Shannon mum’s secret sex with kidnapper
Matthews two-timed Craig with weirdo
EVIL Karen Matthews had a sick SECRET AFFAIR with the misfit who helped kidnap her daughter Shannon, we can reveal today.
The twisted mum seduced sinister Michael Donovan at the FUNERAL of her pervert partner Craig Meehan's dad.
And during their squalid sex sessions the vile pair spawned the plot to fake Shannon's disappearance and claim a £50,000 reward for finding her.
The shocking revelations are made by Craig's sister Amanda Hyett-who lived next door to Matthews' house from hell and witnessed the slob's sordid life close up.
"She deserves all she gets," says Amanda, 26. "I hate her and my uncle Donovan for what they did. They should rot in hell.
"She even cheated on my brother after getting off with Donovan at our Dad's funeral. That's what she's like.
"And she never loved Shannon one bit. The poor kid would be stuck in her room most of the time while she kept an open house, partying with any t*sser off the street who turned up with a tin of beer in his hand."
Escape
As Matthews, 33, and Donovan, 39, face jail for Shannon's kidnap in February, Amanda's testimony opens the door on the monster mum-of-seven's feral world of boozing, sex and drugs in her pigsty home among her waifs fathered by five different men.
She and her coach driver husband Neil also reveal how the monster BLEW thousands of pounds pushed through her letterbox by wellwishers and how she first planned to use her ELDEST BOY as the victim-but was worried he would ESCAPE Donovan's dungeon.
Amanda claims the seeds of the kidnap plot that sickened Britain were sown at her father Brian's funeral in November last year.
"My dad had died of a heart attack-and after the funeral we had a wake in his honour," she says. "A relative walked into the kitchen and there was Karen sitting on my uncle Donovan's knee. they were all over each other.
"They were cuddling and when Karen saw she'd been spotted she leapt up and tried to pretend nothing was going on.
"All the pieces of that night only fell into place for us after the arrests and the link between them became public. But we all remembered Karen and Craig having a blazing row during the wake.
"At one point she yelled at him, 'You can sod off-I've found someone much better than you now!' That must have been Donovan.
"After Dad's death, he drove my mum Alice around a lot to help out. She noticed he was taking a lot of strange calls on his mobile-which he'd answer in sort of code.
"He tried to disguise who he was talking to, but now we know it was Karen." Gossip on the estate was rife that when Craig was at work, Donovan would park nearby and march over fields to the back of Karen's house.
Amanda added: "The family have pieced it all together and it's obvious she was then recruiting Donovan to her plot.
"We also now believe they first wanted to use her eldest lad as the victim- but Donovan refused because he was always running away from home and would be difficult to control while a police search was on."
After Shannon disappeared on February 19, Amanda and husband Neil, 37, were gobsmacked by Matthew's behaviour whenever they went round to comfort her.
"Once I was round there and a fat brown envelope came through the letterbox," says Amanda. "I picked it up off the dirty floor. Karen snatched it from me like an animal and tore it open.
"There was a wad of notes in there along with a card from someone wanting to help with the appeal. Karen was like a kid at Christmas when she saw the money. It went straight into her pocket.
"Another time she came back all smiles because she'd ordered fish and chips in town and the shopowner gave them to her for free. She was delighted and even went back to the shop to try and scab free fish again!
"She loved all the attention and celebrity-she fancied herself as the Kerry Katona of Dewsbury."
Neil-who led many of the searches of Dewsbury streets while Shannon was hidden in Donovan's flat tied to a leash for 24 days-recalls how Matthews blew all the money that came through the door on "cigs, lager and pizza".
More than £6,000 is estimated to have been pushed through her letter box and disappeared. He says: "Her horrible house with its peeled-off wallpaper was suddenly full of hundreds of beautiful cards-and most had had money in them.
"It's heartbreaking to think of pensioners and poor folk sending cash they couldn't spare while that bitch was laughing in their faces all the time."
