Harry Jarvis | I’m Related To A Killer | Forensic Files

[Music] when Harry was dring cattle she would spend days and days in bed unable to
speak the medication he was obtaining and applying to his wife was not designed to make her feel better but
perhaps to make her feel lost Harry wrapped her body in a doy and put her under a gap in the
floorboards Harry Jarvis was a totally unexceptional individual to look at he was very Brazen about the whole thing
you put your lover up in the shed in the garden just outside the window your wife
is Harry was determined to do what he did to get what he wanted out of it to do away with Carol and move on with Rita
that was all that Harry cared about just that worry in the back of your mind of is he dad or is he Harry the Killer
[Music] [Music] Carol Jarvis had been reported missing 2 days before she was found
dead initially the missing person's report had come in from Carol's children to say that they hadn't seen their mom
um for some time and their father had said to them that she was away on resik here up in
dunde when she disappeared he reaction was she's left the house she's gone away is just utterly bizarre because
she'd been bad ban for a significant amount of time decided to form the police just to
report a Miss person the police visited the house just to establish what what had went
on a body was then discovered I remember hearing on the news that a body had been found in a
house in Bathgate which was the area that my practice was based in West lodan I was interested to know what was
going to happen with the people who have been charged with murder the police in Bathgate had
discovered caros remains under the uh floorboards in the high there were clear signs there was a
body that had become a deposition site thoughts very quickly from the police turned to there's only one suspect in
this case and it's her husband there was a very tragic case but from the perspective of those working as
lawyers in the case it was totally unique the background to the death of Harry Jarvis's wife
was bizarre he was very Brazen about the whole thing Clover up in the shed in the
garden just outside the window your wife is this looked like on the surface potentially quite a well planned
murder but actually there were so many issues within Harry's plan for this you couldn't make it up I don't
think he was particularly clever he had some degree of intelligence but he did a number of very
foolish [Music] things whole setup at the house was bizarre Harry Jarvis and his wife Carol
had four children Graham is the youngest son this one yes Mom and Dad always are very
young dad looks really really young there mom's not wearing glasses or that's all right that must
been one when they were growing up to but she looks happy Graham was told his father was
probably her killer and he was nowhere to be seen if your spouse is just been found dead in the floor space in your
house your natural reaction as a grieving spouse would be to stay to help the police with their inquiries to
support the children to plan the funeral so the fact that he absconded and was nowhere to be seen would have
immediately raised suspicions how can you see that somebody is going to do that unless if bu in an
act or they've got a gun then you can't suspect that somebody's going to just hat your plan to kill somebody or do it
SP of the moment you can't foresee that at all it's going to be really tough for
anyone who loses a parent to something as violent as a murder but even more so when the person
who took their life is their other parent there's going to be a real conflict there between Still Loving a
parent as most people do and hating them for what they've done [Music] Harry Jarvis met his future wife Carol
in the late 1970s when he was living in South London and working as a bus driver I believed in met just by Mom
working in the the shoe shop and then just Dad asking her asking it out on a date mom was 18 dad was 30s or 12 year
difference people might say that's a big gap but sometimes there's a connection or whatever it may be it might just be
it by 1982 Carol and Harry Jarvis were married and the couple went on to have four children together I just thought M
and dad were happy as a couple you know they AR gooded like any other couple would and you know money or life worries
but for me yeah they were just a general normal happy Mom and Dad [Music] couple in the early 1990s the Jarvis
family moved over 400 m away from London settling in the west loan town of Bathgate in
Scotland I see done this house a lot of the childhood memories and friend and Neighbors
[Music] and even to family gatherings that happened in in that house she would be the the first one up
dancing or trying to cheer you up and yeah generally quite quite a bit doy and but really um sort of live Lively
character when you wanted to be it was just a mom that was there for you her main sort of life was centered
around the kids and you know the kids extra activities such as the brownies the guides on the off chance he did have a
cup of tea with a friend that would be from a friends across the road the house or or next to her neighbor so generally
just a very very quiet life centered around the four kids har was left to deal with the the
DAT running of the house and the children and she had to see to everybody's needs because Harry was you
know in and out of prison all the [Music] time probably about 97 98 maybe I remember visiting him in sockt so he was
in jail then for whatever reason again I not sure what was if he was in prison mom had the kids and so it was left to
to bring us up Harry was a petty criminal regularly committing low-level crimes such as
