Tag Archive for ‘Scarlett Keeling’ at Asian Window

Tag Archive for 'Scarlett Keeling'

‘I can’t let them get away with it’

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on January 22, 2009

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In the year since her daughter was murdered in Goa, Fiona McKeown has single-handedly fought a botched police investigation, endured vicious attacks in the media and even faced charges of neglect. She talks to Emine Saner about her traumatic search for answers. From The Guardian:

What can it be like, to stand in a morgue, your 15-year-old child laid out in front of you, and have to take photographs – to zoom in and focus, those images burning on your mind – of the injuries and bruises that scar her body? Fiona MacKeown is searching for the words. “It was horrific,” she says. “I had a friend with me and both of us had to keep stopping because we were crying so much. Just … horrific.” Nobody, of course, should ever have to do anything like this, but MacKeown felt she had no choice. Ever since her daughter, Scarlett Keeling, was found dead on a beach in Goa, on the west coast in India, on 18 February last year, she felt there would be a cover-up. When she was first taken to see Scarlett’s body, she saw a bruise on her head and asked the police officer in charge of the investigation about it. “He
said it had happened after she died, from her head bumping the sand when she was floating in the water,” she says. “So I believed it. But when I read the autopsy, it said it had been caused before she died, so I knew he had lied. The only way I could make people believe that he had lied – the police had also said that there were no marks on her body – was by taking those photographs. It is like one of those nightmares when you are screaming and nobody can hear any sound.”

Initially, MacKeown accepted the police account that Scarlett had been drunk and had drowned in the sea at Anjuna, a resort on Goa’s hippy trail, accidentally. “I believed them for the first three days, but something was urging me to go down to where she was found,” she says.

Previously in AW:

Malaise de Goa?

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on November 16, 2008

in India

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Beneath the idyll of a paradise called Goa, a grim, gritty picture of a state scorched by corruption and apathy. Sudeep Chakravarti with photographer Satish Bate in Hindustan Times:

On a cool evening in mid-October, a hundred or so people, mostly Goan – teachers, writers, painters, journalists, businesspersons, fashion designers and lawyers – stood near one of Atanassio Monserrate’s two large villas near Panjim.

They held candles; an emphatic circle of light. I was there too, wax from a temperamental candle blistering my fingers.

It seemed a small price to pay. After all, I didn’t join in the singing of we-shall-overcome, or impassioned speech-making.

My fingers had not been severed with a chopper, as happened to a Goan lawyer the previous night. Nor had I been severely beaten about the head, as had a young Goan professor of history, as he dined on chicken xacuti with this lawyer friend at a modest Panjim restaurant. It’s why we had all gathered in civil outrage.

‘Indian autopsies in Scarlett case absolutely illegal’

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on April 16, 2008

in Crime

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Swedish forensic experts slam the autopsies conducted on Scarlett Keeling in India. Times of India has the report.

Swedish forensic experts have said the two autopsies carried out in India on the body of British teenager Scarlett Keeling, found dead on a beach in Goa, were “absolutely illegal”.

Scarlett’s bruised and semi-naked body was found on the sea shore of Goa’s Anjuna beach just before dawn on February 18. Initially, Goa police said the 15-year-old had drowned.

Previously in AW:

Goa murder: ‘When I remember again it’s like being hit’

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on April 12, 2008

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When the body of Scarlett Keeling was found in Goa many believed her family’s unconventional lifestyle was to blame. In The Telegraph, UK, Cassandra Jardine meets her mother Fiona MacKeown:

A week after Fiona MacKeown (Photo: left) flew back from India with the body of her daughter Scarlett Keeling, life on her small-holding in north Devon is regaining a semblance of normality.

Children, dogs and hens are running around between half a dozen caravans, a barn and the two-storey dwelling where I find Fiona sitting, tattooed and defiant, like a New Age frontierswoman.

The expression on her fine-boned, weather-beaten face is wary but welcoming. Since Scarlett’s body was found on Anjuna beach in Goa, early on the morning of February 18, she has had reason to be both cautious of, and grateful for, the interest stirred up by her battle for justice.

