"

to, "Oh, well, he was a drug dealer,
so that's what he deserved."

But that's not the way
that I knew him

and that was really difficult,

to merge these two different men
together in my mind,

that made up my dad.

They had to come to terms
with not just the loss,

but also, they hadn't known him.

They'd maybe been deceived by him.
Maybe...

He kept things from them.

That's hard.
That's hard to deal with.

I was just in total disbelief.

I felt like I'd been lied to.

That was really difficult.

It hurts me to think that he was
potentially leading a double life.

I do think that I could probably
have prevented some of this,

if I knew what was going on.

But Mark's double life provided
the first real breakthrough

in the investigation.

Finding out that Mark Bradbury
actually supplied cocaine

and was a user himself

really changed things
for the investigation team.

It was no longer likely
to be random.

It was more likely to be connected
to a real criminal underworld.

Desperate for clues,

police began piecing together
Mark's last known movements.

At six o'clock on Thursday night

he stopped at Bargain Booze
and he bought himself a case of beer

and a packet
of Lambert & Butler cigarettes.

His van was tracked
back to his flat,

but it never reappeared
on CCTV again and neither did Mark.

As we uncovered details
about Mark's drugs life,

we did start speaking
to some of his customers.

One of those customers was
the last person to see him alive

and gave us
absolutely critical information

in relation to the layout
of Mark's flat.

The fact that
when she bought cocaine from him,

she'd left some cash

and there should've been
some £10 and £20 notes

sitting on a coffee table
and they weren't there.

The investigation team searched

for anyone else who had been buying
cocaine from Mark.

They came across another customer,
called Dan Shovelton.

During house to house enquiries,

officers went and visited
Dan Shovelton.

It was the first time
he'd come into the enquiry.

It was early doors,
maybe about three days in.

It wasn't far off,

but he was very much just part
of the routine house to house.

There was no expectation
or understanding

that he had any issue with Mark.

They visited him, they asked him
when he'd last seen Mark.

He gave what appeared to be
a perfectly reasonable explanation.

That he'd seen Mark
about a month ago

and he'd bought some cocaine
from him

and he'd paid by bank transfer.

I was quite staggered
that in this day and age

cocaine is bought
with a bank transfer.

A former sergeant
in the British Army,

Dan was now unemployed and
living less than a mile from Mark.

He'd been successful in the Army,
spent about 14 years in,

and developed quite an expertise,
as far as I understand it,

in telecommunications
and setting up field stations

and that kind of activity.

Dan had left the forces
to be at home with his daughter.

He was having counselling

and seeking treatment
from a veteran's charity for PTSD.

There were reports that
Dan Shovelton was depressed

at around about this time.

That he'd gone, you know, offline,
that he'd disengaged.

But he'd left the army
and I think, in all honesty,

he expected to be welcomed
into civilian life with open arms

and given a well paid employment,

using all that skill
that he'd accumulated.

And it didn't happen.

It didn't happen
for a number of reasons.

One was his own...

...raging cocaine addiction.

The relationship
between Mark and Dan,

I think, was fairly business-like.

There was probably envy
on part of Dan.

Dan sees himself as educated,
intelligent, capable.

Probably saw Mark as beneath him.

You know, wasn't as educated.

Probably didn't think
he was capable.

The evidence about Dan's drug habit
was that it was enormous

and it probably dictated
his existence.

Three months earlier,

Dan had lost his job
with a courier company

after being accused of stealing.

At the age of 40,
his home had been repossessed

and he'd moved in with his parents.

At the time of the murder,
Dan was really desperate.

He had lost his house.
He had nothing in the bank.

He had run up debts
with every other drugs supplier.

By 1st August, the day that
we believe Mark was murdered...

...Dan Shovelton had amassed debts
everywhere, well over £50,000.

I think, by that Thursday afternoon,

he would've done anything
for cocaine.

Weeks had passed
since the grim discovery

of Mark Bradbury's body
in his flat in Padgate.

Police had discovered that Mark
had been a small-time drug dealer.

His body revealed that
he had been brutally murdered,

but gave no clue
as to who the killer was.

Mark's body
still had secrets to tell.

It became apparent,
as we investigated the scene,

that there had been a search.

Somebody had been looking
for something.

We established that
Mark had probably got

a significant amount of cocaine
in his property

at the time of the murder.

So we quickly reached the point
that the drugs were the key.

They were probably the reason
Mark had been killed

and it was probably because somebody
wanted what they couldn't afford.

While detectives searched for clues,

Mark's body revealed more details
about how he had died.

