(The last known picture of The Fosters taken at a friend's barbecue on the afternoon of the 26th of August, 2008. Photo credit: The Telegraph)
Continued from part two, please be aware that some details included in this post may be distressing.
During that weekend before the bank holiday Monday, Christopher researched suicide websites online but gave no hint to anyone who had seen him that he was seriously troubled or planning to take his own life.
On Monday the 26th of August 2008, The Fosters attended the bank holiday barbecue and were said to be in good spirits. They left around 8:30pm. The police believe that neither Jill or Christopher spoke to anyone on the phone or online when they returned home but they do know that Kirstie went online to talk with friends.
At 11:30pm, Christopher went upstairs to check on Kirstie and told her it was time to turn the Internet off and go to bed. Kirstie send a message to her friend which read ''Sorry, Dad's turned the Internet off.''
A little while later the friend texted her to ask if she would be going back online. Kirstie texted back ''No. Dad's too close. Night Night. Love U. Kirstie X x x.'' This was the last known message that she had sent.
With Kirstie in bed and Jill upstairs in the bedroom asleep. Christopher Foster was downstairs looking through photo albums.
Some time before 3:34am, he went into Kirstie's bedroom and shot her in the head as she slept. He did the same to his wife Jill. The gun he was using had a silencer.
Christopher Foster took one of his shotguns and went outside to the where the dog kennels were. He shot each of the dogs in the head. He then walked over to the barn where the horses were and also shot them in the head.
Some of the animals were still alive despite their serious life threatening injuries. He returned to the kennels and began to drag the dogs to the barn to where the horses were. He then set the barn on fire with all of the animals inside.
He drove the horse carriage and parked it in front of the main gates where he also shot out the tyres. This was done so that emergency services would have difficulties getting to the fire.
Christopher then placed hose pipes that pumped 200 litres of oil into the cellar of the house from his domestic oil tank. Being the expert that he was about fires, he knew what it would take to completely destroy Osbaston house.
The security cameras picked up images of Christopher carrying guns and the hose pipes. He didn't seem drunk or distraught, he seemed focused and almost robotic. He murdered his pets the same way that he murdered his wife and daughter.
The fire took hold very quickly and ferociously. Christopher went back into the house and went to the bedroom where Jill's body was laid. He lay beside her as the fire surrounded them. Investigators believe that the smoke killed him before the fire did.
By 4:11am, the security cameras had shut down and a neighbour called the emergency services.
12 fire crews arrived at Osbaston house and the fire was so overwhelming that it was difficult for the fire crew to get the fire under control. The main gates to the house being blocked by the horse carrier made things even more difficult. The fire crews did the best that they could.
As the fire fighters battled the blaze, neighbours and members of the public were horrified to see the beautiful estate up in flames and everyone was extremely concerned about what had happened to the Fosters. Because of the ferociousness of the fire, the police and neighbours assumed that Christopher must have gotten involved in a bad business deal and that some underground organisation must have done this. It didn't seem to cross anyone's mind that the family would still be in the house. They thought that they had fled the property for another country to escape a debt or something.
The bailiff's were on their way as planned to Osbaston house but were stopped on the road on the way to the estate and were informed of what was happening. The housekeeper who was due to go to work that morning received a phone call from a friend telling her that she'd heard there was a fire at Osbaston house. The housekeeper didn't think that it was going to be as serious as it was, she jumped into her car thinking that she could go and help. She was also stopped on the way there and informed of what was happening.
Enid and Andrew, Christopher's mother and brother, were informed of what had happened later the next day as they hadn't been at home. They also thought that there must have been some kind of electrical fault in the house.
The newspapers and TV stations put out an appeal to find the family but to no avail. Nobody could get near the house as it was too dangerous. Three days after the fire, investigators were finally able to carefully enter the ruins of the house where they found Jill and Christopher's remains. Their remains were bound together because of where they were laid on the bed and the room had collapsed down to the living room area below which is where they were found.
There was no sign of Kirstie. Everyone hoped that she had managed to get away, others thought she may have been kidnapped.
(Osbaston house. Photo credit: Shropshire Star)
Six days after the fire, some tiny fragments of Kirstie's remains were found. Investigators had to delicately use brushes to move Kirstie's remains into a waiting hearse. A piece of Kirstie's skull had been found and it was from this that they found that she had been shot in the head.
With the neighbours and local public still speculating what had happened to the family, the news of the remains being found had devastated them and they thought that they must have died due to an electrical fault or that someone had committed an arson attack.
200 investigators were working on the case to determine what had happened to the Fosters and it soon became clear looking into Christopher's business dealings and what was left of the security camera footage, that he had murdered his family and his pets, then committed suicide by smoke inhalation.
Enid had struggled with this news, as did everyone else but she refused to believe that Christopher could be capable of doing such a thing. Even to this day she defends him and seems to have a lot of sympathy for him. In her mind she thinks that he did it to protect his family because he loved them and didn't want to see them lose everything.