Previously in AW:

Don’t punish the victim

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on March 21, 2008

in Crime and Women

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In Times of India, CPM Rajya Sabha MP, Brinda Karat on the Scarlett Keeling murder being raked up in Parliament

The Scarlett Keeling case has received a great deal of attention. In Rajya Sabha, there was a sharp exchange of views on the case. A view expressed in Parliament that it was the responsibility of parents to take care of the security of their children finds resonance among some people. Indeed, the Goa government and its spokespersons have projected the case as a tragedy caused by bad parenting. They have said that if the mother had been more responsible, if the victim had been a “good girl”, then…
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Also, see previous posts:

Travel advisory

A Brazilian in Goa

Fiona MacKeown: naive, not negligent

Creaky paradise

What her mother had to see

Another family’s search for truth

Who killed Scarlett Keeling?

The land where the hippy trail reaches a historic impasse

Published

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on March 21, 2008

in Travel

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Adventurous travellers have found many things in Goa. Innocent escape was never one of them. Ian Jack in The Guardian, UK:

Fiona MacKeown was by no means the first parent of a large family to travel from a rambling home in rural western England, in the middle of a damp winter, and see what Goa had to offer by way of diversion. Evelyn Waugh had six children (a seventh died in infancy); Fiona MacKeown had nine (eight since February 15, when her 15-year-old daughter Scarlett Keeling was found dead on the beach at Anjuna). Waugh travelled from Piers Court, a Georgian mansion in Gloucestershire. MacKeown came from a huddle of caravans near Bideford, Devon, a home summarised as “a mountain of old tyres … empty beer bottles … and rubbish” by Wednesday’s Daily Mail. But the bigger difference is that Waugh left his children behind.

He came to Goa in December 1952. “The scenery [is] delicious … the people soft and friendly,” he wrote to his wife.

Travel advisory: pack caution, common sense

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on March 19, 2008

in Crime and Travel

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Namita Bhandare in Mint on the death of Scarlette Keeling, and the lessons we can learn from it

The life and death of Scarlette Keeling has left in its wake a media feeding frenzy. To be sure, the rape and murder of the British teenager goes beyond your average “sansani” (sensational) crime story: There’s the sun and sand of “idyllic” Goa, a heady concoction of drugs and alcohol, a botched police cover-up, accusations of a powerful drug cartel with political links and, finally, the apparently freewheeling lifestyle of Scarlette’s mother Fiona MacKeown.

I have nothing but contempt for stories that focus on Fiona’s past escapades, lifestyle and lovers. I unequivocally agree with Brinda Karat who said in Parliament last week that you cannot victimize the victim.

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I was naive but I wasn’t negligent, says Scarlett Keeling’s mother Fiona MacKeown

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on March 16, 2008

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In The Sunday Times, UK, Dean Nelson meets Fiona MacKeown:

It is hard to classify MacKeown. Her children’s names – including Merlin, Kisangel, Isis Celeste and Trinity Willow – suggest mellow hippiedom. But she defines herself as a gypsy; when she sought planning permission to put caravans on her land she was backed by the Romany council. She is unconventional but when she says she was naive rather than negligent, I believe her. Those who have seen her with her children were struck by how bright, well mannered and affectionate they are.

With her brood of children, MacKeown would receive about £25,000 a year in benefits. In order to pay for the Goan holiday she told me she had saved £200 a week for months by living frugally – buying only rice to supplement the family’s home-grown vegetables and buying clothes for the children only from charity shops. Eventually they had about £7,000 for the trip, topped up by selling a pony for £1,000. It was a tiny budget for a six-month holiday once the flights for nine had been paid for.

Goa: A creaky paradise

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on March 14, 2008

in Society

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“Forty years ago, Goa was a trip. Now it’s also a business, a disease,” writes Sudeep Chakravarti in Hindustan Times. Chakravarti’s novel, Once Upon a Time in Aparanta, set in present-day Goa, will be published later this year.

Two days ago, a friend and I were breakfasting at a chic café in Baga, a bizarre Goan confluence of the digital hippie, Indian yuppie and those whom I simply call Charter Jack and Charter Jane – “Oi, mate!” and chips with everything. A French couple, replete with tattoos, wearing worn clothes, BO, and a girl of about six came and sat by us, burnt some charas, rolled a joint, and began to fumigate the vicinity. My friend, a Goan preparing to adopt a girl, was outraged at the couple’s nonchalance in doing something so openly in Goa that would land them in jail in their own country, besides possibly placing their daughter under State care.

“I can’t believe these guys,” she spat. “They should be whipped. And this Scarlette,” she continued, “how could her mother leave a 15-year-old girl by herself in this day and age, in an area known to be unsafe, known for drugs and raves and what not and go away on her travels? Would she do that in England? No. But this is Goa, right? So now the girl is dead.”

