Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
Entrance to the Chalk Pit today @Googlemaps2025 May2019
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-EIGHT:
On Thursday 28th of November 1946, Australian politician Thomas Ley enlisted four good people to help him trap a bad man who terrorised women. As a simple plan with no law broken and nobody hurt, it was a gentlemanly reaction to a dastardly crime by a criminal who they felt deserved worse. Only what began as a good deed by four decent and moral people, soon descended into deceit and death.
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a brown gold of a 'P' just by the words 'Kensington'. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing in Beaufort Gardens in Knightsbridge, SW3; four streets west of the gay panic, three roads south of the killing of Churchill’s superspy, four streets south of the unsolved assassination of Countess Lubienska, and two roads north of the London cannibal - coming soon to Murder Mile. 5 Beaufort Gardens is one of 46 impressively grand five-storey townhouses worth £10 million-a-piece. Previously being a delightful des’ res’ to many a fop-haired dandy in a top hat and a dashing ‘tache, most are now merely tax write-offs for a faceless conglomerate of baddies, bankers and bastards. But the building’s front is not what’s of interest, as behind is its less glamourous rear end. Set just off the exclusive Brompton Road, Brompton Place is a painfully thin mews which rarely sees daylight and is barely big enough to park a van. As a service entrance for contractors and cleaners, it’s featureless and flat with crumbling paint and a series of vague doors leading to the bowels of these grand houses. On Thursday 28th of November 1946, the ground floor, first floor and basement were being extensively renovated by a troop of burly builders at the behest of its owner, the Australian politician Thomas Ley. With the Police unable or unwilling to assist, as a solicitor, he enlisted four good people to help him trap a bad man who terrorised women. It would be a simple plan with no law broken and nobody hurt. It was a gentlemanly reaction to a dastardly crime by a criminal who they felt deserved worse. Only what began as a good deed by four decent and moral people, soon descended into deceit and death. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 288: The Chalk Pit Murder – Part One. Saturday 30th of November 1946 at 4pm. After days of rain, with the storm finally passing, 16-year-old Tom Coombs was out collecting firewood on Slines Oak Road near Woldingham in Surrey, an isolated country lane surrounded by wide fields, high hedges and few houses for as far as the eye could see. Entering the old chalk pit, a recently decommissioned British Army rifle range, the ground was sludgy as the thick grey clay stuck to his boots. It was slippery as he descended the hill, but this wasn’t what made him to stop. “it looked like a bundle of rags… a dummy, with its legs sticking out of the trench”. Alerting his father, with a dead body found, the police were dispatched. Barely a year since the war had ended, detectives had seen many-a-scene such as this, as with soldiers coming home traumatised to find their families dead and their jobs gone, suicide was all too common. The man was in his mid-30s, handsome, fair-haired, blue-eyed, 5 foot 7 inches tall and 10 stone, with an autopsy later conducted by Dr Eric Gardner showing no signs of disease or natural death. Dressed in a neat but well-worn tweed overcoat, blue shirt and tie, with grey jacket, trousers and waistcoat, he was clean shaven as if looking for work, yet somehow he’d ended up here, 18 miles from London. Dead for two days, without disturbing the body, Detective Superintendents Roberts and King searched his pockets; £27 in notes and coins ruled out a robbery, a book titled ‘100 Cocktails’ suggested he had been or was going to a party as he had five packs of Players cigarettes with two still full, there was no suicide note which isn’t uncommon as gripped by depression the only thought he may have had was his death, as well as a comb, a pencil, a bus ticket from Reigate to somewhere but here and his ID card. His name was John Mudie, and that’s all they knew about him for now. It had all the hallmarks of a suicide; a noose made of ply Jute had been tied around his neck, his face was purple, his eyes bloodshot, and his organs and skin dotted with pinprick haemorrhages. He was fit and strong, and with no defensive wounds nor alcohol or drugs in his blood, lynching was ruled out. It had hints of sadomasochism, as green (odd smelling) cloth was entwined with the noose possibly to prevent rubbing, his trousers were unbuttoned, he wore no underpants, and there was evidence of seminal fluid at his crotch, but why would someone travel somewhere so remote for a sexual thrill? Dr Keith Simpson, the Home Office pathologist later stated ”this is a case of death by hanging… but whether homicidal or suicidal, I cannot say”, as there were several things which didn’t make sense. The body was found in a 6 foot long by 1 foot and 7 inch wide trench, previously used by troops as a latrine, but an axe found nearby showed it had recently been used to widen the grave. It was the right size for him, but the detectives had never seen an incidence of a suicidal man digging his own grave. It wasn’t impossible, just odd. As were the asphyxiation marks around his neck which proved it took him 15 minutes to die, and yet, with the trench being at the base of a barren hill, the only trees in sight were too small to hold his weight, and at the nearest buildings - a pumping station and a Engineer’s cottage 100 feet away – the owners saw and heard nothing and there was no evidence of any hanging. It didn’t seem like a murder, but the Police knew that someone