a6 murder

[Victor]

I am neither 'monumentally stupid' - 'unable to grasp things' - 'illogical' or a 'flat earther' - all of which have been aimed at me in recent days. Like Norma - I would like this excellent thread to get back on a civil and thought-provoking footing. Both camps are guilty of bringing the thread down and both camps need to reflect and think on.

Hi Julie,

I quite clearly said "borders on" and my motive for doing so was that it is easy to accuse anyone on the boards of being a sock-suppet of anyone else, but there's only one person who regularly posted to this thread and has been banned from the boards for doing so. The admin team are able to check the IP addresses of users and will happily tell you that Ron and myself are different users, I'm not so sure they can say the same about Reg - Steve S - Clive English - Derrick and uncle_adolph.

I could respond to the lovely Mastermind parady he posted - I was thinking along the lines of "Who's the A6 murderer? Peter Alphon - Wrong - But it was - No it wasn't - Yes it was - He's behind you"

The other major point that seems to have escaped recent posts, especially Norma's, is that Mr Nudds evidence has little bearing on Hanratty being the killer, however, he's the major contributor to the Alphon case, without him the case against Alphon is a non-starter.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

regarding the question of how DNA can disappear I am posting some links for you to study.The LCNDNA tests that were used on the 40 year piece of cloth have now been banned for use in Courts of Appeal throughout many American States.The method has been rejected because it is subject to so much
error
.http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0608182541.htm

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...7124555AAFg8aZ

Hi Norma,

Those links go to information on how bacteria can degrade DNA, they have no information whatsoever on how DNA can naturally degrade nor that LCN testing is banned in the States. Have you got a link that does refer to this because even Budowle accepts that LCN has investigatory uses.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

Re. your second point it might surprise you to know that there are just 4 posts of Norma's wherein she identified Langdale as Langland. On the other hand there are 21 posts of hers in which she correctly spells his name, in other words 84% of the time.

Hi James,

Lies, damn lies and statistics...

I seriously doubt there are only 4 posts where Norma makes that mistake, and of course I repeatedly pointed out the error which is why it was corrected.

Anyone with any intelligence would know who she meant by Langland anyhow.

In other words, we have to re-interpret or translate Norma's posts to correct them, and we should really know what she means to say instead of accepting what she writes!

I accept that we know who she is referring to when she says Langland, and that it is a simple trivial error, but it is one that is easily rectified.

It does remind me of the John "Mary" Kerr incident.

KR,
Vic.

[Graham]

Hi All,

The other major point that seems to have escaped recent posts, especially Norma's, is that Mr Nudds evidence has little bearing on Hanratty being the killer, however, he's the major contributor to the Alphon case, without him the case against Alphon is a non-starter.

Exactly, Vic. I don't think Sherrard was all that concerned about anything Nudds had to say, but would have been had he been defending Alphon. Nudds is a minor player in this.

Re: the DNA, I've never got involved in this debate because I am not qualified to do so. If a forensic biologist, fully qualified and competent in DNA analysis, came onto this thread and stated that there is a possibility the results in Hanratty's case are questionable, then I'd listen.

Re: sock-puppets, yes, there is a distinct odour of at least one on this thread at the moment, as I've said before. I wonder if it's possible to get Admin to run a check?

Graham

[Victor]

What I am saying is the hanky was not examined for any forensic evidence in 1961.Fact

Hi Norma,

Is that a fact? Where did you get it from?

The judgment says:-
As far as the handkerchief is concerned, it will be remembered that when first examined it was considered to be of no scientific interest. No blood or semen was detected.

If no blood or semen was detected then surely it was looked for.

This hanky panky hanky was kept for forty odd years in a drawer at Bedford police station.Hmmmn---perfect laboratory conditions to ensure lack of contamination you would all agree.

No, not perfect lab conditions, but happily it was protected from light and bacteria and enzymes, so no reason for the DNA to have degraded - I refer you to the Forensic Institute document regard degredation of DNA.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

IN36. On 11 September 1961 (some twenty days after the killing), two cartridge cases were found in room 24 at the Vienna Hotel, Sutherland Avenue, Maida Vale; it was later established scientifically that they had been fired from the murder weapon.

http://www.denverda.org/DNA_Documents/Hanratty.PDF

So – who is having trouble grasping things Ron??

Now - once again – I post my previous conclusions concerning the cartridge cases:

Hi Julie,

Are you going to reply to my comments regarding your repeated posting?

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

Three upstanding citizens identified Hanratty either at the scene or later in the murder car; they chose him from a line up as that man. None of them were gangsters. None had incentive or motive to lie.

No,they did not,Jen .You are mistaken here.

Hi Norma and Jen,

Jen is right Norma, they did pick Hanratty from a line-up, what you posted is mitigation for the selection, but they absolutely definitely did identify him.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

The fact that essentially the same test proved inconclusive one minute and determines Hantatty's guilt the next should sound alarm bells ringing to anyone who has a sensible bone in their body!

