Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome back to The Unseen Podcast, a podcast
Speaker 1: dedicated to missing people, unresolved cases, and UK true crime.
Speaker 1: Today is day seven of twelve days of missing person
Speaker 1: episodes throughout December. This episode covers the disappearance of Sergic
Speaker 1: core Man in nineteen seventy six. It's remained a mystery
Speaker 1: since it happened. The fact that so much time has
Speaker 1: gone by makes this case more difficult to investigate, however,
Speaker 1: not impossible. Her case has had some fresh publicity this
Speaker 1: year and I believe it to be very important to cover.
Speaker 1: This episode is about a missing person case and so
Speaker 1: does not contain any descriptions of violence. However, listener discretion
Speaker 1: is always advised. The city of Birmingham has historically been
Speaker 1: a hub of migration throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
Speaker 1: due to the Industrial Revolution and the large amount of
Speaker 1: job opportunities that were available during this time. Post war,
Speaker 1: during the nineteen sixties and nineteen seventies, immigration from areas
Speaker 1: which during that time were called the New Commonwealth began
Speaker 1: to increase. This included many people from the Caribbean in Asia,
Speaker 1: namely India and Pakistan. This is reflected within the diverse
Speaker 1: nature of Birmingham today and its heritage in Asian cuisine
Speaker 1: and culture. During the nineteen seventies, Sergik korp Man and
Speaker 1: her family migrated from India to Birmingham for many of
Speaker 1: the reasons that lots of other immigrants had settled there.
Speaker 1: Sergei was a teenager when she arrived in the UK,
Speaker 1: and by all accounts, she was described as an outstanding
Speaker 1: student who gained a place to study maths at Birmingham University.
Speaker 1: She was making fantastic progress with her studies and was
Speaker 1: known to be a very hard worker. She was also
Speaker 1: described as being reserved and sensible. The move to Birmingham
Speaker 1: was certainly something that the family appeared to be benefiting from.
Speaker 1: On September eighteenth, nineteen seventy six, Sergeant made the decision
Speaker 1: to accompany her brother and sister in law on their
Speaker 1: trip to France. They decided to do a road trip
Speaker 1: around the country, and in the days that followed they
Speaker 1: made their way to the south of France. By September
Speaker 1: twenty second, four days into their trip, they made their
Speaker 1: way to a beach. The group were having a fantastic
Speaker 1: time and Sergeant, who was twenty especially enjoyed the experience.
Speaker 1: She reportedly made friends with three women who she met
Speaker 1: on the beach. Serget's brother and sister in law made
Speaker 1: the choice to go home two days later, on the
Speaker 1: twenty fourth of September. When they presented Sergeant with this plan,
Speaker 1: she decided that she didn't want to return home with
Speaker 1: them and that she wanted to stay a bit longer
Speaker 1: to do some sight seeing. She chose to delay her
Speaker 1: return back to the UK until the twenty seventh of September.
Speaker 1: They didn't seem to be anything unusual or odd about
Speaker 1: this request, as Sergeant was twenty years old and a
Speaker 1: university student who wanted to experience the world and visit
Speaker 1: new places. Sergi's brother and sister in law left on
Speaker 1: the twenty fourth as planned and went back to the UK,
Speaker 1: expecting that they would wait for Sergeant when she returned
Speaker 1: on the twenty seventh. The twenty seventh of September arrived,
Speaker 1: but instead of Sergeant back home, the family received something else. Instead.
Speaker 1: It was a phone call. The phone call was made
Speaker 1: by a woman who called herself Jane. This woman gave
Speaker 1: the family some horrific news, told them that Sergeant had
Speaker 1: drowned on a beach and that she wouldn't be coming back.
Speaker 1: This must have been an awful phone call to receive,
Speaker 1: as well as being very confusing. Who was this Jane
Speaker 1: and how did she know that Sergeant had drowned? How
Speaker 1: did she know to contact them? And why had the
Speaker 1: police not spoken to them about this? This would have
Speaker 1: seemed like a random phone call if not for the
Speaker 1: fact that Sergeant hadn't returned when she said she was
Speaker 1: going to, and she did not return in the days,
Speaker 1: months or years after either. It was as though Sergeant
Speaker 1: had disappeared into thin air. A description of Sergeant was
Speaker 1: distributed in the hope that someone would remember her, either
Speaker 1: in France or the UK. She was described as being
Speaker 1: slim build, around five feet one inches tall, with long,
Speaker 1: straight black hair, and she possibly would glasses which were
Speaker 1: silver and hexagonal. She is also believed to have worn
Speaker 1: a stainless steel, multi colored pendant, silver bangle, and wore
Speaker 1: size ten to twelve clothes. At the time in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy six, tracing people was extremely difficult and investigators seemed
Speaker 1: to do what they could with the information, but they
Speaker 1: were unable to trace whether the phone call to the
Speaker 1: family had been made or who might have made it.
