True Crime Collection

Genette Tate

Genette Louise Tate was born in Taunton, Somerset on 5th May 1965. She was the only child born to John and Sheila Tate. At the time of Genette's birth, the Tate family lived in the Taunton suburb of Wedlands. They relocated briefly to Cornwall before moving to Devon. 

Genette's parents separated when she was young, and her father remarried. She lived with her father, stepmother Violet, and stepsister Tania at Barton Farm Cottage in the East Devon village of Aylesbeare, 8 miles east of Exeter. After her parents' separation, Genette maintained regular contact with her mother. 

Genette disappeared while delivering newspapers shortly after 3:30pm on 19th August 1978. At approximately 3:28pm, two school friends saw Genette walking along Withen Lane, pushing her bicycle. Genette had delivered 14 newspapers at this point, and conversed briefly with her friends as they ascended the lane. At the top of the hill, Genette mounted her bicycle and rode ahead as her friends paused to read an article in the newspaper they had been given. Genette would not typically have performed this newspaper round, and had agreed to do the job for 1 week as the paper boy who normally did the round was on holiday. Genette was wearing a white cotton t-shirt with her name embroidered in red letters on the left shoulder, light brown trousers, and white plimsolls. 

7 minutes later, the 2 girls discovered her bicycle lying in the middle of the road. Several newspapers she had been scheduled to deliver were scattered across the tarmac. 

Approximately 25 minutes after the 2 girls had discovered Genette's bicycle, John and Violet Tate returned to Barton Farm Cottage from a shopping trip to Exeter. The girls had Genette's bicycle with them, and asked if Genette was at home. When John Tate said that his daughter was not at home, he and Violet, assisted by several friends and neighbours, began a search around Within Road for Genette. At 5pm, John Tate reported his daughter missing to Devon and Cornwall Police. 

Within hours of Genette's disappearance, police mounted an extensive search. 70 uniformed policemen and 50 detectives from Devon and Cornwall Police, assisted by mounted police from Avon and Somerset Police, were assigned to the search. All ponds in the Aylesbeare area were searched by underwater search units, and search dogs assisted police in their search of surrounding terrain.

Devon and Cornwall Police discounted the possibility of Genette running away from home, as at the time of her disappearance she had no personal possessions beyond the clothing she was wearing. She had also left behind money she had been saving for an upcoming family holiday in her bedroom. The money collected from the customers on her newspaper round was still in her purse on the bicycle. The possibility of a hit and run traffic accident was also ruled out, as no tyre marks were found on the road and her bicycle was undamaged. Kidnapping was initially considered a possibility, although both Devon and Cornwall Police and Genette's family gradually discounted this possibility. 

Eyewitnesses reported seeing a maroon Triumph or similar vehicle upon Within Road at around the time of the disappearance, and police issued a photofit picture of a man they wanted to question in relation to the incident. This man was described as being a "very handsome" individual in his early 20s with a pale complexion, short dark hair, who had been wearing a light coloured shirt. 

Despite the police investigation and a search of the surrounding countryside involving thousands of volunteers, Genette's disappearance remains unexplained. In 2002, DNA belonging to Genette Tate was found on one of her jumpers kept by her mother, which would allow her body to be identified if discovered. On the 25th anniversary of the case in 2003, Genette's parents John and Sheila both stated their belief that she is no longer alive. Police have amassed more than 20,000 cards in a filing system related to the case, which is stored at the Devon and Cornwall Police headquarters in Exeter. 

Serial killer Robert Black was convicted in 1994 for similar crimes involving the abduction and murder of young girls, and was subsequently questioned by Devon and Cornwall Police in connection with the Genette Tate case. During the course of his job as a long distance delivery van driver in the 1970s, Robert had made deliveries in the Exeter area. In 1996, an eyewitness claimed to have seen a vehicle of the model he is known to have driven in 1978 at Exeter Airport on the day of Genette's disappearance. The police inquiries were unable to establish that Robert had been in Aylesbeare on the day of the disappearance. 

The Crown Prosecution Service decided in August 2008 that insufficient evidence existed to charge Robert with Genette's murder. After Robert's conviction in 2011 for the murder of Jennifer Cardy in 1981, a spokesman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland commented on the "striking similarities" between the murder of Jennifer and the disappearance of Genette Tate. 

Devon and Cornwall Police reviewed the case in June 2014 in the hope of finding sufficient real evidence to prosecute Robert. At the time of Robert's death in January 2016, Devon and Cornwall Police were 5 weeks from submitting a file to the Crown Prosecution Service in which they sought a new decision on whether to prosecute him. The file was submitted in April 2016, and the Crown Prosecution Service said that due to Robert's death, there would be no posthumous decision to charge him with Genette's murder.

In August 2018, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of his daughter's disappearance, John Tate made a further plea for information about the case, saying "I am not even 100% sure Robert did it. I need proof that Robert killer her." He said that his rapidly declining health meant that he could no longer make his annual trip from Manchester to Aylesbeare, and that his final wish was to give Genette a dignified christian burial and to be buried alongside her. He died in April 2020, aged 77, with the case still unsolved.