A6 Rebooted

[Limehouse]

What about the friends he claimed to have stayed with in Liverpool - did they confirm that he stayed with them and took 2 days out to visit Rhyl?

Clearly Hanratty was expecting an alibi from friends in Liverpool. He told Acott on the phone that he would not give him their names because they bought stolen goods from him and others.

Regardless - he gave an account of his movements in Liverpool - including conversations - that were confirmed by other witnesses. Likewise - in Rhyl - people remembered details of conversations they had had with the man they identified as James Hanratty.

Another point is this. If Hanratty left the Vienna hotel with the intention of roaming out into the countryside to do a 'stick up' he clearly did not take his suitcase with him. It was his habit to leave suitcases with friends (Anderson and France) or at railway stations where he would hire a locker. Where di he leave his case that day? Are there any records of him booking a case in to a depositary at a station? Did the police or either legal team check at the most likely stations to see if a man of his description had desposited a case that day?

[Victor]

Clearly Hanratty was expecting an alibi from friends in Liverpool. He told Acott on the phone that he would not give him their names because they bought stolen goods from him and others.

Hi Julie,

Don't you think this is a tad suspicious? He was on trial for his life and wouldn't name a couple of people who were guilty of nothing more than a bit of fencing, surely his life was worth more than that IF he actually had been with them. The Rhyl aspect of this part of the alibi means he didn't even get to these people and therefore clearly demonstrates that he made a lot of details up or recounted a previous visit.

I don't understand why people say the Liverpool alibi wasn't a lie, just was supplemented by the Rhyl aspect, he provided details of the friends he allegedly stayed with &tc.

It was his habit to leave suitcases with friends (Anderson and France) or at railway stations where he would hire a locker. Where di he leave his case that day? Are there any records of him booking a case in to a depositary at a station? Did the police or either legal team check at the most likely stations to see if a man of his description had desposited a case that day?

Those are good questions, however, he was also in the habit of using a number of aliases and false addresses, so maybe the checks proved fruitless. Does anyone know how the left luggage offices in Euston and Paddington and other London stations operated in 1961? He mentions using those on a few occasions.

KR,
Vic.

[Limehouse]

Hi Julie,

Don't you think this is a tad suspicious? He was on trial for his life and wouldn't name a couple of people who were guilty of nothing more than a bit of fencing, surely his life was worth more than that IF he actually had been with them. The Rhyl aspect of this part of the alibi means he didn't even get to these people and therefore clearly demonstrates that he made a lot of details up or recounted a previous visit.

I don't understand why people say the Liverpool alibi wasn't a lie, just was supplemented by the Rhyl aspect, he provided details of the friends he allegedly stayed with &tc.


Those are good questions, however, he was also in the habit of using a number of aliases and false addresses, so maybe the checks proved fruitless. Does anyone know how the left luggage offices in Euston and Paddington and other London stations operated in 1961? He mentions using those on a few occasions.

KR,
Vic.

Hi Vic

I think some aspects of the Liverpool alibi were true in the sense that Hanratty went to Liverpool to sell some stolen property and intended to catch up with some old lags who he thought would be willing to buy the stuff. When he contacted Acott by phone after finding out he wanted for the A6 crimes this was the reason he used for not coming foward in person. He was worried that he and his friends would be looking at a five year stretch for theft and receiving because of their previous form. At this stage Hanratty had no idea that his role in the Hanratty investigation would go so far.

It is likely that Hanratty believed these men would come forward and back his story and when they didn't he fell back o to other witnesses such as the sweetshop lady and the man in the snooker hall. Hanratty explains his reasons for raising the Rhyl alibi so late during questioning at his trial but i don't have the books to hand righ now.

As for the suitcase thing - yes - he did use pseudonyms and that could account for why his suitcase was not traced. However - if it was deposited it must have been collected at some point. I can't imagine that it is still sitting there nearly fifty years later. If it was collected and identified I am sure that fact would have been used by the prosecution (even after the trial) and/or by the police to lend weight to their contention that Hanratty stayed south that night and ended up in a cornfield beside a Morris Minor.

[Graham]

JH certainly did know people in Liverpool, including one Terence McNally who never denied that he knew JH. McNally's home was searched by pilice the night of JH's arrest, so obviously he, JH, had mentioned McNally as a possible witness to his being in Liverpool on the night of 22 August. McNally was interviewed by Joe Gillbanks, and during this interview he declined to be very forthcoming, asking if JH refused to "open up", then why should he? I've always thouight this an odd thing to say, and to me it's another small but intriguing mystery in this weird case.

