I was a police officer for 30 years and breaking death …

A mother had her worst nightmare come true when she received a phone call informing her that her only child had plummeted to his death in a tragic accident while on holiday in Barcelona.

When Steph Walkinshaw, 60, from Leicestershire, heard the news that her son Billy wanted to spend a year traveling the globe six months before in January 2022, she actively encouraged the decision, just as she had always told her son to seize every opportunity.

Billy had graduated from the University of Bristol with a master’s degree in engineering two years prior, and having spent 12 months working a remote job in his field back in Leicestershire due to the pandemic, he yearned to get back out into the world.

Steph told The Daily Mail, ‘He worked with them for a year, which did him a world of good, but it was all still quite isolating because no one was mixing much.’

Billy, an avid rugby player, was a sociable and outgoing boy, and so time spent exploring with loved ones was massively appealing. ‘He had so many friends, I used to call him the glue because he kept his friends together,’ Steph said.

‘So as soon as he got the opportunity to go traveling, he told us he was going to quit the job. And we wholeheartedly supported him because he needed to go and spread his wings.’

Billy, along with a group of his closest university friends, secured a 12-month working visa in Australia and settled in Melbourne at the start of 2022, where he worked in a bar.

‘He used to FaceTime me when he was on his way back from work, and I used to accompany him while he walked through the streets of Melbourne,’ Steph recalled.

Weeks later, and even better offer came through for Billy – the chance for him and four of his friends to work at the Australian Grand Prix in merchandising, which they gladly accepted.

‘It was going to be the start of the most wonderful trip around the world because this company was going to pay for their accommodation and travel,’ Steph said, adding, ‘He was living his absolute dream.’

‘He did a bit more traveling, he went to Tasmania, he went up the east coast of Australia, and then eventually over to Spain, to the Spanish Grand Prix.

‘It was because he came back to Europe that he decided that he’d have a chance between the Spanish Grand Prix and the Canadian Grand Prix to come home.’

Billy’s trip home in June was completely unexpected, but it now means so much to Steph, knowing that it would be the last time he ever came back.

He had timed the trip back just before Steph’s partner Tom’s 60th birthday, giving him time to spend with his family before travelling back to Spain for the racing event and then later to Canada.

Steph said, ‘He was just such a thoughtful boy. He bought his dad a Ferrari jacket for his 60th birthday. He was very, very kind, generous, and thoughtful.’

Despite travelling for the past six months, Billy made sure to visit all his loved ones during his brief one-week stay back at home.

Steph said, ‘He went off with his rugby friends to the Rugby Sevens in London at the weekend.

‘Every single day, apart from the very first day he got home when he rested, he was visiting friends and catching up, making time for everybody, because that’s just what he did.’

Billy was hesitant to go to Barcelona because he would miss Tom’s 60th celebrations, but, Steph encouraged her son to ‘make the most of every opportunity’, leading him to board the flight.

‘He went off on June 3. I remember getting up at 5am. I’m glad I did because that was the last time I saw him.’

‘I gave him a big hug, and I’d always say to him, ‘Please look after yourself, Billy.’

Tom’s 60th birthday came the following morning, and when no birthday message came in from Billy, Steph reasoned that it was probably because he had a heavy night out in Spain the evening prior.

Steph said, ‘I said to Tom, ‘I’ll bet they’ve had a good night out, and they’re lying in bed’.

And so she took Tom out for a birthday breakfast and a trip to the garden centre, but as they were leaving, Steph received a phone call that changed everything.

Steph recalled, ‘I took my husband out for breakfast, we went to a garden centre, and then I had a phone call from an unknown number.

‘It was his friends, Sylvia and Tristan. They’d been out in Barcelona, had a big day out, had quite a few bits to drink, and then he’d (Billy) climbed on something, he’d fallen on some rocks, and he was dead.’

‘I just did not believe it. I could not. I put the phone down. I grabbed Tom and we ran out to the car because I wanted him to hear it, I wanted to put it on the speakerphone because they rang straight back.’

‘I have no idea what was really being said at that point, but it was on speakerphone. It must have been in some detail, because the couple in the next car to us in the car park at the garden center asked us if we wanted a lift home.’

‘I drove home, I have no idea how,’ Steph continued, and once they’d arrived, they received a phone call from the police.

‘It was horrendous. I’ve been in the police force for 30 years, and I’ve delivered death messages, and it is the most horrific thing you have to do as an officer, but equally, you never think in your wildest dreams that you would be on the end of that.’

Steph learned that Billy had fallen to his death at three in the morning and was later identified through his friends and passport. She said, ‘He fell and hit rocks, and then he went into the sea. The emergency services didn’t recover him for ten minutes.’

‘He climbed onto a cannon sticking out of a seawall. He just slipped off, and people didn’t get to him in time. It was a serious head injury and asphyxiation due to submersion.’

The days that followed turned into a blur for Steph, including when she travelled to Barcelona to complete paperwork and to see her son’s body one final time.

‘We had a glass between us, so we couldn’t do anything, touch him or anything, and that was the very last time we saw him.’

Steph was overwhelmed with the outpour of love at Billy’s funeral, which saw over 450 people attend to honour and celebrate his life.

Life will never go back to how Steph wishes it could, but in the time since, she has found some solace, connection, and community in working at the Royal Voluntary Service, where she helps run the trolley service.

She craved a sense of structure after going through the unthinkable heartbreak, and found the role visiting hospital patients on wards and supplying sweet treats offered just that.

‘I absolutely love it, when you go in there, people’s faces light up. It’s a great thing to do, it got me back into communicating again,’ she explained.

And for Steph, the role goes one step further than adding to her day; it helps keep Billy’s memory alive by allowing her to live the way she knows Billy would want her to.

‘I am always trying to make sure that I’m trying to live as good a life as I can, because that’s what Billy would want. He wouldn’t want me to shrivel up, he knows I’m not that person.’