a6 murder

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Graham,

Did any of the Avondale Crescent witnesses make reference to the three fluorescent stripes on the rear bumper and the pushed-back front number-plate of the murder car?

Graham

Good point.I don't think anybody did.Perhaps julieq may know?
Margaret Thompson referred to it blocking her path when she came back from the shops about 20 minutes before it was found.She said she had had to go on the road with her buggy as a result of the way it was parked.

[Natalie Severn]

I am saying he is mistaken. That is different from lying.

Similarly, Blackhall was mistaken on both occasions he identified innocent volunteers. This doesn't mean he deliberately chose people he knew were wrong.

Which brings us back to the Avondale Crescent witnesses who say the car wasnt parked during the day where it was later found at 6.30pm.

[NickB]

[U]So you are accusing Michael Sherrard QC of lying?

I am saying he is mistaken. That is different from lying.

Similarly, Blackhall was mistaken on both occasions he identified innocent volunteers. This doesn't mean he deliberately chose people he knew were wrong.

[Graham]

Did any of the Avondale Crescent witnesses make reference to the three fluorescent stripes on the rear bumper and the pushed-back front number-plate of the murder car?

Graham

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Norma,

The rest of the evidence suggests that it was Blackhall who was mistaken.


Why are you ignoring Doris Althoe?

KR,
Vic.

Whose evidence is this?

I am not ignoring Doris Althoe.She claimed to have seen "a"Morris Minor parked in Avondale Crescent throughout the day.
And that was what there was .The identical Morris Minor to the murder car,in model ,colour and design, was parked in the same spot on the opposite side of the road all day.It belonged ,not to Gregsten"s aunt, but to Doreen Milne,who had parked in Avondale Crescent at 8.15 every weekday for over a year .However,the previous week she had been approached by the owner of the house and asked to park elsewhere.She then parked in the same spot but on the opposite side,where she had parked on 23rd August.
This was clearly the car Mrs Doris Althoe had seen parked there "all day".
Sometime that day,according to Margaret Thompson it was after 5.30 pm on that day ,the exact same model of car to Doreen Milne's was parked parallel to hers but on the opposite side of the road,in what had been her old spot up until the week before.

It was the Morris Minor Murder car.

[Natalie Severn]

Well Norma, we know he was mistaken or lying about the "on ice" and "frozen" comments, so maybe he is again.

KR,
Vic.

No.They are not the same at all Vic.Both the terms "on ice" and "frozen" when read in the context of my quote ,are metaphors.They are not meant to be taken "literally".
Michael Sherrard"s statements refer to police fiddling with witness statements and altering what Hanratty said so that it made Hanratty look a liar when he was telling the truth.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Vic,

Quote:[Natalie Severn wrote]
We do now know after all that "witness statements" were "tampered with" when Hanratty was in police custody. Modern forensic hand-writing tests reveal that much of what the jury were told that Hanratty had lied about was true

Vic wrote: Wrong.

Then ,since this is what I have understood from Michael Sherrard"s recent biography and I have quoted what he said in a previous post, you,like Nick,are calling Michael Sherrard QC a liar? I see.

[Victor]

So you are accusing Michael Sherrard QC of lying ? He repeats his claim twice and it is in his summary.He suggests it would have made a great deal of difference as to whether Hanratty was acquitted or whether he was executed because he believes it showed Hanratty had told the truth "about much of what had been altered".

Well Norma, we know he was mistaken or lying about the "on ice" and "frozen" comments, so maybe he is again.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

Ok.Skillett was mistaken-

Hi Norma,

The rest of the evidence suggests that it was Blackhall who was mistaken.

Even when Margaret Thompson who lived in Avondale Crescent, Doreen Milne who had parked her identical Morris Minor directly opposite at 8.15 that day both back up Paddy Hogan by telling police the Morris Minor Murder Car was not there?

Why are you ignoring Doris Althoe?

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

The fragment of cloth was not kept in the recommended , bacteria free storage conditions at a lab in a South London police station for 31 years was it? Likewise the hanky kept at Bedford police station for even longer.
How can anyone therefore,in all good faith , say they know for certain that neither of these items were ever exposed to the type of contamination that could have given a most misleading result?

Hi Norma,

In the case of the knickers because 3 DNA profiles were detected - VS, MG and Hanratty - with no extra profile from the rapist, which leads to the conclusion that there was no contamination.

In the case of the hanky because James Hanratty's DNA profile was detected only in the areas of mucous staining and nowhere else, which means that either the contamination was impossibly selective, or there was no contamination.

We do now know after all that "witness statements" were "tampered with" when Hanratty was in police custody. Modern forensic hand-writing tests reveal that much of what the jury were told that Hanratty had lied about was true

Wrong.

Is it therefore so far fetched to be concerned about what might have happened to the fate of the two 40 year old pieces of cloth while in police custody?

Yes it is.

Will we ever be told who actually had access to them?

We have.

We know the pathologist in December 1961 obtained seminal fluid from Hanratty"s trousers through a wash and it seems quite likely this was put into the vial which was found broken and separated from its rubber plug in amongst the piece of cloth from the knickers that had been placed in a sealed brown envelope of which the edges had come free.So to me and others it seems as though that is one area where DNA could have seeped through onto other locker contents and given a false reading.

It is equally possible that the vial contained a sample from Peter Alphon.

We also know already that the hanky was actually handled by Hanratty and others at his trial.

Do we? In any case there was no contamination - see above.

I did have a link to the ban on LCN DNA testing which I will should be able to find tonight, re your question-but I am not in London so I dont have at hand various notes I made at the time, but I think I know which American sites I used and will check them out.What I recall is that in numbers of American States, the Courts of Appeal have been banned from using such LCN DNA test results as were used in the case of James Hanratty in 2002.

As I said before, the link you gave to Budowle's evaluation stated that LCN has evidential uses, although it is not yet admissible evidence in Court.

KR,
Vic.

[Natalie Severn]

Sherrard is wrong on this. There is no evidence anything was altered. The analysis showed that the same passages had been re-written - not different passages.

An innocent explantion is that Oxford was re-writing his notes more clearly before Acott and he had to copy the notes into their respective report books. Of course it is possible he altered them in doing so, but not definite.

This also only concerns the first interview in Blackpool. His continued denial of guilt is reported in the notes, so apart from the 'kip' reference I don't see what Sherrard thinks might have been altered.

So you are accusing Michael Sherrard QC of lying ? He repeats his claim twice and it is in his summary.He suggests it would have made a great deal of difference as to whether Hanratty was acquitted or whether he was executed because he believes it showed Hanratty had told the truth "about much of what had been altered".

[Natalie Severn]

Er...no, they do not negate eachother, one is a positive identification, the other says that identification is wrong, but they both can't be right so one of them is mistaken.

Ok.Skillett was mistaken-

The jury heard evidence that Trower's ID was questionable, but again that doesn't mean he is wrong.

Even when Margaret Thompson who lived in Avondale Crescent, Doreen Milne who had parked her identical Morris Minor directly opposite at 8.15 that day both back up Paddy Hogan by telling police the Morris Minor Murder Car was not there?
Kind Regards

Nats the Flatearther

[NickB]

Modern forensic hand-writing tests reveal that much of what the jury were told that Hanratty had lied about was true--- to quote Michael Sherrard QC on this matter :
"Hanratty would have been proved to have been telling the truth about much of what had been altered

Sherrard is wrong on this. There is no evidence anything was altered. The analysis showed that the same passages had been re-written - not different passages.

An innocent explantion is that Oxford was re-writing his notes more clearly before Acott and he had to copy the notes into their respective report books. Of course it is possible he altered them in doing so, but not definite.

This also only concerns the first interview in Blackpool. His continued denial of guilt is reported in the notes, so apart from the 'kip' reference I don't see what Sherrard thinks might have been altered.

[Natalie Severn]

Do I detect signs of dissension and disagreement amongst the ranks of the Jimdidnotdoites? We should not forget that it was Bob Woffinden and Jim's family's solicitors that wanted the DNA tests to exonerate Jim. Others in the Hanratty camp are now regretting that those tests were ever carried out. As mentioned above in an earlier (and well received) post of mine, the tests seem to have exonerated Pete Alphon and left Jim looking as guilty as sin in the minds of all right and fair thinking people.


Ron

While I believe Bob Woffinden has written a very well researched and presented book on the case , I doubt his understanding of the case ,in terms of the law , stood comparison with either Foot"s or Sherrard"s.Mansfield doesn"t appear to have been fully attentive on this one---IMHO.But I am rather impressed that you did not include Paul Foot, Ron.
Paul had always known full well the lengths they would go to defend themselves .So did Michael Sherrard QC.---who nevertheless played by the rules.

Best,
Loonybins

[RonIpstone]

Hello all

An interesting article at http://www.scientific.org/tutorials/...ley/riley.html.

Among some relevant quotes are:



Is this true of the original examination of the forensic evidence? Since DNA testing was far in the future, why would the people examining the evidence bother?





Note here the reference to thoroughly independent samples and also multiple, independent, non-communicating laboratories. Of course, by destroying the samples, FSS have made such necessary checks impossible...

DM

Do I detect signs of dissension and disagreement amongst the ranks of the Jimdidnotdoites? We should not forget that it was Bob Woffinden and Jim's family's solicitors that wanted the DNA tests to exonerate Jim. Others in the Hanratty camp are now regretting that those tests were ever carried out. As mentioned above in an earlier (and well received) post of mine, the tests seem to have exonerated Pete Alphon and left Jim looking as guilty as sin in the minds of all right and fair thinking people.


Ron