We know that Mark had suffered
quite extensive blows

delivered to the head,
but because of the decomposition,

some of the injuries to the skin
and the body couldn't be seen.

But when the neck was examined,

deep internal bruising
and injuries were found.

These were seen not only
in the muscles or the neck,

but if those muscles are removed,

and I can do that digitally
on this table,

the most important thing is
revealed.

That's damage
to the thyroid cartilage,

the larynx, the Adam's apple,
which showed evidence of a fracture.

It has spikes sticking up
and sticking down

the muscle it's attached to.

It's these that get snapped off

and that showed that
Mark had been strangled as well.

But because of the decomposition,

it wasn't possible to determine

if the strangulation was manual
or with a ligature.

It was quite sadistic.

It was a traumatic way to die.

But on top of that,
the killer had made sure that,

had Mark, by any chance, recovered,
he couldn't get out.

The property was locked.

Mark's phone was switched off

and it was hidden
in the mechanism of the settee.

So it was a cruel
and a sadistic killer

that had been able to do that.

You know, to kill somebody
and then so calmly, coolly,

make sure that
they wouldn't be found

and they'd be there
for some time, just left.

Detectives didn't have
forensic evidence

to link anyone
to the scene of the murder,

but what they did have
was a clear motive.

Dan Shovelton needed money and drugs

and he knew that
Mark Bradbury had both.

Dan had told the police

he hadn't seen Mark for more
than a month before the murder.

But CCTV told a different story.

We had a really good understanding
of his movements

from CCTV, from his phone records.

We managed to build a picture
showing that, in fact, on that day,

he was circling Mark's house.

He was going round
time and time again.

I had in my mind that he had
a question to answer, Dan Shovelton,

about why didn't he tell us
he'd seen Mark

on the weekend of the murder?

Why did he say
he hadn't seen him for a month?

Before Mark's murder,
Dan Shovelton didn't have a penny.

He asked his daughter to transfer,
you know, £7 or so,

so that he could withdraw
a £10 note from a cash point.

But then, after the murder,
he was captured on CCTV

going into a large Tesco store
and, all of sudden, had money.

You know, he was buying
scratch cards,

he was buying alcohol,
he was buying lemonade.

He didn't appear to have
the same financial constraints

that he'd had four hours before.

Five weeks after the murder,

he was arrested and brought in
for an interview.

When Dan was arrested,
it was pretty standard stuff.

A search of the suspect's address.

Mum and Dad went
and stayed elsewhere,

kind of turfed out.

Quite devastating for them, really.

You know,
they're private, proud people

whose house is now being searched
by the police,

with all the neighbours watching.

His room in particular
was searched through methodically

and within his clothing
was found a gold ring.

Here's somebody that's having to get
his daughter to send him seven quid

so that he can take £10
out of a cash machine,

but he's got a gold ring
sitting in his pocket.

Mark's daughter Hannah
confirmed to the police

the ring had belonged to her dad.

When I was in Paris with my dad,

we were walking up towards
the Louvre, across a bridge.

A man on the street,

he was probably
a little bit of a con artist,

but we give him the benefit
of the doubt at the time.

He said that
he had no money for his family,

so would we like this gold ring.

And my dad, not caring, really,
whether it was real gold or not,

he took 20 Euros out of his wallet

and passed it to the man
in exchange for the ring.

That was in 2015.

What's that about, then, Dan?

And then, you know,
he tries to think on his feet

and, "Ooh, I've just been given it
by Mark."

Really? A guy that has really
not got any money to spare

is not gonna give you a gold ring.

And yet he's trying
to put forward this story

about best mates,
give him a gold ring.

"You get rid of it, you sell it.
You get some money for it."

And it just didn't make sense.

Mark's last purchase
was a case of beer

and a packet
of Lambert & Butler cigarettes.

When we found Mark at his house...

...the case of beer was still there,

but there were two bottles missing
and the cigarettes were gone.

When we had our search officers go
through the suspect's home address,

Dan Shovelton has an empty box
of Lambert & Butler cigarettes.

We couldn't forensically connect
those cigarettes

to be the packet that Mark bought,

but it was a phenomenal coincidence.

Meanwhile, a thorough search
of Dan's Internet records

revealed something telling.

Interestingly, Dan had Googled me.

Which is a first.

I've not been Googled by a suspect
before, to my knowledge.

He claimed that
he was just curious about the case.

But in the next breath
he wasn't interested in the case

because he didn't really know Mark

and he had no reason
to be interested.

He just contradicted himself.

