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  • Originally posted by Graham View Post
    Moste,

    I think 'poppycock' is a very appropriate word to describe this highly-unlikely story.

    I don't doubt that at some time it is possible that Justice, Fox and Alphon drove around the area. However, that the 'correct' entrance to the cornfield was revealed to Justice and Fox in the way the former describes is transparent fiction in my estimation. Fox stated that while he was driving the car along Marsh Lane a voice behind him shouted "Stop here!", which he says he did, but - and this is the bit that amazes me - he claimed he couldn't tell if it was Justice or Alphon who shouted! Alphon's voice was nasal and quiet, whereas Justice's was a full, deep, loud baritone, and had long before earned him the nickname of 'Boom'. And he was, of course, Fox's lover. And then it is claimed that after parking, Alphon had a go at driving the car, and 'crashed the gears'. Just like Valerie said the gunman did on Deadman's Hill when he got into the Minor. Well, what a coincidence! Another little clue concocted to keep the finger pointing at Alphon!

    If Justice ever did learn the precise location of 'the' entrance to the cornfield, then in my opinion the knowledge would have come from the Slough freelance journalist Tony Mason, whom Justice knew and who I believe later became a member of the A6 Committee. Mason took a close interest in the A6 Case right from the start (in fact it was he who broke the news of what had happened to Valerie Storie's parents), and because of his journalism had close contacts with the police. Woffinden states that Mason was one of the very few people, apart from the police, who knew the exact location of the cornfield entrance.

    The whole 'Guinness Bottle' episode is written in the most lurid manner, and has sensational fiction stamped all over it. I believe it was an attempt by Justice to keep Alphon very much in the limelight as the 'genuine' A6 killer, and to aid Justice's crusade to prove that the Establishment had got it wrong.

    Having said all that, nowadays I honestly don't think that knowledge of the precise location of the entrance was and is all that important.

    Graham
    While were talking about the Climo's, (and I had forgotten I had read this) Paul Foots 'Who killed Hanratty' tells us the facts with regards to the visit by Fox, Justice ,and Alphon to the Marsh lane field. (page 315 paperback)
    When Foot interviewed Mrs. Nellie Climo who lives next door to the field where Gregsten had been parked the previous Aug. She confirmed that Justice had indeed shocked them with a visit at night ,whereby Mr. Climo had almost taken a shotgun to him. However she maintained her and her husband had in fact seen Justices car in the same field across the way from their home. This pretty well cements the statement of the concealed beer bottle for me. Unless you think maybe Justice bribed the Climo's to tell porkies?
    Last edited by moste; 02-20-2018, 06:20 PM.

    Comment


    • Originally posted by NickB View Post
      That bend, where Court Lane and Marsh Lane meet, is called Climo’s Corner – because a blacksmith called Climo had his forge nearby. I presume the gate-installing Mr Climo was a descendant, perhaps living on the same plot of land.
      Perfect. The only viable solution.

      Comment


      • Originally posted by cobalt View Post
        Not that Gregsten and Valerie Storie could really be described as a ‘courting couple.’ In fact, I think they had actually lived together briefly at one point. As a general observation, women generally look for some kind of progress in an intimate relationship; fumbling around in the back seat of a Morris Minor is hardly evidence of that.

        It was Alphon who first claimed a definite purpose for a gunman in a cornfield, namely to force the couple to split up. The chances of this being a successful tactic has been well aired on this site. Others have suggested the gunman’s motive was perhaps the opposite: to confront the hesitant Mr. Gregsten with the reality of their relationship and tell him to leave the marital home and stop messing his wife about. To which I might add a third; that by drinking together in inns and visiting cornfields of an evening they were humiliating Mrs. Gregsten, so were being warned in no uncertain terms to be more discreet in their activities.

