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Tears welled in Terry Hall’s eyes as we shook hands before he whimpered gratitude for helping share an appeal to help find his common law wife, a missing mother-of-three.
Hall stood beside the despairing mother and stepfather of Lisa Pearce, 26, as a south London estate rallied to trace her while supporting the anxious family.
But the crowds gathering around the home where she grew up in New Addington, near Croydon, were oblivious to the reality she was already dead and hidden in a nearby garage – and the killer who strangled her remained in their midst.
Hall subsequently made a late-night drive to dump her body some 36 hours after his pitiful plea to this reporter.
A call came the reporter’s way from Ms Pearce’s parents in July 1999 after they had not heard from her from several days – deemed unusual for someone so sociable.
She lived just a few minutes’ walk away on the 1930s-built estate with a population of 22,000, sitting between Croydon and Biggin Hill in the Kent countryside.
Ms Pearce lived with 29-year-old Hall in Burford Way in New Addington along with their three children.
She was last seen on July 11, 1999, having visited her parents at their nearby home – and left while expressing her thanks to them for recent babysitting duties.
Her vanishing prompted a wave of concern not only from family members but also neighbours and local community leaders.
Posters were printed showing her photo, distributed across the estate and beckoning anyone with information to get in touch.
And the local Croydon Advertiser newspaper was urged to help share the pleas.
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Ms Pearce’s stepfather John Peters, alongside her mother Rosemarie, did most of the talking as part of what was then seen as a missing person appeal.
Speaking quietly and gravely, he told of the distress suffered – especially by his wife.
Alongside them, although only uttering that he wanted his partner to ‘please come home’, was Terry Hall – happy to let Lisa’s stepfather do more talking on his behalf.
Gulping back sobs, Hall did offer a handshake and insisted he was thankful for any publicity that might help find his absent partner.
That was on a Tuesday that week. Approaching midday on the Thursday, Surrey Police announced the overnight discovery of a body in undergrowth.
This was in the village of Chelsham in Surrey, about four and a half miles south of New Addington.
At the same time it was revealed a man had been arrested on suspicion of Ms Pearce’s murder.
That man was Hall – who had driven the body on the Wednesday then left it overnight.
All the time he was backing the public efforts to find Ms Pearce, he knew where her dead body was being stored – in a nearby lean-to – and that he was responsible.
It swiftly became known he was the man under arrest, as the first news of the body’s discovery was shared among people outside Ms Pearce’s parents’ home.
Mobile phones and internet coverage were available but less commonplace back then.
Mr Peters emerged from the property and was open about how their worst suspicions appeared to have come true before withdrawing, awaiting updates from police.
There were also evident tensions among upset neighbours congregating, who had been backing the family and indeed Hall – but were now coming to terms with the tragic new news.
One leader of the missing person campaign, previously friendly, loudly decried the local correspondent – who had broken the news – as ‘this tit in a suit’ while insisting Hall could not be guilty.
Hall went on to be convicted of Ms Pearce’s murder at the Old Bailey and was jailed for life in June 2000.
The trial heard how Hall – who had been pursuing an affair with another woman – killed Ms Pearce four days before dumping her body in grass in Chelsham, having stored her in a nearby lean-to on the New Addington estate.
After being put behind bars, Hall challenged his murder conviction – claiming his defence was harmed by his lawyer Helen Grindrod QC being in poor health.
She was diagnosed with cancer days after the guilty verdict and died in July 2002.
But his appeal was rejected by London’s Criminal Appeal Court in August 2002, in a ruling saying there was no doubt about the fairness of the original trial.
Justice Roderick Evans said of Ms Grindrod: ‘She never sought to shorten the case in any way and was not at a disadvantage vis-à-vis her opponent.’
After his minimum time in jail expired, Hall was freed in January 2017, with a condition imposed upon him not to return to New Addington – yet Ms Pearce’s family were concerned after sightings of him in the area emerged.
Her parents, who went on to bring up Ms Pearce’s two daughers and one son, told of their fears Hall would try to get back involved in the youngsters’ lives.
