A6 Rebooted

[Limehouse]

Hi Julie,

nice to see you back, even though the A6 Thread has, as it does periodically, 'gone circular'.

I couldn't agree more with what you say about posters (well, a poster) digging the dirt about Gregsten's past and medical problems. And in particular about calling Valerie a liar and describing her as a 'wretched woman' and her evidence as being 'a figment of her imagination'. This particular poster perhaps should re-read his own posts. She most certainly was not on trial for her morals. Such an approach doesn't advance by one jot the discussion of this perplexing case.

If I remember correctly Hanratty was described by one of the several medicos who examined him as having 'psychopathic tendencies', rather than being an out-and-out psychopath. We're in the middle of trying to put some order into our thousands of books in this house, so as soon as I can drop on my A6 books I'll check them again.

I hope you're keeping well and I look forward to further input from you.

Graham

Hi Graham,

Thanks for your comments.I cannot guarantee to stay around for long but, as I said in my post, it is nice to see so much interest in the case again.

The psychotic angle I introduced was just a thought. Hanratty seems to fit the psychotic profile so well - and it is an illness that comes and goes - it is not always with the sufferer.

I'll have a look through my books too to see what I can dig up.

Nice to chat with you again.

Julie

[Limehouse]

Anything which is sauce for the goose, is sauce for the gander. Moste at least understands that.

If you think that Hanratty was guilty then you have a predisposition towards double standards, and your concept of what is appropriate is more limited. Moste, on the other hand, does not believe Hanratty was guilty, and therefore he affords all the other players in this unfortunate drama the same scrutiny as the prosecution side does to Hanratty. I welcome his approach, even if the conclusions he draws do not always convince me.

We were asked to consider that Hanratty was acting under the influence of drugs. No one on this site took offence at this outlandish theory; rather it was accepted as a plausible motive for an inexplicable crime. Yet where is the evidence? Did anyone ever see Hanratty take Purple Hearts? Did anyone ever report him begging Dixie France for some Uppers before going on a job? No absolutely nothing. Purely idle conjecture. Did anyone, in his entire life, ever see James Hanratty with a gun? No. Yet we, on this site, were prepared to argue from that conjecture.

However the minute the same scrutiny regarding mental well being is asked of Gregsten, we are told this should be off limits. Why? Because he was a victim? That is not a good enough reason, not if we are seeking the truth. In any case James Hanratty may well have been a victim himself, and he has not been afforded the same protection. For all we know Gregsten’s mental state may have been central to what took place that night, so I am not prepared to support any voice which wants to close this debate down.

I want the debate to be opened up to try and shed some light on what actually took place. Was Gregsten on Purple Hearts or Uppers? Or Valerie Storie? Might that explain her confused statements? Is anyone offended by these questions? If so, no more than I would be if you ask them of Hanratty.

Hi Cobalt,

Well, I think it is well established that I believe Hanratty to have been not guilty of the A6 crime.

I am also prepared to believe that the strongest motive for the crime was relationship between MG and VS, mainly because Hanratty's recent friend, Louise Anderson, knew MG's brother-in-law and that brother-in-law later went on the have a long-established affair with MG's widow.

I personally doubt whether JH or MG were on drugs. Written evidence suggests they both had some degree of mental illness and may have been on medication for those conditions. Hanratty was known to be a non-smoker and a very moderate drinker (some medications prevent the taking of alcohol) and therefore, I doubt that he was taking illegal drugs. MG was a scientist so would have been well aware of the consequences of taking drugs. However, I do take the point that he seemed to be unnecessarily short of money.

I was not attempting to close down any debate or attribute any saintly qualities to the victims and devil-like qualities to the killer - I just think we should remember that the victims were not on trial and the consequences of the actions of the A6 attacker that night in terms of how the victims and their families were concerned were of a magnitude far in excess of their ill-fated liaison.

Have a good day everyone.

[Spitfire]

The facts as we know them point to James Hanratty being the murderer of Michael Gregsten and the person who raped and attempted to murder Valerie Storie.

