A6 Rebooted

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Louisa ,One Round ,Julie,Caz and Graham,
I was reading a bit about Juliana Galves last night.She did testify through an interpreter.It seems that she lost her job at the Vienna in October 1961 making her vulnerable to repatriation under the aliens act.She wasnt repatriated which may have made her want to please the powers that be by saying it was she who made the bed in room 24 and never moved it or noticed the used cartridge cases on the chair beside the bed.She stated the chair was maroon which it wasnt -it was green-and ofcourse she contradicted Florence Snell's version which was that both women had remade the small single bed slept in by Hanratty and to do so ,both the chair and the bed needed to be moved.So I guess Juliana either didn't bother changing the sheets after Hanratty had left or Florence was the one remembering right and Juliana wanted to keep on the right side of the law-which maybe why she didnt repeat her 13th September statement in court about seeing a pair of black ladies gloves.Seems to me you would expect them to change bedlinen in a place that charged twice what Mrs Jones in Rhyl charged ie nearly £2 a night instead of twelve shillings and sixpence a night!!

[louisa]

Hi Natalie,

I would think that the difference in tariffs would have been mainly due to the fact that the Vienna Hotel was in a popular part of London and Ingledene was in Rhyl.

The Vienna has been described as a doss house and it's unlikely that bed sheets would have been changed after each occupant, unless they looked very soiled.

It seems a strange existence doesn't it, for a young man to want to spend a night here and a night there, rarely spending 2 nights in the same place, living out of a suitcase, but it seems as though that is the way both Hanratty and Alphon lived.

But of course the strangest thing of all is that one of them spent the night in the Vienna and then the following night the other man spent the night in the Vienna (almost in the same room), and then - although there was supposed to be no connection between the two men - each of them gets accused of being the A6 murderer. Hmmmmm

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Louisa,
Yes-and both used false names!
But hey-Alphon came into big money,paid into his bank in separate instalments between September and December 1961.It totalled £7,500 which would have been the equivalent of£600,000 today approx--anyway it was possible to buy two semi detached houses for that then so it was a lot and boy did he live the life of Riley as far as staying in hotels went anyway.And even before he sometimes stayed in the Cumberland at Marble Arch.Trouble with Alphon was that he gambled heavily on the dogs so what he won he lost but the figures above do not account for money won on the dogs.
With Hanratty a bit of him was like that---he liked to be On the Road so to speak!
----Jack Kerouac style maybe?not sure.....

[Limehouse]

Hello All,

I never really doubted Hanratty's guilt (put it this way - I'm 99.9% certain that he did it...) and don't see much in the way of concrete evidence that he was fitted up for the crime. However, I do suspect that France knew more than he ever said in public - there is the strong suggestion that it was he who identified Hanratty to Acott, and also the bulk of his suicide notes were never made public and probably never will be. For some of his time, France worked in a cafe (sorry, I can't remember its name, but it's been posted before) where he was, apparently, known to keep a variety of weapons under the counter. No specific mention of guns, I believe, but I would suggest that when Hanratty decided he needed a gun he turned to his mate Dixie France. .
All the best,
Graham

The Cafe was called The Harmony Inn, located in Ham Yard, close to Archer Street that Hanratty frequented.

It is known that The Harmony Inn was the haunt of many well-known criminals of the time (Jack Spot, for example) but was also the venue at which played some rather good jazz musicians and other assorted acts of the day.

[louisa]

Graham had written:

"No specific mention of guns, I believe, but I would suggest that when Hanratty decided he needed a gun he turned to his mate Dixie France"

I think that if Dixie France had given Hanratty a gun (or the gun) France would have said so in Court.

As it was, and as far as I remember, Dixie France didn't say anything about Hanratty wanting a gun. All he said was that Hanratty had told him that underneath the back seat of a bus was a good place to dump unwanted junk.

However, Dixie France could, no doubt, get a gun for somebody if the price was right. I think that Hanratty said that he knew that guns were available (in Soho) for people that wanted them.

[Graham]

Speaking as one who believes that Hanratty dun it, some of the prosecution evidence does rather suggest the heavy hand of Basil Acott - Anderson was doubtless leaned upon courtesy of her dealing in hot goods, Galves likewise as she was in effect an illegal immigrant, Langdale maybe because he was promised some remission.

Julie,

yep, The Harmony. Thanks, I just couldn't remember. There is (or was) a fascinating website about London's caffs. I've got a vague memory that Kenny Ball played at the Harmony in the early days of the Trad Jazz boom.

