Final texts sent between a woman and her paedophile boyfriend after she found child abuse images on his phone before she killed herself can be revealed for the first time.
Lydia Roberts, 21, felt “violated” and “Disgusted” after finding the sick images on a second phone belonging to Adam Wells while he was at work.
In a heartbreaking text to her best friend, Lydia said : *********
She confronted Wells, 27, by text and reported him to police before feeling so “ashamed” that she hanged herself at their home hours later.
Wells was slapped with a 12 – month community order after admitting Possessing 31 indecent photographs of children and was ordered to sign the Sex Offender Register for five years, complete 150 hours unpaid work and pay a £ 85 victim surcharge.
In an exclusive interview with the Mirror.co.uk, Lydia’s devastated mum, Michelle, says she holds “vile” Wells personally responsible for her daughter’s death.
And she shares for the first time her daughter’s final texts to Wells to show the pain Lydia was going through.
“To think that all of this has happened because of him but he’s been given a slap on the wrist, ”said Michelle.
“ He’s responsible for what she did that night.
“Whether she did it or … he’s responsible.”
In a series of text messages, H&M shop worker Lydia demanded Wells to explain his actions saying: “It’s just so wrong, on so many levels. Look at that photo and tell me it’s not illegal.”
Adam, who worked as a liquidator, initially defended the material, describing it as “just some old porn”, but later begged Lydia to forgive him, saying: “Please Lydia, I’ll sort myself out, losing you will be a big lesson for me. ”
But she replied: “You have problems Adam it’s over. How can you tell me this isn’t paedophilia?
“I cannot be with somebody who likes kids. You must understand it’s not right to look at photographs of girls like that … You can see that that little girl is about ten years old. “
Over a series of hours, devastated Lydia told her partner of two years how he had ruined her life.
In one message, she said: “You’ve torn me away from my family and friends, you’re a vile excuse of a human.
“I pity the absolute fool that ends up with you, it’s a shame your lovely parents have ended up with this disgusting person likes you.”
And in messages to her best friend Sophie Malik, Lydia added: “He’s ruined my life …“ I have been living with a paedo. ”
Following the shocking discovery, Wells returned to the flat at lunchtime, where the couple continued to row, before he left again with the phone saying he was going to sell it.
Wells told police how he found Miss Roberts hanged when he returned to their home in Manchester City Center at 3. 30 am the next day, following a night out with friends.
He called an ambulance, but she was pronounced dead.
For Lydia’s devoted parents Michelle and Eric, the devastating news of their youngest daughter’s death on June 10, 2017, reached them whilst they were traveling on a cruise ship around Norway.
The couple, who have eight children, were escorted off the ship at a port in Newcastle in order to travel
Michelle said: “All of her tomorrows have ended. It was very very hard to learn.
“When we got the call, we were in the middle of the North Sea, it was awful.
“I just collapsed, I cried for days.”
Michelle desperately contacted Adam whilst still on the cruise ship in a desperate bid to find out what had happened.
She said: “I tried ringing Adam but got nothing and he didn’t get in contact.
“So the ship offered their satellite phone and he picked up and he was crying.
“ He said: ‘I’m sorry Michelle, I’m sorry, it’s all my fault. ‘
And I said “no Adam, it’s not all your fault.”
“He was just crying, so I said I’d speak to him when I got home.”
But Michelle never heard from Adam again.
Instead, she was told the awful truth about her daughter’s death when best friend Sophie traveled over to the family home in Mirfield, West Yorks and shared the heartbreaking discovery Lydia had made.
Michelle said: “It was unbelievable, I didn’t understand what Sophie was saying to me.
“ I just couldn ‘ t understand it. Even that same day, my sister came down and had to explain it to me.
“It was the last thing I would ever ever have thought but then we didn ‘t have a reason why she would have done it.
“In a way, I was relieved to learn why she did it. If she had just done it for no reason, I would have wondered what pain she was hiding. ”
It left Michelle and Eric with many unanswered questions.
Despite repeated requests to speak to them about their daughter’s death, they say Adam, who was the last person to see Lydia alive, has remained silent.
Last month he gave evidence from behind a screen at an inquest into Lydia’s death.
