Mother's desperate plea to robbers who stole phone holding precious photos of her dead son
THE devastated mother of a soldier killed in action in Afghanistan is pleading with robbers to return her mobile phone holding hundreds of precious photographs of her dead son.
Jacqui Janes, 54, said she is finding it difficult to come to terms with losing treasured footage after a thief knocked her to the ground and snatched her iPhone 5.
The phone contained 385 pictures and two videos of her son, Guardsman Jamie Janes, who was killed in an explosion in Helmand Province in October 2009, aged just 20.
Now Ms Janes is pleading for the robbers to return her SIM card.
She said: "They can have the phone, that doesn't matter at all."
"The background of the phone is a picture of Jamie hugging me, that's all I've got of my beautiful son."
She was mugged while walking her son's six-year-old dog Ella near the West Hove golf course, Hangleton, on the South Downs in East Sussex on Monday.
I've got some of the photos backed up but video has never been put on Facebook or online by the press. It was personal to me. I feel numb
Ms Janes, from Brighton in East Sussex said one of the videos was shot a friend of Guardsman Janes, of the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards, the Christmas before he was killed by an enemy mine.
"It's only about 50-odd seconds long, but it has Jamie in his civilian clothes and on it he says, 'I do love you'," said Ms Janes.
"I've got some of the photos backed up but video has never been put on Facebook or online by the press. It was personal to me. I feel numb."
The phone was snatched from her hand by a man she believes had been sitting on a bench by the path.
Detective Sergeant Simon Dunn of Sussex Police said the suspected robber ran off towards Hangleton shops.
He is described as a white, in his late 20s, of stocky build with stubble and about 5ft 8in. He was wearing a grey hooded coat with stripes down the arms, dark trousers and smelt of alcohol.
Ms Janes said the mugging has left her feeling anxious.
"It's hard to describe but I don't feel right even in my own home," she added.
Ms Janes made headlines, following Guardsman Janes' death, when the then Prime Minister Gordon Brown spelled her son's name incorrectly and made other errors in a handwritten letter of condolence to her.
The Labour politician later apologised.