else had to be involved, maybe it was a sex game which went wrong, or someone had found him hanging, panicked and tried to bury him. They knew this; as after his death, the rope had been cut into four pieces; it was impossible for him to have hung himself in or near the trench as rigor mortis had begun to set in before he was laid there; it had rained for days making the grey clay soil boggy yet his brown canvas shoes were neat and clean; and with mud smears on the front of his clothes, somebody had dragged him, possibly from the road. The police and the pathologists were stumped, it looked like a suicide, but they couldn’t confirm where it had happened or how. It wasn’t a robbery, a lynching or an assault, yet it didn’t look like a murder. The only way to discover the truth was to trace the victim’s last steps before he ended up dead. But who was he? Born on the 1st of July 1911 in the Scottish county of Fife, John McMain Mudie known as Jack was the middle child of five siblings who was described as “quiet and inoffensive”. Said to be handsome with soft fair hair and beautiful eyes, he had an easy way with the ladies, but was always faithful to his wife. Enlisted as a Corporal in the Royal Army Medical Corps, he served in Italy and Libya, his military record described him as “exemplary… well-balanced and happy”, but burdened by flat feet, he didn’t fight in any large scale conflicts, and therefore he had no injuries and didn’t suffer from shell shock or nerves. Those who knew him said “he was the last person to have an enemy” and “he wasn’t a sexual pervert”. In July 1942, aged 31, he married his sweetheart Jean and they had a son, and although he dreamed of building a nice little home for his family, while he was serving overseas, Jean met another man, she got pregnant, and although John tried to take her back, his heart was broken and the couple split. He was devasted, but as his brother would later state, “he was upset, but not the kind to take his life”. He tried his best to keep the family together, and even got a job as a debt collector at Pearl Assurance, but in April 1946 his wife left him taking the kids to Glasgow, and a month later, he moved to London. By all accounts, he was honest, decent and he didn’t have a criminal record. But then again, the post-war years were tough for everyone. In July, he got his first job as a cellarman at the Dog & Fox pub in Wimbledon, where the bar manager Arthur Rouse described him as “quiet, not particularly bright but industrious”, and said “Mudie was badly in need of work… he had very little money and out of the £1 10s a week he earned here, he paid 27s 6d for a bed in a boarding house” at 3 Homefield Road a few streets away, “and he saved 3s a week by having a cup of tea at work”, he was so broke he hardly ate. After four weeks, he resigned as a better paying job as a barman in Reigate came up, and although £50 in stock had gone missing from the pub, said to be a decent fellow, they couldn’t prove it was him. In June 1946, he started work at the Reigate Hill Hotel, where – as a professional barman - he was liked and trusted by the bosses, the staff and the customers. He lived on-site, he earned a good wage, he didn’t gamble, he was always happy, and his only vice was as a heavy smoker of Player’s cigarettes. Five months later, on his day off, instead of taking his girlfriend Euphemia McGill to the cinema… …he seems to have dug a grave and then hung himself in an isolated chalk pit in Surrey. Investigating his last known movements, Detective Sergeant Frederick Shoobridge searched his room at the Reigate Hill Hotel. It was small, sparse with few possessions and nothing was expensive or fancy. He found nothing sinister or out of the ordinary, only a bog-standard letter from a firm of solicitors. Dated the 25th of July 1946 and sent to his last lodging at 3 Homefield Road in Wimbledon, it read “Dear Sir. On 19th of June 1946, our clients Connaught Properties sent to you a letter addressed to Mrs Byron Brook, one of their directors…”, asking for the return of some company cheques, “unless they are returned, our instructions are to proceed with recovery. Yours faithfully. Denton, Hall & Burgin”. The letter was written at their client’s behest, Mr Thomas Ley, a portly and out-of-shape 65-year old former Australian politician, solicitor and the Managing Director of Connaught Properties. Interviewed at his office at 5 Beaufort Gardens which was thick with builders, apologising for the noise, Mr Ley confirmed that the cheques hadn’t been returned, that Mudie hadn’t replied to his last letter and he was in the process of taking it to court. It was a minor civil matter being dealt with by his legal team. And with that, the investigation hit a brick wall. The police couldn’t find a reason why John Mudie had either hung himself, or why anyone would assist in his death. With no crime committed, it seemed like a simple miscommunication which had either been exacerbated or resolved by Mudie’s suicide… …yet, DS Shoobridge had stumbled upon a tale of blackmail, kidnapping and deception. Thomas Ley was impressive. Often misreferred to as Sir Thomas Ley, he was a political heavyweight who many in 1920s Australia saw as a future Prime Minister. As a Christian who was married and had two sons, he met his wife while she was fighting for women’s suffrage, as a teetotaller the public’s nickname for him was Lemonade Ley, and as a solicitor to the Supreme Court of New South Wales and MP for Hurstville, he rose through the ranks to become Minister for Justice in the State of Sydney and was elected as Nationalist Party of Australia member in the House of Representatives. But following his defeat in the 1928 election, Ley returned to England where he was born and set up his business. As a solicitor and co-director of Connaught Properties with