Valerie Storie's 3 part story as published in 'Today' magazine, June 1962

[Pcdunn]

Not a friend doing a favor?

Hi PC, welcome to the A6 thread.

Your scenario is one that has crossed my mind in the past. However, I am not so sure who would be willing to do that sort of thing as a favour to a colleague or friend, given the risk they were taking in being caught with a gun and ammunition. Also, would someone hired under those circumstances need so such ammunition? Or any at all?

Kind regards,

Julie

Hi, again., and thanks!

Well, he'd have to be a stranger to VS, so hiring a local tough would be possible, but dangerous. The brother-in-law may be the go-between in getting the kidnapping set up. Maybe he didn't remind the guy to go unloaded? Or had another reason for wanting MG dead?

Anyway, I based my idea on the victim's story in the magazine, with her talk of truly loving him, and that making the affair "all right". Now learning from other posts that VS was allowed other liaisons, as was MG, I'm not so sure she was as "clingy" as it seemed to me at first.

I think there was probably a ghost-writer involved in her story, one who made sure a certain portrait of VS emerged, as an innocent young small-town woman ("girl" in the usage of the day) caught up in emotions and circumstances beyond her control.

What were the penalties of the time for carrying a loaded firearm, by the way?

[Limehouse]

Hi, again., and thanks!

Well, he'd have to be a stranger to VS, so hiring a local tough would be possible, but dangerous. The brother-in-law may be the go-between in getting the kidnapping set up. Maybe he didn't remind the guy to go unloaded? Or had another reason for wanting MG dead?

Anyway, I based my idea on the victim's story in the magazine, with her talk of truly loving him, and that making the affair "all right". Now learning from other posts that VS was allowed other liaisons, as was MG, I'm not so sure she was as "clingy" as it seemed to me at first.

I think there was probably a ghost-writer involved in her story, one who made sure a certain portrait of VS emerged, as an innocent young small-town woman ("girl" in the usage of the day) caught up in emotions and circumstances beyond her control.

What were the penalties of the time for carrying a loaded firearm, by the way?

Well, to be fair, if there is one thing that Valerie was, it's innocent. Falling in love with a married man isn't a crime. Having other liaisons isn't a crime and it was not so then either.

However, I do feel there is much more to this story than has ever been revealed and that is perhaps why there is so much speculation.

Kind regards,

Julie

[Graham]

Hi Julie,

the basic problem with your scenario (and others) is that you're really asking questions only Valerie can answer, and I would say that the likelihood of that happening is close to zero. More than once on these boards a poster has stated that he or she doesn't believe that either Hanratty or Alphon was the killer, and that he or she 'thinks he or she knows' (to paraphrase Pierre from another thread) who it was. Yet no names have ever been mentioned apart from Hanratty and Alphon. If it wasn't either of them, then whoever it was must have led a charmed life ever since. The police tend not to forget unsolved murders, and I am confident that if they thought that the A6 Case hasn't been solved, they'd still be looking at it as a cold-case crime. None us was in the jury-room in Bedford, so we'll never know the extent and depth of the deliberations, but the jury was satisfied that the prosecution had made a case for the guilt of Hanratty. Speaking purely personally, it will take new and rock-solid evidence to convince me that Hanratty wasn't the A6 killer, and in all honesty, after all these years, I would be amazed if such evidence will ever be manifested. Not that I want to see an end to this debate, of course I don't, but we've been going round in circles on these boards for a good many years now, and I really haven't seen anything concrete to shift me from my belief that Hanratty dun it.

Regards,

Graham

[Limehouse]

Hi Julie,

the basic problem with your scenario (and others) is that you're really asking questions only Valerie can answer, and I would say that the likelihood of that happening is close to zero. More than once on these boards a poster has stated that he or she doesn't believe that either Hanratty or Alphon was the killer, and that he or she 'thinks he or she knows' (to paraphrase Pierre from another thread) who it was. Yet no names have ever been mentioned apart from Hanratty and Alphon. If it wasn't either of them, then whoever it was must have led a charmed life ever since. The police tend not to forget unsolved murders, and I am confident that if they thought that the A6 Case hasn't been solved, they'd still be looking at it as a cold-case crime. None us was in the jury-room in Bedford, so we'll never know the extent and depth of the deliberations, but the jury was satisfied that the prosecution had made a case for the guilt of Hanratty. Speaking purely personally, it will take new and rock-solid evidence to convince me that Hanratty wasn't the A6 killer, and in all honesty, after all these years, I would be amazed if such evidence will ever be manifested. Not that I want to see an end to this debate, of course I don't, but we've been going round in circles on these boards for a good many years now, and I really haven't seen anything concrete to shift me from my belief that Hanratty dun it.

