Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome back to The Unseen Podcast, a podcast
Speaker 1: dedicated to missing people, unresolved cases, and UK true crime. Today,
Speaker 1: we're looking into the unsolved murder of Brian Hardwick in
Speaker 1: two thousand and one. This crime was devastating and shocking
Speaker 1: for all that knew Brian and his family, including his
Speaker 1: new wife Lynn. Nobody understood why anyone wanted to harm him.
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Speaker 1: for listening, and back to the episode. On the morning
Speaker 1: of Wednesday, November the twenty first, two thousand and one,
Speaker 1: employees at Huddersfield Car Electrical Services Garage on corn Road
Speaker 1: in the town of Huddersfield were beginning to arrive to
Speaker 1: start work. Their colleague, Brian Hardwick, was known as always
Speaker 1: being the first one to arrive and the last one
Speaker 1: to leave, and so that morning they believed would be
Speaker 1: no different. When the employees arrived, though it didn't appear
Speaker 1: to be the same as other mornings. When they entered
Speaker 1: the garage, they immediately spotted Brian slumped on the floor
Speaker 1: next to the vehicles that they would normally be working on.
Speaker 1: It was clear that something awful had happened to Brian,
Speaker 1: and it was evident that he had already passed away
Speaker 1: by the time that he was found. The employees quickly
Speaker 1: contacted West Yorkshire Police to come out to the scene
Speaker 1: and investigate. Brian was fifty at the time that his
Speaker 1: death occurred, and everyone that knew him had something positive
Speaker 1: and nice to say about him. He had a lot
Speaker 1: going for him, and in his personal life, he had
Speaker 1: just started a new beginning with his wife, Lynn, whom
Speaker 1: he had only married six months prior. Lynn discussed Brian
Speaker 1: on a segment on the program Crime Watch. Brian was
Speaker 1: a father of two, and Lynn explained that he was
Speaker 1: a loving, sensitive and hard working man and that his
Speaker 1: friends all thought a lot about him. She stated that
Speaker 1: they had a great social life and every Friday the
Speaker 1: pair would go to a club called the Range Riders.
Speaker 1: At this club, the patrons would dress up in country
Speaker 1: and western gear. They would dance and have a good time.
Speaker 1: Both Brian and Lynn were very passionate about this, so
Speaker 1: much so that when they got married they had a
Speaker 1: Western themed wedding. Brian's colleagues were just as positive about him,
Speaker 1: saying that he was reliable and conscientious and had always
Speaker 1: given everything to the job that he had been working
Speaker 1: in for the last twenty three years. Finding Brian dead
Speaker 1: in the garage must have been a heartbreaking discovery for
Speaker 1: everyone involved. However, when police arrived at the scene, they
Speaker 1: quickly realized that this was not just a case of
Speaker 1: someone passing away from natural causes while at work. Brian
Speaker 1: had clearly been murdered. Police found two gunshot wounds on
Speaker 1: Brian's body, and it was later concluded that he had
Speaker 1: been first shot in the chest, and then when he
Speaker 1: had fallen to the ground, he had then been shot
Speaker 1: in the head. This was completely unfathomable. Why someone had
Speaker 1: wanted to shoot Brian was unknown, as all police could
Speaker 1: find were people who loved and cared about him. It
Speaker 1: didn't appear that he had any known enemies in the world.
Speaker 1: He was a popular man who hadn't had any run
Speaker 1: ins with anyone as far as they could tell. Police
Speaker 1: began looking at the evidence that they did have. They
Speaker 1: found that Brian had been shot with a small caliber weapon,
Speaker 1: a twenty two, and that the scene indicated that the
Speaker 1: motive may indeed have been robbery. A small gray popper
Speaker 1: purse and a brown leather wallet were both missing from
Speaker 1: the scene, although it's been reported that there wasn't much
Speaker 1: in either of these wallets. A set of keys was
Speaker 1: also missing, as well as something sentimental. A gold necklace
Speaker 1: which had one half of a broken heart on it
Speaker 1: had also been taken from around Brian's neck. Lynn had
Speaker 1: the other half, and this itself was hard for her
Speaker 1: to hear as these were very sentimental and meaningful items
Speaker 1: which it seemed strange that someone would want to steal
Speaker 1: from Brian. Detective Superintendent Bob Bridgestock from Calderdale Police was
Speaker 1: put in charge of the investigation and began to look
Speaker 1: into Brian's movements on the evening of the twentieth of November,
Speaker 1: the night before his body was recovered. Brian had been
Speaker 1: at work on Tuesday the twentieth of November as usual
Speaker 1: and had planned to leave at around five thirty pm.
