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When Samantha Bryan was 14 she accidentally made a devastating discovery when googling a list of local crimes for a school assignment.
Given a list of names by their teacher to search, Bryan was shocked to see a photo of herself, aged ten, and her mother alongside a story about a man being described as a ‘cold-hearted child killer’.
“The shock was painful. It was like being thumped in the chest,” she told the Mail Online. A thousand questions ran round in my brain. I didn’t want to be associated with a killer. Was there anything of this monster in me?”
That man is Ian Huntley, the infamous Soham murderer who killed 10-year-olds Hollie Wells and Jessica Chapman in a brutal attack at his house in 2002.
Bryan was aged four at the time of the murders and never met her biological father, after her mother left him when the relationship became abusive and she fell pregnant with Samantha.
Now 18, and her anonymity no longer protected by the courts, Bryan has spoke out in the hopes of proving she is nothing like her father.
“I try not to even say his name, as to do that is to acknowledge his existence,” she said. “I hate him. He’s never been my dad, he’s nothing more than a sperm donor. To know he is genetically connected to me sickens me.”
“I’m speaking out, as I refuse to be ashamed for existing, otherwise I’d become just another of his victims. To acknowledge him as anything else would be to give him a power I will never let him hold over me.”
“I didn’t cause the pain, suffering and anguish he has caused to so many people, although I think of his victims and their families. I feel so terribly sorry for Holly and Jessica’s parents for what he’s done. Especially with young sisters myself. Ever since I found out about the girls I’ve thought about what they must have felt.”
Huntley was sentenced to life in prison on 29 September 2005
