THE MURDER in which a mother killed her baby daughter and fled the country to evade police for three years has featured on TV.
Angela Whitworth murdered 20-month-old Sarah Dahane with a bin liner in 2013 at their home in Herald Way, Bicester, after a bitter custody battle.
The mother boarded a business class flight that night and fled to country to Nairobi to escape prosecution.
But when a £10,000 bounty was put on her head, three years later she was captured in summer 2016 and sentenced to life imprisonment.
READ AGAIN: Mum sentenced to life after murdering her toddler with bin bag
The tragic murder has now been featured on TV as part of a BBC One show called Fugitives.
Sarah’s dad Nabil Dahane, who at the time lived in Banbury, also features and describes how Whitworth failed to turn up to hand over their daughter for the weekend.
On the phone to police he said: “I have an issue of child abduction – I fell it’s quite urgent.”
Officers were deployed immediately to search the Bicester home. Senior investigating officer Det Supt Ian Hunter said: “I was really concerned about the mess of the house and what that was telling me.
“The living room downstairs was a mess, the kitchen was a complete mess, and there were items all over the floor.
“When I went upstairs there was a back bedroom, the wardrobe door open and clothes all on the bed.
“In the front bedroom I saw Sarah, she was on the bed actually looking really, really peaceful. No visible injuries were apparent at all.”
The programme showed pictures of the Bicester home ransacked, and played a recording of the mum booking her getaway flight.
ALSO READ: Angela Whitworth pleads guilty to murdering 20-month-old daughter Sarah Dahane
Thames Valley Police (TVP) enlisted the help of the National Crime Agency and their Kenyan counterparts for surveillance of Whitworth’s family in Kenya. But the show revealed the operation was called off after finding nothing.
TVP launched a fresh appeal for information with a £10,000 reward in 2016 which revealed Whitworth was living under a new name in Kampala, Uganda.
Working with police in Uganda they raided her top floor apartment which was found in a mess like her Bicester home.
Det Supt Ian Hunter said: “I looked at her and she looked at me. I knew by the look in her eyes that she knew the game was up.”
He added: “I think another 24 hours and she would have been gone.”
Whitworth pleaded guilty and the Old Bailey in London, October 2016, heard how the youngster was smothered to death with a black plastic bag.
Police found that Whitworth – who sobbed in the dock as prosecutors described the youngsters last fateful moments – had killed Sarah not long after being told Oxford Family Court would not approve her plans to take her daughter to live abroad. She was to continue joint custody arrangements with Sarah’s father in Oxfordshire.
In the programme Mr Dahane said: “Sarah was just my precious little girl, I used to get many hugs and kisses.
“That relationship was fun, laughter, and unconditional love.
“She was my first child ever and I will just always love her.”
He added: “I try to come to terms with it all, but I don’t know if I ever will. I just have to live with it.”
The BBC programme Fugitives in available on bbc.co.uk/iplayer
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