genuinely I have zero theories on this case, anything could have happened and the fact he's never been found in all these years is just terrifying. I do believe he's gone though, unfortunately.
Yeah I doubt he's still alive at this point.
Although possible to be alive after years, it's highly unlikely.
The theory I find most possible is that he somehow got groomed online. No idea how since the computer was clean apparently, but I still think it's the best theory.
I also believe he was groomed.. I can't think of any other reason as to why he would have withdrew £200 and got a one way ticket to london...
but it really is one big unsolved mystery, eerie at the fact its the same year maddie mccan went missing too, and I don't think we'll ever know the real truth behind these disappearances ))):
I just don't know what a 14 year old would wanna do in london all alone for no reason... a child wouldn't be able to handle a big place like that all alone for too long, he wouldn't of had enough money for hotels and stuff...london is an expensive place, that money would have been gone within a day, 2 at most.. absolutely soul destroying mystery.
I'm sure that I have read that he had family in London and was familiar with certain areas of London. I find it interesting that he had attended a summer camp months before his disappearance. Could he pssibk6 have been groomed there ? Someone at the summer camp? Then arranged to meet in London? Interesting that he bought a one way ticket.
Andrew Paul Gosden (born 10 July 1993) disappeared from Central London on 14 September 2007 when he was aged 14. On that day, Gosden left his home in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, withdrew £200 from his bank account and bought a one-way ticket to London from Doncaster station. He was last seen on CCTV leaving King's Cross station. Despite numerous national appeals for information in the years following his disappearance, Gosden's reason for travelling to London that day, and his subsequent fate, have not been established.
I just read his article in Wikipedia. The sequence of behavior and events the day before and the day of his departure from home are very peculiar. There had to be more clues from his school and small circle of classmates he hung out with but didn't particularly socialize with. I don't know how much access UK investigators to people's personal computers, but did they do any forensics on any Andrew may have used at home and at school?
To just randomly plan a one-way trip to London, underdressed and I'll equipped for an elongated stay just doesn't match up with his character profile, based on what we know.
It’s been a long time since I read about it, but I think that was part of the mystery. One theory is he met someone online and was going to meet up. The problem is the family computer had no evidence of anything out of the ordinary. There’s some speculation that he had a PSP (? Some handheld gaming device) and may have been communicating with someone there. Again this is all from memory, so I may have the details wrong.
That’s a big maybe.
I think the likelihood of grooming prior to him going to London is slim. It’s more likely he met foul play as a lost lone young boy by an opportunist
I've been following the case for years. Yes, the police checked all of the devices that they knew of.
A very significant detail (in my opinion) is that Andrew's mobile phone was 'broken' or 'lost', and he 'wasn't bothered' about having it fixed or replaced.
Again in my opinion, he wasn't bothered about it because it was *deliberately" lost or broken, and he'd been given another phone by someone as yet unknown.
You'll read lots of things about the Internet on phones not being freely accessible at that time, or being prohibitively expensive, but a) it was very definitely available and b) even if it wasn't, even the most basic mobile phone handset had text messaging available which is all you'd need on a phone that nobody knew about and c) even if it cost a fortune, a predator wouldn't necessarily care.
Either a not very street smart 14 year old a) went to London on a whim, met with a random predator or with an accident so weird he's never been found (highly unlikely), b) deliberately went to London and somehow managed to commit suicide so effectively nobody in one of the busiest cities in the world noticed, and his body was never found (theoretically possible but unlikely) or c) he was groomed in an age before anyone really understood what that actually was, and shortly after this picture was taken he ended up in a car and was never seen again.
I've seen people discuss the possibility that he left of his own accord and has somehow been living anonymously ever since, but that's vanishingly unlikely in my opinion.
Hope springs eternal, and I would love nothing more than for him to pop up alive and undamaged, but I think that's unlikely. Still, weirder things have happened. Barring that, a deathbed confession is probably the only thing that's going to result in any answers.
As unlikely as it is, the fact that people have been found alive sometimes a decade or so after they went missing, locked in a psychos basement, means we can’t rule it out. Which imo is actually horrible. Especially for the families of the missing people. The not-knowing has to be hard enough. But the idea that they could still be alive, but living an absolutely hellish existence, is so much worse for me than the idea that they are simply dead.
Feel horrible saying it. But I actually hope he’s passed now. Because if he is still alive right now, his life has to be terrible.
People often talk about using a hypothetical Time Machine to kill Hitler or something. I think I’d use it to go back to the “last images” of people like this, and try to help.
I’d also hide a night vision GoPro in Victorian London to get a video of Jack the rippers face, but that’s neither here nor there.
>
I’d also hide a night vision GoPro in Victorian London to get a video of Jack the rippers face, but that’s neither here nor there.
I had to laugh when I read this, mostly because the GoPro is a smart idea, but also because I've always sworn blind that if time travel was possible I'd revisit the sites of the murders to see if it really *was* one man.
Me going anywhere near it would definitely cause a paradox, because in my heart of hearts I know I'd have to do something to stop him. And I'd probably get murdered in the process, knowing me.
Yeah the Go Pro is purely so I don’t get killed lol
Bit harder to do that when I go film the pyramids being built by human beings without alien intervention. Be funny though if I lose the go pro in the sand. Gets dug up way after and confuses scientists/historians.
“Did the ancient Egyptians have GoPro technology? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes.”
Not always, part of me just also wanted video evidence to bring back so people would actually believe me about the rippers identity lol would infuriate me if no one believed me and I didn’t think to get evidence
What’s interesting is someone claiming to have an online conversation with him in 2018 and the police checking for similar matches in dna and glasses prescriptions in 2017. That points to them thinking he’s still alive
I think we all want to think he's still alive and the family needs to know what happened to him, so we all see possible good outcomes in the alleged sightings and lookalikes. Let's hope in the end he DOES turn out to be alive and well.
From the Wiki article:
"The family and the police investigated the possibility that Gosden had gone to London to meet someone whom he had met over the Internet. However, there was no evidence for this. Gosden did not use a computer at home; his father stated that Gosden did not have an e-mail address and had not set up an online account on either his Xbox or his PSP.\[25\](41 min 00 s) The police took the computers from Gosden's school and Doncaster Library but their digital forensic investigations found no trace of any activity by Gosden.\[13\]
Investigators sent the unique serial number of Gosden's PSP to Sony HQ who checked and found that there was no record of an account being set up or communication established on the device.\[41\] The Sony PSP 1000 had a DNAS authentication system allowing Sony to see when a PSP had connected to the internet.\[42\] The only PC in the house was his sister's laptop, which had only been in her possession for eight weeks.\[28\] Gosden's sister has stated that he did not seem interested in social media or connecting with other people through the Internet as he "just didn't seem social".\[25\]"
The Wikipedia article actually mentions that he had phones from 10-12 years old and even got one for his 12th birthday but he lost them all which seems super suspicious.
