The schoolgirl was stabbed with a hunting knife 28 times in the head, neck, chest and back after being lured to Linear Park, Culcheth, a village near Warrington, Cheshire.
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One neighbour said: It was the other way around. Thompson wasn t that bad a kid when I knew him. Thompson s childhood friend said: He was neglected. his mother was a drinker.
In February 1993, the toddler was snatched from his mother at New Strand Shopping Centre in Bootle, Merseyside, by Jon Venables (pictured) and Robert Thompson.
James mother Denise Fergus (pictured) said she could finally see some light at the end of the tunnel after decades of fighting for justice for her son, adding: I was dreading Christmas.