Joe's killer behind bars

Eleven-year-old Joe was brutally battered and stabbed to death by Hamer, who had lured him to his home in Dalton Street, Bury.

Manchester Crown Court heard that Joe, who suffered from cystic fibrosis, was killed after he spurned Hamer's sexual advances and threatened to reveal his secret'.

Joe was beaten so savagely with a frying pan that it broke in two.

While Joe lay in Hamer's bedroom, drifting in and out of consciousness, his attacker went downstairs, took three knives from a block in the kitchen and returned, stabbing his defenceless victim 16 times in the head, face and neck.

Hamer, who was 14 at the time of the killing in March, dragged Joe's body down the stairs and stuffed it into a wheelie bin.

He then pushed the bin more than half a mile to a secluded gully in Whitehead Park where he buried Joe in a shallow grave.

The court was told that when Joe's worried parents alerted the police, on the afternoon of Wednesday March 1, that their son had failed to return home from St Gabriel's RC High School, the youngster was already dead.

The following day, an hour after Joe's body was discovered, Hamer showed no emotion and just shrugged his shoulders when he was arrested on suspicion of murder. It was during interviews later that day, he admitted killing Joe and disposing of his body.

In what police had described as a "cold, calculated and premeditated act", Hamer lured Joe to his death with a letter purporting to be from his deputy headteacher, Mrs Linda Foley.

The letter said Hamer had been chosen as Joe's mentor at St Gabriel's.

Joe was told to meet his mum at Hamer's home at 4.30pm. Joe was later seen with Hamer in Bolton Road and then on Ainsworth Road, close to Whitehead Park. It was the last time anyone saw him alive.

Once inside the house, the pair went to the upstairs bedroom. Hamer claimed he launched the "savage and sustained" attack when Joe refused to put down a newspaper cutting about his dead half-brother.

However, the real motive only emerged last week when Hamer admitted to his legal team that he killed Joe to prevent him telling the truth about the incident.

Mr David Steer QC, defending, admitted Hamer made a sexual advance on Joe who responded by calling him "gay" and threatened to tell others.

He added: "Michael then tragically responded in the way he did to prevent Joe from telling just what had happened in the house. It was a sexual approach that went horribly wrong. "

In court, Hamer, now aged 15, spoke only once, to plead guilty to Joe's murder.

Prosecuting, Mr Alistair Webster QC, said despite Hamer's relative tender years, he targeted his victim, lured him from safety, by deception and to his own house, carried out the killing with significant brutality and then set about covering up his crime in a calculated way. On the morning of March 1, Joe's mum, Gwen, had picked up her son from Booth Hall Children's Hospital where he had been receiving regular treatment for his condition and dropped him off at school at 10am.

Mr Webster said: "There was nothing discernible in the events at the Hamer household that morning which, so far as Michael's mother was concerned, gave any warning of what was to come.

"In fact, the train of events which led to Joe's murder was already in motion. Michael had already taken steps to target Joe. Why he chose Joe can only be a matter of conjecture. He has told the psychiatrists that he wanted someone else to feel what it was like to be bullied.

"It may be a reasonable inference that Joe was chosen because his illness may have left him, in Michael's eyes, less able to resist."

Mr Webster continued: "Whatever the reason for his choice, Michael drafted a letter to Joe, purportedly from the deputy headmistress, Linda Foley, appointing himself as Joe's mentor and setting up a meeting with Joe after school.

"A copy of the letter was recovered from Joe's body, as was a series of drafts from, in and close to Michael's home. Of significant concern is a draft which may throw some light on Michael's motive. It was a draft which started off as a letter, but then went on to make a sexual suggestion as the reason why Joe would have to go to the Hamer house.

"Hamer thought that this letter had been created three weeks before the killing. Clearly, Hamer had been contemplating his victim for a significant period."

After receiving the letter during the lunch break, Joe produced it to his history teacher who realised it was fake and told him to go and see the deputy head and to go straight home after school.

At the end of break, the young female teacher and an experienced teacher saw Joe with Hamer. Joe was asked if he had seen the deputy head. Joe kept looking at Michael as if seeking approval and reassurance and then said he had seen the deputy head.

Hamer was asked if he was the Michael referred to in the letter. He admitted he was and that he had written the note. Just then a fire alarm was activated, deliberately - but not by Hamer, who was with the teachers. The school was evacuated and the pupils returned to classes a short time later.

At 3.50pm, Joe was walking across the Monkey Bridge' over the railway lines near Bury Grammar School when he said he would go back as he wanted something from the shop.

Mr Webster said: "Joe was seen in the company of Hamer near to the car wash on Bolton Road and then there was a sighting near to Tesco Express. It is clear that Joe was lured back to Michael's house."

After killing Joe, Hamer put his body in a wheelie bin and pushed it to Whitehead Park.

It was during the act of burying the body, or after burying Joe, that Hamer received two calls on his mobile phone from his mother, Julie. His tone was calm as he lied about what he was doing.

When he returned home, he cleaned up the blood in the house, completed his school homework - which was, in a chillingly ironic twist, about the Ten Commandments - and then went to bed.

Meanwhile, Joe's family, friends and the emergency services were involved in a massive search around the school and in Whitehead Park. A number of relatives actually walked past the gully where Joe's body had been buried.

However, it was only when the search was resumed the following day that police made the horrific discovery.

Hamer's name had already been brought to the attention of staff at St Gabriel's, who were told that he had been seen with Joe the previous evening.

He was called from classes and interviewed by deputy headteacher Adam Loster who called in police when it was clear the teenager was lying.

When Hamer was arrested on suspicion of murder, his teachers were surprised by his reaction: he displayed little or no emotion, appeared apparently unconcerned and didn't break down or cry.

He was taken to Bury police station where he later admitted killing Joe.

"The interviews were lengthy," said Mr Webster. "Hamer did say that he was sorry for what he had done and would do anything to put it right."

In his defence, Mr Steer said what Hamer had done was "wildly out of character," but stressed that although Hamer had lured Joe into his home, the violence that followed was not premeditated.

He described the teenager as being of low average intelligence, immature, and also the victim of bullying at school. Hamer also felt rejected by his father, policeman Philip Brimelow, who only saw him intermittently.

"He had a life with a sense of being unloved, denigrated and humiliated," Mr Steer concluded.

Sentencing Hamer to a minimum of 12 years in prison, less 229 days already spent in custody, Judge Mr Justice Richard McCombe said: "No sentence that this court can pass can make good the Geeling family's loss. You have taken Joe from them."

Following Monday's hearing, the Crown Prosecution Service said it was considering an appeal against the "lenient" sentence.