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

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Nats,



I don't mean to be flippant, but if what you say is true then the number of potential A6 killers must be infinitesimal. I mean, my late Uncle Ted lived in Harrow, quite close to where it all began, and as his DNA wasn't on any of the fragments, then could he be considered a legitimate suspect? He was an odd 'un, quite true, but I couldn't see him as a killer and rapist.

The simple fact is, Nats, that Hanratty's DNA was found on the fragments, and Alphon's wasn't. Michael Mansfield, one of the most senior appeal lawyers in the judiciary, was perfectly prepared to accept this, as was Michael Sherrard. It must rest there, I feel.

Graham

Then I really must post you some of the cases of where since then-from the Omagh bomb case back in 2007 onwards several judges and barristers have been overwhelmingly critical and thrown out cases because of totally error ridden LCN DNA results---[one, a teenage boy was accused of rape on the basis of his DNA being found on the victims belongings and who had never even been to the town where it happened and in this case they failed to find the evidence of the rapist on the victims clothing.There are quite a few more too.
Mansfield a was wrong but his mistake can be understood as at the time they were unaware either of the extent of the tests tendency to contamination or its ,via the process of actually being able to ' mask ' another person's DNA .Sherrard was suspicious of the results and makes a cautious assessment in his autobiography of 2009 and in more combative questioning of the appeal court findings in his Horizon TV interview done just after the hearing in 2002.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Nats,

Alphon gave himself up willingly, hardly the action of a man responsible for one of the most brutal crimes of the 20th century, and admitted to the press that the
Alphon's weird behaviour at The Alexandra was absolutely typical of him, as I mentioned in a previous post, and more than one person who knew him testified as such.
Graham

Yes Graham I agree.But its also typical of a person with a schizoid personality under stress.

[OneRound]

... my late Uncle Ted lived in Harrow, quite close to where it all began, ... He was an odd 'un, quite true, but I couldn't see him as a killer and rapist.


Graham

Graham - with all due respect to you and your late Uncle Ted, you would say that, wouldn't you?

Best regards,

OneRound

[Natalie Severn]

I am afraid I don't know who the three people are that Detective Matthews had in mind . [II have thought myself [/I] that Matthews may have believed somebody must have driven the killer to the cornfield because there is no evidence the killer was a hitch hiker and it was miles from anywhere.He also appears to be very clear that the two witnesses could not have seen the car at that time in Redbridge either at the roundabout or anywhere in Redbridge as other withheld evidence suggests the car was left in Redbridge much later on in the day and this is backed up by four different witnesses.Another point he brought out was about how and where the killer cleaned himself up because he would have been saturated with Michael Gregsten's blood as he took his shoulders and pulled him from the car-half Gregsten's head had been blown off.
Andy [my husband] did some interesting research a little while ago on the journey the gunman directed Valerie and Gregsten on which passed the very park Gregsten had been to with his two sons that afternoon in Watford, just two miles from the Gregsten family home in Abbot's Langley suggesting that at least that part of the car journey may have been 'pre-planned'.It appears they took a route from Dorney Reach where the gunman said ' not left at Maidenhead -sick of Maidenhead [where Gregsten was decorating the flat he intended moving into on 27th August 1961] but right to Slough" and so they went down Slough High Street Valerie 'e home being in Slough and on to go through Hayes reaching the Western Avenue and crossing the Greenford intersection up through Harrow and on to Watford ,close to the Gregstens home.Now this must have been a route Gregsten knew as it would have been the easiest route from Abbot's Langley where he lived near Watford to the other Langley near Slough where Gregsten and Valerie both worked . This may be significant as to whether they had been previously followed ,this journey to Dead man's Hill actually being part of a planned route.

[Graham]

Hi Nats,

in fact, the cornfield is probably somewhat less than a mile from the main A4. I've visited the area twice, the first time on a stinking hot day when I parked at Taplow Station and walked as far as Dorney Court. It nearly did me in. The second time I drove. Valerie stated that on the fateful evening they first parked just off Hunterscombe Lane, where they'd parked before, not very far from Marsh Lane, but after a while decided to move to Marsh Lane for reasons I don't think she specified. Unless Hanratty followed them first to Hunterscombe Lane and then to Marsh Lane, how did he know they would be at Marsh Lane at all that evening? To me, this rules out any pre-planning of this crime - Hanratty came across the car purely by chance.