But Amanda and Neil were slow to suspect anything because for years they had become immune to their yob neighbour's behavior in Moorside Road,.
"It was open house all the time," says Amanda. "Craig was a fishmonger at Morrisons and while he was on shift she'd let any lads in off the street to drink, smoke and play on the computer.
"Crate after crate of lager would go into the house. Karen would top it up with alcopops. I heard she even snorted cocaine off the living room table.
"She was an ugly cow but she was giving out sex and a place to live and Craig fell for it. She was always really dirty with blokes. Once she had sex with a 17-year-old lad after a boozy session. The kids found her in bed with him."
Amanda says Matthews couldn't have cared less about her children.
Drank
"She never took them out to play, the kids were mostly left in their rooms while she drank and watched TV," she says. "She certainly didn't love Shannon and always treated her coldly."
"She rarely even fed her kids-that was usually down to Craig."
Amanda brands her brother a "disgrace" for for downloading child porn. He got 20 weeks for it in the run-up to the trial and she says: "He got what he deserved. I still find it hard to believe he did it."
As for her wicked uncle, Amanda has some chilling childhood memories. Donovan was a frequent visitor when she was about seven.
"Mick would draw all the curtains and turn off the lights. Then he'd tell us it was time for his version of hide and seek," she says.
"It was really scary. We'd have to find him in the dark. His favourite trick was to hoist himself into a recess above the stairwell, then jump down making us scream.
"It makes my flesh creep to think about that after what he did to Shannon."
Nailed by a drawing
A DRAWING scrawled by kidnap victim Shannon Matthews as she was held hostage in Michael Donovan's flat backs up revelations of her evil mother's affair with him, the News of the World can reveal.
The youngster's sketch was of an an explicit sexual scene taking place between two adults.
And, damningly, the little nine-year-old had added the caption: "Mummy and Mick".
The piece of paper was found crumpled up in Donovan's bin after police raided his flat in Dewsbury and found Shannon concealed under a divan bed.
The drawing was not shown to the jury during the pair's trial.
Meehan: I still love Karen
VILE Matthews' ex-boyfriend Craig Meehan last night broke his silence to declare: "I don't care what she's done, I still love her."
In an exclusive interview, child porn pervert Meehan spoke of his love for the monster for the first time since she was convicted of the kidnap of her daughter Shannon.
He said: "I have forgiven her. She was my first love and I'll never forget her. At some point I need to take a step back and look at what's happened but I can't ever see a time when I won't love her."
Former fishmonger Meehan, 23, who accessed 113 sickening images of girls as young as four on his PC, vowed to wait for twisted Matthews, 33, to get out.
He said: "If you ask me would I risk losing my family to get back with her? The answer is yes, probably."
Meehan even wants her back despite Matthews lying to him that he was the father of her three-year-old daughter. DNA evidence uncovered during the police investigation found this to be untrue. Now being kept at a secret location for his own protection, Meehan said: "I couldn't believe it when I found out. But although I know that physically and biologically I'm not her dad, I still see her as mine.
He said of the revelations that Matthews had slept with his evil uncle Donovan: "When I found out the rumours about him sleeping with Karen were true, I got really angry. I can forgive Karen but I'll never forgive him."
Meehan has not been paid for this interview
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This article has 42 comments
I just hope Shannon and her siblins will get all the help they can to start a new way of life with careing families.
The very sad fact is these children will always want answers when they are older as to why this evil mother could not only sell her kids but maybe Shannon would not be here today if she wasn't so drugged up with that nutcase!
Will this case teach these types ( and there are more like Mathews ) to treat their children better?
I think not! There will have to be major changes to society to unhinge these breeders from a free pay packet.
By Valerie. Posted December 14 2008 at 12:27 AM.