Regards,

Graham

Hi Graham,

I can't argue with your logic and I almost envy your total conviction that JH was the man responsible for this terrible crime. I wish I could achieve that degree of peace-of-mind but I just cannot.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Julie,

the basic problem with your scenario (and others) is that you're really asking If it wasn't either of them, then whoever it was must have led a charmed life ever since. The police tend not to forget unsolved murders, and I am confident that if they thought that the A6 Case hasn't been solved, they'd still be looking at it as a cold-case crime.
Graham

Sorry to contradict you Graham but
1] neither the lead Scotland Yard Detective Roger Matthews ,[a graduate of Cambridge University so nobody's fool ] appointed to carry out the Home Office Investigation and Report on the A6 crime in 1996 with a team of 20 Scotland Yard detectives and full access to every file available
or
2] Baden Skitt , Assistant Chief Commissioner of Police at Scotland Yard [previously a Chief constable ] who studied the report and led the CCRC in 1997 for the 2002 appea lScotland Yard detectives believed James Hanratty had anything to do with the A6 murder and was therefore completely innocent of the crime .
Not only that certainly Roger Matthews to this day -[and almost certainly too Baden Skitt ]- maintained after the appeal judgment that something must not have been right over the LCN DNA tests.
Moreover Graham since then there have been a number of cases -ie since the 2002 appeal verdict ,that depended on LCN DNA testing that judges have had to chuck out of court the most famous being the LCN DNA tests used to convict Sean Hoey of the Omagh bombing in 2007 and discovered to be completely faulty and thrown out of court by the judge who deemed them completely useless in that case .

[Graham]

So you keep saying, Nats, but I'm still not convinced and I doubt if I ever will be unless and until some new, rock-soild evidence comes to light.

Out of interest, originally (and I'm talking a long time ago) I thought that there might be a chance that JH was innocent, but over the years I've become satisfied that he did it, in view of the fact that no solid evidence that he was innocent has ever been produced.

And if Matthews' report proves his innocence, why hasn't it been published? I think the answer to that question is simple: it doesn't prove his innocence.

Graham

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Julie,

Yet no names have ever been mentioned apart from Hanratty and Alphon. If it wasn't either of them, then whoever it was must have led a charmed life ever since.

Graham

Hi again Graham and thanks for your reply. But all I was pointing out was that there are / have been , very high ranking police officers who held and still hold the belief that Hanratty was innocent and some of these officers have had comprehensive sight of all the files that are available. The DNA tests however seemed to overwhelmingly prove Hanratty's guilt---except that now we know something about LCN DNA tests that was not known in 2002 viz that it just takes one tiny speck to multiply into a monstrous rash of replica specks ..[to greatly simplify the description of the complex scientific process !] ... with the potential of distorting results overwhelmingly as has happened in several high profile cases since.

Regarding your above statement that whoever did it other than Alphon or Hanratty must have led a charmed life......well not if they committed suicide or were helped 'disappear' by the Soho crime mafia of 1962.
best regards Nats

[moste]

Hi again Graham and thanks for your reply. But all I was pointing out was that there are / have been , very high ranking police officers who held and still hold the belief that Hanratty was innocent and some of these officers have had comprehensive sight of all the files that are available. The DNA tests however seemed to overwhelmingly prove Hanratty's guilt---except that now we know something about LCN DNA tests that was not known in 2002 viz that it just takes one tiny speck to multiply into a monstrous rash of replica specks ..[to greatly simplify the description of the complex scientific process !] ... with the potential of distorting results overwhelmingly as has happened in several high profile cases since.

