A6 Rebooted

[Graham]

All of this has, of course, been debated almost to death over the years, but it's good to see that there's still some interest in the A6.

Just to go over old ground, with regard to the clean state of the car, if JH left Deadman's Hill around dawn, and if as Woffinden claims (and I see no reason to disagree with him) the car wasn't left in Redbridge until early evening when it was spotted and reported by Mr Medwar, then that gave JH more than enough time to give the car a thorough once-over somewhere.

As far as I'm aware, the prior history of the gun, and how Hanratty obtained it, were never revealed; I assume that the police made inquiries and they obviously questioned Hanratty, but even so the origin of the gun remains a mystery. My own belief, which I've mentioned before, is purely speculative, but I rather think that Dixie France supplied the gun at JH's request - JH after all did say that 'housebreaking was all through and he wanted to become a stick-up man'. France didn't just hang out at the Rehearsal Club, he was also 'manager' (for want of a better word) of the Harmony Cafe in Archer St, Soho, a place where beats, druggies, musicians and other assorted low-life hung out. It was said of France that he kept a mini-arsenal of weapons under the counter to sort out trouble and for self-defence if required. It wouldn't surprise me that JH asked him to get a gun, and France obliged. In those days hand-guns were relatively easy to obtain. It also wouldn't surprise me that once JH realised that Valerie was alive he forced France to take the gun back; which France then put under the back-seat of the bus and he knew that was where JH placed unwanted loot. Again, I stress - this is pure speculation, but I suggest somewhat strengthened by France's subsequent suicide; had the gun been traced back to him then he stood a very good chance of being charged as an accessory to murder and faced years in prison. France's known suicide notes give the distinct impression that he was driven to kill himself by guilt and remorse. JH plainly should have done what I believe (almost) anyone in his situation would have done - that is dispose of the gun somewhere between Deadman's Hill and Redbridge.

Graham

[caz]

I'm puzzled by the whole chain of events. Gregsten being dispatched with the tried and proven method of an assassin.

Hardly, moste, if he was only spooked into shooting when Gregsten made a sudden movement!

Then Storrie, attacked with what can only be imagined as some kind of frenzy,
I believe something happened after the Gregsten murder, either during the sexual event or immediately after, that sent this nutcase into a rage.

But that makes no sense if you believe Gregsten was 'dispatched with the tried and proven method of an assassin'. He'd have had to do the same for Valerie [and it's Storie, not Storrie], whether he had raped her or not, and he messed that right up, didn't he? He must have shot intending to kill her and silence his remaining witness, because she could so easily have died. He didn't hang around to check, and he didn't just fire shots to frighten her.

She is supposed to have said 'he said to me after the rape," you haven't done this very often have you"? but maybe it was her that said that, and just to complete the insult belittled his manhood.

Here we go again, making stuff up to shift the balance of blame, this time by suggesting Valerie may have contributed to her own ghastly fate by insulting a man who had just shot dead her lover and raped her, and still had a loaded gun on him. For God's sake!

Who knows, I don't believe, his intention was to kill her at all initially. If it was on the other hand, simply that he decided that since she had seen him in the headlights of a passing car, he was going to have to kill her, then after forcing her to pull Gregsten out of the car and over to the edge of the lane, I think he would have just shot her the same way he had with Gregsten.

Are you not over-complicating things to make them fit with this strange idea of a cool assassin, who knew what he was doing up until Valerie said something to send him into a rage? Once Gregsten had been shot dead, the gunman was left with little choice but to kill Valerie too, but he had her there in the car so he thought "Why not?" and raped her first. Believe it or not, some men out there are beasts, and those who are capable of murder are more beastly than most.

...its hard to figure how the spent bullets wound up where they did, given the information from Storie re Gregstens quarter turn ,(he would have been pretty much facing her when the gun was fired,)people may say' ricochet!, but ricochet off what? The bullets should have been embedded in and around the central clock of the dash board.

