Skydiver's Cut Chute Leads to Death
H U M B E R S I D E, England, July 25 -- Minutes before skydiver Stephen Hilder plummeted 13,000 feet to his death, he was smiling and laughing with his daredevil friends. Police say he didn't know that someone had cut his parachute cord.
Hilder, 20, died when his parachute failed to open on July 4. British police say the cord on his chute was cut, as were the straps on his reserve chute.
Detective Superintendent Colin Andrews, the head of the murder investigation in Humberside, England, says police knew Hilder's death wasn't an accident when the skydiver's body was discovered.
"As soon as Stephen's body was found, it was obvious that his parachute had been deliberately tampered with," Andrews said on the BBC-1 program Crimewatch U.K.
Andrews and Hilder's parents have taken the mysterious case to the airwaves in an effort to find out what happened.
Crimewatch U.K. recently aired a videotape of Hilder's final moments. The late skydiver's father, Paul Hilder, 51, said he hopes the moving videotape will push someone to come forward with information.
Paul Hilder said his son's love for skydiving began nearly two years ago after his very first jump.
The tape shows Hilder — a former Bristol University student turned cadet at the Royal Military College of Science — laughing and smiling with his skydiving teammates moments before his doomed final dive. The tape also shows the party Hilder and his friends attended the night before the university skydiving competition. He and his teammates were dressed in drag at a costume party for the competitors.
Police have said they believe the killer may have been at the party. Andrews says he hopes someone will imagine the horror of his final moments, and come forward with information about the murderer, or the motive.
"This is a party. We need to trace everybody who was there," Andrews said. "We know there were [200] to 300 people who attended the site. If we trace all the people then we will trace the murderer."
Following the airing of Hilder's story on Crimewatch U.K., police said they received a mysterious message from a woman. They said she called with what could be "very useful information on a possible motive." Police said they are strongly appealing to the public in the hope that she'll call back.
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