A 55-year-old man has been convicted of bludgeoning and stabbing to death a seven-year-old girl in Sunderland after escaping justice for more than 30 years.
David Boyd, then 25, lured Nikki Allan to an abandoned building near her home in 1992 and ‘shattered her skull’ by hitting her with a brick, before dumping her – dead or dying – in the basement of the Old Exchange building.
He proceeded to stab her in the chest 37 times to ‘make sure of the job of killing her’, Newcastle Crown Court heard.
Nikki Allan’s family never gave up their fight to see justice done after the youngster was lured to her brutal death.
Cries of ‘Yes!’ and ‘You bastard!’ could be heard from the court’s public gallery when the verdict was returned, while Boyd showed no visible reaction.
Nikki’s relatives were seen hugging and shouting in jubilation, after which the judge had the gallery cleared for being too noisy.
Her sister Stacey shouted ‘yes, thank you’ as she left the courtroom.
New forensic techniques were ‘key’ to cracking the decades-old case, Northumbria Police said.
Experts, witnesses and the residents of Sunderland’ were also said to have played a part.
Boyd was not treated as a suspect during the initial police investigation, and another man, George Heron was charged with Nikki’s murder in 1993.
The man was found not guilty but police continued to insist they were not looking for anyone else in connection with the murder for years afterwards.
In the meantime, Boyd was free to act on self-proclaimed sexual fantasies about ‘young girls’, leading to an indecent assault on a nine-year-old in 1999 for which he was jailed for 18 months.
He was eventually arrested on suspicion of murder in 2018.
Outlining the prosecution case, Richard Wright KC told the court Boyd was known to Nikki’s family, lived in the same block of flats as her and was the boyfriend of their babysitter.
Nikki had been out with friends on the evening of 7 October 1992 and a woman told police she saw a little girl wandering with a man now known to be Boyd.
Mr Wright said: ‘The little girl would occasionally drop behind and would then skip to catch up.
Prosecutors said Nikki must have known her killer to willingly follow him – grainy CCTV showed a male adult being trailed by a child.
Locals told police they heard piercing screams on the night Nikki was killed.
And the tight-knit community helped officers, who carried out an overnight search when it was realised the schoolgirl was missing.
The next morning, Nikki’s shoes and coat were found outside the dockside warehouse – with her body found in the basement
Her blood was discovered outside the only entry point, a boarded-up window about six feet off the ground.
Investigators believe Boyd must have hit Nikki outside the building, then lifted her inside and carried out his monstrous attack, during which he left traces of DNA on her clothes.
Assistant Chief Constable Brad Howe, of Northumbria Police, said: ‘Today is about justice – for Nikki and her family.’
Jurors heard one of the first comments he made after answering the door to officers was: ‘What evidence have you got?’
During one of his police interviews, he wore T-shirt which read: ‘I am unstoppable’.
The latest investigation was ‘one of the most complex and comprehensive’ ever carried out by the force, according to Assistant Chief Constable Brad Howe.
He added: ‘David Boyd hid his crime, lying about his involvement and prolonging the family’s suffering, knowing all along that he had taken the life of their little girl.
The Crown Prosecution Service said the latest evidence was ‘meticulously pieced together’ and showed ‘the only person who could have possibly killed Nikki Allan was David Boyd’.
Boyd is due to be sentenced on May 23.