Gillbanks also interviewed one Francis Healey who had met JH in prison, but Gillbanks reluctantly admitted that there was nothing to indicate that JH may have stayed with Healey on the night of 22 August.

Names, but no supportive evidence. No proof.

Finally, something which just caught my eye - Trevor Dutton said that what jogged his memory about seeing JH in Rhyl was that he'd read, or heard, that JH had said in an interview that he'd tried to sell a watch to a man in Rhyl, and Dutton claimed that a young man had tried to do likewise. Unfortunately, JH never mentioned Rhyl at all in this context - what he did say was that he'd tried to sell a watch to man (Mr Kempt) in Liverpool.

Graham

[Limehouse]

Thanks Graham. That's very helpful

Yes - I thought the attempted selling of the watch happened in Liverpool. However he could have attempted to sell the watch in both places and a snooker hall might have been a good choice to find a buyer.

[Victor]

When he contacted Acott by phone after finding out he wanted for the A6 crimes this was the reason he used for not coming foward in person. He was worried that he and his friends would be looking at a five year stretch for theft and receiving because of their previous form. At this stage Hanratty had no idea that his role in the Hanratty investigation would go so far.

Hi Julie,

I can't agree with you there, Acott was investigating the A6 murder and not any other crime so Hanratty knew how deep the trouble he was in was. In either case why not mention Rhyl the first time he discovered the potential noose round his neck?

It is likely that Hanratty believed these men would come forward and back his story and when they didn't he fell back o to other witnesses such as the sweetshop lady and the man in the snooker hall.

Surely they could be impelled to appear, unless they had nothing relevent to say, which according to the Rhyl alibi, they don't.

Hanratty explains his reasons for raising the Rhyl alibi so late during questioning at his trial but i don't have the books to hand righ now.

That's the "I told one lie, and it snowballed" excuse.

As for the suitcase thing - yes - he did use pseudonyms and that could account for why his suitcase was not traced. However - if it was deposited it must have been collected at some point. I can't imagine that it is still sitting there nearly fifty years later. If it was collected and identified I am sure that fact would have been used by the prosecution (even after the trial) and/or by the police to lend weight to their contention that Hanratty stayed south that night and ended up in a cornfield beside a Morris Minor.

I'm sure the Left Luggage Offices would have had a Lost Property policy and probably disposed of anything left for a substantial time.

KR,
Vic.

[Natalie Severn]

Finally, something which just caught my eye - Trevor Dutton said that what jogged his memory about seeing JH in Rhyl was that he'd read, or heard, that JH had said in an interview that he'd tried to sell a watch to a man in Rhyl, and Dutton claimed that a young man had tried to do likewise. Unfortunately, JH never mentioned Rhyl at all in this context - what he did say was that he'd tried to sell a watch to man (Mr Kempt) in Liverpool.

Graham

I think you are mistaken here Graham.According to Paul Foot ,in his book,"Who killed Hanratty?",Mr Dutton was quite clear;in his statement he says it was during Hanratty"s trial and when he himself was in Rhyl , he read the reports that Hanratty had been trying to sell a gold watch in Liverpool.He also read that he had travelled from Liverpool to Rhyl .He said it was on his way back to Kinmel Bay that he wondered whether it could be the same man that had tried to sell him a gold watch outside Burtons in Rhyl High Street , on 23rd August 1961.Mr Dutton waited until he had checked his bank details and when he discovered he had been to the bank on the 23rd August ,the day Hanratty said he was in Rhyl, he decided to go to Abergele police and make his statement.
His statement is in police files in Scotland Yard yet he was not contacted by Superintendent Nimmo who had been given the job of conducting an inquiry into the Rhyl alibi in 1967 .In fact between February 1962 and May 1968 when the A6 committee put out an appeal for witnesses to come forward in Rhyl, Mr Dutton had heard nothing from anyone about the Hanratty case.

Norma

[RonIpstone]

I think you are mistaken here Graham.According to Paul Foot ,in his book,"Who killed Hanratty?",Mr Dutton was quite clear;in his statement he says it was during Hanratty"s trial and when he himself was in Rhyl , he read the reports that Hanratty had been trying to sell a gold watch in Liverpool.He also read that he had travelled from Liverpool to Rhyl .He said it was on his way back to Kinmel Bay that he wondered whether it could be the same man that had tried to sell him a gold watch outside Burtons in Rhyl High Street , on 23rd August 1961.Mr Dutton waited until he had checked his bank details and when he discovered he had been to the bank on the 23rd August ,the day Hanratty said he was in Rhyl, he decided to go to Abergele police and make his statement.