Mrs Bryon Brook, who had previously lived with her daughter Jean in the same lodging house as John Mudie, with the Police unable (or unwilling) to intervene and with Mudie refusing to reply to the letters, Ley had concocted a gentlemanly reaction to this dastardly crime. It wasn’t legal and he risked a lot, but as he was too fat and sick to do it alone, if it was done right Mudie would be punished, Mrs Brook would get justice and no-one would get hurt. He needed four willing co-conspirators who would bend the law to do what was morally right. First was John William Buckingham, the 43-year-old owner of a car hire firm with access to stately-looking Wolseley saloon, vital to the plan. He had a minor conviction for theft 15 years earlier and had been clean ever since, and was described as a tall “all-in wrestler” who was “brutal looking with a cauliflower ear”, and would be there if Mudie got rough, as Ley had seen him be “violent and nasty”. Like the others, Buckingham was moral and had never done anything like this before, but hearing that “two ladies were being blackmailed, Ley wanted to get something on Mudie” – proof of his crimes. Second was Lawrence John Smith, he had no criminal record and only knew Thomas Ley, as being a 28-year-old joiner, since May he had been foreman of construction at the flat at 5 Beaufort Gardens. He was tall, strong and he being morally decent, he was appalled that Mudie was a blackmailer and weeks earlier “Ley had found Mrs Brook in a distressed state, as if she had been interfered with“. They would all be paid for their services in luring this blackmailer into the open, but for Smith, it wasn’t about the money, but “getting the brute who raped the old lady” to face justice. Mudie sickened them. He seemed so quiet, but the tales Ley told of his depravity – “he had sex with the daughter, then the mother, now they’re in a state of nerves” – only made them sicker, but they weren’t here to hurt him. Ley insisted “there’s to be no rough stuff… all you’ve got to do is get him to my office, and I’ll do the rest. He knows me so he can’t see me until then, otherwise he won’t come”. But how to lure him out? From what Ley had told them, Mudie was a charmer, he liked the ladies and was short on money. This wouldn’t be a honeytrap, but a money-trap, as the third co-conspirator was Lilian Florence Bruce, a 66-year-old married cook and housekeeper from Putney, who although a lower middle-class women, by wearing a nice dress, a fancy fur coat, some jewels, and her hair and make-up done, as an attractive older lady with the heirs and graces of a well-to-do woman, she could easily pass as a wealthy widow. Like the others, Mrs Bruce was moral and decent, a woman who had made a good life for herself with her bus driver husband, but knew she was doing right to stop Mudie from terrorising other women. Buckingham & Smith were the muscle if Mudie got nasty, Mrs Bruce was the bait to lure Mudie to London, and the Wolseley saloon (which Mrs Bruce owned) was the deception, but a posh lady doesn’t drive her own car. Needing someone they trusted, Buckingham’s son, John Junior was enlisted having been a chauffeur and driven that car many times before, and like his dad, he knew he was doing right. He even had a chauffeur’s uniform, a peaked cap, a valid licence and the right insurance to drive it. The plan was simple; on the day in question, the car would drive Mudie to the rear door of the flat, the chauffeur would lead them both into the passageway, she would make an excuse, return to the car and the chauffeur would drive her away. Smith & Buckingham would tie Mudie up in Ley’s office, make him sign the confession, and being given money and a plane ticket, he would be forced to leave the country with an assurance that he was never bother Mrs Brook or her daughter, and would never come back. As Ley said, “no laws were to be broken, and no-one was to be hurt”… …but somehow, somewhere, it all went horribly wrong. The autopsy of John McMain Mudie was conducted at Weybridge Hospital, the morning after his body was found in the chalk pit. His cause of death was “asphyxia from strangulation when suspended by a rope round the neck” consistent with suicide. But unlike with most hangings “there had been no drop”. A V-shaped strangulation mark beginning under his chin, rising passed his ears and ending up the midline of his skull proved that Mudie had been suspended for at least 15 minutes before he died by asphyxia, but someone had then cut him down, and dragged and (possibly) driven him to his freshly cut grave. After his death, “there was evidence of some rough handling, as shown by bruises on the head, hip and collar. He was dragged by his clothes, probably by the braces, he was flung down the hill fracturing two ribs and puncturing the skin on the blackthorns… and was pulled head-first into the trench”. Only then was the rope cut. But the rope wasn’t only a noose. With no defensive wounds and his right hand still in his pocket, this 12-foot long piece of ply jute which had later rucked up around his neck had also been used to tie him up. So how could he hang himself, if his hands were bound by his side? Someone had bound him, and with the green (odd smelling) cloth, they had gagged him. They knew this wasn’t a suicide, but was it a murder? The surveillance on Mudie by Smith & Buckingham went without a hitch, and keeping their distance, they weren’t seen or suspected. On 18th of November, 10 days prior, with the plan set, Ley withdrew £250 and then a further £300 in £1 notes to be paid once the blackmailer was delivered to Ley’s flat. With John as her chauffeur, under the alias of a wealthy widow, Mrs Bruce arrived at the Reigate Hill Hotel where she got acquainted with the barman, John Mudie, and on her second visit, she invited him on his day-off to be barman at