1. RGG-EO2-S2
local news all day every day crawleynews.co.ukWednesday, July 13, 2016
This collector
owns 1,800
Monopoly sets
Page 3
Inside
Worth
WIN £5,000 OF
M&S VOUCHERS
PAGE 23
BEST HOMES FOR
SALE& RENT: INSIDE
Police looking
for abandoned
baby’s parents
Page 6
Crawley
Tributes paid
after death
of taxi driver
Page 7
Bewbush
‘RUNNING AWAY
WAS A MISTAKE’Schoolgirl says that she regrets putting her family ‘through hell’
to Crawley, where she stayed with
a friend until 9.30pm before they
caught a train down to Brighton.
The teenager spent the night
on Brighton seafront struggling
to get to sleep in bitingly cold
conditions.
She said: “It was really cold, we
stayed on Brighton beach, I was
wrapped in a jumper and a towel,
but it was absolutely freezing. I
tried to get some sleep at 2.30am,
but woke up at 3.30am. We just
started walking back to the train
station and went up to Brixton.
Scary
“We were just looking for
something to do, but walking
around Brixton was really scary.
People would walk past us and
just stare at us, it was
frightening. There were loads of
drunk people as well.
“I thought what I was doing
was helping me take my mind off
of things but I had barely slept
and it was really shocking to see
all this.”
Charley continued moving on
by train, visiting Streatham and
Haywards Heath as she just
wandered around trying to clear
her mind. Back home her mum,
Gemma Watts, and Callum made
emotional pleas, which were
published on the Crawley News
website, for Charley to come back
or to get in contact.
The appeals on social media
Exclusive by
Thomas Mackintosh
thomas.mackintosh@
crawleynews.co.uk
AN IFIELD teenager who
sparked a massive search after
she went missing for three nights
has admitted that running away
from home was a big mistake.
Charley Harrison left her
home on Friday night and spent
the weekend wandering around
Horsham, Brighton, Brixton,
Streatham and Haywards Heath.
Speaking exclusively to the
Crawley News, the 15-year-old
explained why she ran – and gave
a stark warning to other teens
thinking of doing the same.
She said: “I was just really
down and I thought that getting
away would be the best thing. I
thought by running away I could
be with my friends but it didn’t
work out as I thought. Looking
back it is a regret, I would have
done it differently and gone to
someone from the family.”
Charley told her family that
she was going to spend Friday
night with her boyfriend Callum
Bethell in Horsham, but instead
met up with two other teenage
friends. Her disappearance left
her family frantic with worry as
they spent hours driving around
Horsham and Crawley looking
for her.
On Saturday Charley left
Horsham at 6.30pm and returned I Turn to page 9
REMORSE:
Charley Harrison
has warned other
teenagers that
running away from
home is not the
way to resolve
their problems