The gun under the back seat of the bus, a favourite Hanratty hiding place for unwanted loot; the spent gun cartridge cases in Room 24 of the Vienna, a room in which Hanratty had slept the night before the crime and in which no one else had occupied between Hanratty's stay and the discovery of the cartridge cases; the identification evidence (even allowing for it being open to challenge);the undoubted lying over the alibi and the late disclosure of the Rhyl alibi; the results of the DNA tests which the Hanratty team had initially requested and finally the exhoneration of Peter Alphon (the suspect favoured by Foot and Woffinden) by Hanratty's counsel at the appeal, all the foregoing point to Hanratty being the murderer. The only real question being whether this amounts to proof beyond reasonable doubt. Anyone living in the real world would regard that summary of evidence as laying a case against Hanratty.

Yet for the pro-Hanratty lobby this will not do. It is almost an article of faith that Hanratty did not do it. Therefore there must be facts which exculpate Hanratty, and if these cannot be found then they must be invented and invent them , the pro-Hanratty lobby will.

[Spitfire]

I am also prepared to believe that the strongest motive for the crime was relationship between MG and VS, mainly because Hanratty's recent friend, Louise Anderson, knew MG's brother-in-law and that brother-in-law later went on the have a long-established affair with MG's widow.

I take it you are not seriously suggesting that Bill Ewer murdered Michael Gregsten and raped Valerie Storie.

If Ewer wanted Gregsten dead (or scared), and Ewer knew Louise Anderson who knew Hanratty, then how does that get Hanratty off the hook?

[Spitfire]

For what it is worth, I do not think that Hanratty started the evening of 22 August 1961 with the intention of killing Gregsten or Storie. If murder and/or rape had been the intention then they would have been committed in the cornfield at Dorney. This was not the work of a professional killer. Who in their right mind would shoot someone sitting in the driving seat of a car which provided the only means of a get away? The murder occurred when Hanratty feared that Gregsten was going to attempt to over power him, and Hanratty discharged two shots into Gregsten's head. Once Gregsten was dead, Storie as the witness also had to die, and if he was going to kill her he might as well rape her, that was Hanratty's chain of thought.

We do not know why Hanratty was where he was that fatal August evening. Hanratty never told us. What we can be sure of is that he was not at Ingledene. The judge must have thought that the Rhyl alibi was pretty hopeless and told the jury that it was not for the defence to make out an alibi, it was for the prosecution to prove the case. Michael Sherrard must have agreed for he never sought to adduce any further evidence in support of the Rhyl alibi in the Court of Appeal.

[OneRound]

Fair enough.
We can be certain that we will never find out the question as to the murderer having a drug habit.
However we do know that Gregsten was being prescribed tranquilizers ,and I would put the case that it doesn't require much imagination to assume Gregsten will have visited every avenue available ,to alleviate the symptoms of this ,'severe mental disorder'
Since we know that there were alternatives to the run of the mill drug prescriptions available on the NHS. By putting two and two together ,Could it be why the man was always hard up for money?
People may well say 'documenting information with regards to Gregstens financial situation has nothing to do with his being murdered', but I say it may be central to it!

To be clear, there's no suggestion from me that Hanratty had ''a drug habit''. That though doesn't rule out him - or, if you prefer, the man who murdered Michael Gregsten - having taken drugs for the first time as an one-off on the day concerned.

Hanratty not having used drugs before does not mean he could not have had a first time that day. After all, things are most likely to go horribly wrong the first time used.

Some may equate the comments above with the gun. Having not used a gun before does not mean that Hanratty could not have used a gun that day. It needs to be borne in mind that every gun user has never used a gun until the first time he chooses to do so.

Lastly, if you really consider that Michael Gregsten's finances might be ''central'' to the events of that night you need to explain that with some reasoning. As mentioned before, your comments lack explanation and come across as muck raking rather than considered and reasonable speculation.

OneRound

[Graham]

Good post, OR.

My post re: availability of drugs around the time of the A6 was meant merely to point up the fact that things like amphetamines were available to anyone who wanted them. I also referred to JH's frequenting Soho clubs where drugs (and lots of other things) were available. But I didn't state nor even suggest that he was actually shooting stuff, but Moste seems to have gone off with this idea.