Regarding your above statement that whoever did it other than Alphon or Hanratty must have led a charmed life......well not if they committed suicide or were helped 'disappear' by the Soho crime mafia of 1962.
best regards Nats

I think it was Rob Harriman that pointed out in his book, 'DNA The Travesty'. The system used in the Hanratty case, Low Copy Number, is prone to being too sensitive, attracts contaminants too easily, and is only accepted as a method of dna testing by the Netherlands, New Zealand, and you guessed it UK.(The rest of the world apparently have little or no faith in the thing) Interesting that they took the trouble to exhume Hanratty for his samples and yet the sample from Ms. Storie's underwear was destroyed in the testing technique. what a pity!
As for the true perpetrator living a charmed life, as well as suicide,or being collared by the mob. How about, 'he headed back to barracks, cleaned and put away his weapon, then hit the sack. Reveille at 6.30 am.'
Hey, does anyone know whether the old RAC boxes that were all over Britain up until the 60's,had an illuminated window, showing their location, and were readable from about 100 yards? (If my memory serves I believe this was the case.)

[Graham]

Hi Moste,

I haven't read Harriman's book, but I did see a rather unflattering critique of it.

The thing about the DNA is that the Hanratty family pushed hard for it, but when the initial results suggested that James was in fact guilty, they and their legal advisors shouted "Contamination!", which then led to the exhumation of James' remains ( distasteful in the extreme to any surviving family) on Government edict. I'm no expert on DNA analysis, but the results as carried out about 13 years ago proved to the satisfaction of the Appeal Court that he was in fact the A6 killer and rapist. Sorry, but that's a fact - I'm sure at the time that LCN DNA was accepted by most countries with the capability of carrying out DNA analysis. Also, remember that the first ever murder-case solved by DNA analysis was in the Uk (the murder, if memory serves, of two girls somewhere in Leicestershire). Certainly, Sherrard accepted the results. It's a bit of a two-headed sword, but what was done was done and can never be repeated.

Not sure I understand your comment about suicide, the Mob, barracks, etc. Are you suggesting that the A6 killer was a member of the armed forces? How so?

And I can't help you re: the old RAC boxes!

Cheers,

Graham

[Dupplin Muir]

I think you're missing the point here Graham. Finding Hanratty's DNA should have been assumed, given the way the evidence was handled and stored. If Alphon had been on trial instead I'd have expected to find his DNA there, whether he was guilty or not. What I believe the Hanratty family was hoping for was to find someone else's DNA, though this didn't happen - unless the DNA attributed to MG came from the rapist (and as the paper I posted showed, it is possible for a rapist to leave no DNA at all).

Had the court been truly impartial it would have discounted Hanratty's DNA, because by admitting it they basically implied that all the safety measures used today to prevent contamination are a waste of time, since you can throw evidence into a box willy-nilly and there'll be no contamination at all - oh, unless said contamination would aid the prosecution case.

[Natalie Severn]

The thing about the DNA is that the Hanratty family pushed hard for it, but when the initial results suggested that James was in fact guilty, they and their legal advisors shouted "Contamination!"
Graham

Can we try and get this straight Graham: In 1997 when the Home Office were on the point of agreeing to re-open the case and send it to the CCRC and then the appeal courts, the Hanratty family did ask for the pieces of cloth to be examined for DNA but those earlier results were 'inconclusive'.
In 2002 on the eve of the appeal it was the prosecution who demanded Hanratty's body be exhumed and the 42 year old fragments should be re-tested by a new form of testing called LCN DNA [which unfortunately destroys all DNA evidence in the process of testing ] and has which in addition has since been found to be 'contamination prone' -and in the extreme- as seen in a number of cases where the results have since been thrown out of court by various judges because such LCN DNA tests have been found to be profoundly unreliable/and 'not fit for purpose' because of their extreme propensity to contamination and wrongly formed conclusions.
Even back in 2002 the contamination was acknowledged but it wasn't until a few years later that the full scale of such potential dangers was realised .
Secondly Graham I do think Moste has a point about the armed forces.Only an ex soldier for example or a person trained in military matters such as one who had been for National Service, would have been deemed capable of carrying out an execution-which is what it now looks like to me to have been the case -otherwise why have a pocketful of bullets? Now Charles France knew every nook and cranny of the Rehearsal Club having worked there for quite some time and he also knew where all the guns were kept and who all the Soho Mafia were who frequented that Rehearsal club after hours and Solomon's Gym which was 2 minutes across the road and where even the Kray's were known to hang out.So he was more equipped with such knowledge than anyone else on the scene to be looking out for a competent hitman . James Hanratty would not have been anyone that anybody serious and getting paid for doing a hit job would have considered suitable.
Finally how on earth do you conclude Sherrard was happy about the LCN DNA tests? He was profoundly skeptical as his autobiography reveals viz " Who would have thought the police would have kept on ice Valerie Storie's knickers for 31 years.....and the handkerchief that wrapped the gun ........" Michael Sherrard 2009.