Hi Derrick,

Erm... the fact that one test gave inconclusive results and a more sensitive test yielded a result should not come as a surprise to anyone who has a sensible bone in their body!

This excludes the fact that the evidential sample wasn't stored in an ideal fashion for nigh on 30 years.

See my reply to Norma above - you, oops sorry, Reg posted a link to the Forensic Institute document which says that accepting DNA degredation is scientifically unacceptable. It requires an external trigger.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

Quite frankly we do not know where that fragment of cloth had been that was kept in conditions that would now be considered unacceptable.

Hi Norma,

I don't think that embalming a body and burying it for 4,000 years is an acceptable storage condition, but scientist can get DNA profiles from those. They can also get DNA profiles from blood spots on card stored at room temperature for 40 years too.

KR,
Vic.

[Victor]

I don't think Sherrard was all that concerned about anything Nudds had to say, but would have been had he been defending Alphon. Nudds is a minor player in this.

Absolutely Graham.

Re: sock-puppets, yes, there is a distinct odour of at least one on this thread at the moment, as I've said before. I wonder if it's possible to get Admin to run a check?

Yes it is, but I can't see the point because they'll only pop back up again under a new ID - better the devil you know.

KR,
Vic.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Norma,

Those links go to information on how bacteria can degrade DNA, they have no information whatsoever on how DNA can naturally degrade nor that LCN testing is banned in the States. Have you got a link that does refer to this because even Budowle accepts that LCN has investigatory uses.

KR,
Vic.

Hi Vic,
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?
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--- 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 page 103 "Wigs and Wherefores;A Biography of Michael Sherrard 2009 .
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?Will we ever be told who actually had access to them? 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.

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


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.
Best
Norma

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Norma and Jen,

Jen is right Norma, they did pick Hanratty from a line-up, what you posted is mitigation for the selection, but they absolutely definitely did identify him.

KR,
Vic.

Let us be clear here Vic.
Who are "they"?
Skillett did identify him.Blackhall did not.Therefore they negate each other.
Trower did identify him.But the jury accepted from the measurement demonstrations of the defence,that Trower could not have seen the driver in the way he claimed he had seen him .
Two witnesses from Avondale Crescent were never called---presumed to be part of Sherrard"s assertion that wickedness had taken place over certain "withheld evidence".
Valerie is the only other person who identified him and Valerie identified two men as her rapist,one was Michael Clark -who she thought looked like newspaper pictures of Alphon and the other was James Hanratty.
Yes,Vic,the hanky was subjected to tests but not DNA tests.

[Graham]

Can we please nail the identity parade business once and for all? On the first parade, Alphon was present but of course Hanratty was not, as he hadn't been arrested at that time. Crucially, Valerie did not recognise Alphon as the killer. Possibly she felt obliged to point out someone on the parade, and said that Clark was the man. She need not have picked out anyone. I repeat, the crucial thing here is that she did not recognise Alphon. On the other parade, after considerable deliberation, she identified Hanratty as the murderer. I see no grounds to accuse Valerie of being confused or unreliable. The simple fact is that when confronted with Hanratty, she recognised him.

And if she "thought Michael Clark looked like newspaper pictures of Alphon", then on the first parade she had the man himself in front of her to make a comparison.

Graham

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks Graham,
I didn"t say Valerie was confused.Quite right she did not pick out Alphon and she did pick out a man named Michael Clark-fact.She later said to Michael Sherrard at the trial that she agreed she had said the man "looked like a newspaper picture she had seen of Alphon".

Valerie took 20 minutes to identify Hanratty and again, according to experts in America they insist that instant recognition is considered to be by far the most accurate and reliable ---google "eye witness testimony" and see for yourself if you dont wish to take my word.
Voice identification is also not likely to be at all accurate when it consists of hearing just a five word sentence on an identity parade.
Why need voice confirmation if you are sure?

[RonIpstone]

I see no grounds to accuse Valerie of being confused or unreliable. The simple fact is that when confronted with Hanratty, she recognised him.

Hello Graham,

I think I might be with the Jimdidnotdoites (aka The Hanratty Appreciation Society, aaka the Flat Earthers) on this one.

The trouble is that on the first parade VS picked out the one most like the murderer as she felt she had to pick someone out. There must therefore be considerable suspicion that she approached the second parade in much the same way. If VS had been made aware that the last occupant of Room 24 of the Vienna was on the parade and that the suspect had dyed his hair (Barnet), added to the fact that Hanratty was the only (one of a few) Londoner on the parade and that he was in a state of extreme agitation, then it might not be too difficult for VS to make the identification of the prime suspect without having recognised him from the night of 22/23 August.

I do not accuse VS of any mala fides in this, but she must have wanted to catch the culprit and must have been subliminally influenced to identify the Police's prime suspect. Identification evidence is always suspect and VS's in this case must have been more suspect than most. In short, she guessed on the first parade and MAY have had a guess on the second parade, but her second guess was made more likely to succeed as the prime suspect stood out like a carrot etc.

Ron