John Ward: Driven to the truth

John Ward: "What happened to Julie was unacceptable"

John Ward, the multi-millionaire hotellier who has dedicated the past decade to finding his daughter Julie's killer, is a big man.

And it is not a matter of his thick-set physique and above-average height. It is his dominating - perhaps even domineering - personality, and his dogged tenacity.

In the past 11 years, Mr Ward has travelled to Kenya at least 70 times and spent about £500,000 in a bid to uncover the truth about his daughter's last hours at the Masai Mara game reserve in 1988.

Simon Ole Makallah: Denies murder

Miss Ward's charred and mutilated remains were found on 13 September, 1988, six days after she disappeared from her campsite in the game reserve.

Her father will be bitterly disappointed in the accquital of gamekeeper Simon Ole Makallah, who had been charged with the killing.

Mr Ward considered Makallah the chief suspect because he quickly led a search party to Julie's abandoned jeep and later to her body.

Makallah has accused Mr Ward of carrying out a vendetta against him.

Determined to find killer

The 66-year-old hotelier from Suffolk does not suffer fools.

From the beginning he could see through the shock of Julie's death, and see suspicious circumstances.

It did not make sense to him that his careful daughter should have driven alone on to a little-used track and then leave her stranded car. He contested the early official view that animals had attacked and eaten her.

"Did those animals then set her alight too?" he said.

Murder 'unacceptable'

This man, in a strange country, was awkward and difficult enough to challenge the authorities.

What fuelled that courage was an anger that still lingers. John Ward can be a jovial man. But when asked about why he has persisted in hunting his daughter's killers he changes.

"What happened to Julie", he says with considerable understatement, "was unacceptable."

Horrific death

He believes that she died in terror and in pain, and he wants those responsible to be brought to account.

It is that simple, and that difficult.

Mr Ward, who had to pick up his daughter's severed left leg while bungling policemen stood by, has watched while inquiry after investigation failed.

Julie Ward: Her father picked up her severed leg

A dispassionate fact-finder, Mr Ward became his own investigator.

He chased leads in many countries, and met innumerable conmen who came after the reward offered for the still-missing camera Julie took on her safari.

Mr Ward was seconded to the final detection team last year, the only link between a series of investigations into his daughter's death.

Stiff upper lip

He continued the search because he was able to put aside his feelings as a father.

"If I ever allowed the father thing to interfere with the investigation thing, then it would get terribly involved and muddled.

"So you really must put one in one filing cabinet and the other over there. They are two different subjects. That's how I compartmentalise my mind and it has to be that way.

"It would be hopeless otherwise."