Scarlette Eden Keeling, flower-child of a flower-parent, is dead, after allegedly being on an extended trip of substance abuse, after allegedly being raped by a manager of a shack at Anjuna beach. Less than an hour’s drive north of where I live, in Panjim, Anjuna was once the eastern extremity of Woodstock.

Mothers and monsters

In the media’s hands, Scarlett Keeting’s mother Fiona MacKeown has become a scapegoat for the middle classes. Madeleine Bunting in The Guardian, UK:

Compassion is not a response the media seem able to sustain. That small window that affords a degree of respect for the grief of the bereaved seems to shrink ever more, but even so the treatment of Fiona MacKeown, the mother of the 15-year-old murdered on a Goa beach, has plumbed new depths of harsh judgmentalism.

While MacKeown struggles to get the police to take on the case of her daughter’s killing, she has a second child lying in hospital in the UK with a broken neck from a car accident that happened shortly before her daughter’s death. This goes well beyond the platitude of a mother’s worst nightmare. Yet even such circumstances have not inhibited the torrent of criticism and contempt that has poured down on this woman’s head. Open season has been declared on every part of her family life, her parenting style and even her appearance. She is blamed for abandoning her daughter in a resort while continuing her travels; accused of a recklessly indulgent style of parenting; and criticised for her mode of grieving. Almost every article refers to her hair – it is “lank”, a “curtain” and, most unforgivably, grey.

Previously on Asian Window:

Scarlett Keeling: What her mother had to see

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on March 12, 2008

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Andrew Buncombe, The Independent’s Asia correspondent, on his blog Asian (con)Fusion:

Last week, at a cafe in Anjuna Beach that specialises in organic food, the mother of Scarlett Keeling showed me some photographs that I didn’t really want to see.

The photographs were taken during the first post-mortem tests carried out on Scarlett and unlike the written report itself, the photographs revealed the true extent of the teenager’s injuries. The pictures showed a huge bruise above one eye, a series of bruises on her legs and shins, red marks around the genital area and, most shocking of all, a picture of Scarlett’s face.

Because police claimed they did know who she was when her body was found, the pathologists had cut open her face to enable access to her teeth and to take a dental imprint to obtain her identity. They had then crudely sewn it back up. What was left looked like an horrendous, clown-like smile stitched across the teenager’s face.

In Goa, another family’s search for the truth

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on March 11, 2008

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As Fiona Mackeown, mother of Scarlett Keeling, the 15-year-old British teenager murdered on Goa’s beach on February 18, demands a high-level inquiry, Amanda Merritt, whose brother died there, tells why she’s convinced he was killed too. In Timesonline, UK:

After a year of trying to piece together what had happened to her brother, Merritt has recently succeeded in persuading the Indian police to reinvestigate his death. At first – like Scarlett – he was dismissed as just another hedonistic tourist. But Merritt believes he was targeted and killed by members of Goa’s criminal underworld.

Stephen, who had travelled alone in Asia several times as part of a masters degree in Chinese theatre studies, had been taking a December holiday alone in Goa and intended to be away for two weeks. He planned to spend Christmas with his two daughters and had already wrapped their presents.

On December 12 his body was found hanging from a tree, a woman’s sari around his neck, in a village 200 miles from Goa.

Drug dealers blamed for rising death toll in India’s hippy paradise

Jeremy Page in The Times, UK:

Since the 1960s, when the first hippies arrived with their tie-dye and LSD, Goa has been renowned for its pristine beaches, cosmopolitan atmosphere and plentiful supply of narcotics.

But the suspected rape and murder of Scarlett Keeling, a 15-year-old British girl found dead last month on the famous Anjuna beach, has now shattered the Indian state’s reputation as a “hippy paradise”, free of worldly evils.

Goan officials and many long term foreign residents were quick to blame Fiona MacKeown, Scarlett’s mother, for leaving her alone in Anjuna. They insist that the place is no more dangerous than other popular beach resorts.

A British man has told The Times that he saw an Indian barman apparently sexually assaulting Scarlett Keeling less than two hours before the 15-year-old British girl’s half-naked body was found on a beach in Goa.

The witness, who asked not to be identified, said that the attack took place after Scarlett left Lui’s bar on Anjuna Beach high on a cocktail of LSD, Ecstasy and cocaine at 5am on February 18.

