UK UK - Andrew Gosden, 14, Doncaster, South Yorks, 14 Sept 2007

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Yeah it is much looser with its facts than say Sword and Scale. They basically read some short wiki style summary and the Gosdens website.
Made a change to hear Andrews case getting some air time tho, i get why no other shows seemed to have covered it, too little to go on.

I thought the sikth theory was way over reached. Would of been tons of other smaller gigs In places like Camden too. Have never seen anything to make me think he was such a massive fan of any band that he'd do anything to see them, lured with a ticket.

It might just be because I followed this case but I feel his name/face was well known in the numetal/metal community in London at that time, I remember seeing posters and people talking about it.

I met my OH on MySpace (blush) in 2006 but I had met other people I had met online in years before that, in my late teens. In my mid teens I got into plenty of gigs with a group of friends while underage in London. I just feel Andrew looked too young to get in those sorts of places, Carling venues could be quite strict, yet again it might have been easier with an adult.... Depends how much attention the door person was giving.

The home computer was searched, and the schools system but I have the feeling the internet within a English school I.T set up in 2006 would have been within a intranet and very closed off. I just can't see him being able to chat and build a "friendship" within the school system and hours. Lots of kids now know how to get round it, but Andrew? Then? I don't think he would of...

I just don't know what to think anymore...
This case has just become chasing shadows...

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I literally only just heard about this case and I must say that it's really weird that he'd just disappear.
Kings Cross station is overwhelming, large and busy. I've lived in London most of my life and still find it intimidating. Even though he is clearly a smart boy he might've been fooled into going away with a stranger. I wish I knew what his intentions were.

Doncaster, according to friends of mine, is quite boring and somewhat unpleasant. Maybe he wanted a change of pace and naively tried to run away?

Makes me me happy that police found me when I tried to run away at 13. I may not even be around today if they hadn't :(
 
An odd case. It reminds me (a little) of the Ruth Wilson case from Dorking in Surrey in 1996 (if I recall correctly). Very bright teenagers who clearly planned their disappearance but left few traces of motive and have not been seen since.

I do find the reports on the police examinations of computers worrying. As a 60 year old (now) with a daughter who was a teenager at the time of the disappearance I recall teenager expertise on computers. I also ran a major financial division of a company and had lots of computer exposure at work. I can think of two very simple ways Andrew Gosden could have avoided scrutiny in any online dealings and it would be interesting to know if the police checked them;

1. Use the local library. If the one in Doncaster is like here it has had computers for members to use for the last 15 years or so. And it is easy to join a library under a false identity. They only ask basic identity proof and I vividly recall my dear daughter having at least 2 false id cards to allow her access to pubs and clubs - so they are easy to obtain. Did the police check if he was recognised as a user at the library, or even get an expert to look at their machines for anything interesting?

2. Use your teachers id to use the school computers. At my daughters school at least 2 teachers were known to have their usernames and passwords on pads on their tables. At the company where I worked it was common to have usernames and passwords on whiteboards in offices - because idiots in IT insisted on different ones for every sub-system and no one could remember a dozen different ones. Did the police check for unauthorised use of school computers using identities of other school members?

And those are the easy ways to go online without detection. If Andrew Gosden were tech savvy he would know more technical ways. I have a suspicion that the answer did lie in computers somewhere but that it is probably now to late to find the answer that way.
 
I have always believed that a family member living in London was involved in his disappearance.
 
knowthings said:
I have always believed that a family member living in London was involved in his disappearance.
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Definitely a possibility. Chances are that Andrew 'went' with someone he trusted, be it family or an online friend.

I've never liked the idea that he got taken by a total stranger shortly after arriving in London. Yes, London is a dangerous place but it's also buzzing with people and not the ideal location to stage the random abduction of a teenage boy.
 
Was Regent's Canal ever checked? I image it's too late to check now?
 
flutterby said:
Was Regent's Canal ever checked? I image it's too late to check now?
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If there were anything to be found in the Regents Canal it would have been found, even if it was not checked at the time. There have been fairly regular cases resulting in searches of the canal over the years. Just thinking of the last 2-3 years there have been the murders of Gemma McCluskie, Marta Ligman and Sebastiano Magnanini, where the bodies were found in various stretches of the canal. Additionally, the body of Alice Gross (a more well known case) was found in a branch of the canal. There have been other cases over the years, all of which involved either searches for the bodies or for evidence.
 
alb1on said:
If there were anything to be found in the Regents Canal it would have been found, even if it was not checked at the time. There have been fairly regular cases resulting in searches of the canal over the years. Just thinking of the last 2-3 years there have been the murders of Gemma McCluskie, Marta Ligman and Sebastiano Magnanini, where the bodies were found in various stretches of the canal. Additionally, the body of Alice Gross (a more well known case) was found in a branch of the canal. There have been other cases over the years, all of which involved either searches for the bodies or for evidence.
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Thanks. I was in Kings Cross last week end and the thought came to me.
 
i still think the answer to this case lies closer to home. im convinced Andrew met up with someone he knew. Maybe this person convinced Andrew to meet up in london to go to a gig or something. The fact that as far as we know Andrew told noone of his plans to go to London is very worrying. If the person he met up with told him to keep it a secret Andrew must of trusted this person a great deal to keep it a secret and travel to london to meet.
 
