A6 Rebooted

[Graham]

[QUOTE=NickB;377668]Graham,

At the committal Sherrard asked Nudds on what date he left the Vienna. Nudds replied 12-Sep, and Sherrard made great play of it being the day after the discovery of the cartridge cases. This exchange seems to be what Woffinden bases his story on about how Crocker sacked Nudds and Snell on the same day as discovering the cartridge cases.

Hmmmm....Woffinden, Foot and Miller all have Nudds being sacked by Crocker prior to his inspection of the hotel and the discovery of the cases on Monday 11 September. Woffinden and Foot have Nudds then begging to be allowed to stay one more night, to which Crocker agreed. Surely all three writers can't be wrong about the date Nudds left the Vienna? And Nudds too stated it was the 12th (probably about the only honest statement he ever made...).

So either the Nudds were at the Vienna when Crocker visited on the 11th, or they weren't. If they weren't there, how come Crocker said he allowed them to stay one more night?

If Sherrard didn't pursue Nudds' telling the prosecution that he had left the Vienna on the 5th, then he either didn't think it important or missed it. For my money, the Nudds were at the Vienna on the 12th when Crocker called, and left on the 13th.

Like I said, the whole Vienna Hotel Saga is difficult to get one's head around...well, mine at least.

Graham

[NickB]

Just to correct a point in my previous post, the prosecution (McDermott) did not keep Nudds in the witness box and ask him the question, but called him back the following day 28-Nov-61.

This is what is reported:

Mr Nudds told Mr McDermott that he left his job at the hotel at midday on September 5 and not on September 12 as he stated yesterday.

As such a statement could have been tested by the defence, I do not think the prosecution would have done this unless it was true.

I have already shown (with the reason for Valerie Storie giving her evidence in camera) that Woffinden did not thoroughly examine reports of the committal. I think someone (Foot?) read the 27-Nov reports of Nudds questioning and did not notice the amendment the following day, then the other writers copied.

[Graham]

I have already shown (with the reason for Valerie Storie giving her evidence in camera) that Woffinden did not thoroughly examine reports of the committal. I think someone (Foot?) read the 27-Nov reports of Nudds questioning and did not notice the amendment the following day, then the other writers copied.

Well, Foot was certainly the first of the three writers on the Case that I mentioned. How odd no-one spotted it before - well done Nick! However, I have to say that given Nudds' reputation as a congenital liar when it suited him, it's still by no means certain what day he did leave the Vienna. I suppose that in real terms it probably makes zero difference to the case as a whole.

Graham

[NickB]

Given the manner in which this was done, it appears to be McDermott using Nudds to make a prosecution point. I see it as a simple factual correction. As you say it makes little difference, and thereby McDermott had little to gain. But he would have looked foolish if Crocker and Galves then went into the witness box and disputed it.

[NickB]

The entire 'Vienna Hotel Thing' is, to my mind at least, possibly the most complex and perplexing chapter in the whole A6 Case.

There is an intriguing passage in the Appeal (section 166) where Mansfield suggests the mysteries of the Vienna can be explained by the police attempt to frame Alphon.

It does appear that at the time of his second statement Nudds thought the police wanted him to finger Alphon, but I think it is more complicated than that.

A good starting point is Snell’s claim that ‘Durrant’ phoned her at 11am and made a direct booking for one night. She must have confused him with someone else. I think this for two reasons:

1. In his 27-Aug statement Alphon said that he went to the Broadway House first and was diverted to the Vienna. I think it unlikely he made this up.

2. I am not aware of Alphon booking anywhere for one night. His modus operandi was to keep his leaving date a moving target in case he wanted to slip out without paying.

Galves 13-Sep statement raises certain questions, all arising out of an assumption that Alphon did call at 11am. The most pertinent question was: Why does the diary say he paid a deposit?

The police then put these questions to Nudds which he was able to use as a framework for his second statement. He claims that after the 11am phone call he wrote in the diary 'Mr Durrant, one night’ and then added ‘Deposit £1.7.6.’ when Alphon arrived. I notice in the statement there is no full stop after ‘night’.

