When two police officers came to his family home in Staplehurst in October, Tom Mackelden could have never anticipated the grave news delivered to him.

The 24-year-old from Coxheath, said he felt 'sick' when he learnt that his mother, Tania, was one of David Fuller's victims.

The 67-year-old double murderer, abused more than 100 female corpses between 2008 and November 2020 in Kent and Sussex Hospital, and Tunbridge Wells Hospital while working as a hospital electrician.

An inquiry into how he was able to carry out the heinous acts will run in two parts and is set be completed by the middle of 2023.

Tom lost his mother, Tania Mackelden, in February 2017, aged 48, after after breast cancer spread to her liver, rib cage, bone marrow, spine, and brain.

He said:"I thought of my mum and that she had been violated whilst she was laying there vulnerable unable to fight him off.

"For a long time I couldn’t look at pictures of her as all I saw was his face, I couldn’t sleep I had to have counselling to try and get his image out of my head."

He added: "I’ve had to seek counselling as I was really struggling to sleep and accept what had happened to my lovely mum."

Tom acknowledged that his experience, though dreadful, was just one of many suffered by other families.

He said: "Going to the sentencing and hearing the statements from victims' families was in a weird way quite comforting.

"I realised I wasn’t the only one feeling how I was feeling, and that there were lots of other families who were feeling the exact same way I was.

"They were having the same struggles with sleep and memories as I was."

In a heroic response, Tom has used this as fuel to keep his mothers memory alive, in the run up to a charity foundation ball on April 9.

Tom, who has raised more than £30,000 for cancer research, is set to launch the Tania Mackelden Foundation through a Great Gatsby themed ball.

He said: "The next step for me is the foundation, taking all the negative energy David Fuller has filled me with, and turning it into the driving force behind the Tania Mackelden Foundation and making it a success.

"The foundation is going to help so many families whose lives are being turned upside down by cancer.

"I want to be able to offer them some respite and the opportunity to create life long memories as a family, whether that be by paying for them to go on a weekend away, or a seven night holiday, each experience will be catered to the individual family.

For future projects, Tom added: "I hope to be able to visit oncology centres (Covid depending), hospices and wards to speak to patients, introduce myself and explain what I want to do and why I want to do it.

"I don’t normally feel nervous before events but there seems to be a lot more at stake this time.

"Before I was fundraising for charity now I’m doing things in my mum's name and memory so I need to make sure I do her justice and put on a great night.

"As it stands I have around 80 dinner guests with more coming after dinner for the party.

"I have some performers booked, a DJ and loads of raffle prizes to give away, I’m really looking forward to it.

Tom also added: "I expect it’s going to be an emotional night, it’s my first event for the foundation so I can definitely feel the pressure on my shoulders.

"I hope to raise £1,000 if not more, that’ll give me a good base to approach a family in the near future, as long as everyone has a good time and money gets raised I’ll leave the venue a happy man."

Tom has endeavoured to push the event as much as possible, he said: "I’ve used social media to help promote it and contacted lots of businesses for raffle prizes and luckily they’ve been really generous with donating prizes for the night.

"I’ve been fortunate that local news outlets have been really supportive with helping me spread the word of the ball but more importantly the foundation.

"Social media and news is so powerful and with all the negative events going on in the world at the minute it’s probably refreshing for people to read a positive story in the news.

Tom finally said: "The ball and the foundation means everything to me, I’m desperate for it to be a success and do my mum proud, all I want in life is for my mum to be looking down on me and beaming with pride."

The ball takes place on Saturday April, 9, at the The Weald Of Kent Golf Club from from 6.45pm. Tickets, £45, available at the events Facebook page.