The attack on Swedish housewife Mrs Meike Dalal on Thursday, September 7th 1961

[Alfie]

You're a great hair-splitter aren't you ? Look in any decent dictionary [Oxford English Reference Dictionary or Collins English Dictionary to name but two] and you will discover [if you didn't already know] that icy-blue equates to very pale blue.

I'd say the meaning depends on whether or not a hyphen is included: icy-blue = pale blue; icy blue = blue eyes with an icy expression.

Woffinden and Miller use both forms, seemingly interchangably; Foot only uses "icy-blue"; Hawser, who was writing an official report and would therefore, I imagine, be more constrained than them by a need for absolute accuracy, records the statement made by Valerie to Whiffen on August 28 as being: "... he was clean shaven, has a very smooth pale face, with icy blue large saucer-like eyes."

No hyphen.

[Derrick]

...can you provide your views as far as you can tell from the facts as to how it all happened and why...

OR

How what all happened? The stitch up of James Hanratty or the A6 murder?

Del

[OneRound]

Well, as far as I understand it about this lobby thing it is you who are wrong.

I, for one, believe wholeheartedly that Hanratty had nothing whatsoever to do with the A6 murder. Neither do I believe that Alphon had any involvement.

I am perhaps, foolishly, basing my beliefs on all of the facts of the case, taken together (in the round if you like).

There is no evidence against Hanratty that cannot be plausibly explained by another scenario, especially the gun and room 24.

Hokey doke, Del.

I don't fully buy into it but understand your comment about there being 'no evidence against Hanratty that cannot be explained by another scenario'. That's certainly a factor in my not being satisfied his guilt was proved beyond reasonable doubt.

For reasons of openness it's only right though for me to say that, unlike you, my gut tells me Hanratty did it. For me, just too many separate items seeming to link him to the crime plus his inability to adequately explain where he was at the time.

Ok, that's my cards on the table. With apologies if you've covered this before but can you provide your views as far as you can tell from the facts as to how it all happened and why. That's a genuine request. Genuinely interested.

Cheers,

OneRound

[Sherlock Houses]

Yet Valerie describes blue eyes before she could know Hanratty's eye colour and apparently without having a clue what the man who raped her and left his O group semen on her underwear looked like?

Well she obviously saw enough of the gunman's face to state that his hair was straight [Hanratty's wasn't, Alphon's was], well-greased [Hanratty's wasn't, Alphon's was] and slightly receding at the temples [Hanratty's wasn't but Alphon's was]. Perhaps the smell of Brylcreem was overpowering. The finished identikit she helped to compile, which was strikingly like Alphon, was a very good likeness of the gunman which was why she sanctioned it for publication in the press and on TV.

[Sherlock Houses]

I then asked for a source for her actually 'saying so' (ie using the word 'pale'), not caring who might be able to provide one. But I figured it wouldn't be you because you went to all the trouble and sarcasm of finding and posting that Collins definition to argue that icy eyes equate to pale coloured eyes, when you could simply have quoted Valerie 'saying so' in her own words.

I can assure you I went to very little trouble or sarcasm [a bit hypocritical methinks coming as it does from the Queen of sarcasm] in googling a definition of icy-blue.

Remind us all please of where I stated that Valerie Storie described the eyes as pale blue.

[Sherlock Houses]

Valerie's description was "icy blue large saucer-like eyes". Nothing about them being pale or pale blue.

You're a great hair-splitter aren't you ? Look in any decent dictionary [Oxford English Reference Dictionary or Collins English Dictionary to name but two] and you will discover [if you didn't already know] that icy-blue equates to very pale blue.

[caz]

Derrick never mentioned "pale", it was you who did so, so why are you attributing to him something he didn't say ?

This is the sequence of relevant posts:

Valerie's description was "icy blue large saucer-like eyes". Nothing about them being pale or pale blue.

Nobody leapt in at that point to contradict Alfie.

James Hanratty had neither icy blue, pale blue or even faded blue eyes. He had normal blue eyes like almost half of the UK population.
It must be obvious to the vast majority of folk what icy blue eyes means.......

Just in case anyone besides yourself is in any doubt about the colour of icy blue eyes I'll let the Collins English dictionary say something......

Hi SH,

How are you so sure she meant the shade of blue was icy, as in pale...?

Then Del leapt in to answer my question to you:

For the very simple reason Caz in that she said so...

I then asked for a source for her actually 'saying so' (ie using the word 'pale'), not caring who might be able to provide one. But I figured it wouldn't be you because you went to all the trouble and sarcasm of finding and posting that Collins definition to argue that icy eyes equate to pale coloured eyes, when you could simply have quoted Valerie 'saying so' in her own words.

Now - finally - Del has mentioned 'pale' and offers a source for Valerie saying so as late as January 24th. Better than nothing I suppose.

This still leaves the question of how much darker blue Hanratty's eyes were supposed to be, or could have been. And why some of those who have very little good to say about the police at the time are happy with the copper who got his 'deep set' and 'not deep set' in a mucking fuddle and won't have it that he could just as easily have misreported Valerie's 'blue' as 'brown'.

So almost half of the population are blue-eyed, while O is the most common blood group. That leaves a majority without blue eyes and of a blood group other than O. Enter the blue-eyed, O-blooded 'Jim', who is supposedly the victim of a set-up, whether deliberately targeted by criminal associates or randomly picked on by the police to fit the crime. Yet Valerie describes blue eyes before she could know Hanratty's eye colour and apparently without having a clue what the man who raped her and left his O group semen on her underwear looked like?