I did skip a few pages here so i'm sorry if these points already brought up.

For the no return ticket. Is it possible that he simply planned on making more than one stop and his destination at the end of the day maybe closer to another metro station to depart from to go back home and that's why he only bought a one way ticket? I don't know the public transit system for the area.

The sister, I haven't seen much mentioned of her or many comments made by her but her and Andrew did look to be fairly close in age. They also at the time looked to both have a bit of the rock/metal kid thing going on. That would make me think they where either close or the younger looked up to the older. Either way if something going on strange the sibling didn't hear anything.

The church, The parents sound a bit overly religious but opted to let the kids chose on their own and I have seen reports that both kids decided to stop going to church when teenagers. If he was "groomed" and the internet, friends, school and so on mostly ruled out.. Well, I haven't seen anyone bring up his church so far which he would have only stopped going to a year or so before and would have surely put him in close contact with other people. Some that could have known him for the majority of his life.

My last question, he had a good sized bag but do we really know what was in it? What was missing from his room and if nothing missing what was in the bag? Or was he thinking he would be bringing something back with him?
 
Kings Cross is a big station that you can get too from pretty much anywhere, tube, overground or bus.
I think if he was planing to come home via train he would of got a return as it was pence more. It would of been worth him getting back to Kings Cross no matter where in London his "meet up" or reason for going was. But then again I was a teen living an hour away gigging in London often, Andrew wasnt so Street smart but he was clever and surely would of looked into that with the limited money he had.

Getting in, out and around London is pretty expensive, more so then, without the oyster card system.
But I have wondered before if any tube lines were closed that day that would of thrown his plans out of wack hence why he just wandered out of the station.

I feel we haven't heard a ton about his sister is because they seem a very private family and Andrews dad has gone above and beyond throwing himself into the news, most likely so the rest of the family don't have to?

As for the Church goers, I've not seen much on that either but I'm sure the police checked that out as the Andrews father worked there.

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The Missing People choir, which is made up of families with missing loved ones has joined forces with music stars from across the decades including Rick Astley, Chesney Hawkes, Nik Kershaw, Carol Decker, Lesley Garrett, Hayley Tamaddon, Jodie Prenger, Debra Stephenson, Kerry Ellis, Balsamo Deighton and G4 on a charity single which they are hoping the public will get behind.

The original song, ‘I Hope’ was inspired by the words of Kevin Gosden whose son Andrew went missing from Doncaster at the age of 14 in 2007.
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http://www.itv.com/news/calendar/20...e-released-to-fund-search-for-missing-people/
 
Reportedly an unidentified man visited Leominster police station with info on Andrew's disappearance but by the time an officer had come to greet him, the man had gone. Obviously he could've been a time-waster, but I woudn't be too sure about that. A lot of killers have a crisis of conscience after the fact and come close to handing themselves in before self-preservation takes over. This might be a similar case.
 
ekardh said:
Reportedly an unidentified man visited Leominster police station with info on Andrew's disappearance but by the time an officer had come to greet him, the man had gone. Obviously he could've been a time-waster, but I woudn't be too sure about that. A lot of killers have a crisis of conscience after the fact and come close to handing themselves in before self-preservation takes over. This might be a similar case.
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Leominster? Nowhere near Doncaster or London. Weird. And why is there no CCTV in a police station.... of all the places that should have it!
 
CoverMeCagney said:
Leominster? Nowhere near Doncaster or London. Weird. And why is there no CCTV in a police station.... of all the places that should have it!
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I believe the person only spoke through the intercom at the door to the station rather than actually entering it (I am not sure whether it was open and/or manned at the time) so unless CCTV covered the intercom it would not be available. Having said that, it is likely anyone approaching the station may have been caught on other CCTVnearby so you would have thought the police would have looked into whether that was the case.

The father has also said that the family had holidayed in the area, meaning Andrew was at least somewhat familiar with it. So maybe not so odd. However, if he planned on going to Leominster directly the route would be via Stockport, not London. So he must have had a purpose in going to London first.
 
alb1on said:
I believe the person only spoke through the intercom at the door to the station rather than actually entering it (I am not sure whether it was open and/or manned at the time) so unless CCTV covered the intercom it would not be available. Having said that, it is likely anyone approaching the station may have been caught on other CCTVnearby so you would have thought the police would have looked into whether that was the case.

The father has also said that the family had holidayed in the area, meaning Andrew was at least somewhat familiar with it. So maybe not so odd. However, if he planned on going to Leominster directly the route would be via Stockport, not London. So he must have had a purpose in going to London first.
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Maybe the person at the intercom was in fact Andrew? Maybe he wanted to go home but changed his mind at the last minute?
Voices on intercoms can sound very different so I think it's plausible that his voice could have sounded older to the person on the other side of the intercom.


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