A witness who claims he saw a teenager feared to have been murdered by serial killer Fred West being snatched off the street in a grey van says he was never quizzed by detectives investigating her disappearance.
Retired news reporter Alan Watkins, 74, believes he was the last person to see missing Mary Bastholm alive, moments before she was picked up and driven off while she was waiting at a bus stop 53 years ago.
Mr Watkins says he told police the next day that he saw the 15-year-old waitress getting into a van, but officers never spoke to him again to get a follow-up statement.
He today told how he was waiting for a bus on the other side of the road when he saw a grey Standard Atlas van pull up next to her.
He said: ‘Somebody spoke to her. I didn’t take too much notice, I was thinking about where my bus was. Then I looked across and I saw the back of the van drive off and the girl wasn’t there.
‘And that, I think, was when she was picked up by her killer or killers.’
Mary’s disappearance has remained a mystery for over five decades, although there has been much speculation over the years since Fred West’s murders were revealed in 1994 that she could have been one of his victims.
This revelation comes as forensic teams and Gloucester Police spend their fourth day investigating the basement of a city centre café where Mary had worked.
The then 15-year-old girl was last seen in 1968, but police have been combing through The Clean Plate Café after an ITV film crew alerted them to possible evidence of a body.
Retired reporter Alan Watkins, 74, (above) believes he is the last person to have seen Mary Bastholm alive while he waited for a bus 53 years ago. He claims he saw a grey Standard Atlas van pull up to the teenager and when he next looked in that direction, she had disappeared
Serial killers Fred and Rosemary West are long believed to have played a part in the death of Mary Bastholm (right) who vanished aged 15. The locket she wore as a bridesmaid at her brother’s wedding (pictured right) was found in their Cromwell Street house
New drone pictures directly above the Clean Plate Cafe on Southgate Street show that police have put up forensic tents at the front and rear of the property
The documentary makers, headed up by Sir Trevor McDonald, were recording scenes at the former Gloucester eaterie for their film on serial killer Fred West when they found ‘possible evidence of human remains’.
West, who admitted killing 12 victims and may have murdered 20 more, was also said to have laid the concrete floor there just weeks before Mary disappeared 53 years ago. Sniffer dogs reacted when in the basement and a scanner able to penetrate stone picked up a ‘suspicious object’ under it.
Teenager Mary was last seen at a bus stop in Bristol Road on Saturday, January 6, 1968, and no trace of her has ever been found.
Schoolgirl Mary Bastholm served tea, cake and sandwiches in the Gloucester eaterie then called ‘The Pop In’ and now called ‘The Clean Plate’
A tent was placed outside ‘The Clean Plate’ cafe in Gloucester on May 11, where specialist teams and an archaeologist are scanning the basement for Fred West’s missing victim
Forensic analysts have spent their fourth consecutive day combing through a city centre eaterie after being tipped off by ITV film crews that there may be ‘possible evidence’ of human remains at the site.
Specialist digging teams supported by an archaeologist are working in the basement and garden of the The Clean Plate Café in Southgate Street, where West was a regular and may even have laid the concrete floor weeks before Mary vanished.
Yesterday, forensic teams removed the fireplace in the cellar of the café, which was a five minute walk from West’s home at 25 Cromwell Street, dubbed the infamous ‘House of Horrors’ where many of the victims were killed and buried.
Miss Bastholm was last seen waiting for a bus in Bristol Road, Gloucester on the way to visit her boyfriend’s Hardwicke home with a Monopoly game in her bag in January 1968.
She has long feared to have been abducted and murdered by Fred, but her body has never been found.
Fred West, who admitted killing 12 victims and may have murdered 20 more, was also said to have laid the concrete floor there just weeks before she disappeared 53 years ago
Fred (shown above) working as a builder, and he may have laid the floor that is now being dug up as part of a forensic investigation at the Gloucester eaterie
Mr Watkins, then a young reporter who was in his early 20s, claims to have seen Mary while he was waiting at the bus shelter on the opposite side of the road on the evening of Saturday January 6, 1968.
He recalls the time being around 7.20pm, after he had just left his grandmother’s house to go home in Longlevens.
Mr Watkins said: ‘I saw this girl on the other side of the road and she had a bag. It was reasonably well lit but very dark.
‘It had just started to snow, not heavily but it was snowing. So you get the flurries of snow going across.’
