Jack MacLeod’s family tells the Courier ‘we will always fight for our son’

But Sheena and Ewan Macleod still believe that there are people out there who know what happened to the 17-year-old - and they are once again appealing for those people to come forward and speak out.

“I believe that not everyone is bad. If the people who know what happened realise what untold damage they have done, they will think that has got to stop,” Mrs Macleod, who has been unable to work since losing her son, told the Courier this week.

Jack went missing after a night out with friends on December 4 2005 and his body was not found until a month later.

A reconstruction of events leading to Jack’s death was featured on the BBC’s Crimewatch programme in January 2006, but it was not until March 2008 that an arrest was made in connection with the case. Mark Hoolichan, who at the time lived in Wolverhampton, was charged with manslaughter - but the subsequent trial at Birmingham Crown Court collapsed later that year after the judge ruled that there was “no case to answer”.

Pointing out that high profile cases such as the Stephen Lawrence and Hillsborough inquiries resulted in an outcome many years after the incident, Mrs Macleod said: “There is somebody out there with a conscience and I am appealing for that person to come forward.

“Maybe that person has had a child now and that sense of what it might be like to lose a child might push them to come forward and say something.”

Mrs Macleod said that many of her young nieces and nephews are still struggling to come to terms with what happened.

She said: “Ewan and I struggle all the time. We have had anxiety disorders and socially, we are always very conscious that we are like the elephants that walk into the room.

“When people are takling to me, I get anxious because I know people are going to ask me if I have children. We have had to close down our networks.

She added: “We have already lost one of Jack’s grandparents who suddenly stopped talking a year after we lost Jack. They had been very close.

“I don’t want to lose any more of my family before we know what happened.”

Mr Macleod, who had to take a year off work after losing Jack, said that the winter months are particularly difficult for the couple.

He said: “I have huge anxieties at this time of year. Sheena cannot breathe if she sees Christmas decorations.

“It goes right through to Feburary 3, the date of Jack’s funeral. Jack loved Christmas.”

While the Macleods know that they will never achieve ‘closure’, they are desperate to be able to know what happened to their son.

Mrs Macleod said: “If we knew what happened, it would enable us to stop some of the damage that is constantly being done.

“I don’t know if anything will come of this appeal, but if if doesn’t, I will do it again in five years’ time, ten years’ time, 20 years’ time and 20 years after that as well. I have to try.

“We have to keep trying. If Ewan and I don’t do this, we are never giving anybody a chance to come forward.”