Dawson Face to Face

Finding Justice for My Murdered Twin Brother
1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-83773-244-9
Verlag: Icon Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 288 Seiten

When his identical twin brother Simon was kicked to death, all Nick Dawson felt for the killers was hatred. Struggling in a world where his mirror image had vanished, he came to realise there was only one way to stop the torture - acceptance. Travelling to the absolute limits of personal darkness, Nick came face to face with his brother's killers. Now a champion of restorative justice, Nick heads behind bars, asking hardened criminals to change, to think of their victims, to make amends. In Face To Face he takes us with him on a journey into this hidden and unpredictable world.

Nick lost his identical twin, Simon, through a brutal murder in 1998. Following years of counselling and recovery, Nick eventually went on to meet one of his brother's killers in prison to get answers. Nick now regularly shares his story to groups of offenders in prisons, helping them understand the ripple effect of victim impact and showing them that understanding, acceptance and connection are possible on both sides.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Dawson, Nick

Leseproben

2. TWINS

Our cockerel Harry would wake us up in the morning. As kids we had bantams at the bottom of the garden and the first job of the day was to go down to get the eggs. For the uninitiated, cockerels can be quite vicious, very protective, and it wasn’t unknown for two or three, Harry especially, to fly at us, trying to peck our heads: ‘You two think you’re getting near our hens? Forget it!’ We’d come sprinting back up to the house: ‘Mum!’

Risk of attack aside, those birds were a big part of our life. We always had to get them in before dusk otherwise the foxes would come for them. One evening we forgot and one of Simon’s hens was killed. He was devastated, but it was all part of the natural world in which we were immersed. We were definitely the sort of kids who knew the names of birds and trees. As young as twelve we’d go off cycling or camping in the Lake District. We’d put a tent on the back of our bikes and stay on the banks of Ullswater or Buttermere. Mum thought nothing of it, and she was right. It was a great way of growing up. Innocence personified.

Our village was Branthwaite, only five miles from the West Cumbria coastal town of Workington but still with a truly isolated feel – the sort of tiny place where the bus passes through once a week. Our life was countrified, idyllic. At the back of our house, named Harlaw, was a massive garden to play in, or sometimes we’d go out into the fields, take a picnic, have little adventures. It was a case of ‘See you later, Mum!’ and then we’d be off, walking for miles, messing about in woods, paddling in rivers. In the summer holidays, we’d have family picnics at Wastwater, famed for being England’s deepest lake, overlooked by Scafell Pike, the country’s highest mountain. Sometimes Richard, Simon and I would stay with Dad’s uncle Bobby, who had several farms a few miles away in the remote northern fells. Our speciality was helping out with the sheep-dipping, directing the flock down a narrow channel where Bobby would wait at the end with a big hook to force them down into the chemical mix that protected them from parasites. Bobby kept cattle as well, many bred from Texan bulls. He’d go out to America, buy bull semen and bring it back to inseminate his stock. One way or another, staying with Bobby was always an eye-opening experience.

As we got a bit older, Simon began to exhibit a slightly more maverick side than me, more ‘let’s see what happens if …’ He loved having bonfires in the garden, for instance, and being kids we’d put all sorts of things on the fire – tins of paint, the lot. Simon was definitely a bit of a pyromaniac as a kid. He liked blowing stuff up – more than a few aerosols ended up on those back garden blazes. But it wasn’t like I was sat inside with a library book while he was causing havoc. We both enjoyed that thrill of adventure. Early in our teens we bought a motorcycle. Richard already had one and so Simon and I saved up our pocket money and shared a little 50cc bike which we’d ride around the garden, no helmets or anything. Other times, we’d break through the fence into a nearby scrapyard, climb to the top of the teetering piles of old bashed-up vehicles – the exact sort of thing they told you not to do in the public information films that were so prevalent at the time – and dare each other to nick a badge off a car. It was good fun – until eventually the guy who owned it decided enough was enough and got a big Alsatian. At the same time, neither of us had ever been the type of lads to get into trouble. There was one occasion where we’d fallen out with a couple of mates, had a big row, and one of them took a swing at Simon, but it was just kids being kids and soon forgotten. We’d never had to step in to protect each other.

