FOUR searches according to the Guardian and other news sources
"A number of searches took place at the address," said Commander Neil Basu. (1) "When Tia was first reported missing, officers searched her bedroom as is normal practice
(2) A further search of the house took place in the early hours of Sunday morning by a specialist team.
(3) This was followed by another search of the house by specialist dogs on Wednesday lunchtime."
(4) But it was only on Friday afternoon, after a full forensic search of the house was carried out that the body was found.
As Hazell was being arrested, a senior Metropolitan police officer acknowledged there would be many questions asked about why they had taken so long to find the body
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/aug/10/tia-sharp-body-stuart-hazell
Tia Sharp: Police hold murder suspect after fourth search reveals body
Martyn Underhill, a former detective chief inspector, said yesterday: "The rule with a missing child is to clear the ground under your feet. You have to ask why it wasn't done earlier."
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...after-fourth-search-reveals-body-8030809.html
Britain's famous for its murder mysteries: Sherlock Holmes, any version. Midsomer Murders. Poirot. Miss Marple. Inspector Lynley. Frost. Morse
but even Keystone Cops or Dad's Army would put to shame the handling of Tia's case by British policing, 2012 version, imo
Were police stationed around the house during and between the many searches? If not, why not? Why the complacency? Why the lack of basic professionalism? What if Tia had been kidnapped and kidnappers were casing the house - or had put items or messages on the doorstep? What if Tia had been kidnapped but escaped and had struggled to return to the house? What if kidnappers/rapists etc. had dumped her body on her grandmother's doorstep? Police should have been stationed at the house from the moment they entered the case, imo
If no police stationed front and rear of the house, is it surprising SH was able to simple depart the premises, requiring a several hour search for him and warnings relayed to the public not to approach him (dangerous, obviously, in the police's estimation)
Instead of conducting a thorough search at the outset, police instead were spread over parks and neighbouring regions, were detailed to search garbage and were photographed dramatically arriving in uniformed groups like Ghengis Khan's invading armies with headlines such as Shannon's Team Search for Tia
Police were used to distribute phamplets bearing an outdated likeness of the missing child, when all along, her body sat just feet above 'expert' police search teams' heads
A fiasco of sobering proportions, imo, which will justifiably embarrass British policing all the way from top to bottom. Only this utter and total humiliation might have the impetus to force a complete restructure and examination of the British police force -- one that's obviously WAY overdue
We're just 'members of the public'. We're not experts in forensics or strategy. We don't profess to be. But when we lose our keys or wallets, what do we do - do we distribute pamphlets carrying outdated photos of our lost keys? Do we do a quick whiz around our room, parade around looking officious before heading out to a square kilometre of parkland and call in search-teams from distant States or counties?
No. We systematically search the immediate location from top to bottom. And then we very often do that again -to rule out any possibility our keys or wallet may be where they usually are -- in our cases that's usually our homes or vehicles
Only when we have exhausted ALL possibility our lost item is in the immediate location do we proceed to conduct searches beyond the immediate perimeter. But we ordinary members of the public begin with square-one and then work outwards. And at least eight times out of ten, we're successful
If police had adopted the same logical, dilligent attitudes and actions with regard to Tia, a media circus would have been avoided. Worried parents for miles around would have been spared anxiety. Vital forensic evidence within the house would have been preserved. A suspected killer would not have been provided opportunity to roam around for a week, nor would he have been able to simply walk away from what is now a contaminated, week-old crime scene
[Disclaimer: I'm British, UK-born, from a several hundred year old (minimum) British family-tree, although I don't reside in the UK at the moment, so I do feel entitled to criticise the manner in which this case had been handled by a policing service paid in part by my large, extended family of tax-payers in the UK, in case anyone feels inclined to 'take offence' at my comments. Members of my family (now deceased) were old-fashioned Bobbies who walked the beat with nothing more than a truncheon through rain, fog and anything else thrown at them. They must be disgusted by the charade of policing we've witnessed. They would have performed better their first day on the job]
Let's hope the police don't compound their incompetence by attempting to suggest that Tia's killer/s moved her body all over a difficult to traverse common loft-space separated as it is by 'partial' fire-walls, only to return Tia's week old corpse to a position above her grandmother's home -- all of this above the heads of immediate neighbours living below and (because of high unemployment) who were probably at home, all day and all night, and familiar with every creak of their homes keeping in mind also that the police required to fetch a ladder to enter the crawl-space.
Did SH keep a ladder handy? Was he observed by family-members, neighbours or police to continually carry a ladder into the house? Did family members or police see a ladder inside the home? Did Tia's grandmother observe SH and/or others entering the crawl-space to 'move the body around'. Did SH enter other homes in the terrace with a ladder and disappear into their crawl-spaces? Were tiles on the roofs disturbed? Did neighbours advise police they'd heard noises in the crawl-spaces above their heads, etc? If so and police did not investigate, it serves as yet another level of incompetence