Christopher's brother Andrew has a different take. The brothers hadn't spoken for 16 years and although there was times that Andrew did think of patching things up with Christopher for the sake of their mother, he was too scared to go to Osbaston house in case he had a gun pointed at his face. He claims that Christopher bullied him for years as a child and also sexually abused him. Andrew said his brother was a bully and a control freak who sent him a note written on yellow paper with the words ''You've got to beg and scrape on bended knee to come to me and Jill. I want a written apology.'' In response to a letter from Andrew in 1999, offering to sit down and properly talk things through as adults.
Christopher would never admit to being in the wrong about anything and would hold grudges according to his brother Andrew.
Today, Andrew is married with two children and is still looking for answers as to why his brother did what he did and why he was allowed to own guns.
4 months after the fire on the 19th of December 2008, the funerals of 15 year old Kirstie and 49 year old Jill took place at their local village church. The joint funeral was quiet and respectful with only a small number of close friends and family present. They were both buried in the same plot. At the request of Jill's family, Christopher was to have a separate funeral and buried away from Kirstie and Jill.
A few hours later, 50 year old Christopher's funeral took place and he was buried in the same church yard as Jill and Kirstie.
For a few years after the horror at Osbaston house, the remains of the buildings and the families charred belongings were still there. Police tape and fencing was put up around the estate but people still managed to get in to take selfies and macabre souvenirs. Groups of people were also said to have entered the site to pay tribute to Kirstie on her birthday each year since her death.
There were rumours that someone had left a note on the main gate which read ''Money is the root of all evil.''
In 2014, the 16 acre estate was bought and plans were made for a new six-bedroom house to be built there. Christopher's brother Andrew at the time said that he hoped that the new owners would allow him to have a memorial built to Kirstie somewhere in the grounds.
All of the remains of the house and rubble were cleared in 2011 and the site was put up for sale in 2012 but wasn't sold until 2014 after the price was said to have been reduced.
The neighbours were happy about the new plans for the site and hoped that it would help everyone to move on from what happened and also stop people from going there for selfies.
This was a really disturbing case to research and demonstrates how dangerous it can be (for someone with a certain mind frame) to come from humble beginnings to having a lot of money. Christopher spent money like it was going out of fashion and Jill didn't seem to mind the luxury lifestyle either. A number of people who knew Christopher have said that he was never a long term thinker, he was impulsive and wanted everything right now. A lot of what he had was on credit and the money became an addiction. He enjoyed the admiration and the attention that the money gave him.
He strikes me as someone who was a narcissist and I agree with what his brother said about him being a control freak. I also believe that he was a narcissist based on what I have researched. Kirstie and Jill would have lost the luxury lifestyle, there was no mistake about that but they did not deserve to lose their lives. That was not his decision to make. He wanted to destroy everything because he couldn't have it anymore and couldn't face the idea of facing people after he had played the Lord of the manor for so long.
His mother Enid, believes that he was protecting his wife and daughter and that's why he murdered them. I don't think he thought about anyone but himself. Maybe he thought that Jill would leave him if he told her the truth. Maybe he couldn't face the fact that if he took his own life, there would be the possibility that Jill would meet someone else and get married? Who knows what his reasons were but the fact that he could also shoot animals without a care in the world, was obsessed with guns and bragged about shooting up to 500 pheasants, says to me that he was a heartless person who didn't seem to care who suffered as long as he was king of the castle.
R.I.P Kirstie & Jill
Further Reading & Sources:
- BBC News
Thank you for reading parts one, two and three of this case. See you in the next post x
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Check out some of the true crime cases I have covered previously:
- Stalked To Death: The Alissa Blanton Story
- Rod Ferrell And The Kentucky Vampire Cult
- What Happened To Dominique Dunne?
Check out some of the true crime cases I have covered previously:
- Stalked To Death: The Alissa Blanton Story
- Rod Ferrell And The Kentucky Vampire Cult
- What Happened To Dominique Dunne?
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I always see especially in the US about people owning guns as a hobby and I always have to wonder if it could/will turn out like this, because while shooting and having a few guns is a hobby, when they have a big collection it's a so odd because there is never a reason to have that many. The fact that he went out of his way to torture the animals is disturbing like he couldn't just shoot them he had to set fire to them, jc. I don't understand if he didn't want the humiliation, I hate to say this why not just kill himself and let his family go?
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like his brother knew who he was and I feel like thank god he never did patch things up with him, or he could have been a victim as well. It seem like his mother played favorites with them and it was Christopher, and I feel like she is part of the reason why he was who he was, and why he did this, she helped create this entitlement. When I read the first part, I did feel very heavily that she played favorites, and this just confirms this.
I am glad that Jill's family got the separate funeral and plot away from Christopher, he didn't deserve his family, or to be near them in death.
That's really sad and disturbing that people would get souvenirs from a place that murder happened. I'm surprised that the property got sold at all to be honest. Narcissist and control freak both sound really accurate. Losing the luxury lifestyle would have sucks for both Jill and Kristy but they could have bounced back, and their life should have been their own choice not his. His mother sounds heartless and like a Narcissist as well, with Christopher being her golden child who the narcissism was passed too.
http://loveiszero.net
I totally agree with everything you've said & that Enid played favourites with the boys. Even after the murders you could see that she was in denial and couldn't bring herself to say a bad word about Christopher. Thanks for commenting : ) x
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