deception minor fraud and shoplifting after the London buses dad never really had a permanent sort of
career a permanent job to hold down he did try at times to hold down lawful employment and did try and become fairly
decent person but it wasn't long before he would be enticed back in into breaking
the law again anytime he was in prison or every time he done a disappear AC he came back
it was just normal nothing changed there was never any talk about like sort of mom and dad splitting up
or any changes or at all it would just went back to Everyday [Music] Life when Harry Jarvis was out of prison
there were still times when he would go missing from the family home without warning that just did disappear you know
right from when I was a young kid right up until you know the the last sort of days of of seeing him he would go
anywhere from the local pub to ending up at his brothers down south to you know just no no explanation given at
all for the family the difficulties occurred when Harry was out of of prison but would just then disappear for
periods of time which would cause Carol real anxiety it just became the norm whereby
it was like oh you know we used to come home and Dad wasn't there and then sort of mom would be are we bit
[Music] upset that level of anxiety no matter how hard she tried to Shield her children from it would have been imp
almost impossible because they would have picked up on mom's not okay and Dad's missing and that would have caused
some level of uncertainty and instability within the family [Music] fold it was almost like Mom was fending
for herself and looking after the four of us and that's when it kind of began to spiral out of
control seeing their mom treated in that way would have had a massive impact on on them
family children are supposed to be protected whereas they will have felt quite protective of their mother because
of Harry's Behavior Dad could do a lot of stuff and they used to fight like C dog but I
don't think anybody could ever turn and go my my dad's got it and him to kill somebody Bathgate in Scotland was the
Jarvis's family home for 18 years bate used to be home where it grew up really so know the streets like the back
in my hand basy is a very average Scottish town with a very close-nit Community most likely the locals would
say nothing exit never happens here sometimes right by when in B gate just to drive by or just out the house
just for a couple minutes just as a we sort of memory to M I'm still thinking about her
and let me get on with my day and and life really he felt quite resentful that he
had a wife and children he lived very much a Playboy lifestyle um but didn't really have the
cash to do so so that's where you know he would fleece Carol and any other woman who had the misfortune to meet
him Carol was aware that Harry had lots of other relationships outside of the marriage and I think she tolerated that
because for her her Central narrative was to get him back Carol Jarvis had been battling ill
health and soon after moving to Bathgate was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and muscle
degeneration at that time Graham had just turned 13 initially mom used to just be tired
and fatigued and used to sort of stay in bed a little bit and used to sort of complain about having s muscles so
that's my first memory of it being I feel in terms of not not being able to get out as bed as
much as Carol's Health deteriorated further Harry Jarvis became his wife's carer I don't think Harry was a
particularly caring individual would have relished the idea of having to care for Carol but actually he probably saw
that as a bit of an excuse not to have a job not to have to go to work every day
and he saw it as an opportunity for financial gain as well because he used her money that she got
to support him with having a disability for his own gain going out to the PO B in he didn't think anything of just
leaving Carol and the kids for weeks and weeks and weeks at a time he was somebody who liked things to
go his way anybody who came into his sphere was used and manipulated by him Carol would take to bed particularly if
she was having a depressive episode he would maybe play the attentive husband for a while but
quickly got very bored of that he would do his usual Disappearing Acts for quite
a long time come backwards and [Music] forwards cattle absolutely adored Harry he was able to read all his way back in
and charm her looking back at it now I think to myself how did she manage to do that all
you know I sort of got the the kids now and life's life's a struggle so and yeah
Fair Point Fair Point M she was um one of our [Music] kind as they became adults
Graham and his siblings each moved away from the family home I left when I was 16 I went to stay with my friend through
college and then uni obviously in ter time or at the weekends I used to go back so I was like sort of back and
forth Harry Jarvis was now living alone in the house with his wife Carol har Jarvis was involved in procuring the
medication for Carol Jarvis there were circumstances attached to that which would have indicated that he wasn't
perhaps acting in her best interests there was an indication that the medication he was obtaining and
applying to his wife was not designed to make her feel better but perhaps to make her feel
worse every time I went around everything was Nor in terms of dad was there and mom was
there there was nothing sort of f towards when Harry was dring Carle she would spend days and days in bed unable
to speak she was very Dy she would sleep most of the time the children would pop
in and out she was incapable of holding conversation and purely because Harry was drugging
