a6 murder

[Steve]

A Bob Woffinden seems to have written a large number of books on Rock music and The Beatles. Does anyone know if this is the same Bob?

Yes, one and the same.

[reg1965]

the hard fact of the matter is that the Rhyl Alibi cannot be proven beyond any reasonable doubt.....Graham

If the Rhyl alibi had been fully tested before a court of law, the jury could have chosen to take the full weight of all the alibi testimony together (as with all circumstantial evidence) and decided, that it was sufficient to acquit the defendent as being, say, too compelling to leave a reasonable doubt lingering.
In Hanratty the jury, obviously, decided that the weight of the prosecutions circumstantial evidence was enough to convict without any significant reasonable doubt remaining.
The judge Mr Justice Gorman when asked by the jury when they came back after 6 hours deliberation wanting clarification of reasonable doubt told them 'If you have a reasonable doubt, then you are not sure. You understand that, do you not?' (Woffinden 1997. p260)
When the guilty verdict was returned even Mr Gorman was thought to have been severely surprised.

Reg

[Limehouse]

I suppose the jury were working on the assumption that they had been given all of the relevant evidence supporting a conviction and that the evidence was honestly obtained. They would also be swayed by Hanratty changuing his abili. After all, he had lied to start with so why should they believe him? Wasn't he just trying to save his miserable life?

[reg1965]

One point on the identification, Valerie spent several hours in the car listening to the gunman talking and he apparently had a distinctively high-pitched voice. This was a major part of her identification, his voice.

Steve
This is an excellent point.
Remember the Paris interview that Alphon gave. He does seem to have both a distinctive London accent (maybe not cockney, but many people would not be able to distinguish the two, and PLA may have been able to lay it on a bit thicker when necessary) and a slightly effeminate slightly high pitched voice. It was certainly not anywhere near a butch, home counties twang.
The fact that PLA was not asked to speak at his ID parade and JH was is, has as already been flogged to death, an anomaly that should not have been allowed to admissable in the trial.
Reg

[Limehouse]

Fair enough Reg, but in all reality, if all the men at the line up had been required to speak, I bet most of them would have had a distinctive London accent.

[Steve]

Evening Limehouse

Hear what you are saying, but I think it might have been just a bit more diverse than that.

DCS Fewtrell, head of Bucks CID, had the task of recruiting ten redheaded men for Hanratty’s ID parade. He sent a van to RAF High Wycombe and his officers brought back a random selection of volunteers. I have not been able to find any record of their names or where they all came from before joining the RAF, and I suspect no such record was kept at the time, but it is a fair bet that some of them were not cockneys.

Kind regards,
Steve

[Limehouse]

Hi Steve,

How right you are. The RAF were not recruiting many cockneys in those days!

[Victor]

Someone suggested in a previous post that even Paul Foot was inclined to think that Hanratty was the A6 murderer after the 2002 DNA results had provided definitive proof of Hanratty's guilt. I think he still has serious reservations despite the DNA.

Hanratty was no saint; we all know that and I doubt that anyone would say he was a particularly pleasant character. He had spent considerable time at Her Majesty's pleasure and I suggest that it is convenient to let the blame for the A6 murder remain with Hanratty. The establishment has nothing to gain by expending huge sums of money to establish the truth of the matter even if there are courses of action that could potentially be taken to investigate the case further. I suspect the official line is that it is simply not worth the effort. Is there really only one DNA on the hanky?

This is what Paul Foot wrote in the guardian ...

Hi James et al,

I think the real problem for Paul Foot is that his surprising notion isn't all that surprising...

Stumped by this evidence, the prosecution suggested that Hanratty might have "bought" the alibi - a surprising notion since the man who sold him such an alibi needed to look and speak very like Hanratty.

All that's needed to buy an alibi is some details of what happened - for example, the "Tarleton Road" or "green bath" detail - then let the witnesses fill in the rest for themselves. You might remember something that happened but can you acurrately recall someone you met briefly 6 months before. All you remember is the general details such as someone came in and asked about Tarleton Road - it was a man - yeah, he looked something like Hanratty...

Also, how much more money do you want wasted on this case? I certainly don't consider it money well spent having investigation after inquest after review - as with Princess Di - when the DNA evidence is so conclusive.

KR,
Vic.

[Limehouse]

Hi Victor,

I don't really agree that the DNA evidence is conclusive when there is a real possibility the garments were contaminated during storage.