Speaker 1: Before Brian had chanced to leave, however, one of his
Speaker 1: colleagues went out to get in their own car and
Speaker 1: noticed that Brian had a flat tire on his red
Speaker 1: Reynolk Cleo. Brian went out to have a look and
Speaker 1: found that someone had stabbed his tire and that he
Speaker 1: was going to have to try and fix it in
Speaker 1: the garage before he could drive home. This would have
Speaker 1: been an easy fix for someone who was an auto
Speaker 1: engineer like Brian, and wouldn't have taken him long. In hindsight, however,
Speaker 1: after his murder, this punctured tire seems extremely suspicious and
Speaker 1: relevant who had done it and why. In more recent years,
Speaker 1: Lynn had speculated about whether this was someone from the
Speaker 1: area who knew the garage, given that puncturing Brian's tire
Speaker 1: would have meant he was alone in the garage, and
Speaker 1: it appeared that someone may have known this before then
Speaker 1: attacking him. It was an extremely chilling theory, but one
Speaker 1: that nobody could dismiss, given that it does seem like
Speaker 1: a coincidence that he had the punctured tire, meaning he
Speaker 1: left work late. If this hadn't happened, then Brian may
Speaker 1: still be alarmed. Police also had some other evidence to consider.
Speaker 1: While there wasn't much in Brian's wallets themselves, there was
Speaker 1: Brian's cash card and they were able to trace this
Speaker 1: after his murder had taken place. The card was used
Speaker 1: and as a supermarket on Bradford Road around four miles away.
Speaker 1: It was known that around three hundred and fifty pounds
Speaker 1: was taken out of Brian's account that evening, and police
Speaker 1: discovered that the transaction from the account had taken the
Speaker 1: perpetrator or perpetrators around seven minutes to complete. This was
Speaker 1: quite a long time for someone to have spent it
Speaker 1: a cash machine, and it could have showed someone having
Speaker 1: some trouble accessing the account or just being extra careful.
Speaker 1: Lind later commented on the use of Brian's card, stating
Speaker 1: that she believed that Brian would not have fought with
Speaker 1: an attacker and would have complied, saying, I think he
Speaker 1: did volunteer his card and number. He used to say
Speaker 1: that life is more important than possessions and to give
Speaker 1: your possessions if you're robbed. If some one held a
Speaker 1: gun to him, he would have handed over his possessions.
Speaker 1: This begs the question, then why did some one kill
Speaker 1: him if he did volunteer his pin number, and why
Speaker 1: was he shot in the way that he was. He
Speaker 1: was shot in the chest and the head and it
Speaker 1: has been described as almost execution style. This seemed unnecessary,
Speaker 1: and coupled with the punctured tire, implied that for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: Brian had been targeted. Police reached out to the public
Speaker 1: for their help in identifying anything or any one suspicious,
Speaker 1: and for any one who knew anything to come forward.
Speaker 1: They did receive around six calls coming in the week
Speaker 1: end after Brian had been murdered, and this was seen
Speaker 1: as a very positive start. However, it appears that none
Speaker 1: of these calls led to a perpetrator or an arrest.
Speaker 1: It was decided to reach out to crime Watch to
Speaker 1: try and gain some more publicity for the case and
Speaker 1: hopefully get some more leads. The segment aired on the
Speaker 1: fifteenth of May two thousand and two, and the information
Speaker 1: that the police had was shown to the public. It
Speaker 1: included descriptions of two men who had been seen in
Speaker 1: the area around the time that the murder happened. The
Speaker 1: police wanted to eliminate these two men from their inquiry.
Speaker 1: The first man was described as white in his twenties,
Speaker 1: of an average height and a stocky build. He was
Speaker 1: described as having piercing eyes. The photo fit shows the
Speaker 1: man wearing a hat, indicating that this might have been
Speaker 1: what he was wearing that night. There was less information
Speaker 1: about the other sight in. The other man was described
Speaker 1: as black and appearing to be sheltering from the rain
Speaker 1: that was coming down on the night of the murder.
Speaker 1: These sightings were important as they knew that Brian's car
Speaker 1: tire had been punctured and so anyone waiting in the
Speaker 1: area was immediately under suspicion. As well as this, the
Speaker 1: information about the missing items and the bank cauard transactions
Speaker 1: were discussed in the hope that someone had seen the
Speaker 1: belongings or remembered someone taking a long time at that
Speaker 1: cash machine at Asada that night. Crime Watch helped to
Speaker 1: keep Brian's case in the headlines, however, it didn't solve it.
