The Tragic Life Of Preston Davey: “Was it you?”
5/8/202634 min
In this episode we have the words of Jamie Varley as he denied abusing and murdering the baby boy he adopted. In a series of police interviews we’re bringing you today he says photos and videos the prosecution say are cruel or indecent were “totally innocent.” He also denied having any sexual interest in Preston and he said he did not kill him. But the jury also heard evidence that Preston had 45 bruises on his body, and he did not die from drowning in a bath, as Jamie Varley claimed.
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Presenter: Caroline Cheetham and Richard Marsden
Actor: Sarah Gee
Producer: Chelsey Ranore
Editor: Chelsey Ranore
Creative Director: Caroline Cheetham
Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini
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The Trial series uses actors and some voices generated by AI. Their words are taken as verbatim from the official court transcript.
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSpeaker 0· Soundbite0:00
[knocking] The Crime Desk, arresting podcasts.
Caroline Cheetham· Host0:05
Welcome to The Trial UK: The Tragic Life of Preston Davey. I'm Caroline Cheatham.
Richard Marsden· Host0:11
And I'm Richard Marsden.
Caroline Cheetham· Host0:13
A big welcome to you, Richard. First time on the podcast, and that's because Liz is away on yet another celebration for a bit of a big birthday, which we won't discuss, 'cause we're too polite. But you're kind enough to take her place for today, and this is Friday, that we're recording this on Friday morning. Now, we should say you're able to do this because you've, of course, been covering this trial as one of the northern correspondents for the Daily Mail. So you and I have both been in court this week, and it's been busy.
Richard Marsden· Host0:45
Thanks for having me, Caroline, and yes, it's been a busy week. Now, we should say what we're hearing is still the prosecution case. We know Jamie Varley and John McGowan-Forzakali both deny the charges against them, but the defense case is yet to start. So for the moment, we're still hearing about what the prosecution say is the case against them.
Caroline Cheetham· Host1:05
Yeah, a quick reminder on that. Jamie Varley is charged with murder and with abuse, and John McGowan-Forzakali is charged with cruelty, abuse, and causing or allowing the death of Preston Davey. Now, the allegation is these two men adopted Preston when he was a few months old, and they subjected him to abuse before Jamie Varley allegedly killed him. Now, since