Mr Peters told the Croydon Advertiser in September 2017: ‘At first we thought, “No, he wouldn’t have the bottle,” but now it has been happening very often.
‘My daughter was driving out of this road the other day and he was driving in and looked right at her. She was shaking afterwards and was straight on the phone to police.
‘We don’t know his motive and why he has come back here. He is a convicted murderer and we have been through hell because of him and have had to bring up his children.’
Mr Peters revealed the family reported the sightings to police, adding: ‘We have stayed strong and are still together and we are not going to let him beat us now either.
‘He still looks the same as well, but is just wearing glasses and has put on a bit of weight. He has put on a cap to try to disguise himself but we all know what he looks like.
‘This is bringing it all back. With him being around we have been forced to go back nearly 20 years. The family doesn’t need this again.
‘We are worried about him approaching the girls and we just don’t know what he is going to do. The youngest was only six at the time and the other was just nine.
‘He has murdered their mother and we don’t know what he is going to do. We just want him to stay out of the area. He should be right out of Croydon and nowhere near us.’
Mr Peters described Ms Pearce as a ‘lovely girl’ who ‘would do anything for anybody’, adding how she ‘looked after a few children in the area when she could and you simply couldn’t fault her’.
He said: ‘She was a wonderful mother and cherished her children. She’s still missed to this day.’
Mr Peters died two years ago this month.
His widow Rosemarie, speaking to the Daily Mail, was reluctant to discuss the case, with her family now also mourning her father John Smith after his death aged 95 in February this year.
Ms Pearce’s murder in July 1999 came 10 months after the death of another woman from the area, 38-year-old Isabelle Lewis, whose body parts were found across nearby Addington Court golf club greens.
One of her neighbours, 40-year-old Keith Valentine, was convicted of her murder in September 2000 and sentenced to life.
His trial heard from a pathologist that the victim was stabbed several times and mutilated and had an air rifle pellet in her brain, while also having a cross carved into her forehead.
Subsequent tragedies in New Addington include the August 2012 murder of 12-year-old Tia Sharp by Stuart Hazell, the boyfriend of Tia’s grandmother Christine Bicknell.
He was later arrested and found guilty at the Old Bailey and sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 38 years behind bars.
The killer paedophile, who was obsessed with pictures of child abuse, is in Wakefield Prison in West Yorkshire and will not be up for parole until he is 75.
The house where Tia was murdered has since been demolished.
Hazell had attacked her there while her family were out and concealed her body in the loft.
More recently, 38-year-old Sarah Mayhew was found dead in Rowdown Fields in New Addington after police were alerted to human remains on April 2, 2024.
Gemma Watts, 49, and Steven Sansom, 45, were arrested and charged with murdering Ms Mayhew between March 7 and April 3.
Sansom was said to have used a profile name of Red Rum on Facebook – that is, ‘murder’ spelled backwards.
On March 10 that year, a post appeared on the Red Rum account saying: ‘Best friends are those who don’t say anything when you show up at their door with a dead body. They just grab a shovel and follow you.’
Ms Mayhew’s head, arms and legs were found by police who were called after a dog walking in the fields returned to its owner with a human bone, before further human remains were found in the River Wandle on May 21, 2024.
Sansom later admitted murder and perverting the course of justice by dismembering Ms Mayhew’s body, distributing the parts at ‘various locations’ and cleaning up the scene.
And in November 2024, Watts pleaded guilty to murder and perverting the course of justice.
When sentenced in January 2025, Sansom was given a whole-life term that means he will never be released, while Watts was ordered to serve life with a minimum of 30 years.
Sansom had previously been released after carrying out an earlier murder – the fatal stabbing on Christmas Eve 1998 of Croydon taxi driver Terence Boyle, 58.
He had told friends he wanted £300 to buy Christmas presents, adding, ‘I don’t care how I get the money,’ before knifing the popular father-of-five in the throat and back before running off laughing with £25 he stole.
Sansom, aged 19 when committing his first murder, was jailed for life in May 1999 – serving 20 years before being released on licence in December 2019.
