A6 Rebooted

[Graham]

Hanratty burgled a house on 12 August in Harrow, and amongst his loot was a pair of gold cuff-links having the initial 'E' on them. What a coincidence!

However, another small illustration of how JH wove into his alibi's bits of real events that had occurred in the past.

Graham

[Alfie]

The Morris Minor's exhaust

Trower told the Sunday Times (Dec 1966) that his attention was drawn to the passing Morris Minor because of the noise it made: "I noticed it because it had such a loud exhaust – a modified rally job – without that it wouldn’t have struck me."

Hawser, presumably drawing on Trower's statement to police, reports that “His attention was particularly drawn to it by the way in which the driver changed down making a noise like that of a racing car.”

Trower also told the court at Bedford that the MM made a noise “like a racing car”.

Valerie in her evidence said she dissuaded the gunman from putting Gregsten in the boot of the MM by saying he would be endangered by fumes, because the exhaust had a split or a hole in it.

It seems a very obvious thing for the police to have checked: did the MM have a modified exhaust, or a hole in the exhaust which would make the Morris sound like a racing car? If either was the case, wouldn’t this have bolstered Trower’s evidence considerably? Does anyone know if the police in fact did such a check?

[moste]

Trower told the Sunday Times (Dec 1966) that his attention was drawn to the passing Morris Minor because of the noise it made: "I noticed it because it had such a loud exhaust – a modified rally job – without that it wouldn’t have struck me."

Hawser, presumably drawing on Trower's statement to police, reports that “His attention was particularly drawn to it by the way in which the driver changed down making a noise like that of a racing car.”

Trower also told the court at Bedford that the MM made a noise “like a racing car”.

Valerie in her evidence said she dissuaded the gunman from putting Gregsten in the boot of the MM by saying he would be endangered by fumes, because the exhaust had a split or a hole in it.

It seems a very obvious thing for the police to have checked: did the MM have a modified exhaust, or a hole in the exhaust which would make the Morris sound like a racing car? If either was the case, wouldn’t this have bolstered Trower’s evidence considerably? Does anyone know if the police in fact did such a check?

Watch and carefully listen to the two interviews of Trower and Hogen by newspaper reporters on YouTube from 1962.Then, please come back and explain why you would give any credibility at all to anything Trower had to say ?unbiased as you can be. The question as to why Trowers attention was drawn to the M M ?
Not , why was Trowers attention drawn to the driver of a MM?
Trower needed a reason to be in on the act! Noisy car, was the best he could come up with.
Modified exhaust, 'for crying out loud' ,it was his mother's/aunts vehicle. Gregsten couldn't even get to the bottom of his petrol gauge problem, so much so he had to log his miles carefully so that he didn't run out of gas.
The Trower and Blackhall witnesses though, give us a break Alfie.

[Alfie]

The documentary you allude to aired in 1966, not 1962.

I'm thinking it might pay to append "Sensible replies welcomed" to the end of my posts.

[Spitfire]

The documentary you allude to aired in 1966, not 1962.

I'm thinking it might pay to append "Sensible replies welcomed" to the end of my posts.

Hi Alfie,

This is how Hawser summarised the Trower/Hogan evidence. It seems that Hogan did not do too well in the witness box which might have given additional weight to Trower's evidence. It is not unexpected that in the pro-Hanratty Panorama programme Trower looks shifty and unreliable and Hogan the exact opposite, whereas in the trial itself the roles could have been reversed.

On reading what Hawser has to say it seems that Trower was saying that the gear change caused the engine to race like a racing car.

[NickB]

I also thought Hogan looks more reliable on Panorma - but when you consider what he actually says it is not impressive. The interviewer does not pick him up on the changes he made since giving evidence – namely giving a different car colour, and saying in court he did not see the driver.

As Trower reported his sighting to the police at the time it is difficult to see how he got the date wrong. Hogan gives no coherent reason for disputing the date, just says he knows it is wrong. Then he goes on to say: “Well I don’t go on dates a lot, I never have done. I go from day to day as regards working conditions, but on this particular morning ... um I don’t remember the exact date, but I do know that I was waiting at the door to go to work.”

I wonder if some time after the event Trower and Hogan fell out and this was part of a feud between them.

[moste]

I also thought Hogan looks more reliable on Panorma - but when you consider what he actually says it is not impressive. The interviewer does not pick him up on the changes he made since giving evidence – namely giving a different car colour, and saying in court he did not see the driver.

As Trower reported his sighting to the police at the time it is difficult to see how he got the date wrong. Hogan gives no coherent reason for disputing the date, just says he knows it is wrong. Then he goes on to say: “Well I don’t go on dates a lot, I never have done. I go from day to day as regards working conditions, but on this particular morning ... um I don’t remember the exact date, but I do know that I was waiting at the door to go to work.”

I wonder if some time after the event Trower and Hogan fell out and this was part of a feud between them.

To notice a face' full on' in a split second as the person drives by in a car (as Paul foot has pointed out,)(without the prompting of someone that' Hey your going to need to remember this face at a future moment in time' )
and then, pick out a person in a lineup 3 weeks later is ridiculous beyond belief.
Any untainted jury member would have considered this piece of prosecution evidence as absolutely ludicrous,
As for the Hogan/Trower relationship, I got the impression that they were only ever work associates, and incidentally thinking about it Hogan had absolutely no reason to challenge Trowers recollections, if they had had fallen out would he not have simply said 'no comment', I mean, why cause a rift? No I'm convinced Hogan pretty much had it right, and he wanted to thwart Trowers efforts because he knew the kind of person he was.

[Graham]

Trower told the Sunday Times (Dec 1966) that his attention was drawn to the passing Morris Minor because of the noise it made: "I noticed it because it had such a loud exhaust – a modified rally job – without that it wouldn’t have struck me."

Trower must have changed his tune, because originally he said that his attention was drawn to the car by its driver crunching the gears. No mention as far as I can tell that in his original evidence he referred to noise from the exhaust. He did, however - as we all know - pick out Hanratty on an i.d. parade.

Graham

[propatria27]

Fingerprints in the MM

I have just been re-reading Four Days in November by Vincent Bugliosi, about the assassination of John F Kennedy, and I saw an interesting footnote on page 163 of the paperback edition (2007) concerning the murder of officer J.D Tippit:

"In working with the Los Angeles Police Department when I was with the Los Angeles district attorney's office, I learned that approximately only 30% of the times that fingerprint experts are dispatched to the scene of a crime are they able to secure clear, readable, latent prints belonging to anyone. In most cases the prints found are just too fragmentary, smudged (Tippet's car), or superimposed with other prints to be used for comparison with fingerprint exemplar of someone (here, Oswald) taken at a police station. Indeed, even in those cases where readable prints are secured, only 10% of the time do those prints match up to those of a suspect. The rest belong either to the victim or to some third party. A simple equation:10% of 30% equals 3%. Hence, in only 3% of the times that fingerprint experts go to a crime scene are they able to secure the latent prints of the accused. 97% of the time they are unsuccessful. As a prosecutor I would present this "negative fingerprint testimony" from my expert, and I found it to be a powerful statistical rebuttal to the common defense argument that since the defendant's prints were not found at the scene, he was never there".

So it seems that, whoever was the gunman/rapist, there was only a very small chance that fingerprints would have helped convict him. Which may also explain why no prints from the perpetrator were found in the MM.