For the next few days,
after the murder,

Dan had been out on the road.

He then went on a strange journey
around Warrington.

Areas of water, industrial sites.

Places where
you might have industrial bins.

He nicknamed it
his magical mystery tour, himself.

He never really offered
a meaningful explanation for it.

Whereas the obvious one
is that he was depositing

the murder weapon, clothing.

He was getting rid of stuff.

Mark's flat was a tiny studio

with a double bed,
coffee table at the end of that

and then a settee.

And it was never any different.

It was as it was every day
to everybody that went there.

But when we attended the scene,
that night,

the coffee table wasn't between
the end of the bed and the settee.

It had been moved
and it was underneath the TV.

He was asked,
as part of that interview,

to draw a plan of Mark's flat.

He'd been there,
"Tell us what it's like.

How's everything set out?"

And he drew the double bed
and he drew the settee.

He put the coffee table
between the bed and the settee.

And then he changed his mind.

He said, "Oh, it's not there"
and he crossed it out

and he moved it
to underneath the TV.

At that point I knew I had my man
and we just needed to prove it.

Detectives were closing in
on the killer.

But with no concrete evidence
to link Dan to the crime scene,

they were left with no choice
but to let him go.

He was released on bail
at that point,

with a determination that
you're gonna bring them back

and they'll be charged.

And it's a worry.

What if they go
and do something else?

So it was a real concern to us,

that there was a killer
on the loose.

Police investigating the murder
of Mark Bradbury

were certain
they knew who had killed him.

Former soldier Dan Shovelton
was the prime suspect.

Mark's body had shown
he'd been strangled

and subjected to a brutal beating

and had also revealed when
he was likely to have been killed.

But police had to piece together
the evidence

to prove it was Dan Shovelton
who had murdered Mark.

The murder of Mark Bradbury
was no slam dunk investigation.

It was painstaking.

It was laborious.

It involved thousands of hours
of police work.

Recovering some 14,000 hours of CCTV

and it involved real attention
to detail,

layering up
all of the evidential opportunities.

Whether it was forensic,
whether it was CCTV,

whether it was sightings
that were made,

whether it was strange activity.

It all had to be pieced together
to just present this whole picture

because he was not gonna be
convicted on one piece alone.

We know that Mark had suffered
quite extensive blunt force trauma,

but trauma of that type
has different effects

on different areas of the body.

For instance, the abdomen
is quite soft,

so blows delivered to that area
are displaced.

The bowel underneath
is pushed out of the way

and there's very little bruising.

On the other hand,
when you look at the skull,

which is solid bone
beneath the skin,

the anvil effect of that blow
splits the skin,

causing damage.

And because there are
so many blood vessels,

that bit of the body bleeds rapidly

and causes quite extensive blood
loss all around the place.

In Mark's flat there was
a lot of blood on the floor...

...and in the blood there were
over 100 impressions of footwear.

The killer had spent some time
in that flat moving around

and making
these footwear impressions.

It wasn't a popular brand
of footwear.

It wasn't immediately recognised
by our footwear expert

as a Nike or an Adidas

or, you know, one of the brands
that we see quite frequently.

It was something
that they'd not seen.

You've got the pattern itself,

you've got the approximate size
of the shoe.

But you've also got
things like the wear to the sole,

which can be really important.

People walk in different ways
and wear shoes in different ways

and even more critical,

if you've got a really good print
of a footwear mark,

you can actually see
the tiny little nicks and cuts

and gouges created by damage.

They're picked up
in just the course of everyday wear,

completely at random,
that can actually identify

specifically an item of footwear
to a mark

and actually give you
that direct link.

It's really amazingly powerful
at its best.

Of course, if it's got
blood staining

and you find the mark at the scene

and you find blood on the shoe
when you locate it,

blood on the shoe
that matches the victim,

then that's a really lovely
two-way link.

After some 43,000 records
that had been cross referenced,

the Lacoste Vinale
was identified as the footwear

that's left that impression.

It's been out of production now
for eight, nine or more years.

But Lacoste made us a pair
of those trainers

so that
we could cross reference them

and show that
it is the Lacoste Vinale

that's left
those footwear impressions.

They now knew the exact make
and model of the shoes

the killer was wearing
at the murder scene.

They also knew he had most likely
been searching for drugs.

It was an open secret
amongst his friends

that Mark kept his valuables
in a loft above his bed.

It was accessible,
to somebody of a normal height,

just by standing on the bed.

You could reach up
and you could open the loft hatch.

There were bloody footwear marks
on the bed,

indicating that
someone had stood there.