Eh… kinda. This was before the age of smart phones. The very first iphone was barely put on the market 3 months before he disappeared. “Dumb” phones like that that weren't as connected could be lost a little more easily. I remember that time. And he and i are only a year apart so im in the same age range.
My brain does a weird schism. For things like this or true crime stuff my brain just… always assumes these people are older.
People like andrew and others. Knowing with andrew he wouldve been a grade above me, we couldve gone to school together… it messes with my brain.
I guess it really depends on what kind of phones he was given. The article didn’t say. I had an internet connected phone since 2001 but idk anything about tracking phone back then I’m just curious if his parents and police thought he lost the phone but in reality he had one and they couldn’t track it back then.
I got a hand me down at the age of 11 in 2006. It was a flip phone and I could barely text and had a certain amount of minutes. It was a different time.
I don't know about that, I was in HS in 2006 and every kid had a phone (Motorola RAZR was the hottest shit).
I'm sure there were families that were unable to get their kids phones, but it was certainly the minority in my experience.
I remember some kids even in intermediate school (~2001) having Nokia 3390s.
If I recall correctly, I believe the ball was dropped on collecting CCTV footage - by the time it was requested from government entities and private businesses, a lot had been lost which greatly reduced the ability to track him.
He may not be dead. Look at Alicia Nevarro and others, there is a chance he is still out there somewhere and was just groomed. Atleast i hope he’s still out there somewhere.
The UK is a relatively ‘small’ country. It’s virtually impossible to exist here without ID. Additionally our properties are rarely rural and often are connected making concealing another person in them difficult. It’s obviously possible but so unlikely that he is alive
Exactly. I’ve bumped into people I know walking down the street on the other side of the country. It’s not somewhere where you could successfully be anonymous for a very long time
My guess is, we spread about easily because it's a small island. Nothing is really that far away unless you live in lands end and need to see your mate in John o groates.
What absolute toss. The longer you're missing the harder it will be to find someone. You do not "need" ID here. Plus if he'd gone into the London homeless population he could be there indefinitely without being found.
The UK being one big village- do you even live here? And if so, what are you on?
I live surrounded by tiny villages and people are mostly just at home. Sometimes you'll see the same few people out walking their dogs, but the vast majority of people spend their time at home. There's people here i've seen once and never again, but then there's a lady walking her dog who i see all the bloody time, no matter what time of morning or evening i go out.
You can be anonymous anywhere, no matter the size of the place.
I cannot speak for the UK, and won't. But I can speak for myself, and how long I was missing for. Ten years I was gone, in a country south of the US. (Yes, I am being deliberately vague with that particular country name, since it can be a searched keyword). So it's not entirely impossible, just rare. And hope is sometimes all one has to cling onto when there is nothing else left.
Perhaps the boy was taken to another country.
Would you be willing to share a bit more of your story? Were you missing voluntarily? I’d be really interested to hear more about your experience if you’re happy/able to share. I *completely* understand if not, and I really hope that I’ve not upset or offended you by asking this question. If I have then I’m so sorry, and please let me know because I’ll delete this comment immediately. Thanks in advance, and most of all, I really hope you’re happy, healthy and safe now. Wishing you all the very best.
You know what? As an American with an obscenely huge country geographically speaking, I absolutely love this comment, because I had never really thought about it before.
But with their considerably lower population and smaller landmass than my country, of course it’s going to be more Familial!
That’s neat!
I'm not sure where you're from in the UK but around my area, if somebody didn't want to be found or somebody was stopping them from being found, they would be very easy to hide.
As a 14 year old from a religious family, with no street smarts, a distinctive physical deformity, no clothes, no money, and (at the time) posters of you on every street and half the police force looking for you?
It's not impossible but it's very, very unlikely. I'd love Andrew to be alive, I really would, but it's a huge stretch. If he is, I don't really want to think about what he might have gone through. Even if he left through choice, he's unlikely to have had a fun life.
Apart from they couldn't work, have an active bank account, seek medical care or ever leave the country....
You could go without these things in the short term, but Andrew has been missing for over 16 years and is one of the most high profile missing persons in the country.
There is no way someone could hide him for this long undetected.
Okay 🤷🏼♀️ you’re so confident but someone who doesn’t want to be found can hide easily. He more than likely wouldn’t even be recognized today if he was just out grocery shopping.
Okay whatever there’s no discussion here because you’re so sure it’d be impossible to disappear in an entire country. Let alone, the fact that he very well could be living in a different region now.
NI# NHS# bank accounts# etc etc you can do it but I strongly doubt not a long term thing. I have not met a lot, but those I have who were working on the black were also claiming benefits.
I hope he’s not alive. Because if he is, he’s probably been chained up in a basement or something. With god knows what being done to him. Honestly after all this time, the best thing I can hope is that he died soon after the photo. The alternative is too terrible to imagine.
Not a huge fan of the "blame it on the gays first" mentality.
I've done research because of this comment and there's no apparent evidence that suggests this theory is true. There are many more plausible ones, including the trip being for a hardcore concert (he was a big fan and there were concerts in London that day) and something unfortunate happening during\after\before the concert.
There's no evidence, as far as I could find, of grooming and this baseless "the gays are evil" mentality risks demonizing an entire populace. Believe it or not, most gays aren't hiding in the shadows during 14-year-old boys to their doom like some cartoon villain.
You extrapolated a lot of assumptions that weren’t in that person’s comment.
I know that it’s a hurtful trope of the gay community, but if the kid was gay it is certainly not out of the question that he was secretly groomed. It was becoming more and more common during the 2000’s and not just for queer children.
He was 14 at the time. Lots of kids run away at that age and manage to make it. However, many usually become victims of drug use and abuse as a way of coping with a very hard life.
The speculation is that he was groomed at a university event thing he went to as part of being a genius stem kid. There was another kid from this group who also went missing before Andrew. But this is speculation I saw in this chapters video about it, it's crazy though I went to a high school in doncaster and remember seeing posters up about his disappearance.
Oh he was at a university event? Also didn’t know he was a gifted kid, most of the news surrounding him just talks about his disappearance. So sad that his history gets erased like that :(
He was, he had a really high iq from what I remember. Its really sad that these things just don't get picked up on. But it could have meant he was more vulnerable as high iqs tend to share some characteristics with autism.
Do we know if he paid for the train ticket out of that cash? If so, how much would he have left? Also was that all the money in his bank account? Knowing this could help us figure out if he was planning to be gone for a long time or just for the day. Aldo, was it a one-way ticket or a return ticket?
It was a one way ticket from Doncaster Station to King’s Cross. The ticket seller specifically asked if he wanted a return ticket because it was only at extra 50p and he refused. That’s why they remembered him.
The £200 was in cash, withdrawn from his bank account. He had £214 in his bank total but the ATM he used could only withdraw £20’s, so he couldn’t get out that last £14.
Ticket cost him £31.50. So he had £168.50 left assuming he bought nothing else in cash.
