The Christie Case

[Scorpio]

I have read Kennedys book, and Colin Wilsons musings in a book called ' Written in blood '.

[contrafib]

Fair enough.
So, have you read the 'Two Stranglers' book? And are there any other books on the case that you'd recommend? other than the obvious (Kennedy, Eddowes)

[Scorpio]

So you think Evans killed his wife and Christie the baby??, or Christie both?
It's a hell of a thing to tie a tie round a baby's neck and kill it. It would have been possible to have found a way of giving it to a couple to look after, (though perhaps not totally legitimately). Strange to think that had the Evanses happened to see another 'for rent' sign, Geraldine Evans would be a 62-year-old woman now, though it's doubtful her parents would have stayed together.

I believe Evans killed Beryl, as he originally stated. Its a hell of a thing to kill anybody,but Christie managed it many times. Finding a couple to adopt the child was to not Christie's concern. Your scenario suggests a degree of compassion and selflessness that,i believe, was not in Christies nature. Callousness, shrewdness and neuroticism define the man.

[contrafib]

Found out some stuff i didn't know from the Rillington Place website. Christie and Ethel lived at 2 addresses in the W10/11 area before Rillington Place, one of which was at Oxford Gardens, where Christie's first victim, Ruth Fuerst, later had a room. Also, they lived in upstairs rooms at 10 Rillington Place (they moved in 1937, not 1938) before getting the slightly more desirable ground floor flat. Pretty trivial i know but interesting to pick up more tidbits along the way.

[contrafib]

So you think Evans killed his wife and Christie the baby??, or Christie both?
It's a hell of a thing to tie a tie round a baby's neck and kill it. It would have been possible to have found a way of giving it to a couple to look after, (though perhaps not totally legitimately). Strange to think that had the Evanses happened to see another 'for rent' sign, Geraldine Evans would be a 62-year-old woman now, though it's doubtful her parents would have stayed together.

[Scorpio]

I believe there is adequate motivation for Christie to kill Geraldine. A crime of neccessity is as likely as a crime of passion.The child would have brought to much unwanted attention to Rillington Place,and the eventual intervention of the police who would be looking to trace the mother . Christie was not to know that Evans would screw it all up with his almost immediate voluntary confession, it is the last thing that he would of done.

[contrafib]

One for the experts. Regardless of who thinks Christie or Evans guilty, it is clear that we will never know EXACTLY what happened at 10 Rillington Place and who exactly knew what. On balance, it probably was Christie but the details are in no way clear-cut.

I was recently realerted to a book called 'The Two Stranglers of Rillington Place' by Rupert Furneaux. I knew about this book but didn't realise it came out in 1961, the same year as Kennedy's book. Were the two authors aware of each other's books while they worked on them? WHich came out first? and why is Furneaux's so lesser-known?

Furneaux came up with the same conclusion that the Brabin report did, 5 years later, namely that Evans killed Beryl and Christie killed Geraldine, which seems absurb to so many people.

Has anyone read this book? I'd like to know how the conclusion is arrived at.

[contrafib]

Just read the synopsis of 'A Capital Crime', and it's very heavily based on the case as you said, Sherlock, but perhaps with a couple of twists in the plot. They have 2 major police characters in the book as well.
On that note, apparently Bernard Lee ('m' in the Bond films) shot scenes as Chief Inspector Jennings for the 1970 Rillington Place film but they weren't used. Jennings was the 'bad cop' to his partner's 'good cop' (called Black)

[Delboy58]

Timothy Evans

If a verdict cannot be reached we have a hung jury (no pun intended) but I personally feel one could be easily reached here. Remember I'm talking about the later known facts after the original proceedings took place, giving us the benefit of hindsight. If the case were being considered afresh today, would it not be outrageus to ignore the undisputed evidence that Christie had already committed multiple murders in that same house, years before he had even met Evans, and that he continued to murder there after Evans had been executed. Subsequently, on a personal level, I would have no problem in acquitting Evans.

[belinda]

Hang on a mo, Belinda.

The argument for Evans's innocence is the fact that it was proved beyond any doubt whatsoever, after he was hanged for murder, that he had been living in the same house as an active serial killer. I humbly submit that the case against Evans had to be declared unsafe at the very least after that, without some very compelling (eg forensic) evidence that he had in fact killed anyone at all. It's not a question of whether or not he was capable. He would have to be proved guilty all over again, because the original jury very obviously didn't have nearly enough information about the goings-on in that house to deliver a safe verdict.

There is absolutely no cause to compare Evans with known serial killers.

Hi Delboy,

As a matter of fact, my co-author, Seth Linder is the son of Leslie Linder, who produced the film 10 Rillington Place.

Love,

Caz
X

My position on this is that I don't know. I'm not arguing for or against I was pointing out that driving a van does not automatically make you an innocent person.

As I said I can see a case for both.That's all.And if I had been on the Jury I would not have been able to give a verdict.

I could not condemn him as guilty but equally I could not say not guilty either.

[Sherlock]

I believe that a novel by Laura Wilson entitled A Capital Crime is to be published on 2nd September this year, which is loosely based on the cases of Evans and Christie, although the names in the novel are different.

[Delboy58]

Ah! Then you were not too far away from me, born in Walthamstow and raised in Chingford!

Neighbours in fact! I've been back recently and it's certainly changed... Still, haven't we all?!

[Limehouse]

Thanks Limehouse. Your comments are much appreciated. I was born in East Ham by the way.

Ah! Then you were not too far away from me, born in Walthamstow and raised in Chingford!

[Delboy58]

Thanks Limehouse. Your comments are much appreciated. I was born in East Ham by the way.

[Limehouse]

As this is a British murder, are there any of my fellow countrymen out there who remember visiting the murder site before it was demolished? Having been born in London and still living only about twenty miles away today, I must confess to having possessed a bit of a ghoulish nature as a boy and I paid several visits to the house in the late sixties and early seventies. The last time I saw the road as it was would have been about 1970 when it had been renamed Ruston Close. The street was looking pretty shabby by that time and was only about a year away from being torn down. I think now, being a more sensitive adult and considering all the dreadful events that took place there, I might have been a little less inclined to lay my hand on that famous door...

Hi Delboy,

As a fellow Londoner, but one who grew up on the north east side, I seldom ventured west! However, the very thought of 10 Rillington Place filled us kids with total fear - not lessened much by the film, which evoked terror indeed! Had I been close to the location as a kid, I would not have ventured nearer than the end of the street!

I contributed my thoughts about this crime earlier in the thread, and I will repeat that I think evans was completely innocent of the murder of both his wife and his child. You put up a good argument. Well done.