I suggest what happened is that when Alphon arrived (at 11.30pm) he was confronted by the Vienna policy of demanding payment up front. Not wanting to be specific about a leaving date, he arranged to pay for one night which could be regarded as a deposit. Nudds then made a single entry ‘Mr Durrant, one night Deposit £1.7.6.’

Or perhaps Mansfield is right, and the records were altered.

[cobalt]

Was it still common for ‘stick up men’ to use a handkerchief to hide their face by the early 1960s? The fact a handkerchief can be carried easily in a jacket pocket and with no obvious criminal intent makes it a useful tool for the armed robber. Nowadays, if CCTV on Crimewatch is anything to go by, it seems lowered baseball caps and hoodies are the robber’s preferred sartorial choice. But there was a period when the masked stocking was widely used in the U.K, so that even in 1961 I suspect that employing a handkerchief would have been very Tom Riley from The Blue Lamp.

There is always this discrepancy in the A6 case, of a criminal heavily tooled up with ammunition, who goes on to commit murder, but who in all other respects seems devoid of any plan which would have made it necessary to carry a firearm in the first place.

To return to the handkerchief; it seems likely that the murderer must have removed it once he was in the back seat of the car. He smoked cigarettes during some parts of the journey, and presumably would have not have worn it when the car was being filled up with petrol, which was done by an attendant in those days. Presumably he felt confident he would not be easily recognized in the bad light, so long as he made sure the couple kept their eyes to the front. It also suggests it was not his initial intention to use the firearm to wound or kill.

[moste]

A couple of other strange bits in Woffinden that I do not think have been mentioned before.

- When describing how Acott and Oxford visited Hanratty's parents on 26th September (page 101) asking about Hanratty's whereabouts, Woffinden says:
"James and Mary were, of course, unable to assist in any way, not having heard from him since early July."
But they must have received the postcards from Ireland; Woffinden says Anderson received hers on 11th September.

- Woffinden asks (page 149) about Storie's evidence at the committal:
"Why, at a public hearing, was this crucial part of evidence suddenly held in camera?"
He does not realise this was done at the special request of Sherrard.

[Sherrard: “It is clear that some portions of her evidence may well be the subject matter of legal argument as to its admissibility in due course. Such arguments could prejudice the events if it was published before the trial. On these grounds my application is that her evidence ought to be taken in camera.” The application was granted.]

Read all of Woffindens sentences on this in camera issue, and you will see ,he is not nessesarily unaware that Sherrard called for the evidence to be given in camera. Woffingden goes on to acknowledge the reason given for the need for privacy, mentioning that it may have been seen by many as more dirty tricks on Hanratty. Picking up on partial wording of paragraphs , does no one any good, and casting aspersions on the works of the likes of Bob Woffindens I feel is futile .As for the Acott/Oxford visit to Hanratty,s parents home , you need to read between the lines here ,of course they had heard from James since July but they would have had an urgent need to talk to their son before the police got to him.

[Spitfire]

Read all of Woffindens sentences on this in camera issue, and you will see ,he is not nessesarily unaware that Sherrard called for the evidence to be given in camera. Woffingden goes on to acknowledge the reason given for the need for privacy, mentioning that it may have been seen by many as more dirty tricks on Hanratty. Picking up on partial wording of paragraphs , does no one any good, and casting aspersions on the works of the likes of Bob Woffindens I feel is futile .As for the Acott/Oxford visit to Hanratty,s parents home , you need to read between the lines here ,of course they had heard from James since July but they would have had an urgent need to talk to their son before the police got to him.

The evidence was given in camera was because Sherrard asked on behalf of Hanratty for it to be given in camera. It was not given in camera for the reason given by Woffinden.

By the by, any luck in finding an answer to the question who drove the Morris Minor from Deadman's Hill, if not the murderer?

[Alfie]

Absolutely untrue.Graham we have clear and unequivocal evidence stating the exact contrary to your assertion here by none other than the very senior Scotland Yard Detective Roger Matthews who was appointed by the Home Office in 1996 on the advice of Scotland Yard to oversee and study all the files they had at their disposal and which clearly included this crucial information and Matthews having the true facts on this at his disposal says : he Hanratty] bore not the remotest resemblance to the man [Michael Clark ] she had identified (wrongly, of course) at the Alphon parade.

