The parents of Alice Gross last night paid tribute to their ‘sweet and beautiful’ daughter.
Jose
Gross, 60, and Rosalind Hodgkiss, 50, said they were ‘completely
devastated’ by the news that her body had been found in the River Brent.
Police confirmed that ‘significant efforts’ had been made to hide the corpse on the river bed.
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Grief: Jose
Gross, 60, and Rosalind Hodgkiss, 50, (pictured together last week,
right) said they were 'completely devastated' by the news that the body
of their daughter Alice (left) had been found in the River Brent
The
14-year-old’s family said: ‘It is difficult to comprehend that our
sweet and beautiful daughter was the victim of a terrible crime. Why
anyone would want to hurt her is something we are struggling to come to
terms with.
‘Alice was a loving and much-loved daughter and sister, a quirky live spark of a girl, beautiful inside and out.
‘She
was a funny companion, a loyal friend, both passionate and
compassionate, and so talented with a bright future ahead of her. She
brought so much joy to our family and those who knew her.’
Desperate search for evidence: Tents and an orange stretcher at the site of the discovery
Questions: face questions over the
time it took to find Alice’s body in shallow water just yards from where
her rucksack was found
Her
parents said they were ‘comforted’ by the outpouring of support from
their community in Hanwell, West London. They added: ‘This is a time for
grieving and not a time for anger or recriminations.’
Police
said a post-mortem examination will continue today due to the ‘complex
nature’ of the investigation. But they face questions over the time it
took to find Alice’s body in shallow water just yards from where her
rucksack was found.
Last
night, detectives were still trying to trace prime suspect Arnis
Zalkalns, who was seen on CCTV cycling a short distance behind Alice on
the day she vanished.
Her
body was found by the confluence of the River Brent and the Grand Union
Canal, a five-minute walk from where she was last seen.
Suspect: Last night, detectives were
still trying to trace prime suspect Arnis Zalkalns, who was seen on CCTV
cycling a short distance behind Alice on the day she vanished
Residents
said the area had been cordoned off five days later. A cyclist who uses
the towpath said: ‘I am shocked they have found a body as they have
been searching the area for so long, somebody must have tried really
hard to hide it.’
Last
night it emerged Alice’s body had been concealed in a plastic sack and
hidden underneath a pile of logs. Sources revealed the body was buried
in a pit dug into the river bed and carefully covered with piles of wood
to fool search teams.
A
leading criminologist said the concealment suggested pre-planning.
Professor David Wilson, of Birmingham City University, said police ‘will
be looking at the possibility this was a carefully orchestrated
operation by someone who has scoped out the area, rather than a random,
opportunistic act’.
It is understood an officer found the body during a fingertip search late on Tuesday afternoon.
Yesterday,
dozens of police sealed the area as two forensic tents were erected. A
stretcher used to lift the body was left at the waterside.
Police
have again appealed for help in tracing Zalkalns, last seen a week
after Alice disappeared. His former landlord Radoslav Andric, 64, said:
‘Now they have a body, maybe they can do some more tests and prove what
happened.’
Last
night, a shed where Zalkalns kept painting tools was under guard as
police waited for forensic teams, sparking speculation that its contents
were linked to Alice’s death. The shed is on a gated estate, Heron’s
Court, 15 minutes by bike from where her body was found. Zalkalns, 41, a
convicted killer in his native Latvia, had done odd jobs on the estate
for years.
Volunteers
have been taking down hundreds of posters featuring Alice across
Hanwell. Many streets remain festooned in yellow ribbons, symbols of a
community in shock.
Alice’s
sister Nina, 19, who is due to study at Cambridge next year, posted a
poignant photograph of poppies, which appears alongside her last public
online comment: ‘I love and miss my sister dearly . . . I love you Alice
always.’
Family: Alice's sister Nina (left),
pictured with Alice and their mother (right), wrote: 'I love and miss my
sister dearly... I love you Alice always' see more ....
Tributes: A police officer reviews his notes next to a pile of floral tributes left in the teenager's honour
Resident
Sharon McLeod said she dreaded telling her son, a friend of Alice’s,
the news. She said: ‘It’s absolutely gut-wrenching. No-one can ever
fault the police, they’ve done an amazing job.’
Joanne
Golden, who went to gym classes with Alice, said the inquiry has been
like a ‘thick black cloud hanging over Hanwell’. She said: ‘I have been
having nightmares and all I can think of is poor Alice and her family.’
Ealing
North MP Stephen Pound branded the killer a ‘cold, cunning and
calculating predator’. He said: ‘The body has been concealed . . .
that’s not the action of somebody acting in hot blood.’
Commander
Graham McNulty, of the Met, said recovering evidence ‘may take some
time’. He said: ‘I would urge anyone who may know something to come
forward. Even if you have not yet spoken out it is not too late to tell
us what you know.’
Investigation: Commander Graham McNulty, of the Met, said recovering evidence 'may take some time'
Has river grave preserved forensic clues?
Vital clues may have been lost because of the time it took police to find Alice Gross’s body in the River Brent.
Dr
Stuart Hamilton, who is a Home Office registered forensic pathologist,
said that evidence may have been washed away or contaminated by objects
in the water.
But
the expert, who advises the BBC drama Silent Witness, said the cool
water will have helped to preserve the body, while anything used to
weigh it down could provide damning evidence to catch the killer.
Probe: Vital clues may have been lost
because of the time it took police to find Alice Gross’s body in the
River Brent, according to Home Office registered forensic pathologist Dr
Stuart Hamilton
He
said: ‘Putting a body in water, particularly moving water, is going to
disturb important trace evidence. Fibres and DNA will be a lot more
difficult to get and more difficult to connect to somebody because the
first question will be: Are they contaminated?
‘However,
forensic scientists are very clever and thorough . . . People from
different fields will be coming together to compile the full story of
this person’s death.’
Evidence: Dr Hamilton said the cool
water will have helped to preserve the body, while anything used to
weigh it down could provide damning evidence to catch Alice's killer
Dr Hamilton added: ‘The temperature of the river will be similar to the average temperature of a refrigerator.
‘This
will have preserved the body to some extent, although this will depend
on the river and any potential animal disturbance.’ Diane Robinson, a
senior forensic science lecturer at the University of the West of
England, said clues may have been conserved by silt which apparently
encased the body.
She
said: ‘Just because a body has been submerged for more than four weeks
does not mean that all evidence will have been washed away.
‘We
do not know what type of assault she suffered, whether it was of a
sexual nature, if it was a physical attack or if a weapon such as a
knife was used.
‘If
there was a transfer of forensic evidence during the attack, it may
make its recovery more difficult, but it does not preclude it.’ Mrs
Robinson added that the latest DNA techniques are so sensitive they
could still be effective on even ‘degraded’ traces found on Alice’s
body.
She
said: ‘If the body has been buried it has, to an extent, been more
protected from the environmental conditions than if it was simply left
in the open.’
Ipswich serial killer Steve Wright dumped two of his five women victims in rivers during his six-week killing spree in 2006.
The
move hampered police, as they were not able to recover DNA from the
bodies, but he was eventually convicted thanks to fibre traces and other
evidence.
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