Officers dismantled the cellar’s fireplace and cleared the basement of rubbish, picture frames and menus with an archaeologist also brought in to help with the search for human remains
The Gloucester man remarked that the girl looked like she had hurried to the bus stop.
It is believed Mary was at the stop on the way to visit her boyfriend.
Mr Watkins went on to say a grey Standard Atlas van pulled up beside her bus stop, although admitted that artificial lighting could have changed his perception of the colour of the vehicle.
‘Somebody spoke to the girl,’ he said. ‘And I didn’t take too much notice, I was thinking about where my bus was.
‘Then I looked across and I saw the back of the van drive off and the girl wasn’t there.
‘And that, I think, was when she was picked up by her killer or killers.’
The former solicitor of West’s wife, Rose West, has alleged that Mary was the couple’s first murdered victim together.
Recalling the young girl he saw, the 74-year-old is positive she was the same Mary Bastholm in a photo circulated in appeals to find her.
Mr Watkins thought nothing of it until the following morning, when his news team were handed an appeal by police to find her.
He worked for a news agency called Hyett’s, based in St Michael’s Square which runs next to Cromwell Street where West lived at number 25.
During the morning press conference with Gloucestershire police, he recalls how the missing girl was discussed and then how they moved on to other topics.
‘We were so curious because there were so many people involved looking for her that early after she disappeared,’ said Mr Watkins.
‘I held back after the conference finished and spoke to Inspector Arthur Merrett who was in charge of the press that morning and told him what I had seen.’
He said the inspector responded by saying: ‘Very interesting’, but that was the end of it as ‘he didn’t seem to be wildly enthusiastic to know any more’.
Mr Watkins said: ‘Now for whatever reason, I was never asked to make a statement. I was never questioned by CID [Crime Investigation Department].
‘It just died with that report I made to the police.
‘I thought it was strange at the time and I still think it is strange 50-odd years later.
‘I still find it frustrating.’
Earlier this week, Stephen West spoke to MailOnline and claimed his father opened up about killing Mary, and 30 more women, weeks before he hanged himself while awaiting trial.
Quizzing his father on Mary Bastholm before his death, Stephen asked: ‘Did you do it? You’ve always denied it.
He said his father then admitted it, telling him: ‘Yeah, I did do it. I did take her.’
Speaking exclusively with MailOnline, Stephen said: ‘He begged me not to go to the police, but I went to them with the information the following day. I wasn’t prepared to carry that burden for him.
‘There are reasons why he didn’t want the police to know or to find her. That may become clearer in the future.
‘But I’m left with that burning question, why? Why did he not want anyone to find Mary?
Fred’s son said the true extent of his father’s killing may never be known but he believes it is far more than those he was charged with.
He continued: ‘He talked to me about another 20-30 victims on top of what the police found. He said he lost count, forgot victims’ names.
‘There were a number of other locations that my dad told me he’d buried his victims. I told police this back in 1994/5.
On Friday May 7, officers were called to The Clean Plate Café after they were tipped off by filmmakers about potential evidence of a body buried at the property.
A tent was put up outside the front of the city centre premises and evidence bags and boxes were seen being loaded into a police van.
Gloucestershire Police described the excavations as ‘a significant development’ in the search for Mary which could take weeks to complete.
A spokesman for Gloucestershire Constabulary said: ‘Currently we are focusing our efforts into investigating the potential evidence found by a production company specifically related to the disappearance of Mary Bastholm.
‘After we have completed this work we will review whether any other activity or enquiries are needed.’
The force has issued a statement in response to comments about its refusal on past occasions to search the Clean Plate Cafe, particularly in 2012 when an online petition was raised calling on it to do so.
The police statement reads: ‘At the time of the original Fred West investigation and in response to the 2012 online petition, it was deemed there was insufficient evidence that Mary Bastholm was buried at the location.
‘The reasons behind the 2012 decision were documented in an open letter from former Chief Constable Tony Melville. In the letter he addressed all the points that had been raised.
‘He also stated that if any fresh evidence came to light, Gloucestershire Constabulary would welcome the opportunity of reviewing it and taking appropriate action.
The force said that forensic teams will be carrying out a major crimes investigation at The Clean Plate for a ‘number of weeks’ while they search for human remains.
Three expert archaeologists at the Clean Plate are using geophysical survey equipment in the cellar, which required the fireplace be dismantled.
The force will make a ‘more considered’ decision regarding the extent of the operation on Monday, May 17.