"I'm devastated, everybody around me is devastated. Everybody is trying to offer as much support as they possibly can.
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"I cannot believe what has happened, I cannot understand what has happened, I do not think for one moment what could go through somebody's mind when they do such a thing to such a beautiful, caring and well-meaning person.
"Somebody has planned this in some manner or means and somebody around that person will have noticed a change in behaviour, I would imagine, and somebody has suspicions that this person may have done this dreadful act.
"And if there is any thought in that person's head to get in contact with the authorities who are investigating this situation, then I would appeal to them to please not to think any further about it but just to go ahead and give the police any information they can.
"There are many police officers working on the case, and if your information is not relevant then let the police officers please decide that.
'Gentle and kind'
"Just like everybody else around the country I cannot think of a single reason why anybody would want to kill somebody, for a start.
"I cannot understand why they would want to kill anyone as gentle, kind, well meaning and as perfect a person as Jill."
Interviewer Anna Ford asked whether Ms Dando ever discussed fears arising from her work on Crimewatch, or related to her celebrity.
"Not in any serious manner, not in any way that she was particularly scared.
"There is nothing that has particularly run through my mind, and as you can imagine I have spent some hours, as have everybody who knows Jill, spent some hours desperately racking the back of their minds to see whether they can come up with any particular reason.
Desperately sad
"But it is not a subject that was a regular topic of conversation and it is not something that she felt at all, she never really felt that there was any particular danger to her as far as I'm aware."
Ms Ford asked whether Mr Farthing was concerned that the murder might remain unsolved.
"Yes, of course. My first emotions are obviously that whatever happens, and whatever arrests are made, it does not bring back Jill and that is desperately sad.
"Nevertheless it helps me, and it helps Jill's family and it helps Jill's friends and colleagues to feel that we are doing absolutely everything that we can to try and help to apprehend whoever or whomever was responsible."
Ms Ford asked whether he had seen Ms Dando's family.
"I have spoken to her family many times a day over the past 48 hours."
Ms Ford said the police had interviewed Mr Farthing but cleared him of any involvement. She asked whether police had given him any indication of what lines of inquiry they were pursuing.
Police interview
"They are still talking to all of us. They are talking to everybody who knows Jill intimately and everybody who might be able to consciously or unconsciously put any useful information in their direction that they can then follow up.
"Everybody who knows Jill intimately has been spoken to at great length by the police and there are many, many more hours of police conversations that will have to take place and details that will have to be taken down, I'm sure."
Ms Ford asked whether Ms Dando had had any notion that she was being followed on the morning of her death.
"I didn't speak to her after 7.25 that morning so I'm not in a position to be able to say whether she felt she was followed that morning.
Not aware of stalker
"I'm not aware, I haven't spoken to anybody who spoke to her after she left the house we shared in Chiswick and obviously it would have been from then that anybody could have potentially followed her."
Ms Ford asked whether Ms Dando had ever said before that she thought she might be being followed.
Mr Farthing said: "No, that's not something I can recall."
He was asked how he heard of the tragedy.
Mr Farthing said: "I had a pager message from her agent who was desperately trying to find out whether the rumours that he had heard were indeed true.
"I made an attempt to contact police stations and at that same time a senior police officer who I have previously met arrived at St Mary's to give me the news."
Mr Farthing was asked whether he was going to go back to work.
He replied: "Obviously, yes."
No plans
He was asked whether he was not working at the moment.
"I haven't had a single moment to do anything other than see Jill, and talk to her friends and her colleagues and to talk to the police since Monday lunchtime.
"My colleagues at work have spoken to me on a number of occasions and are amongst many other people adapting to the situation by being extremely helpful."
Mr Farthing was asked what was the best way people who loved Jill might be able to help.
"I think in a practical sense, for the moment, help the police with their inquiry.
"Anybody who was around that area at the time, who may have seen this man that has been so widely described, please don't hesitate to get in contact with the police.
"I think there are many of us who are close to Jill who need to sit down and talk about other aspects for the future such as how she is remembered, and at 48 hours that's a very difficult question to put my mind to at this moment in time."
When further pressed on a possible public memorial, he said: "I think for the moment I understand the BBC have opened up books of condolences and many people have gone up and signed those.
Public thanked
"I think any further than that for the moment is something that we as Jill's closest associates, friends and in particular her family need to discuss at great length and I don't think an immediate response to that is necessarily the best."
After Ms Ford thanked Mr Farthing, he said: "Thank you and thank you to everybody else.
"I would just say that on behalf of the other members of Jill's family, I would want to thank all those who have expressed such kind words and have, much more eloquently than I could possibly do, expressed many people's feelings for her and many people's opinions of her.
"And I am grateful to those people who have a high profile and those people who have, what some people might describe as ordinary jobs, who as everybody has said were equally important to Jill and I am grateful to all of those people as are all other members of Jill's family."
Northern Ireland
Scotland
Wales
England
'Who could kill my perfect Jill?'
(28 Apr 99 | UK)
Video checked over Dando murder
(28 Apr 99 | UK)
Public remembers 'shining star'
(27 Apr 99 | UK)
Plea to underworld for Dando killer
(27 Apr 99 | UK)
Papers pay tribute to Dando
(27 Apr 99 | UK)
The 'Golden Girl' of TV
(26 Apr 99 | UK)
Your tributes to Jill Dando
(26 Apr 99 | UK)
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