her when he used to disappear and then we used to try and sort of take over or help out the care between the siblings
mom used to p cup and we noticed a a sort of difference when he wasn't there to when he was
there the fact that she was up and down could have been put down to something like
fibromyalgia rather than the direct correlation of her improving when Harry was away versus worsening when he was
around conversations between me and the sister or brothers was almost like oh like you
know why is it that you know when when Dad's away then like she's up and about and not even questioning it just sort of
like oh wow mom's mom's actually up she's doing stuff people who use poison or drugs to
subdue a person for their own gain or to ultimately murder somebody as Harry did
they're very weak individuals it's something that can be done quietly almost with minimal force and
effort drugging somebody makes them easier to look after I feel like you never thought or
wait a minute here like eventually that's going to kill her and that's that's a tough one
on September 11th 2009 Graham unexpectedly bumped into his dad Harry in Bathgate Town Center the Friday I
seen him at the market he looked a bit Dazed and Confused as for a couple of pound
um never thought anything of it I actually asked him like where's mom and you said she's in the house
sleeping gram noticed a woman trailing behind Harry unbeknownst to him this was his father's latest lover I didn't link
the two of them together but for whatever reason that memory still comes back to me like how do I how did I
remember like a to stranger to of behind dad like was she that close to him Graham told his eldest brother Kevin
about their dad's strange Behavior at the market so Kevin headed to the family home to check on his
parents his mom was nowhere to be seen and Harry was being evasive about her whereabouts this was so out of the
ordinary that Carol would disappear without telling her children where she was [Music]
going just wanted to to find out where Mom was you know in terms of um making sure she was all right and
yeah just something didn't add up the children of Harry and Carl Jarvis came to the house
and Harry Jarvis seemed to do all he could to prevent them entering the house it was complete manipulation by
Hari Jarvis just to keep them out of his way he gave us some story about he was moving to dund with Mom and she was up
in dunde Graham decided to call the police the police turned up to the house to see if they could establish
Carol's whereabout when police entered the property they found a woman in Carol's
bed who was not Carol despite what she was claiming now fortunately one of the officers had previously met Carol so
realized that this was not Carol Jarvis it would have been at that point where there's a strange woman in the bed Carol
is missing this is really going to raise alarm balls for Polie the mystery person
under the bed was a woman called Rita haser it become AAR that there was this person called
rer we had never really experienced R before and there was still no sign of Carol Jarvis
the police you know said to us that you know that Mom was an adult and there's nothing they could do for 24
hours I had no idea what was coming the police in Bathgate had discovered car's remains under the uh
[Music] floorboards Carol Jarvis had been reported missing outside the the Jarvis family
home Rita hter had been revealed as the mystery woman found in the house there was another person in the
house that Dad had claimed to be mom on the night we had no idea as who she would be when Graham saw the woman
he immediately recognized her she was the woman he'd seen with his dad just before Carol's disappearance
he was in the market I remember her trailing behind him for some bizarre reason had a
suitcase and again I didn't link the two of them together but for whatever reason
that memory still comes back to me Harry met rer hter in 2008 on the internet and uh immediately hit it off
and of course when R told him who her family was very well known very famous very
wealthy Bakers he immediately decided that she was going to be his next partner purely
for uh financial gain we're talking millions of pounds that's the big attraction for
Harry reers money he's a very manipulative individual he was a liar and he I think showed narcissistic
Tendencies he cared about nobody else really other than Harry Jarvis Rita was an ays and a lot is made
about the fact that she was in this position but financially she was actually in quite a dire situation she'd
lost her house um she'd squandered her Fortune so it's almost like he's the protector in this role and Carol's the
enemy that needs to be removed so him and R can be together and he can save her you've got Harry at the center of
this family picture with everyone else orbiting around him almost like objects in his
game and he's moving the pieces absolutely horrendous [Music] initially the missing person's report
had come in from car's children to say that they hadn't seen their mom for some time you're probably just thinking
where's mom you know as he as he left her somewhere or in a hotel or or they sent her to the shops and I'm not not
too sure but yeah yeah you don't think off the the worst case scenario police said that they would
conduct a further search to try and assertain uh where Carol dvis was after 24 hours Carol was still missing police
return to the Jarvis's house Harry and Rita Haster were no longer there they said I we'll go around to the
house to see if she's got a bus pass or purse or bag um if they've any like recent photos of her so they can log
it the police did discover something unusual in the garden shed Rita hter had been living in the
