a6 murder

[Graham]

Do you think that it's possible that the gun was France's and he stored it in the airing cupboard, and Hanratty stole it on the Monday before heading off to the Vienna?

As I speculated last week?

Hi Vic,

I honestly don't know. France strikes me as a totally non-violent villain, maybe a fraudster, a fixer, maybe a gambling cheat, fence for stolen stuff, etc. But not violent. Yet he probably was the kind of bloke who'd 'get stuff', including a gun, if anyone asked him and he saw some profit in it. And Hanratty was definitely the kind of bloke who, if he saw something he wanted, would just take it, even if it belonged to a mate (cf: Terry Evans' shoes). So yes - it is very possible that the gun was France's.

In the note published after his suicide, France said "they're going to crucify us all", and I always took this as meaning that he had some part in the A6 Crime, and if it was to do with supplying the gun (knowingly or not) that resulted in a murder and attempted murder, then could be that the guilt was too much for him. Also, if charged as an accessory, he could have faced a fair few years inside.

Finally, your suggested time-scale for JH obtaining the gun would support my feeling that he hadn't had it long when he hi-jacked the car. Like a kid with a new toy, he had to go and use it.

Cheers,

Graham

[Victor]

France strikes me as a totally non-violent villain, maybe a fraudster, a fixer, maybe a gambling cheat, fence for stolen stuff, etc. But not violent. Yet he probably was the kind of bloke who'd 'get stuff', including a gun, if anyone asked him and he saw some profit in it.

Hi Graham,

So the sort of bloke who might come across a gun maybe to fence? And if he had got hold of one and a load of bullets the sort who would hide it in his airing cupboard and never use the thing? Maybe leaving it there for months?

If Hanratty had discovered it when tidying away his bedding and blabbed to Louise Anderson, then maybe he would have been hesitant about using it too?

KR,
Vic.

[Limehouse]

Hi Vic,

I honestly don't know. France strikes me as a totally non-violent villain, maybe a fraudster, a fixer, maybe a gambling cheat, fence for stolen stuff, etc. But not violent. Yet he probably was the kind of bloke who'd 'get stuff', including a gun, if anyone asked him and he saw some profit in it. And Hanratty was definitely the kind of bloke who, if he saw something he wanted, would just take it, even if it belonged to a mate (cf: Terry Evans' shoes). So yes - it is very possible that the gun was France's.

In the note published after his suicide, France said "they're going to crucify us all", and I always took this as meaning that he had some part in the A6 Crime, and if it was to do with supplying the gun (knowingly or not) that resulted in a murder and attempted murder, then could be that the guilt was too much for him. Also, if charged as an accessory, he could have faced a fair few years inside.

Finally, your suggested time-scale for JH obtaining the gun would support my feeling that he hadn't had it long when he hi-jacked the car. Like a kid with a new toy, he had to go and use it.

Cheers,

Graham

Hi Graham,

I have placed in bold the bits of your post that I find most interesting because this, at least, acknowledges the possibility that Hanratty, if responsible, was not working alone. Dixie France knew Louise Anderson who knew William Ewar who was Gregten's brother-in-law.

Re your point (in a recent previous post) about the killer not being seen in the vacinity of the cornfiled because of the route across the fields being possible from the A4, precisely why would a gunman be roaming across fields, looking for someone to stick up at random? Who would he expect to find? In a place as remote as that (in those times) why wouldn't he be looking for an isolated garage to hold up and rob?

[Graham]

Like I said, my suggestions were pure speculation, nothing more. JH never revealed where the gun came from, and I think I'm correct in saying that it was never pursued during his cross-examination in court. If this is so, it rather surprises me.

Again, the route to the cornfield is simply a possibility, nothing more. JH had nobbled a few large suburban houses in his career, and there are plenty of those around the Dorney area. Perhaps he preferred such locations as they were isolated and he felt safer.

I perceive Dixie France as possibly the most mysterious character in the entire scenario - a man very close to his family yet who associated with known villains and was one himself, and who probably had some insight into why JH carried out the A6 Crime - JH remarked to France that he 'had done something that scares'. Was France something akin to a father-confessor figure to JH? If he was, then JH repaid him rather unkindly viz-a-viz his daughter. But that was JH - didn't really consider the consequences of his actions.

Ewer was actually Janet Gregsten's brother-in-law. Yes, there was certainly a 'professional' connection between him and Anderson....

Cheers,

Graham

[babybird67]

i agree

i think if any further information is to be forthcoming it could conceivably be relating to the France connection.

Am a little way into Foot and he states on p.42

The police offered an amnesty to anyone assisting with information about the gun.