[Graham]

Nats, it was the Home Office who ordered the exhumation.

Sherrard, if I am not mistaken, said that he accepted that the wrong man was not hanged. Which I would take as an acceptance that the DNA results indicated James Hanratty.

Let's not keep going round in circles on this, please, Nats.

Graham

[Natalie Severn]

Nats, it was the Home Office who ordered the exhumation.

Sherrard, if I am not mistaken, said that he accepted that the wrong man was not hanged. Which I would take as an acceptance that the DNA results indicated James Hanratty.

Let's not keep going round in circles on this, please, Nats.

Graham

Graham,
You are mistaken .Read Sherrard's 2009 autobiography.He never says anything that remotely indicates he believed Hanratty was guilty.Far from it.This quote whatever it is that keeps getting regurgitated here about the wrong man not being hanged must,if it was ever said, have been taken completely out of context.
Yes,OK -the Home Office but that is the State which is is the Crown .....and is therefore the prosecution !
And it is not neutral as people appear to believe.Far from it.

[Spitfire]

It was the Court of Appeal that ordered the exhumation of Hanratty. See paragraph 11 of the 2002 judgement.

11. On 17 October 2000, in the light of the DNA evidence then available, this Court ordered that the body of James Hanratty be exhumed for the purposes of obtaining specimens of his DNA.


Hanratty's DNA so extracted matched the DNA obtained from the semen stained knicker fragment and the mucus stained handkerchief, and confirmed that Valerie Storie had made a correct identification of her assailant way back in 1961. Although she had never wavered from her belief that Hanratty was the culprit, the DNA tests must have come as something of a relief to her, as they were to Michael Sherrard, who was relieved that the wrong man was not hanged but continued to believe that the evidence adduced in the 1962 trial was not sufficient to warrant a conviction.

[Graham]

Hi Nats,

sorry to say that you are mistaken. I've posted this little article before:

JAMES HANRATTY'S BARRISTER TAKES THE STAND

Michael Sherrard QC, the barrister who defended James Hanratty in one of the most controversial trials of the 20th century, came to City to talk to members of the Law Society about his experiences during the famous Hanratty trial.

The case was tried 40 years ago, and Hanratty was hanged for murder. In 1999 the Criminal Cases Review Commission referred the case to the Court of Appeal as DNA taken from members of Hanratty's family was analysed to test its compatibility with DNA samples collected from the crime scene. The results were inconclusive, and Hanratty was exhumed so that samples could be taken directly from his body.

Mr Sherrard's talk was fascinating, and touched on some of the most fundamental precepts of the law. He discussed the circumstances surrounding the original trial, and remarked, "If police officers choose what they'll disclose and what they won't, it becomes trial by police".

The recent DNA tests would seem to prove conclusively that Hanratty did in fact commit the crime for which he was executed. Mr Sherrard said, "The wrong man was not hanged. That was an immense relief to me." However, his opinion of the original prosecution remains unchanged. "The evidence was too weak to justify conviction. I still hold that view."

So, have things changed for the better since that infamous trial 40 years ago? Mr Sherrard believes that the legal system has been substantially improved: "I've got more faith in the police today than I did then."

The above is taken with due acknowledgment from Wayback Machine, an internet archive: http://web.archive.org/web/200502121...k/hanratty.htm

As Spitfire points out, Sherrard was not happy with the way certain aspects of the police inquiry were conducted, and he remained surprise that the jury convicted his client on what he, Sherrard, described as 'weak evidence'.

You may also be interested in this article http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/338618.

Sherrard was also filmed after the 2002 Appeal verdict, saying much the same.

Hi Spitfire,

you're absolutely right re: The Court Of Appeal, but I believe that the Home Office was responsible for putting the Court's order into practise.

Graham