‘20 years have passed but it still really hurts’: Best friend of murdered schoolgirl
Joanne Menzies was Caroline's best friend and has been exclusively talking to Clyde News about the last twenty years.
Clyde News is exclusively talking to the best friend of murdered teenager Caroline Glachan, about living with the pain of her death for the last 20 years.
The 14-year-old’s killers have never been caught since the brutal attack on the 24th of August 1996 which left her in River Leven with head injuries.
To mark the anniversary we have launched our #JusticeForCaroline campaign and revealed police are now re-examining the forensic evidence at the Scottish Crime Campus in Gartcosh.
Joanne Menzies was her best friend and still lives with the guilt she did not go with Caroline from Bonhill to Renton to meet her 18-year-old boyfriend on the night she was killed.
The mother of three said; “She was an amazing girl, she was outgoing and fun, oh and her hair was her pride and joy.
“I’ve got friends, but I don’t think I’ll have anyone as close unless there is some sort of closure, someone caught. Then maybe I could move on.
“She was so important to me, she knew all my secrets and I knew all hers. When she was taken away from me, I lost part of me. Sometimes I feel as though I’m fifteen again, in some situations, I definitely miss her a lot.
“It may be twenty years on but some days it feels like (that night) was only two days, never mind twenty years. I still can remember everything we did, as if it was yesterday.
“There has never been any closure; there have been so many rumours but no closure.
“I think the sickening way it happened to her, that’s what haunts me.
“This was not an accident; this was not something you can move on from. Twenty years on and it still hurts me to this day, I still dream about her.”
You can listen to Joanne’s interview with our reporter Shiona McCallum here: