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Found an interesting article in the Independent from 22nd September 1996 on the Matthews report:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...t-1364434.html
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In hindsight it's easy to criticise the original police investigation but even by the more limited technology available back in 1961 there were matters which could have been pursued to greater effect. I'll focus on the alleged sighting of the Morris Minor car by William Lee at around 6.30am on the morning of the crime, near Matlock in Derbyshire. My own feeling is, in line with Acott, that this was a false positive made in good faith. Acott had three good reasons for discounting the alleged sighting. First of all he trusted his witnesses in Redbridge, even although the jury at trial may have been more ambivalent regarding their testimony. Secondly, he had the odometer readings in relation to when Gregsten put petrol in his car and judged that these emphatically ruled out the car ever having been in Matlock. And lastly, why on earth would a murderer drive north before driving back to London in a car which was being sought by every policeman in the country?
However as we know, the fly in the ointment is the green woollen hat with a pom pom that Mr. Lee allegedly described to police on the day of the murder. Such a hat was reportedly photographed in the boot of the Morris Minor in which the crime took place but I have never seen this fact verified. Nor have I seen such a photograph in colour. Nonetheless, there is no conceivable way that Mr. Lee could have obtained this information at the time he made his statement. Yet there is a problem. From what I can gather Mr. Lee did not report his sighting until the car had become a news item, something he learned after returning from work that evening. He said he had written the car registration down on a scrap of paper due to its erratic driving (something which fits with Valerie Storie's account of the killer) but obviously could not have done so when he was actually driving his own car. By the time he did so he may well have remembered it incorrectly. The fact that he admitted to the police he had lost the scrap of paper in the course of the day speaks to his honesty: he could after all have manufactured one quite easily and passed it off as the original.
Acott could have ruled this sighting out with solid police work. First of all, what did Valerie Storie know about the pom pom hat in the boot? What did Gregsten's aunt (?) who had lent him the car know about it? Had any of the Car Rally Club seen Gregsten wear such a hat? In short, who did it belong to?
Then it could have been sent for forensic examination to test for any hair deposited inside. Given that Hanratty (not a suspect at that time) changed his hair colour on occasion this might have later helped resolve the matter.
Finally, Acott could have explored and eliminated what he thought was a false positive regarding the car and the number plate. It's quite common for witnesses to transpose letters or numbers on a registration plate. Nowadays a click on a computer screen can link similar registrations with a model but back in 1961 records were on paper and held at County level, so I appreciate Acott did not want to waste man hours ploughing through card indexes. But such dogged sleuthing helped snare the Cannock Chase child killer Raymond Morris (1968) and cop killer Barry Prudhom (mid 1970s.) These were both examples of damn good basic police work which I don't think was evident with the A6 Case.
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