        The Gregsten/Valerie Storie relationship seems to have been widely known about by work colleagues and also presumably by fellow members of their motoring club. Has any writer spoken to such people to discover what, apart from the obvious sense of shock and horror, their initial reaction to the crime was?
        That's a very good question, and, something I alluded to some time ago was how much time and trouble did the police put in on the interviewing of all the office workers and colleagues, which a sharp investigative journalist of Paul Foots calibre should have been asking for sure.

        Comment


        • Hi Graham. I found this from 10 years ago. I hope you wont mind my posting this as I am genuinely interested as to whether your views have changed over the years.
          'Quote' But III - for years and years and years I genuinely and devoutly believed that Hanratty was the victim of a miscarriage of justice. When it was made public that the authorities would be carrying out DNA tests, I thought, 'Right, the time has come when we'll know the truth, that JH never done it'. Sad to say, the results were the precise opposite to what I, and many others, were expecting. Honestly and truly, hand on heart, I've not yet been convinced that the DNA results are anything but reliable - perhaps not 100% reliable, but damn near. I've said on this thread that I do believe there is a slightpossibility that contamination occurred, but I simply don't know enough about DNA testing procedures to make any further comment

          So, because of all the masses of evidence, witness testimonies ,police withholding vital information, and varying lies from unscrupulous low life's. 'but for the DNA' ,you would be firmly in the camp of Hanratty's innocence?

          Comment


          • contamination

            Further to above post, and I stand to be corrected by someone with a better understanding than myself.
            I would like to make the comment that from the hours, days, and weeks in 1961 that the exhibits of evidence were (in honest ignorance)being brought together ,handled ,breathed on, folded, unfolded ,packed away, unpacked, sorted, sneezed on, labelled, examined, and scrutinized , that in truth would be generally saturating the evidence with many many contaminants, This is notwithstanding where the exhibits have been all these decades, and how they were stored etc. Not to mention broken vials of whatever that contained. I cannot bring myself to accept the validity of the statement, Hanratty had to be the rapist and therefore the killer.
            We've had the wool pulled over our eyes!
            Last edited by moste; 02-20-2018, 10:15 PM. Reason: re -phrase

            Comment


            • Originally posted by NickB View Post
              That bend, where Court Lane and Marsh Lane meet, is called Climo’s Corner – because a blacksmith called Climo had his forge nearby. I presume the gate-installing Mr Climo was a descendant, perhaps living on the same plot of land.
              There are quite a few Climos who living in the Maidenhead/Dorney/Eton Wick area.

              The couple most likely to be our Climos are shown on the 1939 Register as a Thomas George Climo dob 1890 living at 11 Tillstone Avenue, Eton Wick whose occupation is given as Blacksmith and who is married to Ellen Climo dob 1895.

              Foot gives Mrs Climo's Christian name as "Nellie" which is a nickname for "Ellen".

              Thomas G Climo died in 1977 and Ellen or Nellie in 1980.

              Comment


              • Originally posted by moste View Post
                Further to above post, and I stand to be corrected by someone with a better understanding than myself.
                I would like to make the comment that from the hours, days, and weeks in 1961 that the exhibits of evidence were (in honest ignorance)being brought together ,handled ,breathed on, folded, unfolded ,packed away, unpacked, sorted, sneezed on, labelled, examined, and scrutinized , that in truth would be generally saturating the evidence with many many contaminants, This is notwithstanding where the exhibits have been all these decades, and how they were stored etc. Not to mention broken vials of whatever that contained. I cannot bring myself to accept the validity of the statement, Hanratty had to be the rapist and therefore the killer.
                We've had the wool pulled over our eyes!
                It was the Hanratty defence team which initially pressed for DNA testing in the full knowledge of the conditions in which the two exhibits had been retained.

                If the tests had exonerated Hanratty, then I would have accepted them in the same way which I now accept them.

                It is over 16 years since these tests were concluded and in that time no one with the necessary scientific qualifications and access to all the test reports and procedures has come forward to say that the DNA tests point to anything other than Hanratty's undoubted guilt.