But you think Valerie gave duff information, don't you? If so, it was because she would have been in a terrible state of shock from that point, and not about to wind up her lover's killer by insulting his love-making abilities.

Love,

Caz
X

[OneRound]

...
Here we go again, making stuff up to shift the balance of blame, this time by suggesting Valerie may have contributed to her own ghastly fate by insulting a man who had just shot dead her lover and raped her, and still had a loaded gun on him. For God's sake!

...

Love,

Caz
X

In past posts there was implicit criticism of Valerie Storie not recalling accurately enough the colour of her rapist's eyes. It now appears she was too busy assessing and commenting upon his sexual prowess.

After you with the sick bag, Caz!

OneRound

[Graham]

In past posts there was implicit criticism of Valerie Storie not recalling accurately enough the colour of her rapist's eyes. It now appears she was too busy assessing and commenting upon his sexual prowess.

After you with the sick bag, Caz!

OneRound

Excellent comment, Richard.

Graham

[NickB]

A couple of things that have not been mentioned here before ...

The eyes

In that Channel 4 documentary DC Gwen Woodin, who was the first to interview Valerie, said about the eyes: “She never changed her mind about the description in any shape or form. The eyes were blue.”

John Lennon

A widely repeated claim is that Lennon firmly believed that Hanratty was innocent.

Paul Foot wrote:

“In 1969, I got a call at Private Eye from a man who said he was John Lennon. I was busy, and snapped away at the caller until I realised he was John Lennon. I met him in a Soho restaurant, the staff visibly swooning. He said he was worried about the growing demand for a return to capital punishment, and wanted to publicise the Hanratty case.”

This is the basis of Lennon’s support for the campaign, as a platform to oppose the reintroduction of hanging. He thought that all hanging was murder.

Sitting in front of a ‘Britain murdered Hanratty’ poster, Lennon said:

“The hanging thing is something I have been thinking about a lot because it is so much in the news in Britain. I didn’t have a platform, and then from nowhere [came] Mr and Mrs Hanratty, the parents of the boy who they think was not guilty. Now, I’m not sure. But I say either way, if there is a shadow of a doubt about the boy there should be a public enquiry - that’s all we are asking for. This was a platform to say something about hanging.”

I have italicised the word ‘they’ because Lennon appears to be about to say Hanratty was not guilty, but then corrects himself and deliberately says that is what ‘they’ think.

You can see him say this, about 10 minutes in, here ..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM9dgy26fn4

[caz]

Hi Nick,

Very interesting, thanks for this.

I didn't have much doubt that Valerie described the eyes as blue from the start and never wavered. We know that police spokesman got into a mucking fuddle about the eyes when reading from his notes for the tv news. I think that only served to muddy the waters and allow people to cast doubt on Valerie's ability to identify her rapist.

I often wondered how much time John Lennon would have spent studying all the known details of the case. But from what he said here, and the careful way he phrased it, not to mention the context of capital punishment for convicted killers, it would certainly appear that he was deliberately distancing himself from addressing the question of Hanratty's guilt or innocence. Indeed, he had just been expressing his own opinion that nobody should ever face the death penalty [or even go to prison!], no matter what they had done, even if they were to kill Yoko, and that Yoko would feel the same way if anyone were to kill him [!].

Mentioning the controversial case of Hanratty, whose parents thought there had been a miscarriage of justice, sounds like John's way of drumming up more public support for not bringing back the rope.

I might have used the same tactic, being against the death penalty myself, despite the fact that I firmly believe the wrong man wasn't hanged in this case. Hanratty should have had a good long time to regret what he did and the loss of his freedom.

Love,

Caz
X

[cobalt]

I still think the murder weapon is important and that not enough attention has been focused on it. The police are normally very diligent in tracking down the ownership of murder weapons, and have help from that great reservoir of ‘information received.’ It is quite astonishing to me that in a capital crime so little evidence was forwarded about the likely ownership of the murder weapon.