a little cocktail soiree she was hosting her posh 5-storey townhouse in Knightsbridge. They agreed a fee, and he’d be picked up on Thursday 28th of November at 5:30pm. It was easy, he suspected nothing and as Ley had insisted, no one was hurt and no laws were broken. Everyone was nervous that day, but were buoyed by the knowledge they were doing what was right. At 4pm, Smith & Buckingham got to Ley’s flat at 5 Beaufort Gardens to finalise the plans, Buckingham was given a Yale key for the backdoor on Brompton Place to be handed to John Junior, and in a small 8hp Ford saloon that Smith had rented days before, they drove to the hotel to keep tabs on Mudie. That night, without warning, he had cancelled a date at the cinema with his girlfriend Euphemia McGill, and it was clear that Mudie was broke, as he had tried to sell an £80 wrist watch to a customer. Picking up the suitably attired Mrs Bruce at 5pm as planned, the rather grand-looking Wolseley saloon drive up to the hotel at a little after 5:30pm, as a lady must always be late. And dressed in a tweed overcoat, blue shirt and tie, a grey suit and waistcoat, and brown canvas shoes, he was neat and freshly shaven as if he was going to an interview, unaware that he was wearing the clothes he would die in. As expected, with the bait set, Mudie was eagerly waiting at the kerb when the car pulled up. Grinning at the good fortune before him, the chauffeur tipped his cap “good evening Sir”, opened the rear door and on the plush leather seats he sat next to this supposedly wealthy widow dressed in jewels and fur. In his pockets was a 3d bus ticket from an earlier trip to Reigate, £27 in notes and coins having sold a bracelet, as a heavy smoker he had three part-smoked packs of Player’s cigarettes, and believing that he was going to be working as a barman at the lady’s posh soiree, he had a book titled ‘100 Cocktails’. He thought he was being led to a job, Mrs Bruce believed he was being lured to sign a confession, but as the Wolseley followed the Ford at a distance, neither knew that he was being led to his death, as in the backseat, Mrs Bruce and Mudie made small talk. He spoke about growing up in Fife, his military service, his wife and child who he still loved, and how although he rarely saw them, he missed them. For Mrs Bruce and John Junior, it took a herculean effort to hide their true feelings at this blackmailer and rapist of women, who sat there with not a care in the world nor any hint of remorse at his crimes. If anything, he came across as kind and pleasant, but as Ley had forewarned them, it was all a façade. On route, needing extra cigarettes, they pulled up to a pub in Putney, and although as they shared a pint which Mudie paid for, even they thought “he didn’t seem like a bad person”, but they had been told how evil and devious he was, and his charm was how he had conned Mrs Brooks and her daughter. So, soon the confession would be signed, two women would be safe, and that was all that mattered. At just before 7pm, Smith & Buckingham arrived at 5 Beaufort Gardens parking the car out of sight and telling Ley “they’re almost here”. Entering the ground floor, at the rear of the passageway was an office where Ley stood beside a chair, a desk, a piece of paper and a pen for the confession, to the left of the back door was Buckingham silently waiting, as to the right was Smith holding 12 feet of rope. And just out of sight, they heard the Wolseley pull-up into Brompton Place. (Out) Every piece of the plan had worked like clockwork, Mudie was here and he wasn’t suspicious. Having been a barman at many private functions, he was used to entering via the tradesman’s entrance, and with this being an expensive townhouse, his only fear was whether he would do a good enough job. He didn’t quibble that the mews was unlit, that he saw no one else, that the ground floor was under construction, or that above the door, a sign read ‘Old Air Raid Shelter’, as barely a year after the war had ended, regardless of their status, every street was dark and dirty having been reduced to rubble. As rehearsed the chauffeur opened the car door letting out Mrs Bruce & Mudie. He unlocked the back door to 5 Beaufort Gardens with the key, and Mrs Bruce ushered Mudie inside. Armed with her excuse, “Johnny, I want to speak to you”, she left Mudie in the passageway, and that’s when he saw them. As the back door slammed shut and Mrs Bruce was swiftly driven away, what stood before Mudie and his escape was the imposing frames of Smith and Buckingham, at the end of the passageway was Ley, and instantly recognising him, Mudie was said to have muttered “you think you’ve got me, do you?”. The trap had worked, a blackmailer was caught, a rapist would be exiled, and his confession was just minutes away. Justice had been done… or so the co-conspirators had thought. In truth, John Mudie was innocent of extortion, theft, blackmail or rape, and he barely knew Mrs Brook or her daughter. Their morals had driven them to believe a lie, they had lured an innocent man to a flat, and within days his strangled body would be found in a chalk pit… having left the real blackmailer to walk free. The concluding part of The Chalk Pit Murder continues next week. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of.
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Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
65a Aylesbury Street in Neasden, @Googlemaps2025 April 2019
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-SEVEN: On Tuesday 6th of September 2022, 71-year-old Susan Hawkey was last seen entering her flat on Aylesbury Street in Neasden. Nobody saw her, nobody heard her, and – although vulnerable and afraid - no-one was looking out for her. And yet, the quiet isolation of her flat aided her brutal torture and murder by a pack of brainless thugs.
