'My son's murder will not define me'

Andrew told his mother he was happy with his life just weeks before he was killed

Three years ago Janice Lees' youngest son was murdered over a £400 drug debt. She describes her journey from rage to forgiveness, and how her memorial garden has provided salvation.

Janice was sorting out compost in her Blackpool garden when she got the call from her eldest son to say his younger brother Andrew had been critically injured in a hit-and-run and was not expected to survive.

She drove 150 miles to see the 40-year-old in hospital in Coventry, praying all the while it was a "sour joke".

When she arrived, a police officer was present. "I shouted at [Andrew], 'You stupid bloody boy, what have I told you about messing with bad men?'"

The officer told her: "It doesn't matter what he did. He didn't deserve this."

Andrew Flamson was fatally injured after being hit by a car on Grosvenor Road in Coventry on 12 July 2022. It was an act of revenge following a row over money owed for cannabis.

Three days later, his life support was turned off and he died at 15:33 BST.

"I sang to him, and I prayed with him. And I put a wooden cross in his hand," Janice says. "His [step]father put 50p in his hand for his bus fare home."

Andrew's beloved Shar Pei, Zippy, had also been killed in the attack. The futility of it left Janice flooded with rage.

"I went down to the chaplaincy to pray, and I lost it. I was deranged. Screaming and rolling. I was like a devil possessed."

Janice says she has fought through her rage to a place where she can forgive his killers

Janice had known for years Andrew was using and dealing drugs. He was a raver who "lived his life to the beat of his own drum", she says.

"My Andrew was not the sharpest pencil in the box, but he was funny, and he was beautiful, and his smile lit up a room."

He and his brother were a pair of "scallywaggles" as children, their mother says. From the age of 12 Andrew was sniffing aerosols and soon started hanging out with people who worried her. He was very close to his younger sister, who helped guide him.

Shortly after Janice moved from Coventry to Blackpool in 2006, he was caught with a stun gun and drugs and jailed for 42 months.

"While they're under your roof you guide them. When they leave your roof they know your rules and if they choose to go down another path that is their decision," she says.

"I loved them no matter what they did and who they are."

She saw her son two weeks before he was killed and he told her he was content with his life. He loved concerts and dancing, was friendly and popular, and had a beautiful girlfriend, she says.

But, in the weeks after his death, "vile thoughts" and hatred consumed her.

Andrew in a family picture with Janice and her husband Dave

Five men from the West Midlands went on trial in April 2023. Four were convicted of killing Andrew, including the driver of the silver Ford Mondeo that hit him, Ashley Donald, who was jailed for life for murder.

Three passengers - Samuel Henneberry (Donald's father); Carl Tomlinson; and Callum Ayre - went to prison for manslaughter.

Janice sat through the first half of the trial, watching CCTV of her son's final moments.

But, unable to stay quiet when faced with the men's denials, she returned home for the final three weeks, receiving updates from her stepdaughter in court.

Her personality had transformed from "a gentle loving, kind lady" to someone who would "just lose it," she says.

Some mornings she would pick up a knife and scissors and imagine she was stabbing Andrew's killers.

Counselling from a woman called Jan proved a turning point. "She said to me, 'If you continue to hate like this, you are going to cause yourself serious health problems… you are inflicting that pain upon you'.

"She was marvellous... magic."

Creating a memorial garden to Andrew has helped Janice find peace

Slowly, Janice began to find balance, and with the help of a £500 criminal compensation grant, she and her husband, Dave, used it to build a memorial garden at the back of her home.

She planted flowers with initials that spell out Andy, alongside candles and knick-knacks such as a yellow bird and little donkey, in memory of songs he loved as a child.

"All these little tributes to Andrew I've toiled into my garden. That's been my salvation," she says.

A born-again Christian, her faith has helped her find forgiveness for his killers, one of whom, Henneberry, died in May.

"How sad that he died in prison a lonely old broken man," she says. "Now Ashley Donald has not got his dad any more, and I do feel desperately sorry for him."

Andrew was a handful from an early age, but was friendly and popular, his mother says

She sees messages from Andrew each time she spots the number 333, the time of his death, in the name of a shop or on a bus.

It also gives her comfort that he gifted his organs. "We now know Andrew's heart beats in somebody else's chest; he's still here."

She spent the third anniversary of his murder in the garden, chatting to him as she does daily, and remembering the little boy who loved her lemon meringue pie.

Friends and family have helped her survive his loss, alongside her belief that her son is in heaven.

"Even though there was the despair, there was the hope. Sometimes I couldn't string a sentence along; it took me under," she says.

"I am not Janice before the death of my son. I'm another woman, but I'm a stronger woman. Andrew's death will not define me."