Hi Natalie

Is the underlined portion a direct quote, or have you added the words contained in the parentheses? If you have, would you kindly desist from doing so in future, please? It's hard enough trying to make sense of this case without trying to unbundle the facts from posters' contributions.
Thx.

ps: a piece of friendly advice - it also wouldn't hurt if you (and a couple of other posters too) took a little more care with your punctuation. If you did it would make it considerably easier to grasp the (often good) points you're trying to make.

Thx in advance

Alfie

[Alfie]

Michael Clark

Attached is Basil Acott's description of Michael Clark. It is an extract taken from page 174 of his notebook. You will notice how he has emphasised Clark's dark eyes feature by underlining it. Acott made sure he didn't slip up at the Bedford trial by leaking to the court, jury and judge the fact that Michael Clark was dark-eyed.

Presume that's Clark's rank and serial number at the top of the image. Wouldn't the Air Force (?) have had on file somewhere a record of his height, weight, eye colour, etc if Sherrard had thought it worthwhile seeking out these details?

[Alfie]

Surely Alphon would never have been a suspect if there was a reliable description of her attacker as blue-eyed almost from day one? How did Alphon end up being a suspect if he did not fit the description, even if his behaviour was odd?

And more to the point, if Clark resembled Alphon rather than Hanratty, how did the description of the attacker change so radically after Clark had been selected?

One possible reason: Acott, with PLA in his sights, had been treating VS’s description as unreliable, coloured perhaps by the trauma she’d undergone; once the ID parade was over he went back to square one and began taking more notice of what VS had said. Just a thought.

[Alfie]

I don't buy the idea that she 'had to select someone'. That's nonsense. This was a murder, rape and attempted murder investigation. You simply cannot have people being identified just because the victim felt obliged to pick someone!

Hard to say until you've been in VS's position I reckon. If Acott was sure PLA was his man and had conveyed that confidence to VS it's quite feasible that she'd feel she "had to select someone" - or risk ruining the police's investigation and allowing the killer to go free.

[Alfie]

No one seems to want to answer my queries but, ho-hum, I'll try another anyway.

Foot (p.128 of the hardback) says: "In Nov 1966, the BBC Panorama programme, after an interview with Mr Trower, restaged the drive of the car down Redbridge Lane. The viewer saw the same view of the driver which Trower said he saw. All that could be seen of the driver during this restaging was a dull blur."

I've watched the Youtube version of this programme and nowhere in it does this restaging take place. Has the Youtube version been edited, or is Foot confusing it with another TV programme? If so, which one?

[Spitfire]

No one seems to want to answer my queries but, ho-hum, I'll try another anyway.

Foot (p.128 of the hardback) says: "In Nov 1966, the BBC Panorama programme, after an interview with Mr Trower, restaged the drive of the car down Redbridge Lane. The viewer saw the same view of the driver which Trower said he saw. All that could be seen of the driver during this restaging was a dull blur."

I've watched the Youtube version of this programme and nowhere in it does this restaging take place. Has the Youtube version been edited, or is Foot confusing it with another TV programme? If so, which one?

I don't know whether it has been edited. Foot on page 249 of his book describes the Panorama production as being "..a full-length (fifty-minute) programme on the case." Whereas the running time on Youtube is 43.25 minutes.

I suspect that it is Foot's recollection that is at fault here. A similar thing happened with regards to Foot's recollection of Charlie Jones's (AKA White) contribution to the programme. Foot has it that the young man getting of the bus in Rhyl asked for the man (Terry Evans) by his "Christian name" (see page 250). This is not the whole truth. According to Charlie Jones the young man specifically asked for "Terry". However, in August 1961 (and until half way through the trial) Hanratty knew Terry Evans only as "John".

If Foot had been honest, he would have (of, if you prefer the new style of English) said that Hanratty could not have (of) asked for Terry, as he did not know anyone called Terry in Rhyl.

[Alfie]

So there is somebody out there ... cheers Spitfire.

I must say I'm finding quite a few little errors and omissions that are helpful to JH's case as I work my way through Foot again. He wasn't going to let (all) the facts get in the way of a good story.