The possible link to Dixie France has been well-aired on this site, and it is certainly a highly credible one. It is difficult to read about the A6 Case without thinking that Dixie France had some kind of involvement with it. But do we have more than conjecture? Did the police ever suggest this link? I do not think they did. It would be interesting to see the contemporary police case notes attempting to trace those who had access to the weapon. I have no doubt many police hours went into this area of the inquiry. Yet the best that could be offered at trial was, I think, a link between cartridges found in a room that may (or may not) have been occupied by Hanratty and the claim that he liked to stash things under the back seat of a bus. That is not much to come up with given the man hours that must have been involved.

As regards motives for dumping the gun, my thanks to One Round for his thoughts. The first one had occurred to me: that an obvious novice, petty low down the criminal food chain, might act like a faithful retriever dog and bring the gun back to his horrified ‘master’ expecting a pat on the head. Hence the panic decision to jack it under the back seat pronto.

The second motive, which One Round described as ‘low cunning,’ confirms why I made a good decision never to become a detective or a criminal, for it simply too clever for me. To wit, a dodgy geezer might decide to have a peek under the back seat and to his shocked delight discover a revolver. One Round explains how, after lifting it, he might discover to his horror he has implicated himself in a murder. But even then, OR does not quite do the ploy justice. For if the criminal does not lift the gun, but reports it to the bus conductor, he still comes under suspicion. ‘Oi mate, there’s a gun under the back seat of your bus.’ Or even if he does nothing, and the gun is subsequently found, there is a chance the conductor can identify him as a passenger on the top deck. ‘Honest Mr. Acott, I never even looked under that seat.’ That is damnably clever, if the reason for choosing the back seat of a bus.

Let’s suppose for a moment that Dixie France did supply the killer with the murder weapon, then is alarmed when he discovers what it has been used for. Surely, with the police sniffing around, he would be operating within the criminal code to admit supplying the weapon, but be granted immunity for testifying against the killer. Criminals have various reasons for disliking brutal slayings such as the A6 case was, so French would hardly be ostracized by the criminal fraternity for helping to remove the ‘heat’ that must have followed the crime. In fact, if the killer was Hanratty, this is pretty much what he ended up doing, without the detail of supplying the gun of course.

Which is why I suspect that if the weapon was supplied by France, then he knew who was going to be brandishing it AND the reason (alleged by Alphon) for it being acquired. In short, he was not an ‘honest’ crook providing a gun for a ‘stick-up’ but always knew it was going to be used in a ‘frightener’ involving a woman. When the whole operation went pear-shaped he was a very troubled man, for the casualties were not a couple of security guards (who might in criminal terms be seen a as fair game) but a defenceless couple in a car. He would not be able to justify that to his criminal associates, nor to himself.

[NickB]

Indeed, he had just been expressing his own opinion that nobody should ever face the death penalty [or even go to prison!], no matter what they had done, even if they were to kill Yoko, and that Yoko would feel the same way if anyone were to kill him [!].

Yoko does not feel that way! She has refused to support parole for Lennon's killer 9 times.

Hanratty’s parents had a wealthy nephew who lived near the Lennon’s, which is how they were introduced.

John gave them the Wedding Album with a special inscription. You can see a copy here.

Incidentally ... in a Rolling Stone magazine interview, John revealed that Yoko and he were not in the bag that accompanied Hanratty’s parents to a protest event

Jann Wenner: “You appeared in the bags for Hanratty.”

John Lennon: “For Hanratty, yes, we did a sort of bag event, but it wasn’t us in the bags it was someone else.”

[Graham]

The second motive, which One Round described as ‘low cunning,’ confirms why I made a good decision never to become a detective or a criminal, for it simply too clever for me. To wit, a dodgy geezer might decide to have a peek under the back seat and to his shocked delight discover a revolver. One Round explains how, after lifting it, he might discover to his horror he has implicated himself in a murder. But even then, OR does not quite do the ploy justice. For if the criminal does not lift the gun, but reports it to the bus conductor, he still comes under suspicion. ‘Oi mate, there’s a gun under the back seat of your bus.’ Or even if he does nothing, and the gun is subsequently found, there is a chance the conductor can identify him as a passenger on the top deck. ‘Honest Mr. Acott, I never even looked under that seat.’ That is damnably clever, if the reason for choosing the back seat of a bus.