There was some blood
on the loft hatch itself,

which indicated that
here's somebody that

they know Mark and they know Mark
in the context of his drugs.

My dad's in his own home
and he had no shoes on,

so whatever he was doing,
he was comfortable, in his own home,

and he'd obviously invited
somebody in.

I think that was the scariest thing
for me, that it could be anybody.

The killer entered the loft

and they'd searched the front
and they'd searched the sides.

But what they didn't find
was the cocaine was behind them.

Hunting for the shoes that
would link him to the crime scene,

police search Dan Shovelton's home.

We recovered everything
from his house.

We meticulously catalogued it,
photographed it,

worked out what was there,
what wasn't there.

Clothing fitting the description

that he was wearing on CCTV
on that day was not there.

Every path we took
seemed to lead to a dead end.

But there was one clue,
invisible to the naked eye,

that would finally link the killer
to the scene.

When we arrested Dan Shovelton,

one of the items
that was seized from his address

were the keys to the car.

The car itself was also seized

and subject
to meticulous forensic examination,

which revealed nothing.

The key was also subjected
to forensic examination.

In the very hole in the key
that the metal ring passes through,

there was a speck
of Mark Bradbury's blood.

DNA analysis proved beyond doubt
the speck of blood was Mark's.

That was the only tangible forensic
evidence that was recovered

in the entire case.

Because there was nothing found
at the house,

there was nothing found in the car.

There was a lot of blood
at that house.

Daniel Shovelton would have had
blood on his hands, literally,

and it wasn't to be found anywhere,
except for that key.

It is extremely difficult
to get rid of all traces of evidence

and I think this case is
a very good example of that.

Using the chemical screening test
that we have for blood,

it's perfectly possible

to test tiny little nooks
and crannies on things

for the presence of blood.

Even when you can't see it,

sometimes you get
a positive reaction

and sufficient to get
a DNA profiling result out of it.

So, you know, it's really important

to use every kind of tool
at your disposal

when you think somebody might've
been trying to destroy evidence.

Months of painstaking work
had finally paid off.

They had literally found the key
that solved the case.

Dan was arrested
for the second time.

He was absolutely dumbfounded

and it was the, probably, only point
where you really saw him flounder

and he couldn't come up
with an explanation.

So, he asked for a break
in his interview.

When he came back,
he offered an explanation

of having just put the key down
and picked up a speck of blood,

in transfer,
which was farcical, really.

Finally, there was enough evidence

and Dan Shovelton was charged
with murder,

but in court he continued to deny
it.

It was really difficult
attending the trial.

You have to listen
to both sides of the story

and there was no real answers

from somebody
who still pleaded not guilty.

It was clear that

Dan Shovelton had barely told
a word that was true,

throughout the entire investigation

and throughout
the entire court case.

I think he remained committed
throughout the trial

to innate belief
that he'd walk away.

The jury were having none of it.

After 11 hours of deliberation,
they found him guilty.

I can't really describe
the emotions.

You've got this...

...wave of relief that,
you know, he's been convicted,

that all of that work has paid off.

Pleased for Hannah.
She'd got an outcome. You know.

It makes you feel quite glad,

but you shouldn't feel glad
because somebody's been murdered

and somebody's now going
to prison for years.

It was a case
that had tragedy on all sides.

Dan Shovelton was convicted
and sentenced to life in prison.

For the investigators
and for Mark's family,

there was justice at last.

I will fight
for him to stay in prison longer.

Why did he feel the need to...

...beat him to an extreme?

I want to know what my dad
was saying in those last moments.

I can't help but think that
he was just begging for his life

and that
this death was truly painful.

I don't think
he ever doubted for a second

that he still wasn't the best dad.

Cos he gave me everything
that he could've done.

Investigating the murder
of Mark Bradbury

is something that
I'll always be really proud of.

Police officers, civilian staff,
forensic staff, scientists,

all of them
put heart and soul into this.

The effort and energy put in

by the entire investigation team
was staggering.

This was clearly an enormously
challenging investigation

and one that proves
that it's the first hours

after the discovery of a murder
that are absolutely critical.

Mark's body was able
to tell the truth

about the beating and strangulation.

The brutal beating he took,

especially the blunt force trauma
to the head,

meant that there was too much blood

for Dan Shovelton
to be able to clean it all away.

And for Dan Shovelton,

it was the discovery
of a single fleck of blood,

invisible to the naked eye,
on a car key

that was to be his downfall.

That and the painstaking
and determined police investigation.

Subtitles by accessibility@itv.com