Is Moste actually suggesting that Gregsten's 'financial situation' meant that he too was taking drugs? And if he was, so what? It seems to me that Moste grabs an idea and then runs away with it, until something else comes along - not so long ago he was claiming that Gregsten and Storie were on LSD! Now he's saying that it was Gregsten's financial difficulties that led to his being brutally murdered. Moste, to make such speculative suggestions and to be taken seriously does suggest, to me at least, that you really should offer some background support and explanation, as One Round requests. So let's hear it, please.

Spitfire's recent posts summarise most succinctly, for me at least, what those of who who accept JH's guilt actually believe. particularly this paragraph:

Yet for the pro-Hanratty lobby this will not do. It is almost an article of faith that Hanratty did not do it. Therefore there must be facts which exculpate Hanratty, and if these cannot be found then they must be invented and invent them , the pro-Hanratty lobby will.

Graham

[OneRound]

Thanks, Graham.

I also identify strongly with Spitfire's recent posts.

Best regards,

OneRound

[Sherlock Houses]

First instalment in an occasional [or perhaps regular] series.....

Some penetrating questions an enquiring and impartial newcomer might ask herself/himself concerning the A6 Murder case [all pertaining to the week following the murder].........

1] Why does Valerie Storie's identi-kit photo look so strikingly like the first suspect Peter Alphon and absolutely nothing like James Hanratty ?

2] Why is Valerie Storie's initial description of the murderer's hair, 'STRAIGHT, WELL-GREASED, DARK BROWN, BRUSHED STRAIGHT BACK, SLIGHTLY RECEDING AT TEMPLES ' so uncannily accurate for Peter Alphon ?

3] Why did Peter Alphon go into HIDING for five days immediately following the murder ?

4] Why did Valerie Storie make no mention of the icy-blue colour of the murderer's eyes until August 28th if his eyes were his most impressionable feature ?

5] Why did Superintendent Richard Morgan just hours after the discovery of the murder state on camera that the killer had BROWN eyes ?


Believable answers please [no B.S. permitted] on an E-Postcard.......

[Spitfire]

Some penetrating questions an enquiring and impartial newcomer might ask herself/himself concerning the A6 Murder case [all pertaining to the week following the murder].........

There again the enquiring and impartial newcomer might take the word of Hanratty's counsel at the 2002 appeal that the murder had nothing to do with Alphon.

[Derrick]

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There again the enquiring and impartial newcomer might take the word of Hanratty's counsel at the 2002 appeal that the murder had nothing to do with Alphon.

That leaves SH's points 4 & 5 mate.

[Derrick]

Oh and #1 while we at it.

(Irrespective of culpability)

[Spitfire]

According to Woffinden (page 50) VS never at any stage said the killer had brown eyes.

Her statement of 28 August seems to be the first recorded mention of 'blue eyes', so either she mentioned the eye colour and it was not recorded or she did not mention it.

The logical explanation is that from her hospital bed, Miss Storie had formulated a plan to implicate James Hanratty and exculpate the real murderer, Peter Alphon, possibly only known to her as Frederick (Freddie) Durrant. The reasons for this are not entirely clear, but that it happened is clear beyond peradventure. The clever part of this scheme is that Miss Storie gave a description of Alphon, or Durrant as he would undoubtedly have been known to her, to Mackle when he was preparing the photofit. So if anyone challenged Miss Storie with the allegation that she was seeking to protect Alphon, she could say with a certain degree of conviction, "But I have given an exact description which produces an exact likeness of Durrant." and thus the charge would not stick.

What is strange is why Woffinden says she didn't change her description, and why Mansfield says Alphon had nothing whatever to do with the murder. No doubt all these questions will be answered in the new appeal which is due to be made in the early part of 2011

[Sherlock Houses]

Appallingly unbalanced and distorted.....

I'd been aware of but never actually seen the 2002 documentary "Hanratty : The whole truth". Until today.
Considering that somebody uploaded it onto Youtube over a year ago I'm surprised that no-one on these boards seems to have spotted it or drawn other posters attention to it.
I sat through it all with great patience. It requires great patience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHtn2VF7aUI

[Graham]

No doubt all these questions will be answered in the new appeal which is due to be made in the early part of 2011

Definitely, just as soon as the time machine has been delivered by its Chinese manufacters. Can't wait.

Graham