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a green symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Preston' at the far north. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: this is just a selection from various sources:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile, Today, I’m standing on Aylesbury Street in Neasden, NW10; four roads north of Jemma Mitchell’s hire car, five roads west of the Grey Man’s last stand, three roads east of the home of the Little Drummer boy’s last victim, and a short walk from the widow buried in the wall - coming soon to murder Mile. Nestled amidst an industrial sprawl of roads and factories, Aylesbury Street consists of two rows of two-storey semi-detached council houses built to provide cheap homes in the post-war years. With almost every square inch made on concrete, brick or tarmac, this area is the kind of urban hell hole where the pungent aroma of dog turds provides a Satnav home for drunks staggering from the pub. 65a Aylesbury Street was a little home no different to any other. Split into two flats and separated by a black front door, as a shut-in who her neighbours barely knew, the occupier of the ground floor flat was hardly seen beyond her daily trips to the Post Office or off-licence and few people knew her name. On Tuesday 6th of September 2022, 71-year-old Susan Hawkey was last seen entering her flat. Nobody saw her, nobody heard her, and – although vulnerable and afraid - no-one was looking out for her. And yet, the quiet isolation of her flat aided her brutal torture and murder by a pack of brainless thugs. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 287: The PIN Heads. As an unkempt and sullen recluse, it’s easy to see how many who lived around her may have dismissed her as a nobody, but the Susan they saw wasn’t the real Susan who once lived and was loved. Born on the 23rd of September 1951, for Susan and her parents, having seen it grow from a village on the outskirts of London to a bustling modern conurbation as part of the ever-expanding city, Willesden and Neasden was the place she called home, and she would always call it home for the rest of her life. In 1939, as the war loomed, just two miles south-west at 61 High Road in Willesden, it was here that 19-year-old shop assistant Madge Heaton (Susan’s mother) and 20-year-old railway porter Lawrence Hawkey (Susan’s father) once lived. With him being enlisted to give his life to fight for his country and a real risk that these two young lovers may never see each other again, in October 1939, they married. Unlike so many millions, miraculously they survived, but tragedy would strike before Susan was born. In June 1949, Madge & Lawrence Hawkey welcomed into the world twin daughters, Jean & Sylvia, two beautiful baby girls who would make their family happy. But that same month, they also buried them, as neither girl survived, and these grieving parents were left with empty cots and a hole in the hearts. Conceived six months later, the arrival of Susan Anne Hawkey created such a strong unbreakable bond between her parents and their only child that she strived to do them proud, and she did just that. Said to be "generous, intelligent and hardworking", with a good head for maths, she became a well-liked bank clerk at several high street branches, advising its elderly and its most vulnerable customers on the best ways to save and keeping them safe by reminding them “don’t write down your PIN number”. Being barely five foot tall with bright blue eyes, a soft voice and a kind smile, Susan could be mistaken for a pushover, but said to be feisty and forthright, she always stood up for herself as well as others. Across the decades, she never caused any problems, she didn’t fall out with any friends or neighbours, and being unmarried with no children, she remained closer to her parents as they got older and frailer. Her life was simple but satisfying; a nine-to-five job, a regular routine, some savings to fall back on, a holiday once a year, and the love of her parents. That was her life. But as before, tragedy would strike. In June 2004, her father died. Fifteen months later, so did her mother. Heartbroken, all Susan had left was her work to occupy her, but with retirement approaching and with her life shattered, by the start of the 2010s, everything she knew was gone; her job and her parents, as well as the smile on her face and the cheeky twinkle in her eyes. Growing ever more depressed, she refused help from distant family, and talking to no-one, she became ever more insular and isolated. The brick walls and the black door of her little council flat at 65a Aylesbury Street became a barrier, as she blocked out the world to prevent any more pain and misery from breaking her further. She had no phone, she didn’t reply to letters, and no friends ever visited her. She knew no-one. Neighbours would later state “I saw her once or twice. She smiled, but I rarely waved back”, "I knew of her, but never met her”, “she kept to herself, she was quiet and rarely came out”, and she was so isolated, one neighbour would later say “I thought her house was empty. It’s sad, I didn’t even know her name". This proud women was gone, replaced by a shambling wreck; her hair was messy, her hygiene was poor, her blue eyes were cracked red with her lovely smile gone, and although this frugal woman had a work pension, a state pension and £16,000 in her bank account, she never bought any new clothes. As an alcoholic, every day at the same time, dressed in a tatty red duffle coat, a pair of dirty Ugg boots and pulling her canvas shopping trolley behind her, she withdrew money from the Post Office on the corner of Neasden Lane and Braemar Avenue, then headed to Star Wines, her regular off-licence to buy the same three bottles of cheap plonk and a stack of unpalatable frozen meals for one. And seeing and talking to no-one in the ten minute she was out, she closed her door on the world once again. Inside, her flat was choked with rubbish, as midst her lonely mess, this frail vulnerable pensioner sat in her pink armchair, drowning her sorrows, gorging on cheap food and watching her television, alone. Seeing her as nothing but a drunk, it’s clear why so many neighbours ignored her… …but someone was watching her, having become the target of an evil twosome. To an outsider, the tropical island of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines known as SVG may seem idyllic, but with poverty, drugs and crime endemic, it’s is the second most dangerous place in the Caribbean. This was the home of Chelsea Grant and Xyaire Howard, two pathetic greedy wastrels who wanted all the best things in life – fast cars, designer clothes, the latest phones - but were unwilling to put in the effort or hours to earn it. They only cared about themselves, and were