Cobalt,

unless I misunderstand you here, London Transport employed - and probably still do for all I know - "pick up men", whose job it was to collect and remove any rubbish, detritus, lost property, etc., that wouldn't go up the vacuum pipe during the routine cleaning of a bus. The man who was detailed to 'pick up' from that particular No 36A bus was Mr Edwin Cooke. He lifted the upstairs back seat as he always did - he stated later that he had once found two fat dead rats under that seat - and saw the gun plus ammo. He reported this to his superiors, who in turn advised the police, who were on the scene within 10 minutes, given the possible implications of the discovery. Mr Cooke was never at any time under any kind of suspicion: he was just doing his job. The following day the police stated that after ballistic and other tests they were satisfied that the gun found by Mr Cooke was the one used in the A6 crime.

As far as I am aware, no-one, either members of the public or employees of London Transport, were able to say with any degree of certainty, that they saw anyone on the 36A bus who in any way resembled James Hanratty. This, of course, is not conclusive evidence.

Graham

[OneRound]

...

The second motive, which One Round described as ‘low cunning,’ confirms why I made a good decision never to become a detective or a criminal, for it simply too clever for me. To wit, a dodgy geezer might decide to have a peek under the back seat and to his shocked delight discover a revolver. One Round explains how, after lifting it, he might discover to his horror he has implicated himself in a murder. But even then, OR does not quite do the ploy justice. For if the criminal does not lift the gun, but reports it to the bus conductor, he still comes under suspicion. ‘Oi mate, there’s a gun under the back seat of your bus.’ Or even if he does nothing, and the gun is subsequently found, there is a chance the conductor can identify him as a passenger on the top deck. ‘Honest Mr. Acott, I never even looked under that seat.’ That is damnably clever, if the reason for choosing the back seat of a bus.

...

Cobalt - for someone who doesn't think he would have made a copper or a crook, you don't half run quickly when given a dodgy idea.

Best regards,

OneRound

[moste]

Hardly, moste, if he was only spooked into shooting when Gregsten made a sudden movement!



But that makes no sense if you believe Gregsten was 'dispatched with the tried and proven method of an assassin'. He'd have had to do the same for Valerie [and it's Storie, not Storrie], whether he had raped her or not, and he messed that right up, didn't he? He must have shot intending to kill her and silence his remaining witness, because she could so easily have died. He didn't hang around to check, and he didn't just fire shots to frighten her.



Here we go again, making stuff up to shift the balance of blame, this time by suggesting Valerie may have contributed to her own ghastly fate by insulting a man who had just shot dead her lover and raped her, and still had a loaded gun on him. For God's sake!



Are you not over-complicating things to make them fit with this strange idea of a cool assassin, who knew what he was doing up until Valerie said something to send him into a rage? Once Gregsten had been shot dead, the gunman was left with little choice but to kill Valerie too, but he had her there in the car so he thought "Why not?" and raped her first. Believe it or not, some men out there are beasts, and those who are capable of murder are more beastly than most.



But you think Valerie gave duff information, don't you? If so, it was because she would have been in a terrible state of shock from that point, and not about to wind up her lover's killer by insulting his love-making abilities.

Love,

Caz
X

Blinkers. .Blinkers.. Head in the sand.. Blinkers

Allowing horror of the fate of the two in question to foggy up what may well have happened.
True, as with Grahams post I am speculating, but hey! what if Storie was lying all along. then answers must lie elsewhere.
Storie was accommodating a married man with two young children, for four years. Somebody pass the sick bag! By the way, I believe she lied where she claimed her parents knew all about it. sorry, just my opinion.