These people are VILE and unfortunatly every town in the world has them. They disgust and offend me in every possible way. Thank god these children were taken away from her hopefully they will never see her lying scummy face again. For every women reading this who has
1. An aray of children from a number of different men ...
2. Never had a job to support their offspring
3. Who have been on benifits since child number one....and
4.Who thinks they are entitled to money from the government (Us the tax paying public) to support them for their entire lives
PLEASE PLEASE get sterilized get a job and look after your children PROPERLY.
You are a drain on society, you are taking money from people who really need it...... single respectable mothers who look after their children who do not have a football team of them just because they can. I pay taxes and will happily pay them to help people when they need it. I hate paying tax to support the likes of karen mathews GET HER STERILIZED and every one like her.
By Amy . Posted December 12 2008 at 4:50 PM.
that is just cruel that poor little girl does NOT deserve to be treated like this.infact her parents should be treated like that,and how could anyone not love that cute and preciuse little girl .if i ever saw shannons mum i eould spit at her like and old peice chewingum
By anonymouse. Posted December 10 2008 at 9:32 AM.
Throw the key away on that filth
By AGNES & ROBERT. Posted December 9 2008 at 11:08 PM.
Like many other people, I was taken in by the alleged kidnap and only by chance heard a different story. Puzzling!
By Dot. Posted December 9 2008 at 2:19 PM.
I do hope Shannon can bounce back after this and turn her life around and her back on the ugly piece of scum not fit to be called a mother. Same goes to her siblings.
By Angellulu. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:23 PM.
sarah its people like you that encourage this scum your right circumstances do change these people never do,its a good job were all not like these animals somebody has to pay tax to fund their vile lifestyle lets start a campain to get these people to work if its only to tidy up the sewers they live in
By les birmingham. Posted December 7 2008 at 9:58 PM.
until the government of the day stop paying these
scum to stay at home and think its their right to
expect the tax payers to fund their dysfunctional
families this country will continue to sink lower and
lower.
By scout. Posted December 7 2008 at 9:50 PM.
Squat goblins.
By John McAdam. Posted December 7 2008 at 9:12 PM.
Lets see how all the newbies being made redundant like being called scroungers and id like to know where all these so called jobs are coming from!
By jane. Posted December 7 2008 at 8:35 PM.
Sadly I was brought up in similar circumstances to Shannon Mathews. My mother was an alchoholic who had 6 children and was never fit to be a mother. I lived in poverty and was abused and neglected in filth. I joined the army when I was 17/12 and changed my life around but I will never forget my up bringing. I hope Shannon has the strength to forget what happened to her and can buld a happy life for herself.
By spring watch girl. Posted December 7 2008 at 7:10 PM.
Poor Shannon. As the saying goes,'You can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family'.
By Franny. Posted December 7 2008 at 6:22 PM.
Wow - Amanda is FAT and UGLY! Boy o' boy.
By JTB. Posted December 7 2008 at 5:34 PM.
Where were the Welfare Workers while all this gross neglect was going on by the reports of those two individuals I take it that the elfare people knew of the family
By AGNES & ROBERT. Posted December 7 2008 at 4:44 PM.
When is the Gov, going to earn their money and put a stop to all this terrible stuff, fist it was Haringay now this, what next you are going to have to check and make sure that these welfare workers do their jobs right, and if Haringay is an example start at the top and no more Ritz lunchbreaks as a Scotsman to another Scotsman get you and your other people off your backsides and sort these tragic occurrances out this kind of ruelty cannot go on
By AGNES & ROBERT. Posted December 7 2008 at 4:33 PM.
I agree with Kate 7:23am. How has it been proven that Meehan downloaded the child porn when Matthews had all and sundry in the house when he was at work. Grounds for an appeal methinks!! It strikes me that he is being made a scapegoat and so is his uncle;they haven't a decent I.Q. between them. Let's hope Matthews isn't protected in jail like the rest of the scumbags that hurt children are and that she gets what coming to her.
By lisa. Posted December 7 2008 at 3:53 PM.
What they should do with these scum bags, is don't send them to prison send them back to there house and let the public deal with them, she does not deserve human rights neither does him and how can she get all these men she's not exacly a looker.