The family’s solicitor Sefton Kwasnik says the family received vital information relating to the hours before Lydia’s death – such as the 999 transcript – just 15 minutes before the inquest began.
The coroner told the inquest Lydia had a previous history of suicide attempts and had been prescribed medication for depression, the inquest heard, which the family say they knew nothing of.
Michelle said: “She was never treated for depression when she lived at home and it wasn’t until she moved to Manchester that she went to see a doctor. ”
Coroner Za k Golombeck recorded a verdict of suicide.
Now solicitor Mr Kwasnik has demanded vital evidence is handed over from cops, which he says has prevented the family from knowing exactly how Lydia died.
This includes body cam footage from the officers who first attended Lydia’s flat after an emergency call was made, and a report showing Adam’s location according to his mobile phone.
Lydia’s mobile phone has never been recovered and her family claim Greater Manchester Police refused to investigate their concerns in the months following her death, including exact details about how she died.
Michelle said: “I think they failed us.
“They just assumed it was a silly, young girl whose done this. End of. Tick another box, it’s done.
“We even begged them to find her phone and they wouldn’t do that for us.”
Their anguish continued when Wells was given a community order, then changed his name to Adam Scott and got a new job.
“We were on holiday when we got the news about the sentencing,” said Michelle.
“Although we’d begged police to keep us updated, they’d refused to give us any details as we weren’t considered an interested party.
“When we learnt about the sentence, I couldn’t I don’t think anything could justify it. ”
A few months later, Michelle got an email from LinkedIn telling her that someone had looked her up and she was horrified to discover that it was Adam.
She said: “It felt like a slap in the face that he’d just changed his name and got a new job.
“ That shouldn’t happen. ”
It was all a very different story two-and-a-half years earlier when Michelle’s Lydia first met Wells at a gig in Manchester for **** rocker band The Courteneers.
Within months, the besotted duo were living with each other and Wells had impressed the family.
Michelle said: “He lived in London at the time as he worked for a liquidators firm.
“ But he used to send her flowers every week and at first I liked him.
“I thought he was a charmer. He looked immaculate in his black suit and tie.
“Everybody liked him. He came over really well, he was well spoken. ”
By November the pair had moved into a house together but then moved in with Lydia’s parents after the flat flooded
Michelle said: “That’s how we found out about him being a liar, little things started cropping up.
“He’d slip up. Things didn’t add up, he couldn’t hold down a job.
“Once, he said he’d worked at this place in Manchester and it grew too big so they made him redundant. “
The couple moved to Manchester in 2017 and Lydia’s contact with her family became irregular.
Michelle said: “I think he wanted to get her away to Manchester, he just seemed hellbent on them moving there.
“Everything fell in place as she got a job in H&M so it all seemed to work out.
“We didn’t speak for a few weeks and then she texted me about something random.
“But whenever we arranged to meet up, she would cancel. She’d say she would come home and never turn up. ”
A few months later Lydia stumbled across Adam’s second phone.
Following her tragic death, her funeral was packed with hundreds of friends and family members.
But Michelle said she was shocked to see Adam and his parents turn up uninvited.
She said: “I don’t know how he found out. I felt sick when I saw him.
“He kept going in and out slamming the door and it’s a massive parish church and door and you could hear it clunking.
“He’d go out, come back in, on the third time, the funeral director sister asked him to stay out.”
Ahead of the funeral, Michelle chose Lydia’s outfit by writing a list of her favorite items and assigning them to according to songs.
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She said: “I played her favorite playlist and I’d written down outfits for different songs.
“I sat out in the garden and Dexy’s White Runners came on, which meant she wore a white blouse.
“ In the end, she wore a white blouse, checked trousers and boots. ”
As another Christmas without Lydia approaches, the family hope that one day they will be able to get closure.
Michelle said: “It’s so frustrating because we want to know exactly what happened and we’re never going to know. “There’s so many missing pieces.
“ The inquest let her down, they made her sound like a deranged young girl.
“In their mind, what she found on her phone that day made her do what she did.
“But only Lydia will know.”
Greater Manchester Police have been contacted for comment.
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