                Comment


                • Moste,

                  I never made it a secret that I originally was a supporter of Hanratty, that I did think there had been a serious miscarriage of justice. Part of the reason for thinking that way was that back in the 60's and 70's I was a big fan of Private Eye and Paul Foot, and in those days P.E. didn't usually support causes unless they were pretty sure of them. And if John Lennon supported Hanratty, then that was good enough for an old hippie like me! Paul Foot, for all his odd politics, was a committed investigator of miscarriages of justice, and I felt, as did many others, that if he gave his backing to the cause of Hanratty's innocence, then Hanratty stood a very good chance of being innocent. Don't forget that, as Spitfire says, that it was the Hanratty family and their supporters who pressed the Home Office very hard for DNA tests to be carried out. Sadly for them, they didn't get the results they hoped for and expected. At which point, of course, the DNA results were inevitably wrong!

                  Another point I ought to make is that at the 2002 Appeal the judges ruled that even without the DNA results there was sufficient evidence adduced at the original trial to effectively confirm Hanratty's guilt. This was, and still is, hard to swallow for some. I read and re-read at the time all the available literature on the subject, and came to the conclusion - sorry if this sounds a bit pompous - that the original trial verdict was and remains correct.

                  As I've said until I'm blue in the face Alphon's presence in the A6 was purely coincidental, and I have long thought that anyone other than Alphon would have distanced himself from it for the rest of his life. I've also asked more than once if anyone who thinks that neither Hanratty nor Alphon was the murderer - and this is the view of more than one poster here - then perhaps we might hear a suggestion or two as to just who the A6 killer actually was?
                  So far, nothing - and there never will be, in my opinion.

                  I'm currently re-reading Paul Foot, the first time in quite a few years, and it's a very interesting exercise, on which perhaps more later.

                  Graham
                  We are suffering from a plethora of surmise, conjecture and hypothesis. - Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure Of Silver Blaze

                  Comment


                  • Moste,

                    NickB dealt with the direct responses Valerie Storie later received from colleagues and anonymous members of the public.

                    I was more interested in what the local opinion was in the aftermath of the crime, particularly in regard to who had done it and why. There is usually no shortage of theories in such cases, albeit they are usually no more than that: mere theorizing. However, it may have been that those who knew the couple from work and the motoring club had their own suspicions, for what they were worth.

                    Like you I am surprised Foot did not dig deeper into their social relationships and how they were perceived either as work colleagues or motoring enthusiasts. These people would have been aware that the reason for being in a car in a cornfield, as stated at trial, was misleading. Presumably they felt it would have been bad form to say so. The same code of gentlemanly conduct was presumably exercised by local journalist Tony Mason who must surely have discovered the pair were a romantic item. I am curious as to whether other thoughts and suspicions were also deemed unacceptable to voice, given the terrible fate of Mr. Gregsten and Valerie Storie.

                    Comment


                    • As I've said until I'm blue in the face Alphon's presence in the A6 was purely coincidental, and I have long thought that anyone other than Alphon would have distanced himself from it for the rest of his life. I've also asked more than once if anyone who thinks that neither Hanratty nor Alphon was the murderer - and this is the view of more than one poster here - then perhaps we might hear a suggestion or two as to just who the A6 killer actually was?

                      It’s not just one big coincidence though Graham, it’s several.

                      1. His strange behaviour in the Alexandra Hotel in the days after the crime, of the type specifically highlighted by police investigating the crime. This behaviour was reported to police in the belief that Alphon was behaving as a suspect in a murder case.

                      2. The obvious one of being in the same hotel as Hanratty, after being re-directed from the same hotel, albeit arriving one day later. That is really a double coincidence.

                      3. His being seen previously in the Taplow Inn which is in the proximity to where the crime was committed and the victims were known to drink.