That is undoubtedly what Foot wrote about Dutton (see page 264 of 1988 Penguin edition of Who Killed Hanratty) but Woffinden purports to quote the statement given by Dutton to the Abergele cops on 9 February 1962 as follows:-

"What brought everything back to mind was when one of my customers read part of a newspaper report to me and mentioned that Hanratty claimed that he had tried to sell a watch in Rhyl." (page 232 Hanratty The Final Verdict 1999 Pan edition).

As Graham has said, Hanratty never did claim to try to sell the watch in Rhyl, and I should add that Dutton could not positively identify the watch seller as James Hanratty. Trying to sell the watch would have been something that one would have expected Jim to have done in Rhyl, and the presence of a youngish male with an London Irish accent on the streets of this North Wales coastal resort doing just that, is grist to the mill of those members of the group who support James Hanratty and seek to have his good name re-established in the pantheon of diamond geezers.

The inconvenient truth for those members of the above group is that the prosecution, having been ambushed by the change of alibi, was able to satisfy the undemanding and dim Bedfordshire jury that Ingledene, proprietor Mrs Jones, did not have any available accommodation on the night of 22 August 1962. Mrs Jones was shown to have lied on oath and therefore committed perjury during the course of the trial, and her status as a bone fide witness should be in question. Suggestions that Hanratty could have stayed in an attic bathroom must be regarded as risible in view of the description given by Hanratty of his guest house accommodation (room at back with window and curtains and a sink cf room in attic with skylight and green bath).

It should also be noted that JH claimed to have inquired of many guest house proprietors, yet the only ones who were able to support this lived in the vicinity of Ingledene and were thus neighbours and possibly friends of Mrs Jones, and one Mr Christopher Larman, a passer-by on a pub crawl but who also had an 'acquaintance' with Mrs Jones. Did these folk act in the manner they did out of a desire to see that justice should be done, or out of loyalty to their friend, the perjurer, Mrs Jones?

[Derrick]

Here is a very interesting piece by a forensic computer scientist called Robert Harriman that everyone who posts on here should read:

http://pinealscriptures.com/Hanratty%20Case%20Revisited.pdf

Harriman's CV is here:

http://pinealscriptures.com/rahcv.pdf

Happy reading

Derrick

[Natalie Severn]

As Graham has said, Hanratty never did claim to try to sell the watch in Rhyl, and I should add that Dutton could not positively identify the watch seller as James Hanratty.

Ron,

How does anyone know what James Hanratty said about this matter? Did he ever get to hear about it ? Did he remember to relate his every move in Rhyl to his defence team?Anyway the prosecution ,true to form,had come out with an astonishingly vitriolic attack over the watch when the Liverpool incident was raised during the trial so maybe Sherrard decided it was not worth the aggro and further blackening of his clients character.He probably knew deep down anyway that the whole thing stank to high heaven from its start to its finish and that Hanratty had been totally stitched up and was meant to die , so better play safe with those the defence knew they could trust ----like sticking to trying to spot possible weaknesses in the Summing up made by Judge Gorman .
The defence knew nothing during the trial of Mr Dutton and not very much after ---except possibly a name and address scribbled on the back of an envelope taken down by a clerk in the office following a telephone call during a time when various routes were being followed up. Gillbanks, when he saw the envelope with the scribbled writing on, may or may not have passed the information on .
Its quite true that Mr Dutton did not think he would be able to "positively identify" the man after six months.Whats really odd though is that Superintendent Nimmo never contacted him in 1967 when he was interviewing any Rhyl witness who had made a statement to police.How many other people were ignored or dismissed?Any idea?

[Natalie Severn]

The inconvenient truth for those members of the above group is that the prosecution, having been ambushed by the change of alibi, was able to satisfy the undemanding and dim Bedfordshire jury that Ingledene, proprietor Mrs Jones, did not have any available accommodation on the night of 22 August 1962. Mrs Jones was shown to have lied on oath and therefore committed perjury during the course of the trial, and her status as a bone fide witness should be in question. Suggestions that Hanratty could have stayed in an attic bathroom must be regarded as risible in view of the description given by Hanratty of his guest house accommodation (room at back with window and curtains and a sink cf room in attic with skylight and green bath).

It should also be noted that JH claimed to have inquired of many guest house proprietors, yet the only ones who were able to support this lived in the vicinity of Ingledene and were thus neighbours and possibly friends of Mrs Jones, and one Mr Christopher Larman, a passer-by on a pub crawl but who also had an 'acquaintance' with Mrs Jones. Did these folk act in the manner they did out of a desire to see that justice should be done, or out of loyalty to their friend, the perjurer, Mrs Jones?

