Channel 5’s brand new true crime documentary, The Man Who Took Shannon Matthews, focuses on the role Michael Donovan played in the schoolgirl’s disappearance.
Using actors and exclusive testimony, the documentary examines the life of Shannon’s kidnapper, Michael Donovan, including his childhood and teenage years.
Those close to Michael also discuss his health issues and whether it could have affected his decision-making.
So, who is Michael Donovan, and where is he now?
Who is Michael Donovan?
Michael Donovan is the youngest of nine children, and he was brought up on an estate in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.
Despite becoming involved in the disappearance of Shannon Matthews, he was far from a criminal mastermind.
Throughout his life, Michael struggled with learning difficulties, and only has around half of the average IQ.
He attended a Hartshead Moor special school where he claims he was also bullied.
From the age of 11, Michael began getting in trouble with juvenile courts.
His first offences were three counts of arson and shoplifting.
When he was 16, he was convicted of causing criminal damage and, at the time, ran away from home and never returned.
Michael was also scarcely known to his neighbours, but he was nicknamed “weirdo” by locals.
What is Michael Donovan’s real name?
Michael Donovan’s real name is Paul Drake.
But, three years after he was convicted of causing criminal damage, he changed his name to Micheal Donovan via Deed Poll.
He changed his name to Michael Donovan after the star of a 1980s science fiction cult TV show called V.
The Man Who Took Shannon Matthews: Did Michael Donovan have a wife?
While he was undergoing psychiatric treatment, Michael met a woman named Susan Bird.
The pair later married and had two daughters together.
Michael claimed that Susan was violent towards him and had a drug problem.
However, his wife claimed that Michael abused opiates and regularly beat her up.
She told the Daily Mail: “He used to punch me, kick me and slap me.
“He’s broken my cheekbone, and bust my nose several times.”
Whatever the truth, it was a result of Susan’s mental health problems that Michael got full custody of their children when the pair divorced.
But his daughters were later taken into care after Michael was involved in a traffic accident and needed lengthy hospital treatment.
Fifteen months before Shannon’s disappearance, Michael picked his eldest daughter up from school and disappeared with her.
The police eventually traced the pair to Blackpool and Michael was charged with abduction, but the case was eventually dropped.
What did Michael Donovan do to Shannon Matthews?
In 2008, in a case that shocked the nation, Shannon Matthews disappeared on her way home from a swimming lesson at Westmoor Primary School in Dewsbury.
After a huge much-publicised search, the police discovered that Michael Donovan had held the young girl captive at his home for 24 days.
He sedated Shannon with the travel sickness drug, Traveleeze, and held her at his flat in Batley Carr, West Yorks.
Shannon was eventually found tethered and drugged inside the base of a double bed at Donovan’s flat.
Was Karen Matthews Michael Donovan’s accomplice?
It turns out that Michael was working with Shannon’s mum, Karen Matthews, the whole time.
The pair plotted Shannon’s “disappearance” in a bid to try and claim the £50,000 reward for her safe return.
They had planned to ‘discover’ the schoolgirl, and take her to a police station and claim the reward.
Karen and Michael had agreed to split the money between them.
The Man Who Took Shannon Matthews: How was Michael Donovan caught?
After Shannon had been missing for 23 days, new evidence came to light.
Two hero police officers heard about Michael Donovan, who was the uncle of Karen’s boyfriend, Craig Meehan.
Michael was a regular visitor to Dewsbury Moor, but he had not been seen there since Shannon vanished.
Feeling suspicious, the detectives decided to pay Michael a visit.
There was no answer at his flat, so the pair decided to speak to his neighbour downstairs, June Batley.
June told the officers that she knew Nick was in because she had heard movement upstairs, including the “tiny footsteps of a toddler”.
Understandably, this sent alarm bells ringing, and the officers called for back-up before they used a door rammer to get into his flat.
Panicked and realising he’d been found out, Michael bit a police officer as he was dragged from base of his bed.
He told the officers: “Get Karen down here. We’re sharing the money – £50,000.”
Thankfully, police also found Shannon at the house.
The Man Who Took Shannon Matthews: Where is Michael Donovan now?
On December 04 2008, Karen and Michael were found guilty of kidnapping, false imprisonment and perverting the course of justice.
Both were sentenced at Leeds Crown Court to eight years behind bars.
Karen was released from prison in 2012, after serving just half her sentence.
That same year, a photo of Michael appeared in the Sunday Mirror which showed him watching children playing outside a coffee shop.
According to the paper, he had been spotted acting bizarrely while sitting on a bench in a Leeds marketplace.
He had been spending six hours a day there,
Eventually the police picked him up after a request from parole officials.
Michael returned to prison, but it is not known what has happened to him since.
What were his list of rules that Shannon Matthews lived by?
While Shannon was being held captive in Michael’s home, he wrote a chilling list of strict rules for her to follow.
The list was written on a scrawny piece of lined paper.
The heart-breaking note reads: “Rules. You must not make any noise or bang your feet.
“You must not go near the windows, you must not get anything or do anything without me here.
“Keep the TV volume (low) only up to 8 or lower. You can play the Super Mario games and you can play some DVDs and you can play the CD music.”
It is then signed off with the initials I.P.U which is thought to stand for “I Promise You”.
Read more: Shannon Matthews: 12 other unmissable true crime documentaries available on My5
The Man Who Took Shannon Matthews starts on Thursday December 08 2022 on Channel 5.
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