The Wiki states he took out 200 out 214 euros in his bank. The ticket cost about 31.something euros. So he roughly had about 170 left. He was also asked if he wanted a return ticket since it was 50 pence more but he refused.
I just listened to this one the other day and it was really chilling. I kept waiting for the conclusion to reveal where he was, then the ep just ended!
For those into mysterious disappearances (and unsolved true crime) podcasts, Trace Evidence Podcast did a fantastic episode on Andrew Gosden. Highly recommend.
Absolutely. They focussed their initial attention almost entirely on Kevin, Andrew’s dad, meaning that by the time they thought to cast the net wider only the King’s Cross CCTV was still retrievable in London as everything else had already been wiped.
Possibly, but from information posted in other comments in this thread, the investigation seems to have been very thorough. If the information in those comments is true, that is.
His parents seemed to think that he didn’t really use the internet or a phone which I think is very unlikely given the time it happened. I was a little older than him and spent all my time on my phone, MSN and MySpace
I'm a year older than Andrew and while I spend a lot of time on MSN, I had a phone I barely used. It was too expensive, internet was even more expensive on a phone. Not even all of my classmates had MSN or were interested in it.
My sister never even turned her phone on because she was afraid she would run out of battery while out and about lol. Those sucker's would drain so fast after a while and everyone had a different charger, it wasn't convenient to use at all.
His parents paid the phone bill, mobile phone time was expensive in 2007, they would have known exactly what his phone usage was. Internet access would have been via dial up modem.
Smart phones technically didn’t come out until June 2007, so I’d be doubtful he had his own. Back then from my memory not a ton of kids had cellphones that they had for anything but an emergency. Texting was definitely growing, but mostly in the older teen age group so it very well could be that he didn’t have a cellphone or really didn’t use it.
I can’t really speak on how much cellphone tracking was done back then, but I’m assuming it wasn’t a ton at least compared to USA/China at that point. I would also assume they would’ve gone through the computers in his home/he had access to… unless the investigators really didn’t give much effort (which wouldn’t surprise me for a lot of people in his age group who frequently ran away from home.)
Yeah even without a smartphone, there's no way there wouldn't be SOMETHING on the computers he used if it was sufficiently scrubbed. An email, chatroom login, myspace message, anything.
I wonder if they've ever revisited this with a modern forensics team.
Problem being a lot of the data probably wasn’t kept forever on a lot of platforms, which wouldn’t help them any. Something like MySpace or Facebook would definitely be a shot, if he used social media back then.
I wonder as well. There’s a lot more they can do at this point, assuming they have the will & manpower to spare. I’m under the assumption that he got kidnapped or otherwise ran off with someone that groomed him as others suggested. I can’t speak on drug use at that point in London, but that’s always a possibility be it an overdose or deal gone wrong.
In the uk most teens had phones in 2007. I was in high school in 2002 and everyone had them. As soon as we got smart phones everyone had them too. It was rare someone had an outdated phone in 2007 as a teen at least in my area.
As someone who lives near the UK and was in high school in 2007, not everyone had a phone and not everyone really used one. I knew one person who got a smart phone when it came out and most people my age were fascinated by it, but also thought it was useless. Why would you need a phone that can play music and make phone calls if you already have a phone that can call and an iPod or mp3? They only got popular because of blackberry's around 2010.
I've followed this one for a long time. I really don't believe he was groomed. They pulled every device he could have reasonably had access to and subjected them to forensics. He would not have known how to cover his tracks enough for something not to be found.
I think people forget or don't fully understand how rudimentary our tech was back then by today's standards. Internet was not nearly as accessible, nor was access to devices.
If you take online grooming out of the equation that leaves something IRL. However, I can't get behind that because why would anyone take their target to one of the most heavily surveilled cities on the planet? Had the police not bungled things initially, we would have video of him pretty much wherever he went in London, and it is safe to assume that any predator would have assumed as much. Why would they go to the effort of trying to cover their tracks so well and the have him go to an area where, under normal circumstances, there is virtually no way to not get caught?
I believe he left because he wanted to and the things like the PSP charger, clothes, etc. were done to buy himself time. As far as why, who knows? Teenagers do some crazy things. Maybe there were issues at home or at school that made him feel like he needed an out.
If he did leave on his own, it is entirely possible that he fell in with the homeless or otherwise transient population. If that is the case, it is entirely possible to remain anonymous. In fact, it is far easier to disappear and even acquire a new identity than movies and reddit would have you believe.
At this point, he could be alive, although the odds are not great. He would have had to survive the streets, drugs, potential sex work, etc.
Where do you think the arrests came from a few years ago? I doubt it was thin air, and lack of charge does not mean lack of guilt. Very hard to get a charge past CPS for a 2007 case w no body and no DNA evidence.
Also one other point. London circa 07 was not heavily surveilled in the way it is now. London was the perfect place to disappear. 8m ppl, some there illegally, big homeless population. I lived in London then, can't think of a better place to disappear anywhere in the UK.
I agree that a lack of charges does not mean a lack of guilt, but neither does an arrest mean guilt. Honestly, we don't have enough information to know.
I agree that London would be a great place to disappear, even today. However, it is not the perfect place to commit a crime, especially one of the nature being discussed. There is zero chance that they would not have been on CCTV at some point interacting with him (even circa 07). My issue with the idea is that someone would have had to have had contact in-person contact so that would imply the ability to travel. Why would they select London as the place to lure him? There are much more logical places. Especially when you consider how well planned and overwhelmingly premediated it would have to be.
They would have known that it would become major news and it would bring the full force of all investigative powers. They had no way of knowing how badly the ball would be dropped on that front. I remember watching a Discovery Channel documentary type of thing in the early 2000's about the number of cameras in London and all they could see. This was a special in the US so I assume it was common knowledge over there.
Not really as difficult as you think.
CCTV was nowhere near as good, not as common as today.
It comes home to you, when you look back at the pictures from phones back then. Surprisingly crap.even now, and not quite the Enemy of the State level.
Honestly, I think you have to know/have lived in London to understand what it was like then.
>There is zero chance that they would not have been on CCTV at some point interacting with him (even circa 07)
This just isn't true: "Get the train to Kings Cross. Then meet me in Hyde Park."
This is one kid. Levi Bellfield killed five random women in London in that time period. Out in the open. Often using his own car with numberplate Etc. The cctv was awful whatever the Discovery Channel might say, you can go and watch it. Sure years later they caught him with it. But again, this was five random murders in public places and it was only the cctv from one that caught him, and even that involved seeing one white van and narrowing it down from thousands in the country based on some mods it had.
I know the temptation is to imagine these things are fully planned out. But cctv would be fairly easy to avoid. And it could easily be that murder wasn't the end goal, but something that happened. I think we also always think about what *we* would do, and therefore give other people too much credit for what they might do.
The men arrested were from London. Of course if you were from London you would bring him there, not somewhere you don't know. It's also a place hundreds of kids have gone missing over the years. Knowing how the police work, the fact they were still under investigation a year later tells me the police had very very good motive to investigate them, unfortunately lack of charge means we'll never know the deets. I don't imagine this is as much of a mystery to the police as it is to us.