Mrs Betty Davies, Mr Noel Davies,her husband and Mrs Margaret Davies were not at all keen to get involved and in fact did not until Mr and Mrs Hanratty came to Rhyl and put out an appeal for witnesses in May 1968.
They then,reluctantly decided to see Paul Foot and he took statements from them which totally matched the statement made by Mrs Margaret Walker.

However viciously the prosecution attacked her , Mrs Jones remained staunchly supportive of her statement up until her death ---and quite certain that it was James Hanratty who had stayed at her house late in August.
Ingledene did have a green bath in the attic, as Hanratty vividly recalled,and a tiled back courtyard and two tables in the back room.The trains can be heard , as he said.The house is also entered direct from the street and has no front garden,unlike most boarding houses in Rhyl which do have a small front garden.
Hanratty did not say he had called at that large a number of boarding houses.Mr Fish remembered him in River Street,as did an elderly lady whose son refused to allow her to get involved in making a statement to the police.

[Natalie Severn]

Julie wrote:Hanratty explains his reasons for raising the Rhyl alibi so late during questioning at his trial but i don't have the books to hand righ now.

Vic answered:That's the "I told one lie, and it snowballed" excuse.

Hanratty had telephoned Acott at noon from Liverpool where he had gone just after he had phoned Dixie France saying,"Dixie Dixie,I am wanted for the A6 murder.Unknown to Hanratty ,Acott was standing right next to France"s phone.
Hanratty had then raced up to Liverpool and when he got there he immediately telephoned Acott to say he knew nothing about the case and was completely innocent of the murder and could not give himself up because he was wanted for housebreaking and if he got caught again he would get five years.He then phoned the Daily Mirror and spoke to Barry Harding who asked him if he had an alibi for the night.Hanratty said he was there doing business with some friends .He phoned Acott again later that night but the exact discussion that followed between Hanratty and Acott is a matter of dispute between the two participants.Acott pressed him very hard a to provide names and addresses but Hanratty refused.

The prosecution suggested Hanratty should have gone to Rhyl to find the landlady he stayed with and the other people whose doors he knocked at.
Hanratty answered that people did not seem to realise that as a man wanted for the A6 murder, the landlady in Rhyl and the strangers whose doors he knocked on might not be too keen on chatting with him about whether or not they remembered him calling on them the previous August!
It seems to me they got hold of a vulnerable person and held on tight----knowing they could engineer a conviction.

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks for the link Derrick.I found most of it easy to read and instructive.Fascinating stuff about the role now known to be played by human interpretative activity.A point I"d like clarified: Harriman writes,"In view of the fact that the material tested by the FSS seems unlikely to have been displayed in the courtroom during the trial I think it is unlikely that the contamination could have occurred at that time."
My understanding is that all materials including the knicker fragment were produced each day at the committal in Ampthill November 1961 .Contamination could therefore have occurred at that time.
I liked what he asked about Gregsten"s DNA and why it had disappeared from the knicker fragment! Excellent question.

[Derrick]

Thanks for the link Derrick.I found most of it easy to read and instructive.Fascinating stuff about the role now known to be played by human interpretative activity.A point I"d like clarified: Harriman writes,"In view of the fact that the material tested by the FSS seems unlikely to have been displayed in the courtroom during the trial I think it is unlikely that the contamination could have occurred at that time."
My understanding is that all materials including the knicker fragment were produced each day at the committal in Ampthill November 1961 .Contamination could therefore have occurred at that time.
I liked what he asked about Gregsten"s DNA and why it had disappeared from the knicker fragment! Excellent question.

Hi Norma

It seems that Mr Harriman has based his findings purely on the 2002 ruling and the BBC Horizon programme of the same year. He may not therefore be aware of the exhibits being on show at the committal. I will email him and find out if he has considered this. He does quote from Woffinden and recommends Foot also though. I will endeavour to find out.

For me, one of the most important points he makes is that of the CCRC referring the case back to the CACD and then the CACD stating that the case against Hanratty was already a strong one without the DNA. This, as Mr Harriman points out, is complete nonsense.

Derrick

[RonIpstone]

Why do you put such faith in the views of this Robert Harriman, and yet discount the views of the experts on both sides heard on the appeal? Harriman was not at the appeal, but Bindman and his expert were. If there was anything on which the impeccable reasoning of the appellate court could have been attacked we would have heard it from Bindman. We have not. Neither have we heard any more about the proposed second (sic) appeal promised us early in the new year. Goats and monkeys it's now May. What's going on? Have we been lied to by BBC Radio 4? I think we have.