When pregnant Debbie Griggs disappeared from her home in Deal in May 1999, suspicion soon fell on her husband, Andrew Griggs. But it took more than 20 years for him to be convicted of her murder.

On the 25th anniversary of her disappearance, reporter Rhys Griffiths speaks to detectives who helped to bring her killer to justice and solve the mystery of the fate of her remains…

It was October 5, 2022, and DCI Neil Kimber was looking on as the careful, methodical excavation of the garden of a family home in Dorset began to reveal the answer to a question which had remained unanswered for more than two decades: where is the body of Debbie Griggs?

Acting on fresh information more than 23 years after her disappearance, a team of around 20 investigators from Kent Police had, with skill and patience, painstakingly uncovered the remains of the murdered mother-of-three – buried in a barrel-like container in the grounds of the home which had belonged to her killer, husband Andrew Griggs.

The recovery of Debbie’s body, positively identified at a post-mortem examination nine days after being uncovered in the grounds of the property in St Leonards, represented another significant milestone in a case which began 25 years ago today when she disappeared from the family home in Deal on May 5, 1999.

It would be more than 20 years before Andrew Griggs was finally convicted of her murder and sentenced to life imprisonment, justice delayed but finally achieved after years of work by cold case detectives determined to see her killer held accountable for his evil deeds.

Speaking to KentOnline ahead of today’s anniversary, DCI Kimber explained how cases such as that of the murder of Debbie Griggs are never truly closed while any hope of bringing a perpetrator to justice remains.

“I think we have always got to look at what is your role as a police officer? Your role is to get justice for someone,” DCI Kimber said.

“I always look at it from this perspective - if you gave a family the opportunity to investigate, how tenacious would they be? They wouldn’t give up, would they?

“That's basically what you're doing, you're just substituting yourself, doing everything you can. I always think of it in terms of if the family were here, they would be going the extra mile.”

Frustratingly for detectives involved in both the initial investigation in 1999, and in subsequent reviews of the case, there was never any doubt in their minds that Andrew Griggs was the killer. But with no body recovered, and the slightest possibility remaining that Debbie might still be alive, it was for many years concluded that the evidence was not sufficient to bring her husband to trial.

Alan Davies, now retired from Kent Police, was a detective who carried out regular reviews of the case in the years following Debbie’s disappearance. He says officers were convinced from the outset that Andrew Griggs was responsible for his wife’s murder.

“I think very quickly afterwards, from what I've read in the original investigation, the police were not happy with his accounts,” Mr Davies told KentOnline.

“And as the days progressed they became more and more unhappy with his account.

“Debbie was a young woman, she had three young children, she was 18 weeks pregnant, approximately, and she just disappeared. She'd made arrangements to see people the next day and it was completely out of character.

“I think the police at that time were pretty certain that she was dead and that he killed her.

“But we couldn't prove that. That's the frustrating part. You know someone has killed somebody but you can't quite get to that stage where you can get the evidence to charge.”

It wasn’t until 24 hours after the 34-year-old went ‘missing’ that her husband called Kent Police to report her disappearance from their home in Cross Road.

He calmly told the operator: "She's suffering from depression, um, postnatal depression, um, we've got three little boys and she's just wound up too much.

"She is pregnant as well, she's been under the doctor for depression, um, for a while."

Officers who attended the house in Cross Road noted Griggs appeared calm, despite his wife being reportedly missing for more than a day.

"When we asked why it was so late that he reported it to us, he said his wife had gone missing on previous occasions and returned unharmed," a PC who spoke to Griggs that night later told a court in a statement.

Griggs' suggestion to police that his wife had a habit of "going walkabouts" meant that initially the expectation would have been that she could still be found alive.

Looking back on Griggs’ interactions with police following his wife’s disappearance, Mr Davies believes he was being very deliberate in his portrayal of her mental state.

He said: “He was being quite clever in what he was saying. He was trying to portray that she was depressed, he was sort of suggesting that she'd left because of issues with the kids.

“He was being very clever in what he was trying to do. And it was quite hard at that time to try and work around that.”

Appeals were issued for information about Debbie’s whereabouts, and just days after she went missing her car – a white Peugeot 309 – was found abandoned little more than a mile from the family home.

Debbie’s blood was recovered from the vehicle, but no further trace of her was found. Her bank accounts sat dormant and she did not interact with the health service or social security.

It left detectives in the initial investigation struggling to determine if Debbie could still be alive.

Mr Davies said: “Because it was only a short period of time, you couldn't be certain that she was actually dead.

“Of course, in 1999 we didn’t have smartphones, we didn't have all the CCTV coverage, there were all the things that weren't available then that are now to help us out.

“You couldn't quite cross that line to say there was sufficient evidence to say a murder had taken place, and he was still maintaining that she'd walked out on him.”

Although there was a lack of sufficient evidence giving a reasonable expectation of convicting Griggs and allowing the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to authorise charges, it emerged there was a clear motive for wanting Debbie off the scene.

She had learned her husband was involved in a relationship with a 15-year-old girl, and she did not seem willing to cover up for him.