The hankie, bearing Hanratty's DNA, connects him directly or indirectly with the crime. If he was not the gunman and rapist, the hankie tells us he must have had close links with the man who was. But that person - if he had existed - could have had no right to think he had left his surviving victim clueless about his appearance; no right to expect her to describe blue eyes if she was clueless about their real colour; and no right to hope she would pick out the innocent man whose hankie had been deliberately planted on the bus with the murder weapon, let alone express lifelong certainty about the identification. Lastly, he could not have imagined in 1961 that a snotty hankie would be any more use than Valerie in setting up Hanratty's downfall. No use at all, in fact, so what would the point of taking it and planting it with the gun have been?

Love,

Caz
X

[Derrick]

As I understand it, the Hanratty lobby's argument is that the evidence which points to Hanratty, gun on bus in Jim's hankie and spent cartridges in Room 24, was manufactured to implicate the hapless Jim etc., and was part of an elaborate conspiracy to protect Alphon. Yet the very same Alphon, who ex hypothesi must be regarded as part of that conspiracy, is going round the country advertising that he is the A6 killer.

Well, as far as I understand it about this lobby thing it is you who are wrong.

I, for one, believe wholeheartedly that Hanratty had nothing whatsoever to do with the A6 murder. Neither do I believe that Alphon had any involvement.

I am perhaps, foolishly, basing my beliefs on all of the facts of the case, taken together (in the round if you like).

There is no evidence against Hanratty that cannot be plausibly explained by another scenario, especially the gun and room 24.

[Spitfire]

When it comes right down to it,

Storie had absolutely no idea what the guy in the back seat looked like.

Her identikit picture looked nothing like Hanratty at all .

Her first choice of Michael Clark looked nothing like Hanratty at all.

She took an age to pick out what she thought was her assailants voice,

In the end she decided on someone who sounded the most like a cockney,

Her descriptive efforts were rubbish, she even said that the killer was

slightly taller than herself ("and I am" 5' 3 1\2") Hanratty was 5'7" to 5'8".

This meant she would have only come up to the bridge of his nose!

And she didn't notice that:

1. Hanratty wasn't in the car at all;

2. Hanratty was wearing a plastic suit with rubber buttons and/or Velcro fastenings.

What has all this got to with the attack on the "Swedish" Mrs Dalal who in fact happens to have been (and still is) German?

Other than Mrs D's assailant's self proclamation that he was the A6 (or Essex) Killer, this incident seems to have little or no relevance to Gregsten's murder.

As I understand it, the Hanratty lobby's argument is that the evidence which points to Hanratty, gun on bus in Jim's hankie and spent cartridges in Room 24, was manufactured to implicate the hapless Jim etc., and was part of an elaborate conspiracy to protect Alphon. Yet the very same Alphon, who ex hypothesi must be regarded as part of that conspiracy, is going round the country advertising that he is the A6 killer.

Hanratty, who murdered Gregsten, was not a full schilling, or five new pence as we would later call it. The person who attacked Mrs D likewise was a bit of a nutter, but in a country of over 50 million souls there will be no shortage of criminally minded fruitcakes.

[moste]

When it comes right down to it,

Storie had absolutely no idea what the guy in the back seat looked like.

Her identikit picture looked nothing like Hanratty at all .

Her first choice of Michael Clark looked nothing like Hanratty at all.

She took an age to pick out what she thought was her assailants voice,

In the end she decided on someone who sounded the most like a cockney,

Her descriptive efforts were rubbish, she even said that the killer was

slightly taller than herself ("and I am" 5' 3 1\2") Hanratty was 5'7" to 5'8".

This meant she would have only come up to the bridge of his nose!

[moste]

From the notes that James Mackle made on August 26th when he visited Valerie Storie to construct the Identikit picture:

1st page – "eyes blue, deep set"

5th page – "EYES - large blue eyes not sunken, flush with face"

Well I believe that's quite a surprising coincidense , because we have Superintendent Morgan from Biggleswade giving the best description available (to the world) (not to mention brown)"eyes deep set/'not very deep set" from the scene,three days earlier. Something funny here!

[moste]

So to recap: we have Mackle twice noting that Valerie said the killer's eyes were blue, and then Mackle for some reason using the E49 eyes, which apparently was code for "very dark."

And Jim's apologists want to ignore what Valerie actually said - twice - and go with the cop's formulation. Riiiiight

You may be overlooking the fact that when the police officer conducting the identikit process of matching the features of a suspect,he is doing so with full cooperation and guidance from the victim.
Or are you ,as I suspect ,speaking with a d21 tongue planted firmly in a y45 cheek!

[Derrick]

On 24th January, Storie tells Swanwick two differing descriptions of the killers eyes.

Firstly she describes them as being;

very large, pale blue, staring icy eyes

when recounting her alleged only real glimpse.

Then, when saying how she first described the man's eyes to Kerr, she said;

he had large, blue, staring eyes

[gallicrow]

Identi-kit

There's an early example of an Identi-kit for sale on eBay at the moment:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/112147003802

As you can see, the different parts of the face that are printed on the sheets of acetate are in shades of gray.

It would seem natural that in addition to the picture created by the forensic artist and witness from the kit, extra information giving the hair and eye colour (and other, non-facial, characteristics) would have been necessary to include in the description of the person being sought.

Having said that, "very dark eyes" does imply brown or black to me, but perhaps VS chose e49 because the shape of the eye best matched what she remembered.

[Alfie]

So to recap: we have Mackle twice noting that Valerie said the killer's eyes were blue, and then Mackle for some reason using the E49 eyes, which apparently was code for "very dark."

And Jim's apologists want to ignore what Valerie actually said - twice - and go with the cop's formulation. Riiiiight