shed so you've got a mislim woman who was very unwell you've got a missing husband who has just appeared and then
they found someone's actually been living in the shed this is a very very absurd
situation are the conditions there dirty grubby basic for anyone to live in those
squalid conditions was a great surprise to me the shed in the garden was a very basic 6x6 garden
shed there was a tiny window in and R lived in the garden in the shed which basically just had a single
mattress and a blanket no toilet facilities existed there were improvised facilities in the form of a
bucket and that was about it the shed was right outside the windows of the house it wasn't far away
only a matter of feet and really the shed was so close to the house that it surprised me that that's exactly what it
was Harry may have been incredibly good at finding victims who were susceptible to
his charms you can see that with the relationship with Rita you know persuading her to live in the
shed if you find find the right target a person can be very Charmed and hopeful we didn't really know anything
about it until the Monday night it was almost like this this R woman the lover that was hiding in the
shed Biz I have no reason to believe that she was there under any Jess I do think she was there from the
evidence under the manipulative aspects of Harry Jarvis's character and he persuaded her to to go
there I'm not saying that was against her will but I'm sure that this was his initiative and that this is what he
wanted Rita's residence in the shed was unfortunately not the only Discovery the
police made at the Jarvis house when the police came around they said look listen you know we we found I
found a body in the house and um yeah we knew that that would be mom if you're looking for a person and
they find the body a good chance it's not going to be some else up what had been a missing person case
was now a homicide investigation Harry was determined to do what he did to get what he wanted out of
it which was to do away with Carol and move on with Rita that was all that Harry cared
about for Graham what he's caring about is a lot bigger just like just got rening You' you've almost prepared for
yourself for two days that you know something bad's happened and you're kind of stopping yourself
from thinking the wor nobody knows exactly when Carol Daris died but sometime between sep
nember 11th and September the 15th 2009 the police in Bathgate had discovered car's remains
under the uh floorboards in the KN apparently the children used to play in that exact
spot there was two basement the real one in the living room is where they founder we used to go down there as kids
and quite like hide and seek I used to have a mini kid snooker table down there and
[Music] stuff hearing that from the police again just makes you sick was just horrific just horrendous man like I was
sick harrie was so blinded by his obsession with Rita he just wasn't thinking about consequences or next
steps he wanted to be with Rita he saw that Carol was in the way of that therefore removed Carol and he's
free to be with r that's probably about as sophisticated as it got Carol's husband Harry Jarvis had
last been seen in the house the day before with Rita hter police needed to find the couple
urgently I'd got a text message from a police contact who said that there had been a
body found in a house in Bathgate it became very apparent very quickly that they had a suspect close to
home for this the police basically said to us listen we trying to find a dad we don't
know where he is just that sort of worry in the back of your mind of to wait a minute here like is he is he dad or is
he har the killer I can't believe that he could have been a killer or was a killer
and still sit here in disbelief that that that [Music] happened Harry and Rita were on the Run
with Carol found dead in the basement and evidence that Rita had been living in the shed for some
time they were both now Prime suspects for Carol's [Music] murder Harry and R spent the night in a
B&B and the next morning they disappeared without paying the owners of the B&B phoned the
police and gave a description of the people that had uh just left without paying police Tracked Down the couple
the day after Carol's body was discovered arresting them as they got off a bus in
Edinburgh both were charged with murder they released him on Bale and they were still the court process to go
through it was almost like you he was still dead and I think the four of us spoke and was like we're just going to
need to try and help him somehow giving him like sort of a jacket or money to go and and stay somewhere you
didn't think it was possible it was almost that moral compass of like mom would want us
to help him out I can sense that kind of tension that struggle between my dad and this
murderer and I think that tension is always present for for for Graham he works really hard to find a way to deal
with that internal conflict which at times can be very difficult for him as the details of the case started
to emerge and the horror in which Carol had died and the circumstances under which she had
died people couldn't believe it you know how could this happen right under their
noses after police had found Carol's body love letters that Harry Jarvis had sent to Rita were discovered in the
house Harry shows that he had every intention of killing Carol because of the content of the letters that he sent
Rita that in and of itself is very juvenile one said the drugs are doing the job just took longer than I thought
but going fast now another claimed Carol is dying as I write then we have the house to