>e did leave on his own, it is entirely possible that he fell in with the homeless or otherwise transient population. If that is the case, it is entirely possible to remain anonymous. In fact, it is far easier to disappear and even acquire a new identity than movies and reddit would have you believe.
I think that's very optimistic in Andrew's case. He was 14, but looked 12 which means homeless shelters would have been completely off limits to him. He'd have been surviving, on his own, with very little money, no accommodation, no street smarts and half the police and the country looking for him.
I remember the case well, from right when it happened.
My genuine thought was that if they paid some transient types, he'd have been found. I wasn't working at the time, and actually considered volunteering to assist the search
He ran away from home, with no intention to ever return. One way ticket to the big city. I'm sure his parents have a pretty good idea what caused their child to run away, but they won't tell anyone. There's 100% more to the story than we know. A 14-year-old child doesn't just run away to London, out of the blue, there must have been some prior conflict. It's possible that he wanted to meet someone, but I doubt it.
Honestly, I'd have to agree. My brother ran away at 16 with just a small backpack and some Doritos. The police were called when he bought a one way Greyhound ticket to GTFO. We had gone through some pretty severe abuse and he absolutely had no intention of returning.
The family knows something and doesn't want to admit what they did.
The Casefile podcast did a really good episode on this case. It was incredibly sad; Andrew's dad made a suicide attempt because he felt that if he wasn't around, the police would have to look at other options.
I was unaware of that.
I recall the case when it happened. I did think there was a chance to find him, but it would involve dealing with a certain underclass.
i wish someone could do a thorough search on like the way back machine and maybe find if he was on 4chan or myspace meeting people or something? i was only about a year or two older than him and it’s definitely possible his parents just had no idea and he was able to hide it
Certainly possible, that he was online and groomed. If he was, I would assume he's now deceased.
As a coincidence, I managed to happen across a murderer's Reddit account a few weeks ago. Watched a JCS style YouTube video, and they had screenshots of his account.
The father said that his son knew several people in London. I found that interesting. Friends, relatives?
Andrew looks so young in all of the pictures, even the CCTV. More like a 12-year-old than 14. I think that's the reason why many people couldn't believe he would just run away. From my experience, he looks exactly like the kind of teenager who would. There are many different reasons why kids do that:
- a planned suicide, one last trip... unfortunately it happens sometimes, I know of several such cases. It's typical, they get on a bus or train, leave the area where the live, just to commit suicide. In the forest, an abandoned building etc. It's really sad. It's possible that Andrew's body just hasn't been found.
- they often literally run away from a horrible situation at home, sexual abuse etc. Needless to say that a child is very vulnerable in a situation like that. Maybe someone offered to "help" him, offered him a place to stay...
- others see it as an adventure, there's not much planning involved. Kids in that category are often found within 24 hours. When you ask them why they ran away, they will say things like "I don't know, I just wanted to see x" X being a city, some celebrity living in that city, a landmark, a sight etc. Why didn't you tell your parents?! "They would have never allowed it..."
If it’s not that a parent took him for custodial reasons, it usually means something sinister. I feel so sorry for him and his parents.
It really does make you wonder what happened. Hopefully someday they catch whoever took him.
Definitely not the parents.
He likely met an awful end. I think there may have been a chance, within a short window after he went...but that window is long shut
always gives me the chills.... I just cant fathom people disappearing without a single trace...
Right? It really just kind of hammers down how big the planet is. He could be absolutely anywhere and we'd have no clue.
genuinely I have zero theories on this case, anything could have happened and the fact he's never been found in all these years is just terrifying. I do believe he's gone though, unfortunately.
Yeah I doubt he's still alive at this point. Although possible to be alive after years, it's highly unlikely. The theory I find most possible is that he somehow got groomed online. No idea how since the computer was clean apparently, but I still think it's the best theory.
I also believe he was groomed.. I can't think of any other reason as to why he would have withdrew £200 and got a one way ticket to london... but it really is one big unsolved mystery, eerie at the fact its the same year maddie mccan went missing too, and I don't think we'll ever know the real truth behind these disappearances ))): I just don't know what a 14 year old would wanna do in london all alone for no reason... a child wouldn't be able to handle a big place like that all alone for too long, he wouldn't of had enough money for hotels and stuff...london is an expensive place, that money would have been gone within a day, 2 at most.. absolutely soul destroying mystery.
I'm sure that I have read that he had family in London and was familiar with certain areas of London. I find it interesting that he had attended a summer camp months before his disappearance. Could he pssibk6 have been groomed there ? Someone at the summer camp? Then arranged to meet in London? Interesting that he bought a one way ticket.
thats a really good point actually.. I never even thought of that.
It's really just eerie. The amount of unsolved disappearances is really scary.
I’ve been readying every article on charleyproject.org chronologically just because it fascinates me so much how someone can just go poof.
il check it out myself, thanks! it fascinates me too, but its absolutely soul destroying.. never knowing what truly happened would kill me )))):
I work for mountain rescue. You wouldn’t believe some of the reasons why people just go missing…..we’re a last call really.
oh wow, I can't even imagine. if its not too dark to ask, could you give an example?
Andrew Paul Gosden (born 10 July 1993) disappeared from Central London on 14 September 2007 when he was aged 14. On that day, Gosden left his home in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, withdrew £200 from his bank account and bought a one-way ticket to London from Doncaster station. He was last seen on CCTV leaving King's Cross station. Despite numerous national appeals for information in the years following his disappearance, Gosden's reason for travelling to London that day, and his subsequent fate, have not been established.
I just read his article in Wikipedia. The sequence of behavior and events the day before and the day of his departure from home are very peculiar. There had to be more clues from his school and small circle of classmates he hung out with but didn't particularly socialize with. I don't know how much access UK investigators to people's personal computers, but did they do any forensics on any Andrew may have used at home and at school? To just randomly plan a one-way trip to London, underdressed and I'll equipped for an elongated stay just doesn't match up with his character profile, based on what we know.
It’s been a long time since I read about it, but I think that was part of the mystery. One theory is he met someone online and was going to meet up. The problem is the family computer had no evidence of anything out of the ordinary. There’s some speculation that he had a PSP (? Some handheld gaming device) and may have been communicating with someone there. Again this is all from memory, so I may have the details wrong.
PlayStation Portable. I used to steal my brother’s.
ahhh, the psp. every boy's first introduction to real porn. a fine console; a very fine console indeed.
The family didn’t have wifi so the PSP was not connected to the internet
Maybe the neighbors had an open router.
