EXCLUSIVE My ex-British Army brother choked to death on the floor of a police station and 11 years later we discovered we'd buried a 77-year-old woman - why won't cops admit they swapped the body?

Daily Mail​

24-04-2025

It took 13 years for the family of Christopher Alder to be told they had buried a 77-year-old woman and not their beloved brother and ex-British Army paratrooper.
Christopher, who was commended for his service, had choked to death on the floor of a police station while officers looked on and laughed.
Twenty-seven years on, his sister Janet is still waiting for answers - but there is one thing she says is certain: police at the time knew the family had been handed the wrong body to bury, but won't admit it.
The ordeal began on the morning of April 1, 1998, as Christopher was dragged unconscious into a police station in Hull, leaving a smear of blood along the walls in his wake.
He had been arrested to prevent a breach of the peace as his behaviour was said to have been 'extremely troublesome'.
This was possibly as the result of a head injury as he'd been the victim of an assault in the early hours of the morning.
Christopher arrived in a room at the station bleeding with his trousers round his ankles, and his body was dumped down on the floor.
Humberside Police officers asked questions like 'Are you winning, love?' and cracked jokes, despite the correct procedure being to call for medical advice if a potentially ill person is thought to be 'faking it'.
Not long later, Christopher was pronounced dead. An officer reportedly made monkey noises.
In 2011 - 11 years after his funeral - it came to light the family had been given the body of a 77-year-old Nigerian woman called Grace Kamara to bury.
Speaking to MailOnline, Janet Alder has stated she believes it was due to police 'vindictiveness' that the body swap took place.
She said: 'There's just absolutely tons of evidence they knew.
'I think first it was just a private joke between themselves - that "oh, we've given them [the family] the wrong body".
'I just can't believe it. They killed him and they abused his body afterwards.'
In her new book, Defiance, co-authored with Dan Glazebrook, Janet Alder says there was only one other body in the mortuary at the time that was 'black or frozen'.
She added 'there were very few black or Asian people in Hull'.
Evidence cited includes the fact Christopher's body would have had to have been moved more than once.
In 2001, the coroner's and hospital mortuary merged. In 2005, the Spring Street mortuary where Christopher was being kept closed down.
And his body must have also been examined in 2007, as it was later discovered with a wristband on with that date.
A police statement itself also made reference to a testimony the body was being kept for 'legal reasons'.
Police initially said the body was not signed out of the mortuary and they did not know who was on shift. A document from Browns funeral directors under the Dignity Burial system, however, makes clear the date and time of collection.
Mr Glazebrook said: 'Grace Kamara's body was released in place of Christopher Alder's on 21st November 2000.
'This information is clearly recorded on the funeral directors' burial form, the most obvious place to look.
'Yet we are supposed to believe that South Yorkshire Police did not think to obtain this document as part of their £500,000, 18-month investigation into the body swap - and were therefore unable to ascertain the date of the body's release and therefore could not identify who was responsible.
'The contempt they have shown to the Alder family matches that they showed to the families of those they killed at Hillsborough, framed at Orgreave and allowed to be raped in Rotherham.'
Neighbouring South Yorkshire police conducted an investigation into the swap but the Crown Prosecution Service found in 2013 there was 'insufficient evidence' the lawful burial of a body had been prevented.
South Yorkshire Police told MailOnline: 'Our thoughts remain with Christopher's family, friends and loved ones at this time. They have our heartfelt sympathies as they strive for answers and live with their devastating loss every single day.
'South Yorkshire Police was commissioned by the then Deputy Chief Constable of Humberside Police, Stuart Donald, to carry out an independent review to understand how the bodies of Christopher Alder and Grace Kamara came to be mixed up.
'The investigation was led by a South Yorkshire Police Senior Investigating Officer with a South Yorkshire team. As part of the investigation, it was considered whether officers may have been shown the body of either Christopher Alder or Grace Kamara.
'Accounts given by officers who claimed to have seen the body, were passed to the CPS. Having considered all lines of enquiry, we were unable to fully understand how the mix up occurred and as a consequence no one suspected of involvement was charged with criminal offences.'
Asked why she thought the police would have acted with 'vindictiveness', Janet said 'the way they were spying' on her was one of the behaviours to give that impression.
She suggested she had been seen as a nuisance by the force for her enquiries into Christopher's death.
Janet also cited evidence from a self-administered police statement that detailed how week by week around 12 to 15 trainees would go to see Christopher's body - while his family and the wider public still believed it to be the body of Grace Kamara.
She said: 'Right until 2011 they were still using his body to show trainee police officers. His body must have been in a bad state.
'They're supposed to make sure you get your loved ones back in the best condition. I don't think he was in the freezer for the time he was supposed to be. They were using him to shock the trainees. A supervisor said his was the only body that smelt in the mortuary.
'They know it's against the law to damage a body in that way - some of them were saying it was like a mummy. What they've done is appalling.'
Janet also referenced the name police used for the operation to investigate the body swap - 'Operation Almond', saying 'Almond' had been the surname of an ex-partner she had been in a relationship with while she was 'vulnerable' who had 'smashed' her house up.
'That shows how vindictive they were being - they were taking the p***,' she said.
Humberside Police said: 'In 2011, the then Deputy Chief Constable of Humberside Police asked South Yorkshire Police, to carry out an independent investigation into the circumstances as to how the bodies of Grace Kamara and Christopher Alder were misidentified whilst in the care of the mortuary in Hull.
'South Yorkshire Police's investigation resulted in a file being passed to the Crown Prosecution Service, however it was determined that there was insufficient evidence to secure a successful prosecution.
'Our thoughts remain with Mr Alder's family and loved ones, as we understand there remains unanswered questions which compound the devastating loss and pain they have endured, and we continue to offer our sincerest condolences to them.'
Asked to reflect on the toll the events had had on her, Janet said: 'For me it's been devastating.
'I've got a load of ailments now that I never had before. I've just been living with anxiety for years. Anxiety, shock, horror, grief.
'I just don't have any peace or justice or anybody. It's just done so much damage. My trust has been totally crushed. My faith has been totally crushed. It really has been horrendous and so frightening. It's been terrible.
'He fought for this country and that's how they've paid him back.'
Asked for her age, Janet said lightheartedly she couldn't remember if she was 62 or 63.
She added: 'I've lost track of time. I think I'm 62 - to me now it means absolutely nothing. Years have just flown by.'
Defiance: Racial Injustice, Police Brutality, A Sister's Fight for the Truth is out now.