Alice Gross murder: It’s empty without Alice, says mother as she faces second Christmas without her

Heartbreaking: Alice Gross was murdered last year
Kiran Randhawa7 December 2015
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The mother of murdered schoolgirl Alice Gross today spoke of the “void” in care for relatives who have had a loved one taken from them.

Alice, 14, went missing near her home in Hanwell in August last year. Her body was found a month later after police launched a huge search.

Her mother Rosalind Hodgkiss said: “It’s the second Christmas and it’s obviously very lonely and empty. Alice was a big girl for Christmas who loved all the rituals around it.

“We found it very empty last year, so we didn’t have a Christmas tree, we had a memory tree instead.

 Her parents Jose and Rosalind with photos of her. A choir will perform one of Alice’s songs at St-Martins-In-The-Fields tonight
Dominic Lipinski/PA

“It was just a plant with lots of photos of Alice from different Christmases and we wrote down all our memories of her and shared them and lit a candle every night.”

She said there is a “void” in care for those who have lost a loved one but praised the “absolutely amazing” charity Missing People.

“While Alice was missing they did lots of things for us,” she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain. “They had a 24-hour confidential helpline that we could call at any time to get some confidential counselling.

“It was very traumatic the whole time when we were getting information about what happened to Alice.”

Ms Hodgkiss said she had had an inkling of her daughter’s fate as soon as she went missing.

“I knew through my gut fairly early on that something really terrible had happened but I had to keep the hope alive and keep as calm as possible to support my older daughter and we had to keep the publicity going, so that if Alice was out there we might get more information,” she said.

Alice, who attended Brentside High School, was a talented musician who played the piano and violin and wrote her own songs.

One of them, Don’t Let It Go Away, will be performed by a choir whose members have experienced the heartache of losing a loved one. The performance will take place tonight at St Martin-in-the-Fields in Trafalgar Square.

Hosted by patron Sir Trevor McDonald, the service will include tributes from families of missing people, including Ms Hodgkiss, and readings from actresses Monica Dolan and Amanda Redman.

Scotland Yard’s search for Alice was the largest investigation it had undertaken since the 7/7 bomb attacks in 2005.

Her body was found in the River Brent on September 30.

The body of chief suspect Arnis Zalkalns, 41, from Latvia, was found hanged in woodland in Boston Manor Park in west London on October 4.

Tickets to the carols are available from missingpeoplecarols2015.eventbrite.co.uk

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