I think there is an abundance of evidence to suggest Diana died as the result of a car accident so I agree that the public inquiry was unjustified. Likewise, I don't think a public inquiry into the Hanratty case will serve any purpose unless it is carried out by an independent body who are given access to all of the evidence.

[Victor]

Hi Limehouse,

There's more detail to the DNA evidence than has been indicated here so far - they did look at the issue of contamination and found additional DNA traces which were identified as MG and VS (on the knicker fragment) which makes the idea of contamination untennable. Someone posted a link to the detailed report, but I can't locate it at the moment - has anyone else got it?

KR,
Vic

[Steve]

Hi Limehouse,

There's more detail to the DNA evidence than has been indicated here so far - they did look at the issue of contamination and found additional DNA traces which were identified as MG and VS (on the knicker fragment) which makes the idea of contamination untennable. Someone posted a link to the detailed report, but I can't locate it at the moment - has anyone else got it?

KR,
Vic

Hello Victor

I would be interested to see that link if it can be found. I don't remember it being posted here previously.

[reg1965]

Hello Victor

I would be interested to see that link if it can be found. I don't remember it being posted here previously.

Is this what you are looking for?

http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/judgmentsfiles/j1166/HANRATTY.htm

Reg

[Tony]

Is this what you are looking for?

http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/judgmentsfiles/j1166/HANRATTY.htm

Reg

Hello Reg,

Correct me please if I am wrong but isn’t the Forensic and DNA as follows:

Forensics: Immediately after the murder the knickers were examined and three traces were found, one was Valerie’s and there were two semen stains one was Gregston’s and one unidentified.

DNA: By 2002 Valerie’s and Gregston’s had disappeared but the DNA of James Hanratty was found.

Very convenient. Isn’t science marvellous? It’s a bit like magic I suppose: now you see it now you don’t.

Tony.

[Victor]

Is this what you are looking for?

http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/judgmentsfiles/j1166/HANRATTY.htm

Reg

Cheers Reg, it is...

Paragraphs 125 and 126

But that is to ignore the results of the DNA profiling. With regard to the knicker fragment we have what Dr Whitaker would describe as a typical distribution of male and female DNA following an act of sexual intercourse leading, to the obvious inference that the male contribution came from James Hanratty. For that not to be the case we would have to suppose that the DNA of the rapist, also of blood group O, had either degraded so as to become undetectable or had been masked by James Hanratty's DNA during the course of a contaminating event. Moreover, we would also have to suppose that Valerie Storie's DNA had remained in its original state, or at least detectable, and had escaped being overridden by DNA from James Hanratty. The same would have to be true of the DNA attributed to Michael Gregsten. Finally, we must visualise a pattern which is wholly consistent with sexual intercourse having taken place in which Valerie Storie and James Hanratty were the participants.


Much the same reasoning would apply to the handkerchief. The only DNA extracted from the handkerchief came from James Hanratty. The only places on the handkerchief from which his DNA was extracted were the areas of mucus staining. It is to be expected that whoever was responsible for the mucus staining would have left evidence of his DNA. If the explanation for James Hanratty's DNA being found on the handkerchief is subsequent contamination it must follow that either the original DNA had degraded so as to become undetectable or James Hanratty's DNA has in some way overwhelmed the original deposit so that the original is no longer capable of being traced. More than that the transfer must have taken place in such a way as to affect only the areas of mucus staining and not the unstained part of the handkerchief which was not found to bear DNA from James Hanratty or anyone else. In our view the notion that such a thing might have happened in either case is fanciful. The idea that it might have happened twice over is beyond belief.

So Tony, your wrong, they did find VS and MG's DNA.

[reg1965]

Hold your horses!

Dear Victor

The previous paragraph reads:

"124. Making it quite clear that for the time being we are simply considering the risk of contamination of a neutral surface without regard to the DNA profiles which were eventually obtained, we, too, accept that there was at least a theoretical possibility of both the knicker fragment and the handkerchief having been in contact with a surface bearing DNA contaminants from James Hanratty."

So the appeal court judges were at least open to the fact that degradation and contamination could have occurred even though they took the profiling (Paras 125 & 126) to be 100% correct. Thus their ruling that the DNA evidence was overwhelming in the face of all the other appellants grounds is, to be frank, perverse.

What can one say?

Reg