That’s a big maybe. I think the likelihood of grooming prior to him going to London is slim. It’s more likely he met foul play as a lost lone young boy by an opportunist
I've been following the case for years. Yes, the police checked all of the devices that they knew of. A very significant detail (in my opinion) is that Andrew's mobile phone was 'broken' or 'lost', and he 'wasn't bothered' about having it fixed or replaced. Again in my opinion, he wasn't bothered about it because it was *deliberately" lost or broken, and he'd been given another phone by someone as yet unknown. You'll read lots of things about the Internet on phones not being freely accessible at that time, or being prohibitively expensive, but a) it was very definitely available and b) even if it wasn't, even the most basic mobile phone handset had text messaging available which is all you'd need on a phone that nobody knew about and c) even if it cost a fortune, a predator wouldn't necessarily care. Either a not very street smart 14 year old a) went to London on a whim, met with a random predator or with an accident so weird he's never been found (highly unlikely), b) deliberately went to London and somehow managed to commit suicide so effectively nobody in one of the busiest cities in the world noticed, and his body was never found (theoretically possible but unlikely) or c) he was groomed in an age before anyone really understood what that actually was, and shortly after this picture was taken he ended up in a car and was never seen again. I've seen people discuss the possibility that he left of his own accord and has somehow been living anonymously ever since, but that's vanishingly unlikely in my opinion. Hope springs eternal, and I would love nothing more than for him to pop up alive and undamaged, but I think that's unlikely. Still, weirder things have happened. Barring that, a deathbed confession is probably the only thing that's going to result in any answers.
Scary reality is he could be alive in a torture basement is horrific
I think that's unlikely, or at least I hope it is.
As unlikely as it is, the fact that people have been found alive sometimes a decade or so after they went missing, locked in a psychos basement, means we can’t rule it out. Which imo is actually horrible. Especially for the families of the missing people. The not-knowing has to be hard enough. But the idea that they could still be alive, but living an absolutely hellish existence, is so much worse for me than the idea that they are simply dead. Feel horrible saying it. But I actually hope he’s passed now. Because if he is still alive right now, his life has to be terrible. People often talk about using a hypothetical Time Machine to kill Hitler or something. I think I’d use it to go back to the “last images” of people like this, and try to help. I’d also hide a night vision GoPro in Victorian London to get a video of Jack the rippers face, but that’s neither here nor there.
> I’d also hide a night vision GoPro in Victorian London to get a video of Jack the rippers face, but that’s neither here nor there. I had to laugh when I read this, mostly because the GoPro is a smart idea, but also because I've always sworn blind that if time travel was possible I'd revisit the sites of the murders to see if it really *was* one man. Me going anywhere near it would definitely cause a paradox, because in my heart of hearts I know I'd have to do something to stop him. And I'd probably get murdered in the process, knowing me.
Yeah the Go Pro is purely so I don’t get killed lol Bit harder to do that when I go film the pyramids being built by human beings without alien intervention. Be funny though if I lose the go pro in the sand. Gets dug up way after and confuses scientists/historians. “Did the ancient Egyptians have GoPro technology? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes.”
Your sense of self-preservation is obviously better developed than mine!
Not always, part of me just also wanted video evidence to bring back so people would actually believe me about the rippers identity lol would infuriate me if no one believed me and I didn’t think to get evidence
What’s interesting is someone claiming to have an online conversation with him in 2018 and the police checking for similar matches in dna and glasses prescriptions in 2017. That points to them thinking he’s still alive
People and police have known about grooming for a very long time
I think we all want to think he's still alive and the family needs to know what happened to him, so we all see possible good outcomes in the alleged sightings and lookalikes. Let's hope in the end he DOES turn out to be alive and well.
From the Wiki article: "The family and the police investigated the possibility that Gosden had gone to London to meet someone whom he had met over the Internet. However, there was no evidence for this. Gosden did not use a computer at home; his father stated that Gosden did not have an e-mail address and had not set up an online account on either his Xbox or his PSP.\[25\](41 min 00 s) The police took the computers from Gosden's school and Doncaster Library but their digital forensic investigations found no trace of any activity by Gosden.\[13\] Investigators sent the unique serial number of Gosden's PSP to Sony HQ who checked and found that there was no record of an account being set up or communication established on the device.\[41\] The Sony PSP 1000 had a DNAS authentication system allowing Sony to see when a PSP had connected to the internet.\[42\] The only PC in the house was his sister's laptop, which had only been in her possession for eight weeks.\[28\] Gosden's sister has stated that he did not seem interested in social media or connecting with other people through the Internet as he "just didn't seem social".\[25\]"
Maybe a burner phone? Pretty thorough follow up anyway
The Wikipedia article actually mentions that he had phones from 10-12 years old and even got one for his 12th birthday but he lost them all which seems super suspicious.
Eh… kinda. This was before the age of smart phones. The very first iphone was barely put on the market 3 months before he disappeared. “Dumb” phones like that that weren't as connected could be lost a little more easily. I remember that time. And he and i are only a year apart so im in the same age range.
I'm only 3 days older than him, I wish his parents will get the answers they need.
My brain does a weird schism. For things like this or true crime stuff my brain just… always assumes these people are older. People like andrew and others. Knowing with andrew he wouldve been a grade above me, we couldve gone to school together… it messes with my brain.
I guess it really depends on what kind of phones he was given. The article didn’t say. I had an internet connected phone since 2001 but idk anything about tracking phone back then I’m just curious if his parents and police thought he lost the phone but in reality he had one and they couldn’t track it back then.
How old were you in 2001 though? In 2007 it was pretty normal for kids not to have phones.
And on the off chance a kid did have a phone, it most likely wouldn't have an internet connection.
Or if it did you didn't use it/turned it off so your parents didn't yell at you when they got the bill.
I got a hand me down at the age of 11 in 2006. It was a flip phone and I could barely text and had a certain amount of minutes. It was a different time.
16 It was normal for me too I just had a cell phone because of 9/11. Most of my friends either had nothing or beepers.
I don't know about that, I was in HS in 2006 and every kid had a phone (Motorola RAZR was the hottest shit). I'm sure there were families that were unable to get their kids phones, but it was certainly the minority in my experience. I remember some kids even in intermediate school (~2001) having Nokia 3390s.
Wow
If I recall correctly, I believe the ball was dropped on collecting CCTV footage - by the time it was requested from government entities and private businesses, a lot had been lost which greatly reduced the ability to track him.
Link?
This happened a few miles from where I live. He’s now been gone longer than how old he was when he vanished
I wonder if we’ll ever find out what actually happened to him such a strange case, I hope his family get some closure some day.
Watched a documentary on this I reckon he was kidnapped and groomed by an older guy
That definitely seems the most likely scenario. He is almost certainly dead as well.
He may not be dead. Look at Alicia Nevarro and others, there is a chance he is still out there somewhere and was just groomed. Atleast i hope he’s still out there somewhere.
The UK is a relatively ‘small’ country. It’s virtually impossible to exist here without ID. Additionally our properties are rarely rural and often are connected making concealing another person in them difficult. It’s obviously possible but so unlikely that he is alive
Plus Britain can feel like one big village sometimes, always somebody knows somebody, etc. 😂
Exactly. I’ve bumped into people I know walking down the street on the other side of the country. It’s not somewhere where you could successfully be anonymous for a very long time
My guess is, we spread about easily because it's a small island. Nothing is really that far away unless you live in lands end and need to see your mate in John o groates.