willing to hurt others to get it. Born in 1999 in Edinboro, a crime-ridden town on the outskirts of the capital of Kingstown, 24-year-old Xyaire Howard started out as someone who wanted to do something with his life having gone to SVG Community College and had a child with his partner. But as less of a leader and more of a follower, being a heavy drug user who was addicted to smoking strong skunk, getting stoned became his goal. Looking like a thin and spindly weasel of a man who was described as “shifty, deceptive, monosyllabic and always licked his lips when he was nervous”, in 2021, Howard came to the UK (supposedly) looking for work even though he was on a six-month tourist visa, but instead he illegally overstayed his permit. At a party, a few months later, he met 28-year-old Chelsea Grant from Ottley Hall north of Kingstown, a “domineering and aggressive” women, five years older and easily twice his size who was the epitome of greed. She had convictions for fraud and assault, with two kids who she abandoned in SVG when she too came to the UK and overstayed her tourist visa. Baffling, this 20-stone women later claimed she came here to join the Royal Navy, but ended up (ironically) as a ‘carer’ in an old people’s home. That night, being sex-obsessed, they both had intercourse, and sharing a fatuous love of drink, drugs, tacky gold jewelry and wearing designer brands, they acted like stupid little kids with no responsibility, and – often unable (and more likely unwilling) to pay their rent as they were to lazy to work for it and always blew anything they earned – they moved-in together into a cheap rented flat at Pit House on Press Road in Neasden, just one street from the Post Office and Star Wines which Susan visited daily… … and just two streets from her lonely and isolated flat. For these selfish work-shy lay-abouts, they had decided that they best way to earn was to take. And unwilling to put in the effort, they opted for steal from the weakest, frailest and most vulnerable. As a 71-year-old depressed alcoholic, who was unsteady on her feet, didn’t have a mobile phone, spoke to no-one and followed the same route every day, she would be a push over for these two cowards. On Wednesday 27th of July 2022, having watched her withdraw cash from the Post Office on Braemar Avenue and wheel away her canvas trolley towards the off-licence, they snatched her handbag and ran. Anyone else would have been shaken, but being little, feisty and financially savvy having been an bank clerk for years, she immediately had access to her account frozen, so all they got was some cash. That night they celebrated their little score of about £100, by getting drunk, stoned and having sex, resulting in another baby, who – possibly like the other three – they would both abandon and ignore. Susan might have brushed the attack off as a one-off, but as an easy target, they would attack again. A month later, on Monday 22nd of August, in broad daylight (as she never went out after dark), they stalked her and ripped her bag off her shoulder with such force it knocked her to the ground, and being concussed, before she could freeze the account, Howard & Grant had made a few transactions of some drink, some Rizlas, some tobacco, some phone cards to call home and a Big Mac meal for two. Again, being savvy, as she hadn’t written down her PIN number in her diary which was inside her bag, they couldn’t withdraw any cash, but this didn’t stop their greed as their despicable crimes escalated. The next day, the bank card hadn’t been stopped, it’s uncertain why but maybe having hit her head, all Susan wanted to do was go back to the comfort of her pink armchair, pull up her duvet and sleep. Inside her lonely little flat, she felt safe, only she wasn’t as in her handbag was also her house keys. Nobody noticed as Howard & Grant sidled up this quiet residential street with cruel intentions. With the front garden of 65a Aylesbury Street being overgrown with weeds, no-one saw them at her door. Their plan was simple, get the PIN number, whether by robbery or force, she was an old women after all. And being drunk and stoned, they weren’t exactly silent. Being a runt and a Heffer, they clumsily barged in. But being feisty and alert to their stumbling, Susan grabbed a hammer, stood her ground and fighting them both off, again they got away with nothing and ran as the frail old lady cursed them. She was alone and afraid, but unwilling to back down as this was her home. She didn’t call the Police so they were unaware that any crime had taken place, but she had told her neighbours (so they didn’t become targets to) and she notified the Housing Association so they could replace her door locks. That should have been the end of the story, as the cowardly twosome fled with nothing… …but seeing her account balance, Howard bragged to a pal on Instagram, “Yo, I copped a card bro. 16k is on this t’ing”. They wanted her money, all of it, but what they didn’t have was her PIN number. Tuesday 6th of September. A heat wave had passed and although still hot, Susan shuffled in her red duffle coat and Ugg boots, as her trolley clinked with three wine bottles for £10. She hadn’t smiled in years, and with her sullen face still bruised from the attack just two weeks earlier, she thought she was safe at home, only she wasn’t. CCTV captured Howard & Grant at 1:38pm on Neasden Lane, but instead of stalking her, they dithered, pacing the neighbouring streets and discretely passing her isolated flat for almost 90 minutes. No-one saw them approach or heard them enter, so what happened within the flat can never be truly known. Having peeped through the window, it’s likely they saw her slumped in her armchair, a duvet up to her neck, a meal-for-one carton and an empty wine bottle by her side, snoozing in front of the telly. This time they were quiet as they crept in, using the same key, as the Housing Association had failed to replace the locks in the two weeks since, so she had no idea that pure evil had entered her home. Wounds to her arms, face and chest would prove that she tried to fight back, but she overpowered by the fists of either this 20-stone lump, a skinny stoned thug, or both. Deep abrasions to her wrists show she was bound using his bootlace, but by tearing bedsheets, she was tightly tied at her hands and feet so she couldn’t move, and with a roll of parcel tape, her mouth was gagged and her eyelids taped shut. Unable to see or scream, Susan was repeatedly punched as the television muffled any sounds as her swollen and bruised face was battered again and again. Alone and frightened, her killer or killers must have seen that Susan wouldn’t give up her PIN number, so that’s when they stripped her. Ripping any shred of dignity from this proud woman; they sliced her pyjama top up the front, cutting open her bra