Louise,

maybe hard to believe, but in those days guns were much easier to obtain than they are today. There were, literally, hundreds of thousands of ex-military war-surplus firearms on the market. Hanratty would've had no problem in getting a good shooter, and neither would France. I rather think that Hanratty was fly enough not to deal face-to-face with a known gun dealer, but did it via a mate - maybe France. Pure speculation. Providing France was reasonably sure that his mate Hanratty wouldn't name him as the source of the gun, then there was no real reason for him to own up. More pure speculation.

Hanratty himself said that he'd asked his mate Donald Slack about getting a gun, but later Hanratty downplayed it, and Slack denied it (as he would). Nevertheless, Hanratty played right into Acott's hands, as he actually admitted that he'd been looking to obtain a gun.

Graham

[Limehouse]

Speaking as one who believes that Hanratty dun it, some of the prosecution evidence does rather suggest the heavy hand of Basil Acott - Anderson was doubtless leaned upon courtesy of her dealing in hot goods, Galves likewise as she was in effect an illegal immigrant, Langdale maybe because he was promised some remission.

Julie,

yep, The Harmony. Thanks, I just couldn't remember. There is (or was) a fascinating website about London's caffs. I've got a vague memory that Kenny Ball played at the Harmony in the early days of the Trad Jazz boom.

Louise,

maybe hard to believe, but in those days guns were much easier to obtain than they are today. There were, literally, hundreds of thousands of ex-military war-surplus firearms on the market. Hanratty would've had no problem in getting a good shooter, and neither would France. I rather think that Hanratty was fly enough not to deal face-to-face with a known gun dealer, but did it via a mate - maybe France. Pure speculation. Providing France was reasonably sure that his mate Hanratty wouldn't name him as the source of the gun, then there was no real reason for him to own up. More pure speculation.

Hanratty himself said that he'd asked his mate Donald Slack about getting a gun, but later Hanratty downplayed it, and Slack denied it (as he would). Nevertheless, Hanratty played right into Acott's hands, as he actually admitted that he'd been looking to obtain a gun.

Graham

Hi Graham - I think you are completely right about Acott leaning on such witnesses. He probably thought that it was necessary in order to be sure he nailed his case. However, such methods do call into question the idea that the DNA made 'a strong case stronger'. It could not have been a strong case if such tatics were needed. It also makes one wonder, if the police had had the gun and ammo from two days after the crime, did they in fact, place those cartridges in that room (to strengthen the case against Alphon initially)?

Kenny Ball may well have played at the Harmony. Many trad jazz acts did so. I saw Kenny play live a good few years ago now. He was magnificent!

Hanratty did, indeed, apparently say that he fancied getting a gun and duiversify into armed robbery because there was not enough dosh in house breaking. However, as Hanratty pointed out at his trial, he was in prison at the time and in the company of other lags. He explained that it was the type of thing you say when you are in such company, to big yourself up. A kind of survival tactic. You never said to such men 'I'm going straight when I get out'.

Hanratty also said that if he was looking for some easy money, he would not be looking for a car in a cornfield. He would be looking for a garage or similar place with lots of cash to steal. The only possible reason he could have approached that car was to steal it in order to have a getaway car. So, if that was the case, why didn't he just order them out of the car and drive it away?

Julie

[Limehouse]

Christmas Greetings

A very merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year to all the A6 contributors - of all persuasions.

Warmest best wishes

Julie

[OneRound]

.... It also makes one wonder, if the police had had the gun and ammo from two days after the crime, did they in fact, place those cartridges in that room (to strengthen the case against Alphon initially)? ....

Hi Julie - Do you also wonder if the police did anything underhand with the hanky or do you think that too fanciful?

Best regards,

OneRound

[louisa]

Graham - I absolutely concur with you about guns being rife in the UK. When the war ended a great many ex-servicemen kept their guns and there became a trade in them.

I just can't really understand why you can be 99.9% certain that Hanratty did the crime. Unless of course you're basing this on the recent DNA findings, which I suspect, in the future, will be overturned as having possibly been contaminated, and therefore inadmissable.

To my mind I feel certain (99.9%) that Hanratty is innocent and I would think that anybody who has read the well researched books on the case by Paul Foot and Bob Woffindon would come to the same conclusion.