Speaker 1: While there may have been leads that came in about it,
Speaker 1: they did not lead to any arrests or convictions. In
Speaker 1: the months and years that followed, Brian's case was occasionally
Speaker 1: brought up in the headlines, however it seemed to be
Speaker 1: in relation to other shootings taking place. West Yorkshire Police
Speaker 1: in fact, were dealing with quite a few few shootings
Speaker 1: in two thousand and one alone, with twenty one shootings
Speaker 1: taking place that year. While Brian's case was unusual as
Speaker 1: he was an unlikely victim, shootings themselves in the area
Speaker 1: were not years passed, but Brian's wife Lynn did not
Speaker 1: give up on the case and kept in touch with
Speaker 1: police regularly to find out if anything new had been discovered.
Speaker 1: In twenty eighteen, Lynne told the press that the police
Speaker 1: were reviewing Brian's case again, seventeen years after it had occurred.
Speaker 1: She stated that two cold case detectives had visited her
Speaker 1: and explained that they would be reviewing the evidence all
Speaker 1: over again. She said, I was visited by two detectives
Speaker 1: who told me that Brian's case was being looked at again.
Speaker 1: They are going through all the evidence in Brian's case
Speaker 1: right from day one. They have new techniques and forensics
Speaker 1: are a bit better. They may also be reinterviewing people.
Speaker 1: They said that I might not hear from them for six,
Speaker 1: twelve or eighteen months, and that they can't promise anything.
Speaker 1: They said they'd already started to go through everything and
Speaker 1: look at every piece of evidence. I feel quite positive
Speaker 1: Brian hasn't been forgotten. They couldn't promise there would be
Speaker 1: a good outcome. This was a step in the right
Speaker 1: direction for the case. And Lynne has always been open
Speaker 1: and honest about how the murder has affected her, given
Speaker 1: that she had found love and happiness with Brian and
Speaker 1: they'd only been married six months before the murder took place.
Speaker 1: She said, we have missed seventeen years. We didn't even
Speaker 1: have our first Christmas together as man and wife. He
Speaker 1: has just taken from me and his friends. His best
Speaker 1: friend John still talks about him. She also explained that
Speaker 1: she believed someone who knew Brian had committed the murder,
Speaker 1: given that it had taken place at his job and
Speaker 1: that the person could get away and seemingly knew the area.
Speaker 1: She stated he was murdered at his place of work.
Speaker 1: I remember that night because it was dark and raining.
Speaker 1: I will never forget it. Someone who knew the area
Speaker 1: got from the garage to Asda. I think they knew
Speaker 1: the back roads. In two thousand and one, the detectives
Speaker 1: were asking about Brian and saying that nobody had a
Speaker 1: wrong word to say about him. I said they wouldn't
Speaker 1: because he was that sort of bloke. He was cruelly
Speaker 1: taken from us. At the time, police explained that they
Speaker 1: were dedicated to justice for Brian, with Detective Superintendent Jim
Speaker 1: Dunkeley of the Major Investigation Review Team saying, as a
Speaker 1: victim focused organization, our priority is to achieve justice for victims.
Speaker 1: We never close a case until it's solved, and we
Speaker 1: continue to review evidence and look at new advances in
Speaker 1: DNA technology which may help with the investigation. Despite extensive inquiries,
Speaker 1: the murder of Brian Hardwick is a case that remains unsolved.
Speaker 1: Getting justice for a victim's family is a top priority
Speaker 1: for West Yorkshire Police and our commitment and determination doesn't
Speaker 1: waiver as time passes. I would reiterate our appeal for
Speaker 1: anyone with information on his murder to come forward. Has
Speaker 1: been seventeen years since Brian was shot dead, but the
Speaker 1: pain endured by his family hasn't lessened. Allegiances may have
Speaker 1: changed over this time, and I would appeal for anyone
Speaker 1: who has been concealing any information to protect someone else
Speaker 1: to contact detectives. The reinvestigation was certainly a positive step. However,
Speaker 1: since twenty eighteen, there has been no new developments reported
Speaker 1: since then. In six years have now passed. It has
Speaker 1: now been twenty three years since Brian Hardwick was murdered
Speaker 1: at his job, doing something that he loved and was
Speaker 1: dedicated to. If this was a robbery gone wrong, it's
Speaker 1: extremely tragic that whoever did it killed a father and
Speaker 1: a husband for just three hundred and fifty pounds and
Speaker 1: a gold necklace. If this was someone who knew Brian,
Speaker 1: then why did they do it? By everyone's accounts, Brian
Speaker 1: was a loved person who was popular and happy. He
Speaker 1: did not deserve to die the way that he did
Speaker 1: and leave behind so many people who cared about him.
Speaker 1: If you know anything about the murder of Brian Hardwick,
Speaker 1: then please contact police on one oh one. Our crime
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Speaker 1: I'm Caprice and this has been unseen