and exposing her breasts, and pulled off her pyjama bottoms and her knickers, exposing her genitals. None of the neighbours heard any of this, but it’s likely they laughed as they abused and humiliated her, loving every moment, as they didn’t see her as a person, only as an obstacle to a four digit number. It’s impossible to know the pain and terror Susan felt as they beat her black and blue, as they degraded her, and even - as the evidence would later suggest – that Zyaire Howard may even have raped her. Susan was smart, she knew her PIN number wasn’t worth dying for, so at some point, she gave it up. She gave up the fight, she would wait for them to leave, she would cancel the card and she would live. At least, that’s what she thought. In court, the prosecution would state “there was a clear intention of ensuring she couldn’t interfere with the ability to access the funds in her bank account”, and although they both blamed each other, with Grant claiming she was at home and Howard saying “she was fine when I left her”, which is a lie? Susan couldn’t move or scream, but out of pure greed, one if not both of them put a jumper over her head so they couldn’t see the terror in her eyes, and with a strip of black fabric, they strangled her with so much force, it broke the hyoid bone in her neck. Whether they waited to watch her die is unknown, but having thrown the duvet over her, they left her in front of the telly as if she was sleeping. As an isolated shut-in, no-one would come looking for her and no-one would report her missing. Before her body was even cold, this evil twosome took her bank card and with glee went on a spending spree, knowing full well that the late Susan Hawkey wouldn’t be found for days, maybe even weeks. Moments after her murder, Howard walked into Post Office, the shoelace still missing from his boots, and using the PIN number, he withdrew the maximum daily allowance of cash on her card. The next day, they did it again, and again, and from the 7th to the 26th of September, over the next three weeks, there wasn’t a single second of mourning or regret, as this sick and twisted couple went shopping. Totalling 146 purchases, the stolen card went unchecked at Timberland, Clarkes, H&M, Adidas, TK Max, Poundland, Primark, Sports Direct. John Lewis, Michael Kors and Puma, with them splashing out on watches, speakers, telephones, designer clothes, sunglasses, hats, perfumes, handbags and a new television. They repeatedly returned to Westfield in Shepherd’s Bush, paying for the bus trips and taxis on the card, they withdrew cash to buy skunk, and ate many burgers at the McDonald’s in Wembley. They sent a little money back home to their children, but most of it was blown on crap, and at no point did the bank spot any fraudulent purchases, even though, Susan followed the same routine every day. By the 19th of September, with the £16000 Susan had in savings now depleted to £3434 and falling, they both used their new phones to search “what do pensioners get paid?", and “benefits for over 70s” as they knew her date of birth, and wanted to know when her pension was paid in and how much. That same day, two weeks after Susan’s murder, sometime during the night and with the skunk making them paranoid, again using their own phones, they searched 65 different variations of “is a dead body a strong smell?" and ‘if someone is killed do the police tell the bank?’. It was clearly on their minds, as during that night, CCTV would show Howard walking down Aylesbury Street with a torch in his hand. The summer had been hot, Susan’s heating was on and being hidden under a 12 tog duvet for the last 15 days, by the 21st of September at 3am, Howard had begun searching for protective overalls, rubber gloves and a face respirator to ensure the stench of decomposition didn’t make him choke. In court, he would claim “it was for a job on a building site, but I overslept and was sacked”. But that was a lie. In the end, they didn’t dispose of the body, as being too lazy, they just left her to rot. Howard & Grant got everything they wanted, but with balance depleting, the bickering had begun, and later on, so did the blame game. Zyaire Howard refused to talk, so being a self-pitying blabber, all we have is Chelsea Grant’s version of events, which paints her as an innocent victim of coercion. The prosecutor stated that Grant was “greedy and ruthless”, which she denied claiming “I’ve looked after elderly people and never tied them up or anything or encouraged Xyaire to do that. I should have stopped him. I didn’t and that’s something I can’t change’. And although she accused him of pressuring her into going on the shopping sprees (as the CCTV shows no coercion as she grins at every purchase), or assaulting her stating “he hit me, I had spotting. I told him I think you’ve killed the baby”, but it was her who had prior convictions for fraud, assault and was said to be “domineering and aggressive”. No-one will ever know the truth, except we know that they each played a part in Susan’s death. At about midday on Monday the 26th of September, 20 days after she was last seen alive, a neighbour realised that Susan’s bins hadn’t been put out for about two and a half weeks, and notified the police. Forcing entry, the first thing they saw was the flies, the first thing they inhaled was the smell, and with a mouldy meal-for-one by her side and this hoarder’s room littered with empty wine bottles, they had initially thought that another old forgotten shut-in had died of a heart attack in front of the television, but as they removed the duvet, it revealed the harrowing story of torture, murder and possibly rape. Detective Chief Inspector Neil Rawlinson headed up the investigation, stating “an elderly vulnerable woman appears to have targeted and the circumstances of her murder are particularly tragic”, as this was clearly not just a robbery or a sadistic torture, because a key piece of evidence drew his attention. On the floor, amongst the litter, detectives found a wrapper and a used condom. The wrapper bore Howard’s fingerprints and inside was also his semen, but the condom itself (which was opened in that room) was speckled with three very distinct traces of DNA; Howard’s, Susan’s and Grant’s. Grant’s defence team would claim, her DNA got on the condom as Zyaire rarely showered, they had sex regularly and – even more bafflingly - “it was transferred onto the condom by a fly”. Yes, a fly. But surely there are only three likely scenarios that suit the evidence and they are all horrific; that either Howard raped Susan; that Grant & Howard had sex and forced Susan to watch, or that they did both? The arrest of Howard & Grant couldn’t have come quick enough, and even though the hunt for Susan’s murderers was reported in the press, their callous greed didn’t stop until every last penny