Growing up in such an insular environment might well be most modern children’s idea of a nightmare. Had I been an only child maybe I’d have felt the same. But Simon and I were with each other virtually every second of the day. In fact, to ourselves and everyone else around Branthwaite we were effectively a unit, not so much Simon and Nick as ‘the twins’. And we suited that singularity. From the start, we had always been those classic identical twins. We dressed in the same clothes, had the same haircut, were in the same class at school and had the same friends. In our early years, even though we hadn’t needed to, we even shared a bedroom. Aside from the everyday similarities, there were those which were a little less easy to describe, the main one being an uncanny ability to know what the other one was thinking. We had an innate understanding of one another. That’s how similar we were in personality. And that’s how we liked it. That began to change as we went further into our teenage years, at which point we both increasingly wanted to be independent, to be people in our own right, to seek out our own identity.

As a twin you see the world in a slightly different way and the world sees you in in a slightly different way, especially if you’re identical. For a long time, you’re seen as being part of a pod, two halves of one person. But the older you get the more you start to get fed up with being seen as just a single entity. At school, the teachers wouldn’t even try to tell us apart. They’d just ask, ‘Which one are you?’ While, as with all identical twins, there were subtle differences in appearance, to them we were simply ‘twin one’ and ‘twin two’. When we got older it was time to break free of that monochrome depiction. We wanted to display our true colours. We remained incredibly close, but different. You can see the change in family photos. Early on, we’re pretty much identical. But as we go into secondary school there’s signs of a fraternal rebellion as we begin to display differing looks to match diverging lives. At that school we developed different friendship groups, accentuated when, after year 10, we found ourselves in different classes. Wanting our own space and privacy, by then we’d also had a few years of separate bedrooms.

It was difficult to tell us apart when we were young. ‘Which twin are you?’ our teachers would often say. That’s me on the left, I had a slightly wider face.

In our early years Mum would dress us identically. We loved it. It really felt like we were each a half of the same person – an incredibly close bond. I am on the right here.

At this point, the main ingredient in our glue was our isolation, which dictated that we remained very reliant on each other. It meant, for instance, that we didn’t have much of a social life until we were sixteen or seventeen, which is quite late for a lot of teenagers. With no way of getting anywhere, and friends based mainly in Cockermouth, the small market town a few miles away where we went to school, it was inevitable we were still going to be spending a lot of time together. If we did go into Cockermouth, it would be as a pair relying on a lift from Mum. We did, though, manage to tick off a few teenage experiences. Cockermouth was where we’d have our first taste of alcohol. While Branthwaite had two pubs, there was no point trying to get served underage in a village where everyone knows you. In Cockermouth, on the other hand, we could give it a try, although it was never easy as we both looked incredibly young for our age. More likely that we’d be drinking, and very possibly being sick, at a party at a friend’s house whose parents weren’t around.

If we were going to achieve any kind of real independence from Branthwaite then we were going to need cars. We passed our driving tests at the earliest opportunity and soon both had Minis. We were definitely starting to spread our wings. Academically, we had both left school at sixteen. I worked for a chemical company while studying for a BTEC and then went on to study chemistry at Manchester University. Simon, meanwhile, went to technical college in Carlisle before studying computer science at Coventry University. We both had an interest in computing, having owned ZX Spectrums, the pioneering early home computers, when we were kids. We tried our hands at writing code to create games – another factor in having to make our own entertainment. Simon actually devised a game called Alien Alert, showing his early programming skill by selling several copies through a software company.

Simon left home aged eighteen, a year before me, which I found quite hard. Not only was it the first time we’d been apart, but I couldn’t help contrasting my continued quiet village life with the rather more ribald time he was enjoying at university. Coventry offered that explosion of independence Simon had been looking for. He turned up at home one day with his ear pierced. Dad went berserk but for Simon it was just something he and a few friends had done after a few drinks. Coventry, for him, was a whole new world of fun and escapism. His going to live there came at the time when Coventry City won the FA Cup. I remember him telling me how mad it was, with street parties, people having the time of their lives, and it seemed like his own everyday experience was pretty much the same. In fact, while I was already working full-time in a chemicals factory, with day release for study and evening classes, it was hearing about his university experience that made me want to go off and do the same. I saw it as a way to see a bit of life, be independent, and find out a bit more about myself. I had a good life in Cumbria...