Going back to the case, and on another point entirely - am I right in thinking that a jury member was tracked down, a few years after the trial, and said that it was the eye witness accounts that persuaded them that Hanratty was guilty?

[Natalie Severn]

A very merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year to all the A6 contributors - of all persuasions.

Warmest best wishes

Julie

Nicely put Julie!
Warmest Wishes to everybody for Christmas and New Year!xx

[caz]

Hi All,

For Hanratty to have been innocent, there has to be someone, somewhere, who got away with rape and murder that night, and again when only Hanratty's DNA showed up on the victim's underwear.

Since there was an exact match between the DNA from Hanratty's exhumed remains and the hanky he admitted was his (as you'd expect) and the underwear, the only potentially reasonable explanation must surely be one of the various contamination theories, which would still leave us with the mystery of the disappearing rapist's DNA.

Do we know how much effort was made by Paul Foot et al to find any real hard evidence against anyone else, whether they thought it was Alphon or A.N.Other who did the deed? Obviously a strong case against someone else - anyone else - would have gone a long way to help the campaign for Hanratty, but did they simply give up on this front and concede defeat? Seems hard to believe if the loose-tongued Alphon really was involved, yet still couldn't be exposed by such passionate campaigners for justice.

Love,

Caz
X

[louisa]

Some good points, Caz.

Only a tiny fragment of Valerie Storie's knickers were kept. I can't help but wonder about the rest of the garment. If the entire garment had been DNA tested, I wonder if Alphon's DNA would have been present?

[Limehouse]

Hi All,

For Hanratty to have been innocent, there has to be someone, somewhere, who got away with rape and murder that night, and again when only Hanratty's DNA showed up on the victim's underwear.

Since there was an exact match between the DNA from Hanratty's exhumed remains and the hanky he admitted was his (as you'd expect) and the underwear, the only potentially reasonable explanation must surely be one of the various contamination theories, which would still leave us with the mystery of the disappearing rapist's DNA.

Do we know how much effort was made by Paul Foot et al to find any real hard evidence against anyone else, whether they thought it was Alphon or A.N.Other who did the deed? Obviously a strong case against someone else - anyone else - would have gone a long way to help the campaign for Hanratty, but did they simply give up on this front and concede defeat? Seems hard to believe if the loose-tongued Alphon really was involved, yet still couldn't be exposed by such passionate campaigners for justice.

Love,

Caz
X

Hi Caz - and happy New Year to you and all.

These are good points. Firstly, just because the hanky was Hanratty's and it had his DNA on it (as you would expect, as he admitted it was his) does not mean that he was in the car that night. After all, his finger prints were not found on the gun or the cartridges found on the bus (or the cartridges found in room 24). Whether there was an 'exact' match for Hanratty's DNA on the knicker fragment is open to contention since the DNA extracted was a mixture of several profiles.

As to whether Paul Foot et al persued any evidence against other suspects, well to do that they could only work with the evidence that was in the public domain. They could not know about any other suspects or any witnesses that were not disclosed to the prosecution, the defence or the investigation team. Efforts were made to search for witnesses who saw Hanratty in Rhyl, of course.

However, the real question for me is, how much effort did the police make to investigate any further than looking for 'men who were behaving strangely in B&Bs or hotels'? My point is that Acott's previous experience of investigating the murder by shooting of a policeman in 1959 had lead him to Gunther Podola, who was hiding out in a B&B. More or less his first action following the A6 shootings was to ask B&Bs and hotels to inform on any man behaving strangely - and very soon Alphon was reported to police. I think from that moment on they were not going to persue any other avenues. Any evidence that may have been relevant to the 'real' killer (and I have doubts about Alphon) would not and could not emerge once the investigation team had decided on their lines of enquiry.

I would not be at all surprised if a killer had disappeared into the night, never to be identified because he did not visit a B&B in the days preceeding or following the crime.

[OneRound]

Hi Julie - Do you also wonder if the police did anything underhand with the hanky or do you think that too fanciful?

Best regards,

OneRound

Hi Julie - this question followed your possible suggestion that the police had planted cartridges in the Vienna hotel. Interested in your view. Be as dismissive as you wish - you always set the highest watermark for tact and diplomacy on this forum.

I'll try to put together an email this weekend covering my concerns about the DNA ''evidence'' and the Court's over reliance upon it, including when dismissing other avenues of appeal However, it should be noted that other headline verdicts this week will further hinder Hanratty's cause.

Best regards,

OneRound