a6 murder

[jimarilyn]

Did Michael Gregsten take out a life insurance policy ?

Hi,

I remember reading (it may have been in Woffinden's book, which I haven't got to hand) something to the effect that Michael Gregsten had some kind of feeling that maybe he should be dead. If this is true (Gregsten it seems suffered from bouts of depression from time to time) I wonder if he took out life insurance cover ? I don't believe for one moment that Janet Gregsten had anything to do with her husband's murder, but maybe a very interested 3rd party (watching the unfolding marital situation of the Gregsten's) did.

Maybe this very interested 3rd party (WE can guess who I'm sure) knew that this life insurance policy would pay out very handsomely to the widow in the event of "unlawful death". Knowing all this, and with ulterior motives in mind, perhaps this 3rd party devised a foolproof plan to get rid of the cheating husband (with a ready made, expendable "patsy" set up to take the blame). This plan would involve the services of 4 or 5 others (including the gunman) who would all be paid an agreed sum of money.

The gunman, however ,was a bit of a chancer (in more ways than one) and became dissatisfied with his share. Blackmail had now entered the equation and further sums of money were demanded in return for his continued silence...............

Simplistic, fanciful, unfounded ?

[P.L.A]

Blackmail

Greetings one and all

It’s difficult to envisage a scenario in which a person that has committed capital murder is in any position to blackmail anybody.

Why doesn’t Kerr mention Burton in any of his interviews?

Peter

[jimarilyn]

Greetings one and all

It’s difficult to envisage a scenario in which a person that has committed capital murder is in any position to blackmail anybody.

Why doesn’t Kerr mention Burton in any of his interviews?

Peter

Hi,

Maybe a bit of a glory seeker, I don't know. His chance of 15 minutes of fame ? I didn't realise until I saw his photo on this thread that Sidney Burton was an elderly farm worker. Perhaps he didn't seek the limelight as much as an 18 year old might.

It's interesting to hear him say that Miss Storie was "pretty coherent" given her condition. He wrote down her description of the murderer on a piece of paper that conveniently went AWOL. Perhaps this description, given to Kerr when Storie's recall was at it's freshest, clashed too much with her later descriptions given to Basil Acott.

[P.L.A]

Our John

Greetings one and all

The glory seeking and self importance is what I’m getting at. In his interviews he appears to like giving the impression that he was the first on the scene, and as I said, airbrushes Burton from history.

Anyway, with a name like that he would have been a prime candidate for the England cricket captaincy. That was in the days when the national team needed specially wide scorecards in order to get all the batsmens’ initials on.

He certainly wasn’t being groomed to go to east Barnsley Polytechnic to read pest control.

Peter

[jimarilyn]

Anyway, with a name like that he would have been a prime candidate for the England cricket captaincy.

Peter

Maybe his parents thought their son could lay claim to the throne of England and named him thus trying to upstage a certain Charles Philip Arthur George Windsor.

[jimarilyn]

Hi,

I assume that it was Burton who went for a Kerr and not the other way round.




PS. Why are the posting times on this site sometimes 2 hours ahead (of G.M.T) but mostly 3 hours ahead ? There's a mystery in itself.

[Limehouse]

Sorry, but what's all this nonsense about names? My husband is called Edward John Charles Oliver ******* (don't want to add my surname). This came about because his young parents were bullied into naming him after both of his gandfathers, his own father and a dead uncle. he certainly wasn't destined for Oxford. My own son is called Douglas Edward Bartholomew ******* after my father, his own father and the hospital that saved his (and my) life during birth. He went to good old ordinary Northampton University.

[dougie]

Hi,

I remember reading (it may have been in Woffinden's book, which I haven't got to hand) something to the effect that Michael Gregsten had some kind of feeling that maybe he should be dead. If this is true (Gregsten it seems suffered from bouts of depression from time to time) I wonder if he took out life insurance cover ? I don't believe for one moment that Janet Gregsten had anything to do with her husband's murder, but maybe a very interested 3rd party (watching the unfolding marital situation of the Gregsten's) did.

Maybe this very interested 3rd party (WE can guess who I'm sure) knew that this life insurance policy would pay out very handsomely to the widow in the event of "unlawful death". Knowing all this, and with ulterior motives in mind, perhaps this 3rd party devised a foolproof plan to get rid of the cheating husband (with a ready made, expendable "patsy" set up to take the blame). This plan would involve the services of 4 or 5 others (including the gunman) who would all be paid an agreed sum of money.

The gunman, however ,was a bit of a chancer (in more ways than one) and became dissatisfied with his share. Blackmail had now entered the equation and further sums of money were demanded in return for his continued silence...............

Simplistic, fanciful, unfoun
ded ?

No ,just plain ,old fashioned B.S.

[Graham]

Hi JM,

Re: Gregsten and life-insurance, he didn't know where the price of his family's next meal was coming from, let alone fork out for life-insurance. He had to sell his car (THE Morris Minor was his aunt's) and even his beloved piano to try and make ends meet.

Cheers,

Graham

[P.L.A]

Mr. X

It’s difficult to see how the A6 murderer could blackmail anybody over their involvement in the crime without literally jeopardising his own neck

If the murder was a collusion, then the most any other conspirator would be guilty of was non capital murder.

Mr X’s identity was revealed much later on a placard at Speakers Corner. The location made it impossible to initiate litigation.

Peter.

[P.L.A]

John and Val

How much reliability can be placed on John Kerr’s account of his conversation with Miss Storie?

“We picked up a man near Slough” – she actually did say that. Because of Kerr reporting this, the crime was known as the hitch-hiker murder for a few days, with motoring organisations advising drivers against picking thumbers up.

“…..I wrote down the number of the car and her name – I remember this especially, because she said to me, as I thought, that her name was Mary Storie.”

Don’t know where the breakdown in communication was, but if Valerie Storie didn’t know her own name, then her memory can’t be said to be too fresh at the time.

On the other hand, maybe Mr. Kerr misheard what she said, or possibly couldn’t take it in because of the circumstances. Could be that he knew her name was Valerie, but there was a slip of the tongue due to the pressure.

After all is said and done, this was an interaction between two people who were both probably in a state of shock to some degree or other.

In such circumstances, it isn’t beyond the bounds of credibility for his handwriting to be rather different from the norm, probably quite shaky, and for him to be confused over the details of events.

Two things are certain: they didn’t pick a hitch-hiker up and her name isn’t Mary Storie. But John Kerr told the world that Valerie said both of these things.

Peter

[Steve]

Hello Peter

My assessment of John Kerr is that he is a reliable individual, and I cannot think of any reason for him not telling the truth as accurately as he was able. He would have had nothing to gain from doing otherwise.

In Valerie’s confused state it is understandable that she related the story incoherently – it’s a miracle she survived the night. How she didn’t bleed to death I do not know. She can perhaps be forgiven for blurting things out in a rush, she can perhaps also be forgiven for lacking some eloquence under the circumstances. Do you agree?

John Kerr could very easily have misheard a mumbled ‘Valerie’ as ‘Mary’ because they both end in a similar sound, and by this time Miss Storie must surely have been very, very weak.

As for the shakiness or otherwise of Kerr’s handwriting that morning we wont know the answer to that until the missing document turns up, possibly in someone’s attic, maybe the grand-daughter of a long-retired Bedfordshire police officer.

Kind regards,
Steve

[Steve]

Most People Have Forgotten All About Hanratty

As an interesting aside, at a wedding yesterday, the church verger was an elderly gentleman by the name of Keith, who joined the Met in 1956 as a constable and was based in north London at the time of the A6 murder and specifically at Wembley police station which covered the Kingsbury area. Naturally I took the opportunity to ask him his recollections from that time but sadly other than remembering that the first suspect was released without charge he had no memory of the rest of the case. I had hoped that he might have been involved in some aspect of the A6 investigation, or even remembered the Hanratty family. If so he has completely forgotten about it!

Kind regards,
Steve

[jimarilyn]

Re. Panorama programme of November 7th 1966

Interesting article, especially the last paragraph.

[Steve]

Very interesting article, as you say ... especially the last paragraph ... even though five years had elapsed at the time of its writing.