'We'll never get over losing our son on Father's Day'.

Byline: By Gerry Holt South Wales Echo 

For many families across South Wales yesterday will have been a special day celebrated with an impromptu breakfast in bed for dad or a fun get-together at a restaurant.

But for Anne and Bryan Bermingham Father's Day leaves little to celebrate - because it will forever be the day they lost their son.

Two years ago they, and their eldest son Gerard, waited and waited at a Cardiff restaurant for their son Adrian to arrive for a celebratory family meal - but he never did.

Because in the early hours of Father's Day 2004, their Royal Marine son who had been born on Mother's Day 27 years earlier, died in a hospital just around the corner from their Cardiff home after being brutally stabbed by a young drug addict.

In January the following year, the Berminghams finally found some solace when they witnessed their son's remorseless killer, Ryan Voisey, being handed life in prison at Cardiff Crown Court.

But the feeling of some small victory was short-lived for the couple as they soon realised that they had to come to terms with living without their talented and popular son.

Two years on and the family seem at a loss with what to do on Father's Day - but one thing is certain - the day will not go by without their thoughts turning to Adrian.

'We will probably go out for a meal,' said Anne at the couple's home in leafy St Benedict's Crescent, in the Heath, Cardiff.

'Whateverwe do, we'll talk about him and remember him.

'He would have made a marvellous father himself - he was a natural with Caitlin (Adrian's five-year-old niece).

'It's through her that we've been able to keep normal, we've had to hide our tears.'

And it was Caitlin, who was just three when her uncle was ruthlessly murdered, who gave Adrian or Uncle Ad as she called him, such pleasure.

Anne said: 'Caitlin idolised him and she still does.

'We just told her he was very, very poorly and couldn't live anymore and that he had to go to heaven.

'Now she looks at photos of her uncle Ad and says 'I wish he hadn't died, I wish he was still here'. And she looks out of her window at night when she's going to bed and finds the brightest star and says 'that must be uncle Ad'.

'She calls his grave uncle Ad's special place - 'where they go to think about him' - but she doesn't know that he's buried there.'

It is clear the quietly dignified couple's pride at their son's achievements has not been dampened with time - Anne, 68, brings out photographs of Adrian at his degree ceremony, of him in full camouflage as a marine, and a snapshot of him pushing Caitlin on a garden swing.

While Bryan, 75, proudly digs out a wooden model of Cardiff Castle clock tower which his son made at school, and framed certificates from his zoology degree at Southampton University.

Every reminder of Adrian is kept polished, pristine and close at hand.

Anne beams as she recalls Adrian's love for adventure and the outdoors.

'He loved activity holidays, cycling, climbing, marathon-running and sky diving - he did 36 jumps,' said Anne.

'He always put his all into everything he did.'

In stark contrast to murderer Ryan Voisey, whose life had spiralled into drink, drugs, burglary and later murder, well-travelled Adrian had achieved so much.

After four years of rigorous training with the Royal Marine Reserves, the keen musician had just gained his cherished Green Beret and was due to be posted to Iraq just a few weeks after he was killed.

'I can remember the day he called me to tell me because he said 'mum, you are speaking to marine commander Adrian Bermingham',' said Anne.

'He was so excited.

'The ironic thing is that his unit went to Iraq about a month later.

'The whole unit came back unscathed - he would have been safer there than in Cardiff.'

For Adrian's family it is still hard to fathom why their good-natured son died in a such a mindless attack as he walked home from a school reunion with two friends from the South Glamorgan Youth Choir on June 20, 2004.

And it was clear the onslaught had been brutal beyond all imagination.

The Corpus Christi RC High School and St David's Sixth form college pupil was left to die in a pool of blood in Craddock Street, Riverside, Cardiff, after being stabbed in the chest, kicked and punched.

It is clear that, even now, his parents ask themselves everyday what they could have done to stop it or whether they could have been there at his bedside when he died.

What is even more torturous for the family is that Adrian died in the middle of the night at the Heath hospital, just minutes from his home - but he was unable to be identified because Voisey, who had been on early release, had stolen his wallet.

Ann, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, said: 'It was terrible to think that we hear the ambulances going to the Heath during the night but on that night one of them was bringing Adrian and we didn't know.

'He was so near and yet so far.

'If only we had known. But then we couldn't have done anything.'

Anne said she and her husband had been left with a 'terrific void' and said they had only just begun to stop feeling 'lethargic' about life.

'I don't know that it's going to get any easier,' said Anne, who planted a Rowan tree in Heath park in memory of Adrian.

'It's probably got to the stage now where it's always going to be. We're never going to get over this.

'Sometimes I think I'm getting over it but then some little thing will creep up on you and you're right back to square one.' 'If someone carries a knife, it follows they are prepared to use it': Anne Bermingham's philosophy on knives mirrors that of the judge who jailed her son's killer for life.

And she doesn't believe knife amnesties solve the problem.

Mr Justice Roderick Evans QC told the court in 2005: 'If someone carries a knife it follows he is prepared to use it' - and to Anne, the kind of people who are prepared to use a knife are not those who will give them up.

'I think it helps but on the other hand I don't think a knife amnesty will make much of a difference,' she said.

'It's the ordinary people - those who aren't criminally intent - who will give knives up.

'Those who are won't.

'People should have a licence to be able to carry a knife.

'It would help to save all the other people going through what we've been through.'

The amnesty, which is being held by police forces nationwide, takes place until 30 June.

Anyone caught with a knife after that, could face arrest and up to four years in prison. Bermingham's killer jailed for life: Drug addict Ryan Voisey was jailed for life for the killing of Adrian Bermingham in a city street on Father's Day 2004.

Cardiff Crown Court heard that Adrian, 27, had been in a 'good mood' as he walked home from a night out with two female friends.

But following a 'trivial' exchange of words, Voisey swung the knife at Adrian cutting his face and throat, before plunging the weapon into his chest.

An 'enraged' Voisey stamped on the marine's head as he lay in a pool of blood and punched him causing fractures.

Voisey, 24, from Leckwith, Cardiff, then stole his wallet.

Voisey denied murder and theft, but was found guilty of both, and sentenced to life in prison on January 28, 2005.

Mr Justice Roderick Evans QC said Voisey, who had previous convictions for carrying a CS gas canister and a knife, would serve a minimum of 16 years.