A mum who mourned her two beloved children for years, always believing they had been snatched from her in separate horrific tragedies, was horrified to find her ex had actually murdered them.
Laura Gray discovered that Jordan Monaghan had murdered 24-day-old Ruby and 21-month-old Logan in a twisted attempt to make her stay with him.
Laura is haunted by thoughts of how her tots died and racked with guilt that she couldn’t save them from control freak Monaghan.
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She is constantly tormented, replaying her children’s final days over and over, wondering what she could have done to protect them.
Laura, 29, said: “I always feel guilty, every day I feel guilt, and it runs through my head all the time what I could have done differently.
“I carry that with me every day. I will carry that with me for the rest of my life.”
Tiny Ruby was smothered in her Moses basket at the family’s home in Blackburn.
Eight months later, Monaghan killed Logan in a swimming pool cubicle before pushing his body back home in a pram.
Doctors ruled Ruby had pneumonia, while Logan’s cause of death was inconclusive. Laura never suspected her children had died at the hands of their father.
But in 2018 – five years later – information came to light involving the collapse of another child and police arrested construction worker Monaghan, 30, on suspicion of murder.
Horrifyingly, while on police bail as inquiries continued, he murdered his girlfriend Evie Adams, 23, with a deadly cocktail of tramadol and diazepam.
Last month, Monaghan was found guilty of three counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder on an unidentified child.
He was jailed for a minimum of 40 years.
Laura said the family had the “best Christmas ever” after Ruby was born on December 8, 2012.
She said: “I felt like the luckiest mum in the world, with my own little family.
“It was all I had ever wanted. I was determined to give my children everything I had never had.”
But the bliss was about to be shattered. Laura was upstairs folding clothes when Monaghan shouted up to her.
As she rushed down, she saw him holding Ruby, who was fighting for breath. Panic-stricken Laura called an ambulance and Ruby was kept in hospital for three days.
But on New Year’s Eve, a day after she was discharged, Monaghan killed her.
Laura said: “The children were in bed and we watched a film and saw the New Year in before I went to bed. Jordan stayed up to give Ruby her 2am bottle.
"I woke in the early hours to Jordan shouting that she wasn’t breathing. I ran downstairs and I could see, the moment I looked at her, that she had gone.
“We called an ambulance and I went with her to the hospital, but it was too late.”
A routine police investigation followed and Ruby’s death was attributed to acute bronchial pneumonia.
Laura was utterly devastated. She said: “I crashed completely after Ruby died. I really leaned on Jordan for support. He was very strong and practical. He planned the funeral, then he returned to work.
“He just carried on. But again, I just thought that he was being strong for me. I didn’t suspect a thing. We focused on Logan, because he was all we had left. Jordan had a really close relationship with his son.”
But tensions between the couple increased when Laura discovered her fiancé had not been paying their rent and had developed a serious gambling addiction.
Still in the throes of grief, she told Monaghan the relationship was over and that he needed to move out.
He killed Logan the very next day.
Monaghan took the tot to the local swimming baths and smothered him in the changing rooms. He wheeled the toddler home in his pushchair with the rain cover on, under the pretence he was asleep.
Laura said: “Jordan told me to wake Logan while he went out to collect a pizza.
“I knew the moment I lifted the rain cover.
“He looked the same as Ruby. Jordan tried CPR, covering up what he had done and putting on a show, knowing he was already dead. I was shell-shocked, absolutely devastated.”
Monaghan gave chilling interviews, speaking of his family’s heartbreak at losing two young children, pleading “for answers”.
The distraught mum suffered a breakdown and was admitted to hospital for psychiatric help. But she and Monaghan rekindled their relationship.
Laura said: “Jordan visited every day. He was really supportive.
“He was the link to my two children, the only one who knew how I truly felt.”
The couple tried to rebuild their lives, but Monaghan began gambling again and Laura finally ended their relationship.
Then, in 2018, came the news that the deaths were being reviewed.
Monaghan was arrested but was still able to unleash yet more unimaginable pain.
While on bail in October 2019, he murdered his new partner and faked a suicide note after she tried to end their relationship.
During a 10-week trial at Preston Crown Court, jurors were told Monaghan had committed the murders because he could not face rejection by his partners.
Laura says Monaghan killed Ruby and Logan in order to force her to stay with him, knowing she wouldn’t walk out if they lost a child.
She said: “He knew that we were having problems and I think he did it to bring us closer together, knowing that I would lean on him for support. And I did. I leaned on him, and he knew that I needed him. It was a control thing.”
The headstone on Ruby’s grave pays tribute to the “little princess”, with “All our love, Mummy and Daddy”... Laura having no clue at the time that Monaghan was responsible.
She said: “I visit the graves every week and it is extremely painful for me to see. I am now looking into ways of having “Daddy” taken off.”
While Laura says it was a comfort to meet Ms Adams’ family at the trial, she is also haunted by what might have been having she and Monaghan stayed together.
She said: “It’s scary to think what could have happened if we hadn’t split up.”
Laura also asks herself what could have been done differently.
She said: “When I found Ruby, she was covered with a blanket.
"Looking back, that didn’t make sense. Surely if she wasn’t breathing, he would have uncovered her? With Logan, he had taken him swimming without telling me.
"Jordan hated swimming, he’d never been. Then he came home and insisted that I woke Logan, to ensure that I found him. I still struggle not to blame myself.”
Laura was best friends with Monaghan’s sister and knew him from when they were kids.
She said: “Looking back, he was controlling me, even then, but I didn’t see it.
“Nobody did. I could never in my worst nightmares have imagined what the future held.”
When Laura was 16, Jordan proposed, getting down on one knee, and they moved in together a year later.
She said: “We settled down and were really happy. Jordan was well thought of by family and friends. There were no warning signs at all.”
The couple tried for a child and in 2011 Laura’s dreams came true when Logan was born.
Monaghan seemed to be a “good dad”. Now Laura can barely bring herself to say his name, simply referring to him as 'scumbag'.
She is trying to rebuild her life with the help of her new partner Andy Chambers, 33.
It took Laura a long time to trust men again. But she prays, one day, she and stairlift engineer Andy can have a baby of their own.
Now, she is hoping to work with women trapped in abusive relationships.
Laura gains fleeting comfort by cradling her children’s toys, teddies and even the clothes they wore on the day they died.
But she can never forgive. She said: “No punishment would ever be enough. What he did is beyond human understanding.
“I will always carry the memory of my precious children and I want to make them proud.
“The thought of having more children after what’s happened is hard, but I want to keep that hope alive. I will always be a mum, it’s all I ever wanted, and Jordan can’t take that from me.”
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