Again, following the speculative direction of this thread, perhaps the gun was Dixie's, which would explain why no further efforts were made to trace the origin of the gun; I like Vic's idea that France just had it lying around somewhere, JH spotted it, helped himself to it, then took it back and asked for help disposing of it after the fact. If the gun had been taken without France's knowledge or permission, then used in murder, once can imagine both the remorse which caused France to take his own life, after all, he may have felt indirectly responsible for those deaths, and one can imagine the bitterness he held against Hanratty which was evident in some of his final letters and would explain why he became a witness for the prosecution.

It would be great if any new information could be found regarding the gun.

[Limehouse]

I find it unlikely that Dixie would have left the gun 'lying around' because, although his dauighter Carol was around 16 at the time, he had much younger children. Additionally, his family had the impression he was a respectable working class man and it appears he hid his criminality from them very well. (Although his wife may have known differently but perhaps believed he was 'going straight')

[caz]

Hi bb,

Thanks for the kind words. I’m blushing. Makes a nice change because in the past I tended only to attract abusive language on this topic.

Hanratty had a blood donor card that was discovered by his family many years later which showed he was rhesus negative. So someone must have known his blood group whilst he was alive.

It doesn't help explain the DNA matches though.

KR,
Vic.

Rhesus negative, Vic? In the UK today, only 7% of the population are O Rh Neg. I can't believe that everyone in the "Hanratty was innocent" club failed to mention that before. All I heard in the past were assurances that group O was so common that we could discount it as having any bearing on the theory that an innocent man was deliberately set up. That argument only (half) stands up to scrutiny if the blood group concerned was O positive. It's terribly misleading otherwise.

The point is, would the people doing the framing in 1962 have known that the rapist and Hanratty were both in this tiny minority? Or even that semen would be left anywhere and the offender's blood group could be established from it? If they did it shows a quite remarkable level of premeditation, planning and anticipation. If they didn't how lucky was that?

JH never revealed where the gun came from, and I think I'm correct in saying that it was never pursued during his cross-examination in court. If this is so, it rather surprises me.

Well he could hardly admit to knowing where he got the gun if he was protesting his innocence to the end. But then he admitted that the hankie found wrapped round it was his, which is slightly puzzling. Maybe he was caught out telling the truth, in the heat of the moment.

But maybe he genuinely didn't know what his hankie was doing with the murder weapon on the bus because he had not put them there himself. He would have been in a pretty pickle because he couldn't very well say: "But I didn't put the gun there, I put it somewhere else/gave it to X afterwards - "

It would certainly make sense to me if France topped himself, fearing that once convicted Hanratty had been pressured into giving chapter and verse, including various unsavoury or incriminating revelations about certain individuals. Could someone have suspected France’s involvement and put pressure on him, by suggesting that Hanratty had spilled certain beans, in an attempt to get an admission from him? I can't see otherwise why France would have said: "they're going to crucify us all".

The Catch 22 for Hanratty was that if he knew France had either tried to help or hinder him by planting the gun and so on, he couldn't say so to anyone without admitting his own guilt.

"Come on Dixie, you may as well admit it now. Once Jim knew the game was finally up, he opened right up, knowing it was his last chance to have his sentence commuted. So we know it was your gun and you arranged for it to be hidden on the bus so it would look like Jim's MO. He knew it too, but he could hardly drop you in it without dropping himself in it, could he? And that's what you were banking on, wasn't it? Well I'm afraid there's no loyalty among villains when the big drop looms."

Hanratty needn't have said a word of course, but if France believed he had, it could have thrown him over the brink.

Love,

Caz
X

[Graham]

I find it unlikely that Dixie would have left the gun 'lying around' because, although his dauighter Carol was around 16 at the time, he had much younger children. Additionally, his family had the impression he was a respectable working class man and it appears he hid his criminality from them very well. (Although his wife may have known differently but perhaps believed he was 'going straight')

Hi Julie,

Dixie was employed by the Harmony Cafe, somewhere in Soho, where he had the reputation of being a wheeler-dealer and also a police-informer. I'd think his family were perfectly well aware of how he made his money!

Guns were (probably amazingly) much more common in those days than now. My dad had a small .22 revolver just 'lying around'. Fortunately for all of us, I could never get hold of any ammunition for it...but I had a small armoury of air-guns even when I was a sub-teen.

Cheers,

Graham

[Victor]

Rhesus negative, Vic? In the UK today, only 7% of the population are O Rh Neg. I can't believe that everyone in the "Hanratty was innocent" club failed to mention that before. All I heard in the past were assurances that group O was so common that we could discount it as having any bearing on the theory that an innocent man was deliberately set up. That argument only (half) stands up to scrutiny if the blood group concerned was O positive. It's terribly misleading otherwise.

Hi Caz,

Yes, negative. But the information is not particularly useful because the rhesus factor is not detectable from semen. It has been mentioned before somewhere buried in this thread (or the DNA thread) and it's in Woffinden.

So we can't narrow the proportion down to 7% I'm afraid, it has to go back to approx 1/3rd.

I can't see otherwise why France would have said: "they're going to crucify us all".