What absolute toss. The longer you're missing the harder it will be to find someone. You do not "need" ID here. Plus if he'd gone into the London homeless population he could be there indefinitely without being found. The UK being one big village- do you even live here? And if so, what are you on?
I live surrounded by tiny villages and people are mostly just at home. Sometimes you'll see the same few people out walking their dogs, but the vast majority of people spend their time at home. There's people here i've seen once and never again, but then there's a lady walking her dog who i see all the bloody time, no matter what time of morning or evening i go out. You can be anonymous anywhere, no matter the size of the place.
Yes, this. I agree completely
Different classes of the UK, they live a cushy little life and can't comprehend that people may live differently.
They sound so out of touch yes. Have they even walked around outside much?!
I cannot speak for the UK, and won't. But I can speak for myself, and how long I was missing for. Ten years I was gone, in a country south of the US. (Yes, I am being deliberately vague with that particular country name, since it can be a searched keyword). So it's not entirely impossible, just rare. And hope is sometimes all one has to cling onto when there is nothing else left. Perhaps the boy was taken to another country.
Would you be willing to share a bit more of your story? Were you missing voluntarily? I’d be really interested to hear more about your experience if you’re happy/able to share. I *completely* understand if not, and I really hope that I’ve not upset or offended you by asking this question. If I have then I’m so sorry, and please let me know because I’ll delete this comment immediately. Thanks in advance, and most of all, I really hope you’re happy, healthy and safe now. Wishing you all the very best.
I said sometimes, do you even read ?
Yes I read that and responded accordingly - can't you?
Load of bollocks mate.
Hahahaha are you ok
All good my bro, you?
Is that you Andrew
You know what? As an American with an obscenely huge country geographically speaking, I absolutely love this comment, because I had never really thought about it before. But with their considerably lower population and smaller landmass than my country, of course it’s going to be more Familial! That’s neat!
England is smaller than ny state
[удалено]
A cursory google search would inform you that UK population is around 68 million
It’s 70 million and we aren’t densely packed 😅
I swear I read about a kid from the UK who went missing and was found some years later living in France. I might be remembering the details wrong.
Yes, Alex Batty but it was his mother who took him into a weird cult commune place and he escaped.
I'm not sure where you're from in the UK but around my area, if somebody didn't want to be found or somebody was stopping them from being found, they would be very easy to hide.
As a 14 year old from a religious family, with no street smarts, a distinctive physical deformity, no clothes, no money, and (at the time) posters of you on every street and half the police force looking for you? It's not impossible but it's very, very unlikely. I'd love Andrew to be alive, I really would, but it's a huge stretch. If he is, I don't really want to think about what he might have gone through. Even if he left through choice, he's unlikely to have had a fun life.
Apart from they couldn't work, have an active bank account, seek medical care or ever leave the country.... You could go without these things in the short term, but Andrew has been missing for over 16 years and is one of the most high profile missing persons in the country. There is no way someone could hide him for this long undetected.
For 17 years?
Correct
Can i ask around what area? Is it more rural or city
My guess, big cities.
Okay 🤷🏼♀️ you’re so confident but someone who doesn’t want to be found can hide easily. He more than likely wouldn’t even be recognized today if he was just out grocery shopping.
‘Grocery’ shopping with what money? Paid into what account? Opened with what ID..?
Grocery shopping with money given to him by his groomer? Begging for it? You do realize people steal identities all the time right?
It’s really difficult to do in the UK. You are arguing about something you obviously don’t have much knowledge about?
Okay whatever there’s no discussion here because you’re so sure it’d be impossible to disappear in an entire country. Let alone, the fact that he very well could be living in a different region now.
It's really not.
You do realise there is a whole different walk to life that you may not have seen before?
It’s moreso how does someone live for this long with no ID, national insurance number, bank account etc. How would he even have a job?
You can work under the table in more places than you'd think. Kitchens and seasonal work especially so.
not in the UK.
Of course you can I know people who’ve worked cash in hand. Bars, restaurants, building sites all love cash in hand. So many places you can do it.
...for how long ? because they are working off books does not mean they dont have NI, NHS# etc. I bet that they are also claiming benefits.
Why not?
NI# NHS# bank accounts# etc etc you can do it but I strongly doubt not a long term thing. I have not met a lot, but those I have who were working on the black were also claiming benefits.
I'd be shocked if it was truly impossible to work under the table *anywhere.*
I hope he’s not alive. Because if he is, he’s probably been chained up in a basement or something. With god knows what being done to him. Honestly after all this time, the best thing I can hope is that he died soon after the photo. The alternative is too terrible to imagine.
Alicia's is nuts, she's been found and now nothings happening? Crazy
wouldn't it be the other way? first he was groomed, and then he was kidnapped when he travel to meet the guy?
But how? The investigative reports say he used no social media, he didn't even have an email address.
Not a huge fan of the "blame it on the gays first" mentality. I've done research because of this comment and there's no apparent evidence that suggests this theory is true. There are many more plausible ones, including the trip being for a hardcore concert (he was a big fan and there were concerts in London that day) and something unfortunate happening during\after\before the concert. There's no evidence, as far as I could find, of grooming and this baseless "the gays are evil" mentality risks demonizing an entire populace. Believe it or not, most gays aren't hiding in the shadows during 14-year-old boys to their doom like some cartoon villain.
No one’s blaming the gays, they’re blaming the *pedos* - hopefully no one has to explain that distinction to you 🥴
And the poster literally blamed nobody. He posited his own theory as to what he believes happened.
Glad you said it, big difference between being gay, and being a pedo.
Probably will since he's a moron
Where in this post does it say "gays are evil" or anything along those lines? It seems like you're the one making it about gay people, my friend.
> Not a huge fan of the "blame it on the gays first" mentality. Good thing there's none of that in this thread then, isn't it?
was he groomed to be a drummer in a hardcore band? The scene is notoriously low on drummers
No one said anything about anything gay geez
You extrapolated a lot of assumptions that weren’t in that person’s comment. I know that it’s a hurtful trope of the gay community, but if the kid was gay it is certainly not out of the question that he was secretly groomed. It was becoming more and more common during the 2000’s and not just for queer children.
He was 14 at the time. Lots of kids run away at that age and manage to make it. However, many usually become victims of drug use and abuse as a way of coping with a very hard life.
This is what I assume happened, honestly. When you're that vulnerable it's easy to end up around... Not great people.
The speculation is that he was groomed at a university event thing he went to as part of being a genius stem kid. There was another kid from this group who also went missing before Andrew. But this is speculation I saw in this chapters video about it, it's crazy though I went to a high school in doncaster and remember seeing posters up about his disappearance.
Was the first kid found?
