The Murder of Rachel Nickell, Netflix’s new documentary about the case, revisits one of the most controversial chapters in the investigation: the undercover “honeytrap” operation involving Lizzie James.
Nickell was just 23 when she was murdered on Wimbledon Common in July 1992. She was stabbed almost 50 times and sexually assaulted, with her two-year-old son Alex becoming the only eyewitness.
Her killer, Robert Napper, would not be convicted for more than 15 years. By then, the investigation had already been overshadowed by a series of major police failings, including the pursuit of an innocent man.
That man was Colin Stagg, and the woman at the centre of the operation against him was Lizzie James.
Who was Lizzie James in the Rachel Nickell case?
Lizzie James was an undercover officer with the Metropolitan Police.
To understand why she became involved, it’s important to look at how detectives built their case against Colin Stagg.
Stagg broadly matched the description of a man seen near Wimbledon Common around the time of the murder. However, police had no forensic evidence linking him to Rachel Nickell’s death.
Instead, detectives turned to criminal psychologist Paul Britton and asked him to create an offender profile.
“What they got from me is a point-by-point psychological analysis,” he explains in the documentary.
Britton believed the killer was likely under 30, lived locally, had few friends, preferred solitary hobbies and had interests in martial arts and pornography.
When police interviewed Stagg, he admitted he had been near the Common. Detectives also viewed the pagan and zodiac imagery in his flat as suspicious.
Even then, there still wasn’t enough evidence to charge him. That’s where Lizzie James entered the investigation.
Lizzie James’ role in Operation Edzell
After police received a call from a woman who had exchanged letters with Stagg through a lonely hearts column, they launched a covert operation known as Operation Edzell.
Lizzie James, an undercover officer from the Met’s Special Operations Group, contacted Stagg while pretending to be a friend of the woman.
According to Stagg’s defence barrister, William Clegg KC, James would “promise intimacy with Colin Stagg… but said she could really only do it if he’d killed Rachel Nickell”.
“I remember reading the transcripts of the undercover operation, all of which were taped, and I was completely and utterly astonished,” he said.
“I couldn’t believe what I was reading – that the police had behaved in this way.”
In one conversation, James famously told Stagg: “If only you had done the Wimbledon Common murder, if only you had killed her, it would be all right.”
But Stagg repeatedly insisted he had nothing to do with the crime.
Despite that, he was charged with Nickell’s murder.
When the case reached the Old Bailey in September 1994, it quickly collapsed. Mr Justice Ognall condemned the police for “deceptive conduct of the grossest kind” and Stagg was acquitted.
What is Lizzie James’ real name?
Lizzie James was never the officer’s real name. It was simply the alias she used during Operation Edzell.
A lifetime anonymity order protects her identity, meaning her real name has never been made public.
What happened to Lizzie James after Colin Stagg’s acquittal?
The fallout from Operation Edzell affected James, too.
Following Stagg’s acquittal, she took 18 months off work after developing post-traumatic stress disorder.
She later took early retirement in June 1998 before launching legal action against Scotland Yard, claiming she had not received adequate support following her role in the operation.
“She was not offered sufficient support in dealing with the difficult experiences she went through,” a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Federation said (via The Independent).
In 2001, it was reported that James received £125,000 in compensation.
According to her solicitor, Liz Dux, the size of the payout “must indicate their recognition that she sustained serious psychiatric injury” (as reported by BBC News).
A spokeswoman for the federation added: “Her career and health have been wrecked as a consequence of a police operation where she was a junior officer simply obeying the orders of her superiors.”
The payout proved controversial. By comparison, Alex Nickell, who witnessed his mother’s murder as a child, received £22,000 in compensation.
Lyn Costello, co-founder of Mothers Against Murder and Aggression, described the payment as “disgusting”.
“The taxpayer is paying this money out and as a taxpayer I know where I’d rather have my money going to, and that is to a victim of crime rather than someone doing their job,” she said.
You can watch a Channel 4 drama about Lizzie James
Channel 4 dramatised the story in Deceit, which aired in 2021.
The series starred Niamh Algar as Lizzie James, renamed Sadie Byrne, and followed the undercover operation that targeted Colin Stagg.
Oddly, the drama isn’t currently available to stream on Channel 4.
The only legal ways to watch it are through digital rental and purchase services such as Amazon, or by buying the DVD.
Speaking to Channel 4, Algar said: “The real identity of the undercover officer is protected and that was always maintained, so I was just given the ingredients of how to create this character of Sadie.
“We haven’t specified which parts are verbatim and which parts aren’t, and that’s important because [writer Emilia di Girolamo] isn’t trying to show who she actually was.
“I was shocked about how the real Sadie was treated, the position she was put in. How Colin was treated was horrific as well, and it really continued for 15 years until Robert Napper was finally convicted.”
Read more: New documentaries and true crime on TV and streaming this month
The Witness and The Murder of Rachel Nickell are available to stream on Netflix now.
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