‘They made him a hero and forgot about his victims’
Vicky Foster. Picture by Neil Holmes Photography
When Steven Gallant tackled a terrorist on London Bridge last year he was hailed a hero and granted a Royal Pardon - reducing the sentence he was serving for the murder of Barrie Jackson in Hull in 2005. Mr Jackson’s ex-partner Vicky Foster will examine the concept of heroes in a BBC Radio 4 documentary, Can I Talk About Heroes?, to be broadcast next week. Here, she writes exclusively for The Hull Story about the show and the issues it raises
I learned a long time ago that heroes aren’t always what they’re cracked up to be. That if you get too close, you might see something behind a headline or a uniform or a two-minute video that you don’t like.
I know I’m not alone in this. People’s perceptions of heroism are changing.
Nevertheless, I was drawn in by images of a man on London Bridge last November, tackling an armed terrorist with a narwhal tusk.
It appeared to be a clear-cut case of good triumphing over evil; a physical, decisive, spur-of-the-moment act that saved lives and brought to life a mythical creature. A light in the middle of a tragic event. A video to share on social media, show to your friends and then forget about.
That’s exactly what I did, but then in January this year word came to me, from a local journalist, that the hero I’d admired in those videos last November was actually one of the men who murdered Barrie Jackson, the father of my children, back in 2005.
It was a strange bit of information to process, especially as it came on the day the news was announced that I’d been shortlisted for an award for an audio drama I’d written about that murder and the effect it has had on my family.
I tried to brush it off at first; get on with other things. The past is the past and there’s nothing I can do about it. But it wasn’t that simple.
Steven Gallant said in his statement to the Press that “when you go to prison, you lose control of your life”. Now, I’ve never been to prison, having never committed any major crimes, but I know that feeling all too well.
‘When extreme violence enters your life, everything is shattered’
In fact, Gallant was one of the people who had taken away my control over my own life; first in 2005 and then again with that statement and all the publicity he received. You see, when extreme violence enters your life, everything you think you know is shattered. Everything becomes harder.
There is very rarely only one victim in a homicide case. Victim Support uses the term ‘co-victims’ to describe the relatives of the person who loses their life. Their report, Living with Loss, details the emotional, psychological, physical and financial toll homicide takes on co-victims, as well as the stress placed on their relationships.
I read that report this year and it had a profound effect on me. It detailed all the things I’ve experienced over the last fifteen years, that I still live with every day, and that my children have grown up to experience too.
It had never been explained to me that these things were expected consequences of what had happened. The National Homicide Service, set up in 2009, didn’t exist when Barrie was murdered, and I’d never heard of them until I started Googling this year.
They’re now providing me with the trauma therapy I wish I could have had back in 2005. The child work they offer, though, is not appropriate anymore; my children having grown into young men by now. That report was a difficult read for me, but it offered some hope; the National Homicide Service does exist now and they’re doing amazing work.
But also on the Victim Support website is the Make It Right For Victims manifesto they published last year, which states: “There is growing evidence that the current state of victims’ rights in the criminal justice process falls far short of what is needed and what victims deserve.
“As many as six in ten victims do not receive their entitlements under the Victims’ Code; rights that entitle victims to support, information and respect from criminal justice agencies. Too often the criminal justice system does not deliver victims their rights and lets them down.
“There needs to be a legal and cultural change in how victims’ rights are treated, so that they move from a ‘nice to have’ to rights that criminal justice agencies must deliver.”
‘My MP raised this with the Prime Minister, but we were never consulted, never informed’
I could not agree with this statement more. Throughout the course of this year my children and myself have been hugely impacted by the coverage of Steven Gallant in the news, and despite letters from my MP Dame Diana Johnson, explaining this to members of the government - including Boris Johnson - we have had no contact or consideration in their processes whatsoever.
Gallant no doubt helped save lives on London Bridge last year, but he has also caused lifelong damage to myself and my family.
There’s been a lot of talk on social media this year about whether Barrie deserved what Gallant did to him, having been accused and convicted of violent crimes himself. I don’t think this should need saying, but just for the record, nobody deserves what they did to him, and a civilised society shouldn’t even have to ask the question.
I find it difficult to understand how one violent man can be held up as an example of what rehabilitation can do, while it’s suggested that another deserved to meet with the brutal murder that man committed. Logic alone means those two things cannot both be true.
Barrie caused us great distress before he died, but negative plus negative does not, in this case, make positive. It just makes more distress and trauma that we’ve had to work through. Myself and my boys definitely did not and do not deserve that, or the added trauma that this year of news has caused us.
Heroes are a complicated concept, and it’s fair to say that I have had a lot of questions about them this year. I cried the first time people came out on their doorsteps and clapped for key workers, even though I’m not one myself. It felt like an acknowledgement that not all acts of heroism are visible or appreciated.
I cried again when Black Lives Matter protesters toppled a statue of Edward Colston in Bristol, despite not being black myself. That felt like people pushing back against the heroes that are thrust upon them and setting the record straight.
I’m privileged that I’ve been given a platform to speak about these issues in two Radio 4 programmes, in published work and on stage. It’s a privilege most people in my position won’t have.
In 2018, 732 people died from homicide in England and Wales. For each of those victims, there will typically be between two and ten close family members who will be severely enough affected to be termed co-victims.
Most of those co-victims will experience lifelong damage as a result, and many of them will feel voiceless and unrepresented in the criminal justice system and the media.
‘Co-victims of murder face a daily struggle with little support’
They are my heroes; the ones whose lives are a daily struggle and challenge; who had no choice about the circumstances forced upon them; whose lives will be harder on every level because of what has happened to them – what has been done to them.
Others among my heroes include those who work and campaign to help victims; the trauma therapists, Victim Support, and people like Jacquie Johnston-Lynch who help save the lives of addicts by engaging them in recovery processes (co-victims of homicide are twice as likely as victims of other crimes to develop problems with drug and alcohol abuse).
Turning your life around is an amazingly brave, heroic thing to do, and if Steven Gallant has done that, then he deserves respect for it. But five minutes on London Bridge would not be proof. It’s an ongoing battle that many people will never have to understand or acknowledge. I think we should be talking about it more. That’s one of the reasons why in this show, I’m asking Can I Talk About Heroes?
Can I Talk About Heroes? will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 at 8pm on Tuesday, December 22, and repeated at 5pm on Sunday, December 27