By mark roberts. Posted December 7 2008 at 3:47 PM.
Not Evry one who is brought up in a council house is scum >:( i lived in 11 driffrent council houses till i was 13 and my mum was a loving single pearant who worked 3 jobs to keep her 2 kids happy and we never felt alone or anything bad..i hate it how people say there all the same on council asstaits..what happend to shannon was wrong on discusting and should never happen..but not every one on her street was treated the same..
By McKenziee. Posted December 7 2008 at 2:53 PM.
Not Evry one who is brought up in a council house is scum >:( i lived in 11 driffrent council houses till i was 13 and my mum was a loving single pearant who worked 3 jobs to keep her 2 kids happy and we never felt alone or anything bad..i hate it how people say there all the same on council asstaits..what happend to shannon was wrong on discusting and should never happen..but not every one on her street was treated the same..
By McKenziee. Posted December 7 2008 at 2:53 PM.
Does this woman have no shame?!
There are people out there that can't have children for whatever reason and who would do (almost) anything to have children of their own and then there's downright scum like Karen Matthews who just sees children as a way to leech more money from decent hard-working, law-abiding, honest people.
Honestly...where are her morals?!
By Claire. Posted December 7 2008 at 2:19 PM.
It is a sad indictment of society today that there are literally millions of these sub-human scum living in our once great country.
Where did it all go wrong? Normally these people, 40 years ago, would have been the backbone of the country, hard working, loyal, with a real sense of community and right and wrong. Now, it is this type of scum that give the british a bad name abroad, on holiday dripping with cheap gold jewellry and tattoos swigging alcohol 24 hours a day funded by the British taxpayer in the main.
What the hell has happened to this country?
By Paul B. Posted December 7 2008 at 2:19 PM.
How would u pay meehan
By sean. Posted December 7 2008 at 2:10 PM.
ALEX.....Heres hoping you never get left on your own with your kids with no one around to help you out....you would soon change your tune!!!
circumstances can change at any time!
By sarah. Posted December 7 2008 at 12:29 PM.
Immigrants keep getting blamed for everything going wrong in the UK but one needs to look at its fellow countrymen to see that the principles of the British society has broken down and is in serious need of repair.
By Gabriel. Posted December 7 2008 at 12:55 PM.
Crikey this really is pond life!! They must be heavy boozers cos with a face like that you'd need SERIOUS beer goggles - actually meths goggles would probably only just get her laid!
By nikki. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:27 AM.
When is the UK going to stop the feral scum chav families that are blighting the lives of the rest of us, get this lazy lot of scroungers out to work or stop their benefits because as a tax payer I am utterly sick and tired of funding the scummy chav lifestyle so many seem to be living in the UK.
By Lyn Taylor. Posted December 7 2008 at 10:42 AM.
papers are the first to judge so us mugs buy them. a lot what they print is not true or made up to make it sound worse and we all know the police lie to make them selfs look like heroes
By tbh. Posted December 7 2008 at 10:42 AM.
Until the bleeding heart liberals are over-ruled - and we find the back-bone to force sterilise these scum - council sink estates will continue to be a breeding ground for these vermin!
By Lee. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:05 AM.
she is a greedy money grabbing scrounger who was not happy with all the money she has scrounged all her adult life from the hard working tax paying public to feed /clothes herself and her brood knocking out kid after kid just to get more money instead of getting off her fat lazy arse and supporting herself and her brood.this is why the benefit system needs to be reviewed as this case has highlighted what many of us have known for along time.you should get full benefit for the first half fror the second and anychild born during them being on the dole then full for first child but anything after that nothing as the way i see it you dont have a dog if you cannot fed it so why bring a child in the world if you cannot provide for it.it is not fair on the rest of society to have to pay to bring up these children when they are working hard enough to bring up their own and keep their head above water
By sj. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:03 AM.
