Nearly 20 years after Emma Caldwell’s body was found in a remote forest, a man interviewed in the initial investigation has been found guilty of her murder and being a serial rapist.
The unsolved murder, one of Scotland’s longest running cold cases, was branded a “scandal” by a former newspaper editor who exposed Ian Packer as a “forgotten suspect”, and subsequently led to police The prosecutor’s office has resumed the investigation.
A jury found Packer guilty of murdering a 27-year-old boy who went missing in Glasgow on April 4, 2005, and whose body was found the following month in Limefield Woods, near Roberton, South Lanarkshire. It took four days.
Following a trial at the High Court in Glasgow, he was also found guilty of indecently assaulting Ms Caldwell and raping nine women, among dozens of other sex offenses over a 26-year period.
Mr Packer, from Glasgow’s east end, was found guilty of raping an underage girl in 1990, but the girl’s family rejected the conviction during his trial, which was heard by the court.
He was first reported to police in March 1999 after a sex worker raped her and then stole a tax disc from his car to prove her identity.
The court heard the defendant preyed on “young, vulnerable and drug-addicted” sex workers in Glasgow’s red-light district and repeatedly committed violent acts, including strangling women.
One victim, who was assaulted near the Tennent Brewery in Glasgow’s east end between 1993 and 2004, said Packer worked in the family business, liked to “manage women” and wore women’s underwear. He is said to have called himself “Jack the Gad.” – Areas where many attacks took place.
Mr Caldwell disappeared on April 4, 2005, just days after telling his mother Margaret of his desire to overcome his heroin addiction after losing his family in his early 20s.
She comes from a close-knit family and met her parents twice a week and spoke every day.
She was reported missing after she did not respond to attempts to reschedule a visit with her mother.
On May 8, 2005, a dog walker found Caldwell’s body in the woods, with a “garrote” tied around his neck.
Her father, William, who died in 2011, made her family promise to get justice for her.
Mr Packer, who worked as a sign installer across Scotland, the north of England and Northern Ireland, was first interviewed by police on June 22, 2005, but had never previously picked up Mr Caldwell. Instead, he lied to the police and said, “I couldn’t cooperate with the investigation.” He lied further in interviews in 2006 and 2007.
The court heard Mr Packer made extensive use of sex workers, described them as “addicts” and repeatedly lied to police and a BBC journalist who interviewed him on national television in 2018.
During the trial, Packer admitted forcing Caldwell to have sex with her in August 2004, even though she told him not to, which he admitted was “criminal” and apologized.
A friend of Caldwell’s told the court that Packer “wouldn’t leave her alone” and another sex worker said she was “terrified” by Caldwell.
Mr Packer was investigated by the press in 2015, leading to the case being reopened, but in 2018 he gave an interview with BBC journalist Sam Poling to “clear his name” after “instigating” the case. After admitting that he had done so, he claimed he had never visited the forest area.
However, in his evidence at trial he admitted to visiting Limefield Woods six times, including to Miss Caldwell, but prosecutor Richard Goddard KC said there were many more times.
Soil samples taken from the scene where Caldwell’s body was found were analyzed in 2021 and were a “97% match” to the soil found in his blue work van, and Packer was found in 2022. He was indicted in May.
The jury was taken to the isolated spot where Mr Caldwell’s naked body was found between two streams in woodland 60 miles from Glasgow.
Ms Packer claimed she had never seen that particular place before and blamed four Turkish men for her murder, but the number of culprits has since been reduced to two.
The four men were arrested in 2007 after interviews with other sex workers and a two-year surveillance operation in a Glasgow cafe, but the case collapsed over translation issues.
Packer entered special pleas of guilty and consent, arguing that many of the sexual assaults were consensual and that he had never met some of the women.
The complainant, who was raped by Mr Packer during a £30 deal she agreed to under financial pressure in 1998, eventually went to police in 2021, but she described it as the “worst thing in my life”. Stated.
Packer admitted in his evidence that he had lied throughout seven police interviews and three BBC interviews, but told the court: “I wasn’t the one who killed her girlfriend. It wasn’t me. I didn’t do anything to her.”
Former Sunday Mail editor Jim Wilson exposed Mr Packer as a “forgotten suspect” on the anniversary of Mr Caldwell’s murder in 2015, after the case was reopened. “It’s a scandal” and a “failure.” of the judicial system.
Mr Wilson said: “The Scottish justice system failed Emma Caldwell, her family and all the other women terrorized by Mr Packer during the years he was free.
“His conviction answered one question, but Police Scotland and the Crown have many more questions to answer.”