A DAD who found the torso of a young boy floating in the Thames after an apparent “witchcraft ritual” has spoken of the trauma – as a killer remains on the loose 25 years on.
Aidan Minter was walking across Tower Bridge to a work meeting on September 21, 2001 when he made a grim discovery that changed his life.
Cops believe the still unidentified boy – thought to be around age five – was from Nigeria and had been trafficked to the UK before being murdered as part of a ritual sacrifice.
However, despite a number of arrests and tip-offs over the years, no one has ever been charged and what happened has never been cleared up.
The boy, later named “Adam” by detectives, had been decapitated and his arms and legs removed before being dumped in the water wearing orange girls’ shorts.
Aidan, from Billericay, Essex, now 55, told The Sun: “There’s lots of unanswered questions about the crime itself.”
SUZY RIDDLE
Who is Mr Kipper? Chilling clues in hunt one of UK’s most notorious killers
DARING STING
How genius ‘bottle trap’ nailed killer behind ‘painful & terrifying’ cold case
He added: “You hope that with advances in technology and maybe AI can be incorporated to help figure out what happened.
“It’s one of the more ghastly crimes in the UK and it’s captured the limelight because of how gruesome it was.”
Dad-of-two Aidan had welcomed his first child, a daughter, the year before, and it was just days after the 9/11 attacks in the US.
He recalled how London was still in shock and as he headed to a creative meeting in Butlers Wharf that Friday afternoon, there was almost no one else around.
At first, he thought “Adam” was a barrel and then a tailor’s dummy.
“On a Friday afternoon at 10 past four that bridge is normally packed with people leaving work early, but there was nobody on that bridge other than myself,” he said.
“That was spooky, not having anyone else around to say ‘have I just seen what I think I’ve just seen float under the bridge?’
“It was just really eerie.”
He went on to describe: “I spotted what looked like wreckage in the middle of the Channel, as it’s coming into London.
“It looked almost like a bin or a beer barrel – there was a length of wood, about 4ft in length, about six inches wide.
“It just looked like one of those things that take trash up and down London on the river.
“As it got closer and closer, I could see there was something attached to it, which were the shorts.
“I thought by then it was a tailor’s dummy, there was an indentation.”
He continued: “As it got closer, there was a pallet and it was upended and seesawing up and down out of the water and I remember thinking at the time ‘if that hit a prop on a boat, it’s going to do some serious damage’.”
‘Adam’ – the torso in the Thames
The torso of a young boy was found in the Thames on September 21 2001, and would become known as “Adam” by investigators.
Police believe he was likely from Nigeria and had been trafficked to the UK for a ritual sacrifice.
Nobody has ever been charged with his murder and Adam’s identity remains unknown.
The child was found with his head, arms and legs having been removed, and wearing a pair of girls’ orange shorts.
A post-mortem showed he had been poisoned, and his throat slit to drain the blood from his body.
Through study of the minerals in his bones and the contents of his stomach, experts were able to determine Adam had only been in the UK a few days or weeks before his death.
Detectives believe he was, on examination of his blood, from a region of southwestern Nigeria near Benin City – the birthplace of voodoo.
The initial police appeal only received small publicity and interest due to the proximity to the 9/11 terror attacks.
However, the following year former President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, made a public appeal requesting information broadcast across all of Africa.
Met detectives travelled to Africa on numerous occasions, and multiple arrests have been made over the years – though no one has ever been charged.
At one stage, Joyce Osiagede alleged that she had cared for the boy in Germany before handing him to a man who took him to the UK.
However, her accounts were differing, with several names given for the boy, and with police ultimately having doubts over her mental state.
She has since died.
Despite the lack of closure, the Met Police says the publicity surrounding the case has acted as a deterrent for further ritual crimes in the UK.
Aidan said the object was “travelling at quite a speed” and, leaning over the railings, he could see at around 20ft away there was “a spine sticking out of the neck area, and the arm bone on the upper right shoulder”.
“That’s when I realised it’s not a tailor’s dummy, it’s in fact the torso of a small boy or young man”.
He continued: “I saw the damage around Adam’s neck. His upper arms had been completely removed, it was the left shoulder had been completely removed at the shoulder, but the right one had about three inches of bone sticking out of it.
“Then the neck area was just jagged flesh and you could see the spine, but the knees, you couldn’t see anything because of the fabric where the lower leg part was was just sort of flapping.
“Both his legs had been taken well above the knee as well.”
Standing there in shock on the east side of the bridge facing south, Aidan dialled 999 on his mobile phone and was transferred to the river police.
He said he told them: “I’ve just seen the body of a small man or a young child float under Tower Bridge.”
The call handler said they’d send police down to the scene.
Aidan tried to keep his eyes on the torso and as he stood up on the blue railings he could see a tourist boat coming down the middle of the channel.
“It was called Millennium of Freedom, one of those big open top boats,” he explained.
He spotted “Adam” about 150 yards downstream and told the police the address.
A CID officer then came out to take a statement and he later got a call to confirm police had recovered the remains of someone from the water.
“They did offer me counselling, I declined it,” said Aidan.
“I didn’t think I needed it. I went home, that was the Friday evening. Then the story started to come out over the coming days.”
With 2026 being a landmark anniversary of the still unsolved case, Aidan said he hopes by speaking out he can help bring more witnesses forward.
“If it jogs someone’s memory and moves the case forward in any way I’m happy to help,” he said.
Referring to “Adam”, Aidan said: “It is sad, he was only about five. He had a personality, he had his own dreams and aspirations, dare I say, of what he wanted to be when he grew up. It would never come to bare.”
He said he hopes that advancements in technology, like artificial intelligence, could help finally move the case along.
“The cost of everything for the police over the years, I imagine has been huge, all the different tech,” he said.
“But it’s been 25 years, you wonder how much can they find out?”
Aidan has since been diagnosed with acute PTSD.
“It’s not directly related to what I saw,” he said. “It was a trigger, it wasn’t the thing itself, seeing the body… it’s the other things that were related to that, feeling helpless that I couldn’t help him at the time, he was way beyond help.”
Aidan said it went on to bring up traumas from his past.
He explained: “Your brain compartmentalises it and puts it away somewhere and something else will happen and then that will be the trigger for setting another thing off which could’ve happened 10 years before.”
Aidan added: “I don’t dwell on it, it’s one of those things that happen to a very small minority of people.
“It’s one of those things that happens to certain people, an extremely small minority. Closure on it would be great.”
Asked if using AI technology to help solve the case is being considered by detectives, a Met Police spokesperson told The Sun: “I’m afraid that’s not something we would comment or speculate on.”
In a statement, the force said: “This case is currently held by our Cold Case Homicide team, who deal with non-recent unsolved homicides.
“This is an active investigation, and has been subject to regular review, but the team has not received any significant new information.
“No unsolved case is ever closed, and anyone who wishes to share information with the police about this case is asked to contact officers via 101, quoting Operation Swalcliffe.
“Alternatively, information can be provided to Crimestoppers 100 per cent anonymously on 0800 555 111.”
Do you know more? Email ryan.merrifield@thesun.co.uk
Read the full article here