ourselves and sell all in it to move on dangerous times but we will get there we can see Harry's intention with
the letters that he was writing to Rita there is definitely premeditated Behavior at play here so this wasn't a
crime of passion this was a crime of planning Harry's trial began on January 31st
2011 he pleaded not guilty and the true horrors of the crime played out in court there was no established cause of
death but the circumstances pointed to Harry having a major involvement in the deterioration of her
health creating a set of circumstances with the administration of medication or maladministration of
medication which contributed to that Harry was already drugging Carol he anticipated that he would be
able to uh get rid of her fairly quickly after Carol passed away Harry wrapped her body in a Duvy and and put
her under um a gap in the floorboard and he told the police that he'd put Carol there to keep her close
to him and me he tried to claim that Carol had died from natural causes hiding her in the way that he did
and saying she died in natural causes just shows a real lack of remorse car was identified through d DNA
from her fingertips because there had been such a decomposition of the body the postmortem could not show any
cause of death and how Harry did it har Jarvis wrote notes which were producing evidence and the prosecution
relies on those notes they were crucial to the prosecution case to show some degree of evil intent on his part and
some intention to act to the detriment of his wife's health and as the prosecution argued his intention was to
kill [Music] her the jury concluded that all the evidence was such that a clear inference
could be drawn Beyond reasonable doubt that Harry was responsible for her death Harry Jarvis was eventually convicted of
murder and sentenced to life imprisonment even after the verdict Harry remained silent about the
murder we'll never know as what happened what made him do it or how he done it if
he stabbed her or shot her then that's like clean cut but it was never Cas of it was clean cut as to what had
happened Graham as an adult has to come to terms with his father murdered his mother and buried her body in the house
that his father had a mistress living in the shed and had planned to get rid of Carol and run off with
Rita that his father was basically a criminal hidden in plain sight and this is the person you call
Dad this would be mindblowing for Graham to wrap his head around all these multiple narratives about this one man
this is my dad I loved him as a child and these are the things that he did as a result of his
behavior Peter hter instructed a member of my firm who constructed me as solicor Advocate to defend her for
the charge of murder 5 months later on June 15th Rita Haster stood trial at Edinburgh High
Court charged with murder and attempting to defeat the ends of Justice DNA identified as being that of
Rita hter was found at the edge of the trap door leading down to the sell area below the living room where the body of
Carl Jarvis had found that doesn't necessarily mean that R hter was there but it did link her physically to the
premises and to the vicinity where the body was found by the finding of a DNA in the
house together with all the other circumstances led the jury to convict her of the charge of attempting to
defeat the ends of justice and she was sentenced to 4 and 1/2 years imprisonment for that but of
course the murder charge did not apply to her in 2017 6 years into his life sentence
67-year-old Harry Jarvis died in prison of heart failure Graeme and his siblings would
have felt this huge loss with their mother but also with their father so there will be lots of complex
feelings here and and trying to figure out that relationship and where it stands after that point Harry dying in
prison might not have brought closure to his family because he didn't serve much
of his [Music] [Music] sentence because you've lost both of them you're not really angry you're more
sad at the overall situation all did get on top of me and then I done some mental health therapy
stuff C CBT and that um which which which helped still have you know I still have
the old Nightmare and that about the the basement in the floor and don't no better we get rid of it at
[Music] all life goes on eh [Music] [Music] [Music]

Graham Jarvis has had to accept that his father Harry Jarvis is a killer following the murder of his mother Carol.

Relatives of murderers tell their stories, discussing how the crimes affected their families and whether there were any signs on murderous intentions beforehand.

Brief Summary

Harry Jarvis murdered his wife Carol, hiding her body while living with his mistress, impacting their children profoundly.

Key points

Harry's Deceptive Nature. Harry Jarvis's manipulative behavior raises suspicions about his involvement in Carol's death.
The Disappearance of Carol Jarvis. Carol Jarvis was reported missing by her children, leading to a shocking discovery.
The Impact on the Children. The Jarvis children grapple with the reality of their father's actions and their mother's death.
The Mystery Woman. The police discover a woman in Carol's bed, leading to further investigation.
Life in the Shed. Rita was found living in a shed, raising questions about her relationship with Harry.
The Discovery of a Body. The police found a body in the house, marking a shift from a missing person case to a homicide investigation.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

He was very Brazen about the whole thing.

Describing Harry's audacity in his actions.

0:38WatchDec 20, 2024

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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