‘You never heal’ – families still grieving decades after Glasgow murders

The sister of a 21-year-old woman who was murdered in Glasgow nearly 30 years ago has said she will never get over her death, saying “it’s your sister and you never heal”.

Bernadette McCash was just 12 when her sister Tracey Wylde was choked to death at her flat in Barmulloch in November 1997.

It took more than 20 years for her killer, Zhi Min Chen, to be brought to justice.

Ms Wylde was one of a number of a women involved in prostitution who were killed in Glasgow the 1990s and early 2000s, whose deaths are being examined by a new podcast.

Ms McCash told Rayo’s Beware Book podcast that when police came to her door to say her sister had been murdered, “I was 12 but it never hit me”.

She went on: “The school kept me inside because the paparazzi were trying to pull me out of school.

“All my friends rallied around me and they were asking if that was my sister in the paper and on TV.

“You never heal, it’s your sister and you never heal.

“Twenty odd years down the line, you just learn to cope but the heartache is still there.”

The podcast also spoke to Alice Wilson, whose daughter Jacqueline Gallagher was brutally murdered in June 1996.

The 26-year-old was last seen alive at the corner of Bothwell Street and Blythswood Street, in the city’s red light district.

Her body was found the next day in a layby in the village of Bowling, West Dunbartonshire, wrapped in a home-made curtain.

A few years later a man was charged with her murder after his DNA was matched to traces found on Ms Gallagher’s clothing.

However, a jury returned a not proven verdict after a trial in 2004, and Ms Gallagher’s murder remains unsolved.

“I think her last words would have been mammy, I do,” Ms Wilson said.

“I think she would have cried out mammy and it was more than 100 blows she took.

“Can you imagine that? A wee lassie.

“Then he bit her, he bit her as well. I don’t know. Disgusting. An animal.”

Ms Wilson said her daughter had been “a lovely lassie, beautiful looking”.

“She was born with jet black hair, it was coal black. She had a twinkle in her eyes and was always bubbly.

“I fair miss her, so I do.”

Ms Wilson said it has been “hell” knowing her daughter’s killer has not been brought to justice.

“I’m even looking myself at people walking by me,” she said.

“I’m really hurt. I’ve lost my daughter in these circumstances, and I just wish to God that that bandit was put away for a long time.”

Ms McCash finally saw her sister’s murderer convicted after a wait of two decades.

She had some words of advice for all the families still waiting for justice of their own.

“Keep your hope, don’t give up,” she said.

“You might wait 10 or 50 years, but as long as your family know that this could happen one day.

“We honestly gave up hope thinking that this would never happen.

“He wasn’t in the system and then he got caught with a stupid crime.

“The pain won’t go away but talk about your loved person.

“Look at pictures and look at parties. If you don’t talk, you hurt harder.”

The Beware Book podcast takes its name from a journal which was used by women involved in prostitution to warn each other about potentially dangerous or suspicious clients.

The podcast is being released following the conviction of Iain Packer, who was brought to justice almost two decades after murdering Emma Caldwell in 2005.

The relatives of those who were killed say they have not been contacted by Police Scotland.

As well as Ms Gallagher, the deaths of Karen McGregor, Leona McGovern and Diane McInally have not been solved.

A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “All unresolved and unsolved homicides remain under review which means they’re never closed.

“When new information, new evidence, comes to light, we do act upon it.”