He could have been driven to the cornfield, I suppose, but unlikely.

For what it's worth, I never thought much of the various claimed sightings of the car, either in London or elsewhere.

As far as I'm aware, Valerie said that the route they took to Deadman's Hill was virtually all dictated by the gunman. Hanratty did know the Bedford area as his aunt lived there, and after the crime he took his girl-friend Gladys Deacon to Bedford. From London he could have taken the A6 or the A1/M1 routes.

Where he cleaned himself up is anybody's guess, or perhaps he didn't get as much blood on him as is supposed. If he stopped somewhere secluded on his journey south after the murder, then why didn't he dispose of the gun? Odd.

Graham

[Graham]

Graham - with all due respect to you and your late Uncle Ted, you would say that, wouldn't you?

Best regards,

OneRound

Hi OR,

Yes, you're right, but Uncle Ted did possess a gun - an ancient WW! Lee-Enfield rifle which didn't work! He was odd all right, but his wife (Aunt Lily) was even odder....I won't go into it!

Graham

[Ed James]

I am afraid I don't know who the three people are that Detective Matthews had in mind . [II have thought myself [/I] that Matthews may have believed somebody must have driven the killer to the cornfield because there is no evidence the killer was a hitch hiker and it was miles from anywhere.He also appears to be very clear that the two witnesses could not have seen the car at that time in Redbridge either at the roundabout or anywhere in Redbridge as other withheld evidence suggests the car was left in Redbridge much later on in the day and this is backed up by four different witnesses.Another point he brought out was about how and where the killer cleaned himself up because he would have been saturated with Michael Gregsten's blood as he took his shoulders and pulled him from the car-half Gregsten's head had been blown off.
Andy [my husband] did some interesting research a little while ago on the journey the gunman directed Valerie and Gregsten on which passed the very park Gregsten had been to with his two sons that afternoon in Watford, just two miles from the Gregsten family home in Abbot's Langley suggesting that at least that part of the car journey may have been 'pre-planned'.It appears they took a route from Dorney Reach where the gunman said ' not left at Maidenhead -sick of Maidenhead [where Gregsten was decorating the flat he intended moving into on 27th August 1961] but right to Slough" and so they went down Slough High Street Valerie 'e home being in Slough and on to go through Hayes reaching the Western Avenue and crossing the Greenford intersection up through Harrow and on to Watford ,close to the Gregstens home.Now this must have been a route Gregsten knew as it would have been the easiest route from Abbot's Langley where he lived near Watford to the other Langley near Slough where Gregsten and Valerie both worked . This may be significant as to whether they had been previously followed ,this journey to Dead man's Hill actually being part of a planned route.

Hi Nats

I am interested in what you say about Matthews's view that the murder car was abandoned later in the day at Redbridge.

I think there is an argument that East London was not an accidental location for the dumping of the car. The gunman either had friends in the area and /or hailed from there. An argument runs that the gunman made for that general area for safe refuge, albeit haphazardly after the murder , got cleaned up and possibly cleaned up some of the car. The car was then moved , in a panic, to Avondale Crescent around 5.30pm when it was recognised the car was really hot - this would fit the witness evidence of the sighting and non sighting in Avondale Crescent.
The risk of being sighted in the car at this time was great, but the gunman and possibly an unwilling associate were desperate. To make identification difficult , the front number plate was deliberately bent so it was not easily readable and a closely following car obscured the rear number plate and provided a getaway when the car was abandoned. Parking near to the tube was designed to suggest the gunman came from outside the area.

In a previous post I also suggested that the route of the MM after the abduction was either another coincidence or deliberate - the car passed within a couple of miles of Gregsten's Abbot's Langley home, and would have been closer still but for the gunman's apparent confusion between Watford and St Albans.

