Bristol mum Hannah Saaf 'would not have coped with guilt'

The former Bristol flatmate of Hannah Saaf has defended her friend, saying she did not believe the 27-year-old had run from the scene of her crime to escape justice, and that she would barely have been able to live with her guilt.

Speaking exclusively to the Bristol Evening Post from Turkey, Sylvia Weilbach said the realisation of what she had done would have consumed Saaf.

Mrs Weilbach, 44, a housekeeping manager in an apartment complex, said: "She didn't hide away in order to get away with it, just to get it sorted in her head.

"She wouldn't have been able to cope with the guilt. It must have suffocated her, absolutely, because it could have been her own boy.

"Hannah was out of control of her mind, and she ran away out of shock and pure instinct.

"She would have realised very quickly that he was in a bad way, but I think the logical side of her brain shut off and she ran out of shock."

Mrs Weilbach said she followed the story over the internet.

Every day that went by without Saaf being found made her fear the worst.

She said: "I was seriously worried about her well-being.

"I think she probably went into hiding to come to terms with what she was doing, and it is possible she was trying to reconcile what was going on.

"There is a certain capacity for the human brain to cope with stress. This would have tipped her over the edge, and I believe she would have just been trying to cope."

Mrs Weilbach met Hannah Saaf at the end of January, when Saaf moved into the Kingsdown flat she rented while she worked as a taxi controller in Old Market.

Saaf had moved into the flat, Mrs Weilbach said, to build a new life for herself and her two sons after separating from her husband.

The two became close, and each evening before Mrs Weilbach went to work they would cook together and chat for hours.

On March 8, the day before Mrs Weilbach returned to Turkey for work, the two friends had their last conversation.

It was to be a prophetic one.

Mrs Weilbach said: "What spooked me about the accident was our conversation when we said goodbye to each other.

"Hannah said to me that there are two different types of angels in this world – angels of life, who bring luck and life to other people, and the angels of death, whose destiny was to bring death to others.

"She had no idea she was talking about herself.

"It is more than sad, it is tragic."

Mrs Weilbach said that Saaf had told her that her home life had been an extremely difficult one. After her father left the family, her mother was left to raise Saaf, her brother and sister on her own.

Mrs Weilbach, who described Saaf as her "soulmate", said her friend had told her that she left her own husband in the autumn of last year.

She had then lost her children to her mother, who was worried about Saaf's mental health.

Mrs Weilbach said: "She is such a free spirit. She broke out and did free things, and didn't want to be stuck in a rigid family.

"She is a very friendly, outgoing and highly energetic person who knows exactly what is wrong and what is right.

"Her biggest goal in life was to get her kids back, and when I knew her she was going through legal processes to do that.

"They meant the world to her, and she adored them.

"She was emotionally down because of what she was going through, but every day she gained a lot of strength and every step she went forward she grew stronger.

"The last time I saw her, she was ready to take over the world again and take her kids back."

Mrs Weilbach, who is herself divorced, said that in Saaf she had met someone very similar to herself.

She said: "The way we saw the world was the same.

"Hannah was a very peaceful person with an outgoing energy that rubbed off on you."

Commenting on this website at the time of the accident, Mrs Weilbach said: "I am so utterly sorry for what happened.

"Hannah was my flatmate and soul mate, and we shared everything for two months until I left the UK.

"I know her well, she would never ever harm anybody.

"I know that's no excuse for the parents, who must go through the biggest emotional nightmare.

"I know that she cannot live with the fact of having killed an 11-year-old child."

Yesterday, Mrs Weilbach expanded on that.

She said: "Hannah wouldn't be able to cope with what she had done. She never will, not now, not in 10 years' time, never.

"I think she ran away because of the shock, and because she couldn't cope with what had happened.

"I am 100 per cent sure of that."