The Story of Sarah Payne: Every Parent’s Nightmare

Sarah Payne

It is every parent’s worst nightmare come to life. Your children are outside playing, they are with others, and it should be safe. There is no way that an inconceivable atrocity beyond thought could happen to them. Unfortunately, this is what happened to eight-year-old Sarah Payne on the 1st of July 2000. Young Sarah had been playing with her siblings Luke, Lee, and Charlotte in a cornfield close to her grandfather’s house.

According to reports, she had run back towards her grandfather’s house when she was grabbed and forcibly abducted by a man in a white van. Later, her brother Lee’s damning testimony about the van helped convict the monster that kidnapped and murdered her.

It was Lee that saw him driving past in his white van, manic smile on his face while waving at him. Little did he know that his sister was trapped inside. It was a moment in time that would haunt him for the rest of his life, even though there was nothing he could have done to save…