Unlike your husband Andy, I don't believe the MM went along the A412 directly past Cassiobury Park, Watford (where Gregsten took his son and neighbour's boy earlier in the day) I think the route was on the Watford By Pass from Stanmore (A41), but am happy to be corrected.

KR
Ed

[OneRound]

Hi OR,

Yes, you're right, but Uncle Ted did possess a gun - an ancient WW! Lee-Enfield rifle which didn't work! He was odd all right, but his wife (Aunt Lily) was even odder....I won't go into it!

Graham

Hi again Graham,

I'm tempted to ask what Uncle Ted's driving was like but I'll bring the shutters down here before you tell me that he and Aunt Lily used to holiday in Rhyl!

Best regards,

OneRound

[moste]

Well they'd have had to be close associates if Alphon had been the gunman and used Hanratty's hanky when disposing of the murder weapon.

However, any actual evidence of such a relationship seems to be totally lacking.

Love,

Caz
X

Absolutely lacking. But very possible.

[moste]

Hi moste,

It was Norma who suggested that Alphon "may have had a schizoid or borderline schizophrenic personality and if he did, then that personality type can indeed commit such crimes as the A6 murder...".

If this is true, any unsupported confession he made should not be relied on or used against him.

I'm not sure what Gregsten's mental capacity has to do with anything. He was the murder victim.

Love,

Caz
X

Alphon wasn't fragile mentally. Thats all.

[Sherlock Houses]

Alphon wasn't fragile mentally. Thats all.

So true. Anybody coming to that conclusion , Moste, after all we know about Alphon, frankly hasn't got a clue. Alphon was in truth anything but fragile. He was mentally acute, manipulative, cunning, threatening and any number of similar adjectives. He would often toy with people when it suited his purposes. One thing he couldn't shake from his mind however was the A6 murder, a subject he would return to time after time over the years. He was ultra careful to include glaring inaccuracies in his many confessions over the years, a self-preservation tactic. It is often said that confession is good for the soul.

[Sherlock Houses]

Isn't this a case of reading (sorry!) too much into it? If Alphon wanted to line his case with newspaper, a recent one would be a likely choice.

He didn't need to line his case with anything though. The contents of the case were all neatly wrapped up in brown paper or newspaper. Most people in those days, I would say, would have chucked an almost 4 day old newspaper in a nearby bin. Not Alphon though. I wonder just how much longer he kept hold of that particular copy of the Express ?

[Sherlock Houses]

Alphon's calling card

...Amongst other things she describes him as having his hair plastered back, wearing a tie-less white shirt and wearing a new, light coloured three quarter length mackintosh. As we know Alphon was very fond of three quarter length macs and greasing his hair back without a part.

Alphon felt the need to purchase a brand new three-quarter length mac just two days after the A6 murder. Was he replacing a bloodied one I wonder ? As I have mentioned before he didn't seem to go anywhere without one. How common was it for 30 year old males to wear one back in 1961 ? Was that summer really such a wet one ? Even 30 years later he was filmed wearing one. An ideal sort coat for secreting things on one's person I suppose.

[Sherlock Houses]

Alphon's weird behaviour at The Alexandra was absolutely typical of him, as I mentioned in a previous post, and more than one person who knew him testified as such.

Where is the evidence to show that Alphon's strange behaviour at the Alexandra Court Hotel between August 23rd and August 27th was "absolutely typical" of him when staying at hotels/B&B's ? ?

The only other example of weird hotel behaviour on his part happened at the Regent Palace Hotel in the early hours of Sunday, March 18th 1962, arguably under the influence of drink.This incident, somehow involving a hotel chambermaid, is fairly well documented in the Foot and Woffinden books so it doesn't require me to go into any detail about it.

[Graham]

Where is the evidence to show that Alphon's strange behaviour at the Alexandra Court Hotel between August 23rd and August 27th was "absolutely typical" of him when staying at hotels/B&B's ?

You misunderstood what I wrote - I was referring to Alphon's character and behaviour in general, not merely what he got up to in hotels, etc. Plenty of evidence in the books with regard to his character. A previous landlady of his complained about the noises from his room at night, for example.

Graham