The Girls Who Were Found Alive

Synopsis

The two 10-year-olds, Charlene Lunnon and Lisa Hoodless, were abducted as they made the short walk to school from their homes in an unnamed seaside town on January 19, 1999. A convicted paedophile drew up in a car, grabbed them, covering their mouths as they screamed, and bundled them into the vehicle's boot. Child protection officers called at Alan Hopkinson's home on a hunch, and found the girls "distressed" but safe, sitting together on a bed. Hopkinson, 45, from Eastbourne, East Sussex, pleaded guilty at Lewes Crown Court to two charges of kidnap, two of false imprisonment and nine assaults. The unemployed computer programmer also admitted 11 counts of assault against two other girls aged 10 and 11 in 1998. Ten other charges of assault would lie on the file, the court was told.