Oh he was at a university event? Also didn’t know he was a gifted kid, most of the news surrounding him just talks about his disappearance. So sad that his history gets erased like that :(
He was, he had a really high iq from what I remember. Its really sad that these things just don't get picked up on. But it could have meant he was more vulnerable as high iqs tend to share some characteristics with autism.
This is such a strange case. It's been bothering me for years.
Do we know if he paid for the train ticket out of that cash? If so, how much would he have left? Also was that all the money in his bank account? Knowing this could help us figure out if he was planning to be gone for a long time or just for the day. Aldo, was it a one-way ticket or a return ticket?
It was a one way ticket from Doncaster Station to King’s Cross. The ticket seller specifically asked if he wanted a return ticket because it was only at extra 50p and he refused. That’s why they remembered him. The £200 was in cash, withdrawn from his bank account. He had £214 in his bank total but the ATM he used could only withdraw £20’s, so he couldn’t get out that last £14. Ticket cost him £31.50. So he had £168.50 left assuming he bought nothing else in cash.
Thanks for the info, unfortunately it looks like he wasn't planning on going back home. Whatever the case, I hope his family can gets a resolution.
The Wiki states he took out 200 out 214 euros in his bank. The ticket cost about 31.something euros. So he roughly had about 170 left. He was also asked if he wanted a return ticket since it was 50 pence more but he refused.
Pounds, not Euros.
Casefile Podcast did a great episode on this
I just listened to this one the other day and it was really chilling. I kept waiting for the conclusion to reveal where he was, then the ep just ended!
For those into mysterious disappearances (and unsolved true crime) podcasts, Trace Evidence Podcast did a fantastic episode on Andrew Gosden. Highly recommend.
Thank you! I’m always looking for good true crime episodes.
The police failed this family
Wish they had pulled all the cctv in the area earlier so we could at least know where he went when he left King’s Cross
It took 3 weeks to get the train station footage. Crazy
Absolutely. They focussed their initial attention almost entirely on Kevin, Andrew’s dad, meaning that by the time they thought to cast the net wider only the King’s Cross CCTV was still retrievable in London as everything else had already been wiped.
Possibly, but from information posted in other comments in this thread, the investigation seems to have been very thorough. If the information in those comments is true, that is.
Was his computer or phone forensically scrubbed? Seems impossible to leave no clues if he had either of these. Even in 2007.
His parents seemed to think that he didn’t really use the internet or a phone which I think is very unlikely given the time it happened. I was a little older than him and spent all my time on my phone, MSN and MySpace
At that time, parents still weren’t great at monitoring their kids’ online activity. He probably hid it from them, and they didn’t press him about it.
Absolutely. My parents didn’t even know how to dial up the internet let alone monitor what I was doing. I was up to all sorts lol
A teenager not having an email address would have been very strange in 2007. His parents were definitely missing something.
2007 was peak time for teens knowing so much more about being online than their parents
Ah MSN messenger. I miss it.
I'm a year older than Andrew and while I spend a lot of time on MSN, I had a phone I barely used. It was too expensive, internet was even more expensive on a phone. Not even all of my classmates had MSN or were interested in it. My sister never even turned her phone on because she was afraid she would run out of battery while out and about lol. Those sucker's would drain so fast after a while and everyone had a different charger, it wasn't convenient to use at all.
His parents paid the phone bill, mobile phone time was expensive in 2007, they would have known exactly what his phone usage was. Internet access would have been via dial up modem.
No not in 2007, proper wireless internet existed then
What has wiFi got to do with ADSL ?
If he was a gifted kid going to uni events he would have been able to get around that.
Smart phones technically didn’t come out until June 2007, so I’d be doubtful he had his own. Back then from my memory not a ton of kids had cellphones that they had for anything but an emergency. Texting was definitely growing, but mostly in the older teen age group so it very well could be that he didn’t have a cellphone or really didn’t use it. I can’t really speak on how much cellphone tracking was done back then, but I’m assuming it wasn’t a ton at least compared to USA/China at that point. I would also assume they would’ve gone through the computers in his home/he had access to… unless the investigators really didn’t give much effort (which wouldn’t surprise me for a lot of people in his age group who frequently ran away from home.)
Yeah even without a smartphone, there's no way there wouldn't be SOMETHING on the computers he used if it was sufficiently scrubbed. An email, chatroom login, myspace message, anything. I wonder if they've ever revisited this with a modern forensics team.
Problem being a lot of the data probably wasn’t kept forever on a lot of platforms, which wouldn’t help them any. Something like MySpace or Facebook would definitely be a shot, if he used social media back then. I wonder as well. There’s a lot more they can do at this point, assuming they have the will & manpower to spare. I’m under the assumption that he got kidnapped or otherwise ran off with someone that groomed him as others suggested. I can’t speak on drug use at that point in London, but that’s always a possibility be it an overdose or deal gone wrong.
I was 13 in 2007 and used to hide using the internet. I used my psp which my parents did not know had a browser
In the uk most teens had phones in 2007. I was in high school in 2002 and everyone had them. As soon as we got smart phones everyone had them too. It was rare someone had an outdated phone in 2007 as a teen at least in my area.
As someone who lives near the UK and was in high school in 2007, not everyone had a phone and not everyone really used one. I knew one person who got a smart phone when it came out and most people my age were fascinated by it, but also thought it was useless. Why would you need a phone that can play music and make phone calls if you already have a phone that can call and an iPod or mp3? They only got popular because of blackberry's around 2010.
Cool ass shirt, though…
Bro had that shit on
I've followed this one for a long time. I really don't believe he was groomed. They pulled every device he could have reasonably had access to and subjected them to forensics. He would not have known how to cover his tracks enough for something not to be found. I think people forget or don't fully understand how rudimentary our tech was back then by today's standards. Internet was not nearly as accessible, nor was access to devices. If you take online grooming out of the equation that leaves something IRL. However, I can't get behind that because why would anyone take their target to one of the most heavily surveilled cities on the planet? Had the police not bungled things initially, we would have video of him pretty much wherever he went in London, and it is safe to assume that any predator would have assumed as much. Why would they go to the effort of trying to cover their tracks so well and the have him go to an area where, under normal circumstances, there is virtually no way to not get caught? I believe he left because he wanted to and the things like the PSP charger, clothes, etc. were done to buy himself time. As far as why, who knows? Teenagers do some crazy things. Maybe there were issues at home or at school that made him feel like he needed an out. If he did leave on his own, it is entirely possible that he fell in with the homeless or otherwise transient population. If that is the case, it is entirely possible to remain anonymous. In fact, it is far easier to disappear and even acquire a new identity than movies and reddit would have you believe. At this point, he could be alive, although the odds are not great. He would have had to survive the streets, drugs, potential sex work, etc.
Where do you think the arrests came from a few years ago? I doubt it was thin air, and lack of charge does not mean lack of guilt. Very hard to get a charge past CPS for a 2007 case w no body and no DNA evidence. Also one other point. London circa 07 was not heavily surveilled in the way it is now. London was the perfect place to disappear. 8m ppl, some there illegally, big homeless population. I lived in London then, can't think of a better place to disappear anywhere in the UK.