I've always interpreted "all" to mean the France family, as in Dixie did away with himself to protect his wife and daughters by severing all links between them and Hanratty.

KR,
Vic.

[Graham]

Hi Caz,

Well he could hardly admit to knowing where he got the gun if he was protesting his innocence to the end. But then he admitted that the hankie found wrapped round it was his, which is slightly puzzling. Maybe he was caught out telling the truth, in the heat of the moment

Slight malfunction of the old frontal lobes, there...of course he wouldn't admit how he got the gun. But I bet he bit his tongue after he'd identified the hanky as his - I always wondered why he didn't just deny it.

It would certainly make sense to me if France topped himself

Can you prove that that expression was actually in current usage in 1962....?

Cheers,

Graham

[caz]

Can you prove that that expression was actually in current usage in 1962....?

Cheers,

Graham

Don't you start, Graham. I'd rather the mayhem didn't spread up the A6.

Hi Vic,

Ah, thanks for that. My mistake - I didn't realise that the rhesus factor would not have shown up in tests.

But then, I don't suppose petty crooks back in 1962, setting up an innocent man for rape and murder, would have known what would or wouldn't have shown up in tests. So from their point of view it may as well have been 7% as 33.3%.

Love,

Caz
X

[babybird67]

halfway through Foot

an interesting read but in places the bias is evident, imo.

For example, p. 193, discussing Hanratty's Liverpool alibi, Foot states that information received from Usher, the man with the withered hand who remembers seeing someone like Hanratty at the Left Luggage area, "rings true" to Hanratty's story, drawing the reader's attention to the matching elements, the name 'Ratty' with initial J and the crippled hand.

Usher's evidence however states the time this incident occurred as being "probably between 11 and 12.30."

This time is totally at odds with Hanratty's own testimony that he arrived in Liverpool at anywhere between 3.30 - 5pm.

Foot deals with this discrepancy quite dismissively by stating:

The timing was indeed quite 'wrong', but it was the only thing which was seriously 'wrong' with Usher's statement.

Forgive my naivete, but isn't the whole crux of an alibi based around the accuracy of timing? If Hanratty had been there, as witnessed by Usher, at 11 or 12.30, that would not preclude him from having had time to return to have committed the crime he had been accused of, therefore this can in no way, shape or form be considered an alibi. To suggest that because the timing is the only discrepancy in this account of someone seeing Hanratty in Liverpool then it must still be true is quite an odd approach to an alibi isn't it?

Mr Usher may very well have seen Mr Hanratty at another time, as i believe is quite likely, but the timing was off, hence this is not an alibi. It is this non-verifiable nature of the alibi/s Hanratty gave which was a crucial factor in his conviction i believe. I find it odd that he had the receipt from the Vienna but no other receipts, no bus or train tickets etc that could have proved he was on any of those trains/buses etc.

I believe the Rhyl alibi suffered from the same inconsistencies of timings and is why many of the alleged witnesses to Hanratty's presence there were not called to give testimony.

[Victor]

an interesting read but in places the bias is evident, imo.

Hi Jen,

You'll come across quite a lot of that, Foot actively suppresses discrepancies but then he was writing a book saying Hanratty was innocent. You get the same with JtR, some authors utterly dismiss "problems" with their theories, such as Sickert could have got a ferry over the channel before and after every murder. Woffinden selectively quotes some of the peripheral statements that are a tiny fraction of hundreds of public statements made to police and gives the impression that that one "might be" significant just to put a doubt in your mind. It's just manipulating the reader with spin.

Forgive my naivete, but isn't the whole crux of an alibi based around the accuracy of timing?

Absolutely. How many sightings of Elvis have there been after he died?

I believe the Rhyl alibi suffered from the same inconsistencies of timings and is why many of the alleged witnesses to Hanratty's presence there were not called to give testimony.

Sherrard chose not to use any of the Rhyl witnesses for the appeal, it doesn't inspire confidence in them.

KR,
Vic.

[Graham]

Sherrard chose not to use any of the Rhyl witnesses for the appeal, it doesn't inspire confidence in them.

Mrs Grace Jones of Ingledene really blew it for the Rhyl Alibi, when she fell apart at the trial, aided and abetted by the wily Swanwick.

I think it's telling that Sherrard never called Terry Evans, the most vocal of JH's Rhyl supporters - Terry was a fence, a fairground worker, a teddy-boy, and had a start tattooed between his eyes. He'd have been a big hit with the appeal court...not.

Cheers,

Graham

[Victor]

I think it's telling that Sherrard never called Terry Evans, the most vocal of JH's Rhyl supporters - Terry was a fence, a fairground worker, a teddy-boy, and had a start tattooed between his eyes. He'd have been a big hit with the appeal court...not.

Didn't he get caught out trying to get the newspaper seller (Charlie Jones I think) to lie for Panorama?

KR,
Vic.