Speaker 1: There seemed to be no trace of Sergeant then or
Speaker 1: during the time after nineteen seventy six. It wasn't until
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three when PC Sean Reeve from West Midlands
Speaker 1: Police opened up Sergeant's unsolved case and began to look
Speaker 1: through it. He was interested in Sergeant's disappearance and decided
Speaker 1: to explore everything that he could with fresh eyes almost
Speaker 1: fifty years after she went missing. He tried to find
Speaker 1: any proof of life for Sergeant, including looking through police records,
Speaker 1: doctors records, hospital admissions and phone book records. They looked
Speaker 1: to see if she had a presence on social media
Speaker 1: and also liaise with the National Crime Agency. PC Reeve
Speaker 1: said anything that anyone could think of in terms of
Speaker 1: proof of life we covered. We've made hundreds of inquiries
Speaker 1: with the hope that she's alive, that she started a
Speaker 1: new life elsewhere. Inquiries have taken us to countries around
Speaker 1: the world. We know she hasn't contacted family since if
Speaker 1: she has passed away, we are very much relying on DNA,
Speaker 1: relying on the body to be recovered, but that hasn't
Speaker 1: been done yet. The other thing that hindered the West
Speaker 1: Midlands Investigation was the fact that the only picture they
Speaker 1: had of Sergeant was a black and white photocopy of her,
Speaker 1: which was such a poor quality that they could barely
Speaker 1: make out any features. In twenty twenty four, pc Reeve
Speaker 1: reached out to Serget's family, her brothers and her nephew,
Speaker 1: who provided him with the clearer image of Sergeant to distribute.
Speaker 1: Pc Reeve said it was terrible quality. It was really
Speaker 1: grainy and looked nothing like her, but it was the
Speaker 1: image we had and there was little we could do
Speaker 1: to retrieve new photos as this was going back to
Speaker 1: the seventies. By putting this enhanced photo out, we're hoping
Speaker 1: someone who recognizes Sergeant will trigger old memories in people
Speaker 1: who knew her. It's clear that pc Reeve feels very
Speaker 1: passionately about Sergeant's case and wants her to be found
Speaker 1: after all these years. He said, Sergeant's case has remained
Speaker 1: unsolved for nearly fifty years. One of my main goals
Speaker 1: is to make as many people aware of it as possible.
Speaker 1: This is one of West Midland Police's longest unsolved cases
Speaker 1: and while we don't know what happened to Sergeant, she
Speaker 1: deserves to have people looking for her. My aim is
Speaker 1: to bring that closure to her remaining family. So much
Speaker 1: time has passed with Sergeant still missing. She would be
Speaker 1: sixty nine years old now if she was still alive,
Speaker 1: and so if she has chosen to make a new
Speaker 1: life for herself, those that knew her may not know
Speaker 1: that she's even missing. She will have changed a lot
Speaker 1: since then. However, someone may recognize some features or some
Speaker 1: aspects of her story. Is there any truth to the
Speaker 1: story that Sergeant drowned on a beach? Or was this
Speaker 1: a hoax call? If it was, why was it made?
Speaker 1: There are so many aspects of the case we don't
Speaker 1: know about, but like PC Reeve, I believe her story
Speaker 1: is so important to be told. If you know anything
Speaker 1: about the disappearance of Sergeic kor Man, please contact the
Speaker 1: Missing People Charity using the link in the show notes,
Speaker 1: or contact the Missing Person's Investigation Unit on zero one
Speaker 1: two one six two six seven zero zero three. Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to day seven of twelve Days of
Speaker 1: Missing Person episode in December. Stay tuned for day eight
Speaker 1: in a couple of days. If you'd like to support
Speaker 1: the podcast further, then you can on Patreon and contribute
Speaker 1: to exclusive polls to get extra bonus episodes every month.
Speaker 1: You can also get access to new episodes early in
Speaker 1: ad free. You can use the link in the show
Speaker 1: notes to visit Patreon and see what we offer. You
Speaker 1: can also support us by reviewing the podcast wherever you listen,
Speaker 1: including Spotify, and also just share the episodes as our ways.
Speaker 1: I'm Caprice and this has been Unseen eight