Firstly,i would like to wish shannon matthews a long and happy life,she deserves it after escaping this scum.Her so called mother is not typical of a normal mothers behavior,there are thousands of dysfuntional and misplaced families in britain who are struggling to keep afloat every day,who would not even consider what shannons mum did to her as a way out.They are prepared to rise above this small minority of scummy living on so called sink estates,to try and keep kids in education,keep away from gangs who lead them astray,from drugs and excess alcohol drinking,from turning feral on the streets and to make something of themselves,merry xmas shannon and a happy new life.
By john. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:02 AM.
Sterilize them all.
DRAIn on society.
sick of apologising for them all, they are SCUm, pure and simple.
Playing the system and us mugs pay for it.
NO MORE!
By Alex. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:02 AM.
At least one good thing may come out of thos scum,s life, she,ll have time to wash her hair for once in prison. Hope the other normal criminal females take care of her .
By Peter Kent. Posted December 7 2008 at 11:12 AM.
Just think, there are hundreds just like her in pockets on every council housing estate. Third generation scum. Never had a chance, they know who their mothers are but not many know their fathers. They will never hold down a job and live in squalor, God help them. Please do not think every unemployed family are like them though.
By lyn. Posted December 7 2008 at 10:23 AM.
What always struck me as a bit weird was in all the interviews on TV and printed in the papers, that Craig Meehan never said a single word. Anyone know why?
By Jim. Posted December 7 2008 at 10:07 AM.
A sad picture of this Country emerges week after week - when is the Government going to put a stop to these irresponsible, selfish and useless people sucking our socieity dry?
I pray those children find loving homes and are never touched by their 'Mother' and her sordid friends again.
By michelle marsden. Posted December 7 2008 at 9:03 AM.
"Shes a s****** and hes a geek. She should have been a parot as she likes the odd cockatoo", By c bronson.
NICE ONE!!! Made me laugh.
There are many, many sordid sink estates like this one in Britain. The kids are bred like animals to get more money. They then copy their parents and take things out on other decent kids they associate with in schools and vandalise property. So in effect they become ALL of our responsibility!
It should be compulsory to remove children from these homes and provide contraceptive injections to these irresponsible scum! Theres what right and what REAL and our society can only get worse if these people are not controlled!
By marissaX. Posted December 7 2008 at 9:03 AM.
If only social workers and agencies involved would listen to those who have been abused but sadly they don’t they miss all the warning signs if you live in an area what they would consider not worth bothering about then your luck has just run out help is available but they prefer to hide behind there paper work after all this is priority can you please also note that child abuse also happens in the very upper class they are aloud to sweep it all under the carpet because of who they are.
From a survivor of child abuse
By Zoe Macrae. Posted December 7 2008 at 8:39 AM.
I am sorry but Meehan does not look like the brightest star in the sky. I am sure wherever little Sharon is,she will have a wonderful Christmas.
By Jonathan. Posted December 7 2008 at 7:53 AM.
I am sorry but Meehan does not look like the brightest star in the sky. I am sure wherever little Sharon is,she will have a wonderful Christmas.
By Jonathan. Posted December 7 2008 at 7:51 AM.
Shes a s****** and hes a geek. She should have been a parot as she likes the odd cockatoo
By c bronson. Posted December 7 2008 at 7:33 AM.
I just wondered if lots of people off the street where coming into the house and using the pc, how can the police be sure that it was Craig Meehan, who downloaded the child porn...
I feel sorry for the children in this, I hope now all of them have found some peace and happiness.
By Kate. Posted December 7 2008 at 7:23 AM.
This is such a sad story for little Shannon, but if only this "family" were a one off. Thanks to labour's policies which have lead to the break down of our society and especially family life, this is just the tip of the ice berg. Why are we paying for sluts like this to breed, 5 kids to different dads, an open house for drink and sex, what is going on? We all laughed at Jerry Springer when he first exposed us to trailer trash from the States..now we have our own and it is far worse!!
By Grant Hopwood. Posted December 7 2008 at 6:35 AM.