Does anyone have any input with regards to the final resting place of the so called .38 bullets, given the obvious line of projection. I mean anyone other than the ostriches. PS. I knew it was Storie actually for Valerie I prefer Story

[cobalt]

Hi Graham,

A slight misunderstanding. Edwin Cooke, the bus cleaner, can actually be found on youtube giving a very impressive interview from TV footage at the time.

In no way did I intend to imply that the police would have suspected the cleaner.
I meant that any minor criminal, aware of swag being stuffed there, might havehad a look and ound himself in a Catch 22 situation.

As you say, no eyewitness evidence was offered regarding persons on the top deck of the bus behaving suspiciously during the relevant time. Presumaby though, the top deck must have been empty, or near to empty, for a gun and box of ammunitipn to be put under the back seat, which means there may have been a possibiity of the passenger being remembered by a conductor.

[NickB]

The conductor (or conductress!) was Pamela Patt.

‘Pamela Patt's statement (taken on 26 August 1961) was to the effect that the passengers during the northern part of the journey to West Kilburn were all regulars, with one exception. At 6.10am a young man of dirty appearance, wearing a dirty raincoat got on near the Grosvenor Hotel and went to the upper deck, where he was the only passenger for a time. On the return journey the bus was full between Harrow Road and Victoria.’

The man was 'about 25, 5 ft. 7 ins., medium build, thick wavy hair, mousey colour, clean shaven'.

[Graham]

Hi Graham,

A slight misunderstanding. Edwin Cooke, the bus cleaner, can actually be found on youtube giving a very impressive interview from TV footage at the time.

In no way did I intend to imply that the police would have suspected the cleaner.
I meant that any minor criminal, aware of swag being stuffed there, might havehad a look and ound himself in a Catch 22 situation.

As you say, no eyewitness evidence was offered regarding persons on the top deck of the bus behaving suspiciously during the relevant time. Presumaby though, the top deck must have been empty, or near to empty, for a gun and box of ammunitipn to be put under the back seat, which means there may have been a possibiity of the passenger being remembered by a conductor.

Hi Cobalt,

OK, understood. I've seen the Edwin Cooke interview - he seems too smart a bloke to be cleaning buses.

As NickB says, Pamela Patt did mention just one man going upstairs during the run, but from her description I wouldn't think he was either Hanratty, as I don't think 'mousey' would correctly describe either his natural or dyed hair-colouring, or France, who didn't have much hair of any colour. But of course it could have been a third party, someone 'hired' by either Hanratty or France to hide the gun. Pamela Patt was not called to give evidence at either the trial or the Appeal.

And the other little mystery is the elderly woman at the Appeal, who when it was concluded stood up and shouted, "It wasn't him! He didn't do it. You ought to ask the conductor on the 36 bus." She then hurried out of the court and disappeared in the crowd, and was never seen again or identified. Note that she said 'conductor' not 'conductress', which, if she did indeed know something, might suggest that whoever planted the gun didn't do it when Pamela Patt was aboard. She also said '36' and not '36A', but that could merely have been a slip on her part, as it must have taken a lot of bottle to do what she did.

Graham

[NickB]

Hi Graham!

As we both know, newspaper reports specified that the mystery woman was referring to Ernest Brine who was the conductor in the afternoon - when it appears the bus was too busy for anyone to be upstairs alone.

I speculate that Patt told the police she would be unable to recognise the man, or I think they would have pursued her more to give evidence.

She was due to appear as a witness at the committal but was unwell. Had she appeared I believe that Top Deck Man would have become a main feature of the case.

In the 2002 Appeal the defence appeared to accept that Top Deck Man was the most likely depositor of the gun. ‘Mr Mansfield argued that it was significant because, according to her, the only person who would have had an opportunity to deposit the gun and cartridges was the man whom she described and whose description was not consistent with that of James Hanratty.’

It would have been interesting to see which side would have benefited most had Patt been well enough to appear. If she did not positively identify Hanratty the defence would have claimed a point. But the prosecution would have drawn attention to the similarities in her description apart from the hair and how, if it were Hanratty, he would then have had plenty of time to get up to Liverpool and send the telegram.