Boys who killed Damilola took my wife's life; EXCLUSIVE FUNERAL HEARTBREAK OF RICHARD TAYLOR.

Byline: BY ROS WYNNE-JONES

AT the cemetery, the sky cracks with lightning and the heavens thunder.

Heavy rain pours down on the bowed heads of hundreds of mourners. And then, suddenly, the sun floods through - a ray of light in a world made darker by the loss of Gloria Taylor.

At a graveside for the second time in eight years Richard Taylor stands, straight-backed as always, holding his daughter Gbemi and touching the arm of his son Tunde. A hundred saddened voices sing Abide With Me as Gloria is laid to rest next to her lost son Damilola, the boy whose terrible death on a Peckham stairwell seven years ago had broken her heart.

"You know, people always saw the strong side of Gloria," Richard says, breaking away from the other mourners.

"They saw that she supported all these people, that she was always fighting, that she was always laughing and helping others. But she suffered silently at home.

She bottled things up and in the end the strain was too much for her heart." He shakes his distinctive grey head slowly.

"There is no doubt in my mind that those who killed Damilola took Gloria's life too."

A few days ago, Gloria died of a heart attack at the age of just 57, her youthful spirit destroyed by grief. Yesterday her husband's face lit up when he said her name.

"The morning that she died, we had been laughing together," Richard remembers.

"Just about silly things. I told her to get out of the bathroom because she was taking too long and I needed to go to our meeting. She had been feeling ill and I told her to rest and not to go to out. She was laughing at me."

Now he cannot go into the bedroom they shared. The sight of her things - her hairbrush, her clothes, the book she was reading - is too much to bear.

"Gloria is everywhere in our house and I cannot believe that she has gone," he says simply.

On April 8, Richard had been at the Daily Mirror's London offices talking excitedly about plans and ideas. Afterwards he went to work for a few hours and then left to watch his son's favourite team Arsenal play Liverpool. At the last minute he decided to go home instead.

"I don't know what made me go home," he says. "It was just a feeling that I had, that I wanted to go there.

"When I got off the bus at Shooters Hill I could see something had happened.

Two men were standing over the body of a fallen person. One was on the phone, the other standing over the body.

"I began to quicken my pace, thinking that person must need help. I was thinking I must help them."

Then, with a sharp pain, he recognised the leather jacket the fallen woman was wearing.

"I saw it was Gloria's jacket but her face was turned to the floor," he says. "I turned her face and saw blood. I knew she was dead, even though the doctors tried so hard to save her.

"When the ambulance came they kept on trying and at the hospital 20 doctors and nurses tried to save her. But I saw the blood on her face and I saw her eyes and I knew she would not come back."

This is the moment that haunts Richard now, the link between the loss of his son and the loss of his wife.

"You see, Gloria was the one who was at the scene when they found Damilola," he says. "That moment stayed with her for the rest of her life."

Gloria Taylor was an extraordinary person who bore an extraordinary pain. After her gentle, hard-working son had been stabbed in with a broken beer bottle, she sat with his body at the hospital.

"I couldn't believe it was him," she said later. "I pulled him and I put my head on him and all that came out from his lips was blood... splashed over his face and just like a dream to me."

Those words echo in Richard's mind when he thinks of her last moments. "It is just like a dream," he says. "Being in the church, hearing the singing, listening to the words. I keep thinking it is a dream."

Yet Richard Taylor still talks of forgiveness and understanding. Of trying to help those with hate in their hearts find the good in themselves.

He is determined that the Damilola Taylor Trust, set up in his son's name, will be given new life by Gloria's passing. She chose the new chief executive of the Trust, Mike Jervis, and Richard is determined to bring her ideas to life. "One of Gloria's favourite ideas was a project to take young people from Peckham to Nigeria," Richard says. "She wanted these youngsters who think of themselves as underprivileged to see what true poverty means."

Yesterday hundreds of mourners - politicians, community leaders, relatives and friends - packed into All Saints Church in Plumstead, South East London, to honour Gloria, spilling out on to the steps of the church itself. Several speakers laid the blame for Gloria's death at the hands of the Preddie brothers, who were convicted of Damilola's manslaughter after three trials and two flawed police investigations. Others spoke of how no one could fail to be inspired by someone whose sense of humanity was so powerful.

As Gbemi Taylor leaned on her father, it was hard not to reflect that the Taylors had come to Britain to find medical help for her epilepsy and instead found so much sadness and grief. England football captain Rio Ferdinand, who grew up close to where Damilola died in Peckham, sent a message to say: "Gloria's strength and resolve to help make a difference was an inspiration to me."

Sir Trevor McDonald, patron of the Trust, praised Gloria's "amazing warmth and compassion coupled with a humility that at times was hard to comprehend".

"Everyone will have to work hard now, striving to boost inner-city local communities, some of the groundwork which has already been laid by the Trust," he said. Labour Party Deputy Leader Harriet Harman, who supported the Taylors's battles to win justice for Damilola, said: "Gloria suffered terribly after the tragic murder of her son Damilola but she bore her grief with great dignity."

And as the sun shone through the heavy rain, Richard Taylor looked for a rainbow over South East London, bearing his grief with a great dignity of his own.

EIGHT YEARS OF PAIN

Nov 27, 2000: Damilola bleeds to death after being stabbed in the leg with a broken bottle and collapsing on a stairwell of the North Peckham Estate, South London.

December 2, 2000: Several youths are arrested in connection with the case - including two brothers who would eventually stand trial in 2006 for Damilola's murder. All are released without charge.

December 21, 2000: Hassan Jihad, who would also stand trial for Damilola's murder alongside the two brothers in 2006, is arrested and released after questioning.

January 19, 2001: Damilola's funeral takes place in Plumstead, South East London.

April 7, 2001: Hundreds march through Peckham in a tribute.

June 26, 2001: Four youths aged between 14 and 16 are charged with murder and assault with intent to rob.

Nov 27, 2001: Damilola's parents launch Damilola Taylor Trust on the anniversary of his death.

January 30, 2002: Trial of the four youths begins at Old Bailey 

February 27, 2002: The case against the 17-year-old collapses after the judge rules that main witness, a 14-year-old girl, was lying.

March 28, 2002: Case collapses against the 15-year-old boy.

April 25, 2002: Trial ends with jury finding the two 16-year-old brothers not guilty.

November 27, 2003: Police announce they will review all of the evidence in the case, using new forensic techniques.

Jan 6, 2005: Three youths charged with murder. They all deny it.

January 24, 2006: Prosecutor Victor Temple QC tells the jury the initial investigation missed vital DNA clues.

April 3, 2006: Hassan Jihad, now 20, is cleared by the jury of all charges in relation to Damilola's death.

April 4, 2006: The two remaining defendants are cleared of murder but the jurors cannot reach a verdict on the manslaughter charges.

June 23, 2006: New trial begins of the two brothers - as Danny and Rickie Preddie of Peckham - this time for manslaughter which they both deny.

August 9, 2006: The two Preddies, now aged 18 and 19, are convicted of Damilola's manslaughter and get eight years youth custody.

April 8, 2007: Damilola's mother Gloria dies of a suspected heart attack.

Voice of the Mirror: Page 8

CAPTION(S):

DESPAIR Gloria died of a broken heart; TRAGEDY Gentle Damilola stabbed; MOURNING Richard behind the coffin; MOVING Sir Trevor heads Damilola Trust; DIGNITY Harriet Harman praised Gloria Pictures: ROGER ALLEN; BROTHERS Danny, left, and Ricky Preddie