The couple at the time ran Griggs Freezer Centre in South Street, Deal, and it is believed he feared he could lose half if she divorced him over the involvement with the teenager. Days before Debbie vanished, Griggs set their joint business bank account up in just his name.

“Most people who are murdered, we tend to find their bodies,” Mr Davies said.

“It's unusual that we don't find the body. And there's always that doubt within the CPS’ mind, are they still alive?

“The last thing they would want is to charge somebody, get them convicted on circumstantial evidence and then someone to walk in through the door. So they always like to be cautious.

“But I think, from my memory, at that point we weren't very far off crossing the line but we just couldn't quite get to the line.”

It was not until 2019 that Griggs – who had remarried and moved with his sons to Dorset – was finally charged and put on trial accused of murdering his wife and disposing of her body.

A statement from Senior Crown Prosecutor Nigel Pilkington in March 2019 said: “In December 2018, the Crown Prosecution Service received a file of evidence from Kent Police relating to an allegation of murder against Andrew Griggs.

“Following a review of the evidence, we have authorised Kent Police to charge Mr Griggs with the murder of his wife, Debbie Griggs, in 1999."

The decision to finally bring charges was the result of evolving case law in cases where the body of the deceased had not been found, and the ‘proof of life’ investigations which cold case detectives used to show that there was overwhelming evidence that Debbie was not alive.

At the trial, prosecutor Duncan Atkinson KC argued that the concealing of the whereabouts of Debbie’s body was "the most aggravating factor" of the case.

A jury at Canterbury Crown Court found Griggs guilty in October 2019, with a judge accusing the sailor of dumping Debbie's body at sea.

In his sentencing remarks, Mr Justice Spencer told him: "Only you know how you killed her and where you disposed of her body.

"The jury convicted you on the most compelling circumstantial evidence.

"You told lie after lie in the witness box, just as you did at the time of Debbie’s disappearance, to her family, her friends and to the police, and just as you have for the past 20 years."

​​Mr Davies accepted there was a rational case for arguing that Griggs could have disposed of his wife’s body at sea, but he said that doing so would have been to give up control over her remains. While Griggs was able to conceal her whereabouts he was able to deny to police the vital evidence which he feared would lead to his conviction.

DCI Kimber said: “It was always believed that she may have been lost out at sea.

“So to all intents and purposes, the family and the wider public are thinking she's out to sea somewhere, never to be found.

“But actually what we do find out eventually is that Andrew Griggs knew exactly where she was every minute of every day, and had that total control on it.

“I think he had a belief that if we never found Debbie he would never get convicted. I think that's probably what he was thinking straight off the bat.

“But the evidence was strong enough to obviously convict him, and rightfully so as well.

“And I think that's the real interest that the public have to have, is to say yes, he's serving life for the murder of Debbie Griggs, and now surely you knew where she was for all that time and you did nothing. You said nothing. Still haven't said anything. But actually, you should be held to account for that.”

Mr Justice Spence sentenced Griggs to life in prison with a minimum term of 20 years, telling him: “You have shown no remorse whatsoever. True remorse would have been shown only by a guilty plea and by disclosure of where you concealed the body."

Perhaps the cruellest consequence of Griggs’ continued refusal to accept his guilt was the impact on his three sons, who even after he was jailed continued to believe he was innocent and cling to hope their mum was still alive.

Griggs even attempted to overturn his conviction, but his appeal was rejected in July of 2022.

Just five months later Debbie’s remains would be found buried in the garden of the Dorset home he had moved to with their three boys just two years after she disappeared.

DCI Kimber oversaw the excavation and recalls how, as officers broke ground, he was sure the container uncovered by his team held Debbie’s remains.

“I was convinced at that point,” he said.

“There would be no reason for that to be in the ground there at that place if it did not have her in it.”

Kent Police has declined to reveal the source of the information that led to the discovery of Debbie’s remains, which were matched to her by teeth fragments.

Despite extensive tests, pathologists were unable to determine how Griggs had murdered her because of the level of decomposition of her body.

Both DCI Kimber and Mr Davies reflect on the conviction of Andrew Griggs and the recovery of Debbie’s remains as successful outcomes for the cold case team that continued to review the investigation over a period of more than two decades.

They also believe it sends a message to perpetrators of historic offences that justice can still be done after the passing of many years.

Mr Davies said: “Certainly, as a cold case detective at the time, it's very satisfying because you have righted a wrong.

“In Debbie Griggs’ case we could show to the family that Andrew Griggs has killed her, beyond all reasonable doubt, because the jury found him guilty.

“All the thought processes over the years were right, we were all right, but we just couldn't quite cross that line.

“It’s a success for the whole cold case team, and all the people involved, and just shows how good the cold case teams are and how valuable they are to not only Kent Police but all the other police forces, because it brings closure for so many families.

“Just because it happened 20 years ago, or 30 years ago, it doesn't mean you can't solve it, because we can. We can get there in the end.

“It's been a very long, detailed investigation covering many years. There are so many bits to it, it's very hard, but we've got closure for Debbie's family. Ultimately it's about justice and that's what we've achieved with this one.”