Jean-Baptiste Talleu: Has anyone seen this man?

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on March 11, 2008

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After the rape and murder of 15-year-old Scarlett Keeling, comes news that a 26-year-old French cyclist Jean-Baptiste Talleu who arrived in Mumbai from Dubai on December 4 has gone missing.

According to his family, Talleu is on a world tour. They are sure he landed in Mumbai since his bank records reveal two cash withdrawals on his credit card on December 5. He last spoke to his mother on December 2 from Dubai. After that, no news.

An e-birthday greeting sent to him on December 11 has gone unacknowledged. The family has lodged a missing person complaint with the Sahar police and is also in touch with the French consulate in Mumbai.

Lonely Planet has tagged the missing cyclist, click here for more.

Talleu is 26 years old, 5 ft 10 inches tall with long, curly, dark brown hair that is always tied. He usually wears beige, brown, blue or black clothes. Information about him can be sent directly to his mother, Marie-Claire Taleu (mctalleu@gmail.com, +33622078234) or his family friend in Mumbai, Annie Simoes (+91 9920174062)

Who killed Scarlett Keeling?

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on March 8, 2008

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The man suspected of raping Scarlett Keeling, a 15-year-old British teenager found dead on Goa’s Anjuna beach on February 18, appeared in the local Goa court wearing a police hood. But Scarlett’s mother says she is not at all convinced that Samson D’Souza, the 26-year-old barman who worked at Lui’s Bar and was seen with Scarlett on the day she died, is the right man. She wants the country’s premier investigating agency to take over the case.

Read that story here.

The case has rocked Indian and British media, following allegations of a police cover-up by Scarlett’s mother, Fiona MacKeown who refused to accept an initial post-mortem report that concluded that her daughter had drowned. Fiona has maintained all along that her daughter had been raped and murdered, pointing to the bruises and cuts on her body.

A second post mortem was ordered and found that Scarlett had indeed died of drowning. Significantly, it didn’t rule out homicide.

Meanwhile, media attention has also focused on Fiona MacKeown who left her 15-year-old daughter behind with the family of the local tour guide she had befriended. Fiona, her boyfriend and six other children headed off to a beach in the neighbouring state of Karnataka, leaving Scarlett behind in Goa. In the Daily Mail, Tom Rawstorne reports that Fiona is clear that she is not to blame

It was meant to be great family adventure – then 15-year-old Scarlett MacKeown was left alone by her mother in Goa. Days later she was dead. Murder… or a drunken accident? Here, her mother insists SHE wasn’t at fault.

As she tearfully retraced her teenage daughter’s last steps, Fiona MacKeown’s eye was caught by an object lying on the edge of the dusty track. It was a leather sandal — nothing special — but its discovery started a chain of events that has sent shockwaves through a part of the world still regarded by some as a corner of paradise.

Fiona knew at once that the shoe belonged to her daughter, 15-year-old Scarlett Keeling, whose body had been found on a nearby beach three days earlier.

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And is time running out for ‘tourist paradise’ Goa? Andrew Buncombe in The Morung Express reports from Anjuna

From his vantage point on a cushion in Anjuna’s German Bakery and Café, Thomas Keller smiled nostalgically as he recalled first coming to Goa more than three decades ago. “It was 1974,” said the wiry 53-year-old from Denmark. “[Then] it was serious hard-core hippies. Now everybody can come and go.” And that may be the problem for Goa. When people like Mr Keller first arrived, they came overland, down the hippy trail that wound from Turkey through Iran and Afghanistan to this tiny former Portuguese enclave on India’s western coast. They were few enough in number to blend in among the coastal villages, and if they were in a blissed-out haze on marijuana or hash a lot of the time, nobody minded too much.

Finally, local Goa newspaper Navhind Times pays tribute to Fiona MacKeown in an editorial:

Goa police have started investigations along a new line into the death of the 15-year-old British girl Scarlett Keeling, but the loss that the state government and police – and collectively all of us Goans – have suffered during the three weeks in terms of image cannot be made up, no matter what we do. The adverse publicity we have got has not only damaged tourism but also our reputation as a state that can take up a case in the right earnest – without hiding or suppressing or manipulating facts – and go straight after the accused. How great a gratitude we owe to the mother of Scarlett, Fiona Mackeown! It was her tireless and determined fight for bringing the guilty to book that rocked the international and Indian media and forced the state government to take immediate steps to ensure fair play and justice to the deceased girl and her family.

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