As Cindy Bennett took in the beautiful vista of Elbow Beach yesterday, it reminded her of her murdered daughter Becky Middleton.“It’s just like her. Sunny. The blue sea like her eyes. The golden sand like her hair. She was just a great girl,” she reflected.

Being back on the Island where her beautiful 17-year-old was killed eleven years ago is tough, and it has been a long time since her last visit.

The last lengthy spell spent in Bermuda was in 1998 when she endured the murder trial of Justis Smith, which was thrown out by a judge.

A ‘flying visit’ in 1999 saw her present the first Bermuda College scholarship in Becky’s memory.

Now she is back to hear a judicial review pushed for by a team from the Middleton camp including her ex-husband Dave — the pair had divorced before Becky’s death — and family friends.

Lawyers from Appleby in Bermuda will assist top human rights barrister Cherie Booth, from Britain, with the case. They hope it will pave the way for fresh charges to be laid against the original suspects.

“I said a prayer as I came back here and hoped for the best,” said Mrs. Bennett, 55, a Federal Government worker from Belleville, Ontario, who has two sons and is remarried.

She feels Bermuda’s criminal justice system has let her family down.

“This has been so badly handled so far, from the lack of getting the right evidence from the crime scene or doing the right testing,” she said.

She describes the criminal cases that followed as a “fiasco” and believes the charges now being sought of kidnap, serious sexual assault and torture should have been pressed against Smith and Kirk Mundy in the first place.

“The people supposed to be the experts — the Police and Department of Public Prosecutions — should have laid those charges then. This reflects very badly on them,” she said.

But she added: “Some things are in the past and you have to put them behind you and have to go forward with a plan of action. I have high hopes for the judicial review, and am looking for a very favourable outcome.”

Unlike Becky’s father, she does not intend visiting the remote spot in Ferry Reach where her daughter died, although she will visit the Rebecca Middleton Nature Reserve in Paget for the first time.

“Becky is in my heart. I don’t have to go to those other places to have her close to me. I take it day by day,” she said.