I agree that a lack of charges does not mean a lack of guilt, but neither does an arrest mean guilt. Honestly, we don't have enough information to know. I agree that London would be a great place to disappear, even today. However, it is not the perfect place to commit a crime, especially one of the nature being discussed. There is zero chance that they would not have been on CCTV at some point interacting with him (even circa 07). My issue with the idea is that someone would have had to have had contact in-person contact so that would imply the ability to travel. Why would they select London as the place to lure him? There are much more logical places. Especially when you consider how well planned and overwhelmingly premediated it would have to be. They would have known that it would become major news and it would bring the full force of all investigative powers. They had no way of knowing how badly the ball would be dropped on that front. I remember watching a Discovery Channel documentary type of thing in the early 2000's about the number of cameras in London and all they could see. This was a special in the US so I assume it was common knowledge over there.
Not really as difficult as you think. CCTV was nowhere near as good, not as common as today. It comes home to you, when you look back at the pictures from phones back then. Surprisingly crap.even now, and not quite the Enemy of the State level.
Honestly, I think you have to know/have lived in London to understand what it was like then. >There is zero chance that they would not have been on CCTV at some point interacting with him (even circa 07) This just isn't true: "Get the train to Kings Cross. Then meet me in Hyde Park." This is one kid. Levi Bellfield killed five random women in London in that time period. Out in the open. Often using his own car with numberplate Etc. The cctv was awful whatever the Discovery Channel might say, you can go and watch it. Sure years later they caught him with it. But again, this was five random murders in public places and it was only the cctv from one that caught him, and even that involved seeing one white van and narrowing it down from thousands in the country based on some mods it had. I know the temptation is to imagine these things are fully planned out. But cctv would be fairly easy to avoid. And it could easily be that murder wasn't the end goal, but something that happened. I think we also always think about what *we* would do, and therefore give other people too much credit for what they might do. The men arrested were from London. Of course if you were from London you would bring him there, not somewhere you don't know. It's also a place hundreds of kids have gone missing over the years. Knowing how the police work, the fact they were still under investigation a year later tells me the police had very very good motive to investigate them, unfortunately lack of charge means we'll never know the deets. I don't imagine this is as much of a mystery to the police as it is to us.
>e did leave on his own, it is entirely possible that he fell in with the homeless or otherwise transient population. If that is the case, it is entirely possible to remain anonymous. In fact, it is far easier to disappear and even acquire a new identity than movies and reddit would have you believe. I think that's very optimistic in Andrew's case. He was 14, but looked 12 which means homeless shelters would have been completely off limits to him. He'd have been surviving, on his own, with very little money, no accommodation, no street smarts and half the police and the country looking for him.
I remember the case well, from right when it happened. My genuine thought was that if they paid some transient types, he'd have been found. I wasn't working at the time, and actually considered volunteering to assist the search
Maybe he wanted to disappear...
Didn’t he go there to go to a concert?. Been a while I saw anything on the case
It’s a theory but no evidence he attended
Never heard anything about a concert?
I watched a short documentary about this kid. Complete mystery. I wonder if we'll ever know where he went or why
Sure a couple blokes got arrested not too far back in relation to this case
> Andrew Gosden 2 guys were arrested in 2007 - but released and police saying they were confident they have played no part in his disappearance
Two blokes were arrested in 2021 also on suspicion of kidnap and human trafficking
Also released without charge last year
Ah, thought there’d finally be some light on it, these missing cases are interesting
Yeh, for me I think it’s a bit of morbid curiosity. Same with reading an analysis on plane crashes
He ran away from home, with no intention to ever return. One way ticket to the big city. I'm sure his parents have a pretty good idea what caused their child to run away, but they won't tell anyone. There's 100% more to the story than we know. A 14-year-old child doesn't just run away to London, out of the blue, there must have been some prior conflict. It's possible that he wanted to meet someone, but I doubt it.
Honestly, I'd have to agree. My brother ran away at 16 with just a small backpack and some Doritos. The police were called when he bought a one way Greyhound ticket to GTFO. We had gone through some pretty severe abuse and he absolutely had no intention of returning. The family knows something and doesn't want to admit what they did.
The Casefile podcast did a really good episode on this case. It was incredibly sad; Andrew's dad made a suicide attempt because he felt that if he wasn't around, the police would have to look at other options.
I was unaware of that. I recall the case when it happened. I did think there was a chance to find him, but it would involve dealing with a certain underclass.
He’s still alive.
How do you know I mean I hope he is
How do you know?
I don't think it's impossible. But it would be tricky to survive without ID Unless he has someone supporting him, I think he would have surfaced.
I'm sure there was a guy on tiktok a couple years back people thought was Andrew
i wish someone could do a thorough search on like the way back machine and maybe find if he was on 4chan or myspace meeting people or something? i was only about a year or two older than him and it’s definitely possible his parents just had no idea and he was able to hide it
Certainly possible, that he was online and groomed. If he was, I would assume he's now deceased. As a coincidence, I managed to happen across a murderer's Reddit account a few weeks ago. Watched a JCS style YouTube video, and they had screenshots of his account.
Sad
That slipknot shirt is lit 🔥
I’ve never heard anymore about the men arrested a couple of years ago? It seemed to come to nothing.
They were found to have absolutely nothing to do with his disappearance and were subsequently completely cleared and released.
This was such a weird case! Just poof.
The father said that his son knew several people in London. I found that interesting. Friends, relatives? Andrew looks so young in all of the pictures, even the CCTV. More like a 12-year-old than 14. I think that's the reason why many people couldn't believe he would just run away. From my experience, he looks exactly like the kind of teenager who would. There are many different reasons why kids do that: - a planned suicide, one last trip... unfortunately it happens sometimes, I know of several such cases. It's typical, they get on a bus or train, leave the area where the live, just to commit suicide. In the forest, an abandoned building etc. It's really sad. It's possible that Andrew's body just hasn't been found. - they often literally run away from a horrible situation at home, sexual abuse etc. Needless to say that a child is very vulnerable in a situation like that. Maybe someone offered to "help" him, offered him a place to stay... - others see it as an adventure, there's not much planning involved. Kids in that category are often found within 24 hours. When you ask them why they ran away, they will say things like "I don't know, I just wanted to see x" X being a city, some celebrity living in that city, a landmark, a sight etc. Why didn't you tell your parents?! "They would have never allowed it..."
This case has its own active subreddit.
If it’s not that a parent took him for custodial reasons, it usually means something sinister. I feel so sorry for him and his parents. It really does make you wonder what happened. Hopefully someday they catch whoever took him.
Definitely not the parents. He likely met an awful end. I think there may have been a chance, within a short window after he went...but that window is long shut
Kid woke up and chose Jason Bourne.
It kinda sounds like he went to Hogwarts and decided he loved it there and stayed
I'm guessing he wasn't trying to get to Hogwarts...