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Norfolk's biggest mysteries

Steven Newing (Sept 2, 1969):
It was with the disappearance of April Fabb still fresh in the public mind that the unthinkable happened. The freckle-faced 10-year-old was playing near his home in Lee Warner Avenue, Fakenham, just days before his 11th birthday when he vanished. One theory was that he had fallen down a disused well shaft of an old sawmill nearby, but it is widely believed that he was abducted. A memorial prayer candle stand was recently dedicated at Fakenham Parish Church at a service attended by his mother, Jean, and other relatives.

Susan Long: (March 10, 1970): The Norwich Union worker had been out dancing at the Gala Ballroom in Norwich with her boyfriend, Brian Tungate, and caught the last bus home to Aylsham. She arrived at around 11.10pm and began the seven-minute walk to her parents’ home at Sir William’s Lane, but never arrived. The headlights of a milk-float picked the shape of her body lying in a pool of rainwater in a lovers’ lane the following morning.

Headless woman at Cockley Cley (August 27, 1974):
Concealed in weeds off the Cockley Cley road, near Swaffham, the badly-decomposed and headless body of a young woman was found by a farm worker. She was wearing a pink, frilled Marks & Spencer nightdress, but a better clue was the brown plastic sheet in which she was wrapped, bearing the letters NCR (National Cash Register). Only six such sheets were made by a Scottish company between 1962 and 1968, but police never identified the woman, let alone her killer. Today, there is no grave or headstone, just an unmarked spot in a Swaffham churchyard.

REMEMBERED – The memorial to April Fabb at her home.

April Fabb (April 8, 1969):
The shy 13-year-old set cycled off to her sister’s home in Roughton to give her brother-in-law a packet of cigarettes as a birthday present. It was only two miles from her home in Metton, but she never made it along the country lane. Between 2.06pm, when she was seen by a tractor driver, and 2.12pm, when her blue and white bike was found lying on its side in a field, she vanished. The mystery haunts the county to this day.

Pamela Exall (August 30, 1974):
With people in Norfolk still reeling from the gruesome discovery in Cockley Cley, a young woman disappeared from a campsite in Snettisham.
An articled clerk with Berkshire County Council, Pamela Exall was on a motorcycling holiday in Norfolk with her brother, Peter, and a friend. After enjoying a meal and a drink at Dinglea Campsite, at Snettisham, the leather-jacketed Pamela set out alone for a moonlit stroll along the beach. Extensive searches along the mudflats of the Wash and the lake at the Snettisham bird sanctuary, failed to find any trace of her.

Yvette Watson (March 1979): Yvette was 17 when she disappeared from the David Rice Hospital at Hellesdon, near Norwich, only days before she was due to return to her parents at Aldeburgh in Suffolk after receiving treatment for depression. She left behind a heartrending diary, describing her hopes for the future and crying out for help in her battle against her illness – but it gave no clues as to her whereabouts, and her parents, Enid and Colin, have lived for 23 years with the pain of never knowing what happened to their daughter.

Natalie Pearman (Nov 20, 1992): See main feature

Johanna Young.

Johanna Young (December 23, 1993):
The 14-year-old left her home in Merton Road, Watton, at around 7.30pm and was seen outside her local fish and chip shop half an hour later. During that evening, her parents found she had taken down all the Christmas cards in her bedroom. The alarm was raised the following morning when she failed to turn up for her paper round and, on Boxing Day, her half-naked body was found in a freezing pond near her home and clothes and shoes discarded nearby.

Kellie Pratt (June 11, 2000):
A heroin addict and mother of two small children, Kellie was working in the red light area of Norwich when she vanished. The 28-year-old Newcastle-born woman was seen talking on her mobile phone outside The Rose pub at the junction of Queens Road and City Road at around 11.30pm, but despite a thorough inquiry, neither she nor her Nokia 6100 phone have been found. She remains on the Missing Persons list.

Michelle Bettles (March 28, 2002):
The murder of another prostitute in Norwich led to media speculation about a serial killer at work in the red light area, although there is no evidence to link the four cases. A 22-year-old drug addict with three small children, none of whom were in her care, she was last seen alive in the Queens Road area of Norwich. Her fully-clothed body was founded in woodland off Podmore Lane, Scarning, three days later.

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