Pete

[Sherlock Houses]

To notice a face' full on' in a split second as the person drives by in a car (as Paul foot has pointed out,)(without the prompting of someone that' Hey your going to need to remember this face at a future moment in time' )
and then, pick out a person in a lineup 3 weeks later is ridiculous beyond belief.
Any untainted jury member would have considered this piece of prosecution evidence as absolutely ludicrous,

Ridiculously ludicrous I would say, Moste. Especially bearing in mind that Skillett and Trower had forgotten all about the incidents with Morris Minors they claimed to have witnessed. It wasn't until the Thursday, a full 24 hours later, that their memories were jogged when questioned by the plod. Then, magically, more than 7 weeks later, these paragons of virtue were able to pick out Hanratty from an Identification Parade. Trower picked out Hanratty within a matter of seconds, lol. Skillett in his trial evidence claimed to have had sleepless nights for several weeks after his encounter with the Morris Minor as the image of the driver's face kept popping into his mind, lol.

With reference to Trower's performance in the 1966 Panorama documentary, I dare say a body language expert would have a field day with all that nose touching.

[Alfie]

Hawser report

On p.393 when talking about the Hawser report, Woffinden wonders whether its author did in fact read past page 1 of the transcript of Valerie's Sept 11 1961 interview with Acott. He asserts the following: "If he had done, he was bound to notice a number of startling evidential points: the reiteration of her doubts; the reinforcement of the fact that she didn’t think the gunman’s name was ‘Jim’; the disparities about the roadworks evidence; the fact that the ‘done the lot’ evidence was not based on witness testimony and was effectively faked; et cetera. None of this, however, was addressed by Hawser in his report."

When he says the 'done the lot' evidence wasn't based on witness testimony and was effectively faked, what does he mean - that Valerie didn't say the gunman had used that expression?

[Spitfire]

When he says the 'done the lot' evidence wasn't based on witness testimony and was effectively faked, what does he mean - that Valerie didn't say the gunman had used that expression?

Hi Alfie, I think Woff deals with this argument on pp 249-250 of his book. Woff accepts that the gunman used the phrase “i’ve done the lot” but that that was in answer to a question posed by Gregsten and Storie as to what else, apart from housebreaking, had the gunman done.

In that context “I’ve done the lot” would be unlikely to mean “I’ve served a full prison term without any remission” which was the meaning sought to be attributed to it by the prosecution.

[Alfie]

Thanks Spitfire. The way Woffinden frames the phrase, it is open to a different interpretation. But wouldn't Sherrard have challenged the prosecution's interpretation in court if Valerie had in fact taken Hanratty's statement to mean he'd "done the lot" in terms of crimes?

Another query: The petition calling for a reprieve handed in to the Home Office by Hanratty senior on March 28 1962 - Foot says it contained 90,000 names; Woffinden says 23,000. Who's correct?

[Spitfire]

Thanks Spitfire. The way Woffinden frames the phrase, it is open to a different interpretation. But wouldn't Sherrard have challenged the prosecution's interpretation in court if Valerie had in fact taken Hanratty's statement to mean he'd "done the lot" in terms of crimes?

Another query: The petition calling for a reprieve handed in to the Home Office by Hanratty senior on March 28 1962 - Foot says it contained 90,000 names; Woffinden says 23,000. Who's correct?

Sherrard would undoubtedly have challenged the prosecutions interpretation of "done the lot". Woff's gripe is that this aspect was not considered by Hawser, a gripe which does have some substance.

As to the petition there seems to have been at least 23,000 signatures and possibly more, whether there was another 67,000 is probably questionable.

[Graham]

Reference the execution of Ruth Ellis in 1955, the Home Office received a petition for clemency containing over 50000 signatures, even though Ruth Ellis made it publicly known that she did not wish for a reprieve. I recall much public sympathy expressed for Ruth Ellis in the media, and relatively little for Hanratty at the time. Obviously the cases were very different, and equally obviously there was a general feeling of revulsion at the hanging of a woman.

There were surprisingly few campaigners against capital punishment, and the generally curious, outside Bedford Prison at Hanratty's execution, but a very large crowd gathered outside Holloway at the time of Ruth Ellis's. A rough measure, perhaps, of the public feeling regarding the two cases.

From what I've read, the Home Office gave very little or no consideration to public petitions for a reprieve in any event.

Graham