A PAEDO bus driver who murdered an 8-year-old lad then moved in with the boy’s parents could be freed from prison in weeks.
Darren Vickers was caged for a minimum 25 years for the murder of Jamie Lavis after snatching him as he boarded his bus.
But in a duping that shocked the world, Vickers became the Lavis family spokesperson, moving in with them to help ‘find’ Jamie.
Now 56, the monster could be released as early as February as he goes up for parole for the May 1997 murder, The Manchester Evening News reported.
On the day Jamie’s life was cruelly snuffed out, Vickers had managed to groom the youngster to stay on his bus all day.
In the days that followed the lad’s disappearance, twisted Vickers posed as an innocent bus driver who was the last to see Jamie alive.
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He weaselled his way into the Lavis’s home in Openshaw, Greater Manchester, going on searches for Jamie and even fronting press conferences to help find the lad.
At one point he slept in the family home, with Karen and John Lavis even offering to move onto the sofa to give Vickers a bed.
Vickers’ evil plan meant he could stay in tune with the police investigation.
Cops became suspicious of Vickers – a married dad-of-two – who lost his job and became isolated from his family during his “obsessive” involvement in the lad’s disappearance.
Five months after Jamie vanished, the sick bus driver was arrested for Jamie’s abduction but continued to feign his innocence.
The boy’s naked body was found in undergrowth in Reddish Vale, Greater Manchester, two years after he was sexually assaulted and murdered.
Following the discovery, Vickers was jailed for life for murder, with a minimum 25 years.
Sentencing Vickers to life, Mr Justice Forbes said Jamie’s life was “cruelly” ended simply for getting on the 10.30am bus on Ashton Old Road on May 5, 1997.
Ex cop Asif Hussain, 60, spent weeks embedded with the Lavis family in his role as family liaison officer.
He told the Manchester Evening News: “Vickers will be a danger to children for the rest of his life.
“He was a married man with two children of his own and yet he was able to take the life of another child. He can never be rehabilitated in my opinion.”
Roy Rainford, the senior investigating officer on the case, previously told a documentary: “Darren Vickers should never be released. He will be a danger to children.”
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A spokesman for the Parole Board said an oral hearing for Vickers, of Gorton, Greater Manchester, is scheduled for February 2023.
They added: “A panel will carefully examine a huge range of evidence.”