                      4. His resemblance to an early impression of the suspect.

                      Maybe I should add a fifth. His later ability, whether through luck or judgment, to identify the specific field where the crime originated.


                      Other suspects? Well they must have existed, otherwise the police would have pursued Alphon with a bit more vigour and lighted upon Hanratty somewhat quicker as well. I assume Superintendent Matthews had access to the A6 Case files to find out what they were doing for the first three weeks of the enquiry and who was in the frame.

                      Comment


                      • Hi Graham,

                        I think it’s fair enough to change your opinion on the A6 Case. I might even do that myself one day. I have no doubt that for many, who have followed the case over the years, the DNA evidence was a decisive moment. I will try to explain my reasons for not accepting it. I am aware of the controversy over Low Copy DNA but will not go into that specialist area.

                        As was written here recently, the Hanratty conviction had been a monkey on the back of British justice for many a long year. Once a verdict has been reached it is in the interests of the judicial system to uphold that verdict up to the point it becomes impossible to so do. Since the judicial system effectively judges itself, this is not a particularly difficult task to carry out. I recall one appeal by the Birmingham Six where an appeal judge pronounced that, having reviewed the evidence, it only made a strong prosecution stronger! Willful misjudgments of this enormity usually earn an accompanying promotion, along with an obligatory seat in the House of Lords, and these gratuities are never revoked. Unsurprisingly therefore, this kind of talk has been a feature of problematic cases since Timothy Evans right through to the Hillsborough Inquiry where, belatedly, the truth finally emerged. In essence, there is a mindset that the integrity of the justice system and its public perception are more important than the guilt or innocence of one mere citizen or citizens.

                        So, when Sherrard raised his eyebrows at the discovery of Valerie Storie’s clothing for DNA testing, along with a hanky, he was going as far as the rules of the game he played allowed. Mansfield, in similar vein, had to argue from the standpoint of accidental contamination. That tactic had at least proved successful in the case of Barry George, found guilty of Jill Dando’s murder largely on the basis of gunpowder residue found in one of his jacket pockets. When the Hanratty appeal judgment was made two senior policemen, who knew the case intimately, were reportedly at a loss to explain the DNA results. That is as far as they are able to go.

                        Not being bound by their professional code I can go further and suggest that the DNA evidence was fabricated. It not only got the Hanratty case of their backs- he could not be released and given a grudging apology like the Guildford Four or Birmingham Six- but discredited all these political agitators like Foot and their accompanying band of social misfits, well-intentioned do-gooders and nosey parkers. A salutary lesson for anyone who might have been inspired to follow in their footsteps. British justice does not hang innocent men. So, a good result and done, incidentally, with the very method insisted upon by the Hanratty family themselves the better to seal the case once and for all.

                        A different monkey was lifted from the back of British justice some years back when there were eventually two convictions in the Stephen Lawrence case. However, the method of ascertaining guilt was similar: exhibits from the time of the crime were found in a police store room and the DNA results proved conclusive after incriminating fibres were found at the bottom of a plastic bag. So, the police cannot not be racist or corrupt after all.

                        Forensic evidence which turns up late in the day is always unsatisfactory, especially when a case takes on a political dimension. Forensic evidence which inexplicably fails to be collected at the time- a feature the Lawrence case shares with the A6 Case- is equally unsatisfactory.

                        Comment


                        • Hi Cobalt,

                          1. His strange behaviour in the Alexandra Hotel in the days after the crime, of the type specifically highlighted by police investigating the crime. This behaviour was reported to police in the belief that Alphon was behaving as a suspect in a murder case
                          Indeed yes, Alphon was acting oddly. However, unlike various reports to the contrary, he did leave his room at least once during the (five?) days he was at The Alexandra. The thing is, had Mr Sims the Manager chosen not to concern himself with his guest's odd behaviour, chances are we'd never have heard of Peter Louis Alphon. And, if I may ask, how does a suspect in a murder case actually act? By bringing attention to himself as Alphon did? Don't think so, somehow.

                          2. The obvious one of being in the same hotel as Hanratty, after being re-directed from the same hotel, albeit arriving one day later. That is really a double coincidence.
                          A coincidence maybe, in view of later developments, but there is absolutely no evidence that they intended to meet there by design, nor even knew one another. Don't forget they stayed at The Vienna on different nights.


                          3.His being seen previously in the Taplow Inn which is in the proximity to where the crime was committed and the victims were known to drink.
                          I can't recall Mrs Lanz, proprietor of The Old Station Inn, Taplow, saying that she remembered seeing Alphon or someone who resembled him before
                          the murder. She did, though, claim that she had seen Gregsten and Valerie there several times prior to the murder night - when she also stated that she saw them. If she did claim to have seen Alphon at The Old Station before, on, or after the murder night, then she I think was either making it up, or someone (I wonder who??) was putting words into her mouth.

                          4. His resemblance to an early impression of the suspect.

                          If you mean the famous Photofit, then I'm honestly not convinced. In my opinion, both of the Photofits were highly questionable. Even Paul Foot had to admit to that. There are many genuine photos of Peter Alphon on the net, if you wish to look, and none of them look like the Photofit some have claimed resemble him. OK, the same may be said of the Photofit that many have stated resembles Hanratty - well, maybe, if you look at it in a darkened room with one eye closed. Frankly, I don't think the Photofit 'evidence' did much more than to muddy the already-murky waters. Others may think different.

                          Maybe I should add a fifth. His later ability, whether through luck or judgment, to identify the specific field where the crime originated

                          And here we have Messrs Justice, Fox and Alphon on a boozy night out around and about the murder scene. If you read my earlier post on this subject, you'll see how questionable it is that Alphon had the faintest idea of where the actual crime originated.

                          There were other suspects, naturally, including someone who was subjected by Acott and Oxford to rigorous questioning for several hours. Who this person was has never been revealed, nor have the names of other persons hauled in for questioning. I think, to be very honest, until the cartridge cases were found at The Vienna, the police were floundering around in the dark. And even afterwards, some might say.

                          Graham
                          We are suffering from a plethora of surmise, conjecture and hypothesis. - Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure Of Silver Blaze

                          Comment


                          • Alphon could have seen reports of the committal where the cornfield was described as being about 200 yards south of where Marsh Lane (reported as Arch Lane) crossed over the M4. Then he could have discovered the exact location in court when Valerie described their movements in detail with the aid of a plan of Dorney Reach.

                            Comment


                            • Graham,

                              Acott believed that one type of behaviour consistent with having committed murder was to lie low in a hotel room. It had produced up a result for him in the case of Gunther Padola a year earlier, hence his request to hoteliers following the A6 crime. Five days seems a long time for a wanderer like Alphon to stay in one hotel, but I lack the supporting confirmation for this. You could equally well say that if a hotel manager had not alerted the police, we may never have heard of police killer Gunther Padola.
                              One of the great fascinations of the A6 Case is whether Hanratty and Alphon had ever met, or shared mutual acquaintances. Was the coincidence of the Vienna Hotel actually a planned meeting which never took place, or the transfer of a weapon via a third party?


                              NickB,

                              I am sure Alphon was astute enough and had the motivation to identify the cornfield. His police interviews might have allowed him some information as well. Yet remarkably, no one else seems to have subsequently been able to match his powers of deduction, if the story of the farmer pointing a gun at Fox’s head is to be believed.

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by NickB View Post
                                Alphon could have seen reports of the committal where the cornfield was described as being about 200 yards south of where Marsh Lane (reported as Arch Lane) crossed over the M4. Then he could have discovered the exact location in court when Valerie described their movements in detail with the aid of a plan of Dorney Reach.
                                Or he could have actually been there during the execution of the crime. Almost certainly witnessed as having frequented the area by Mr. Fogarty Waul

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