was spent. On Wednesday 28th, two days after her body was found, detectives visited every shop where Susan’s card was used. In Wembley, they had secured the CCTV at Poundland, Primark and Money Exchange with each purchase clearly made by a skinny runt with dreadlocks, a gold chain, jeans, a Russell athletic sweater and Timberland boots, and a big Heffer wearing Caribbean style Quadrille and a headdress. Entering the McDonalds at 482 High Road where the suspects had dined using the card several times before, the detectives blinked, unable to believe their eyes, as exiting the restaurant was the two they had seen on the footage, wearing the same clothes, and gorging their greedy fat faces on junk food. At the Park Lane bus stop, marked as Stop CL, Howard & Grant were stopped and searched, and finding £1600 in cash in his pocket (withdrawn prior to the Police ordering the account frozen) and Susan’s stolen bank card in Grant’s handbag, they were both arrested for Susan Hawkey’s murder. (End) Beginning on 4th of September 2023 in Court 2 of the Old Bailey before Judge Judy Khan KC, the five week trial saw Chelsea Grant and Xyaire Howard put forward a cutthroat defence in which they acted as if they were both innocent, as if both were forced the other, and as if neither were at all to blame. Both appearing via Videolink from their respective prisons, Grant pleaded not guilty to three counts of robbery while Howard denied two but admitted to one, with both admitting to two counts of fraud. Howard gave little evidence to prove his innocence, and although Grant had written a letter explaining that her remorse was genuine, the Judge dismissed it stating "your only regret is you were caught". On 25th of October 2023, after two days of deliberation, Zyaire Howard was found guilty of two counts of robbery, attempted robbery, fraud and murder, being sentenced to life for a minimum of 31 years. Chelsea Grant was sentenced to 15 years in prison for three counts of robbery, one count of attempted robbery and fraud, but even though the prosecution had proven “it would have taken two of them to hold Susan down”, the jury were unable to accept this, and Chelsea Grant was cleared of her murder. Summing up, Judge Judy Khan KC stated of Zyaire Howard (as the only person on trial that day who the jury accepted was responsible for Susan’s murder) “you terrorised Ms Hawkey and subjected her to humiliation and degradation to access her money. It was a calculated and callous act, a killing motivated by greed”. And with neither being legally in the country, they will both be deported back to SVG once their prison sentences are served in full, costing the British tax-payer £61000 a year, each. Susan Hawkey was a good women, honest and decent, who had experienced much trauma in her life, and not wanting to be hurt, she had earned the right to be left alone and unbothered, as she wished. Conversely, Chelsea Grant & Xyaire Howard are pure scum, selfish nasty bastards who abused and terrorised a vulnerable pensioner, then tortured and murdered her, and all for a four digit PIN number. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of.
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week. 
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-SIX:
On 1st January 1932, in the attic room of 27 Old Compton Street in Soho, 19-year-old domestic servant Edith McQuaid gave birth to a baby boy. Whether he died of natural causes, or she took his life by infanticide will never be known. But she wasn't alone. Edith was one of 1000s of women who concealed the pregnancy, the body of the dead babies or murdered them at birth across the United Kingdom, and yet, it wasn't there fault, as this national scandal had been raging for centuries.
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a bright green symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Soho'. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Old Compton Street in Soho, W1; ten doors up from the bombing of the Admiral Duncan, three doors west of the Battle of Frith Street, opposite the gangland hit at the Golden Goose, and two doors from Charles Bertier and the deadly ‘big arms’ quip - coming soon to Murder Mile. At 27 Old Compton Street currently stands a five storey Georgian townhouse from 1781, with high windows and a shop on the ground floor. Today it’s an Italian restaurant called Pepe, where customers waddle out rubbing their bellies groaning “why did I eat so much”, having only planned to nibble a Caesar salad, but was ‘forced’ (they claim) into wolfing down a bowl of antipasti, six loaves of olive-topped bruschetta, a battalion of gnocchi, a metric tonne of pasta, a fistful of parmesan, a pizza so big they had to demolish a whole wall to get it in, and a tiramisu so colossal you could bathe in it. Heaven. But from 1927 until at least 1932, the four floors above was the luxurious West End des-res of wealthy widow, Mrs Lewis. With a whopping 10 rooms, the 1st and 2nd floor was Mrs Lewis’ private abode with its own bathroom, sitting room, dinette and kitchen, on the 3rd floor was her stylish bedroom, and in the loft space was storage, a room for her housekeeper, and a box bed for her servant, Edith McQuaid. As an unmarried 19 year old working-class girl struggling in an era where unfair laws were against her, she was doomed to failure as society decreed what she could or couldn’t do, what was right or morally wrong, and like many women that year, a death sentence hung over her for the infanticide of a child. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 286: The Black Cap Farce. March 1932, The Old Bailey. It had been a short trial, almost perfunctory with the evidence of her guilt as clear as the tears which flowed from her sullen eyes. Judged by a jury of her peers, many of whom (being both men and women) couldn’t look in the eyes as the foreman proclaimed her ‘guilty’. Behind the bench, the Judge nodded with a resigned sigh, he declared “for the killing of a bastard child, I sentence you to death” and upon his white wig, he donned his black cap, a silk square of black silk which the terrified young girl knew what it meant. Judge: “you will be taken from here to whence you came, and there be kept in close confinement, and upon said day, you shall be taken to a place of execution and there be hanged by the neck until you are dead. May God have mercy on your soul”. Barely able to stand as fear ravaged her pale limbs, she sobbed like she had never sobbed before, as the guards dragged her down to the cells to await her fate. She was barely a child, but it wasn’t her fault, as the same law which condemned her to death, condemned her to a life which wasn’t her own. The killing of an infant by its mother has been a tragic phenomenon throughout history, but it wasn’t until 1624, in the reign of James 1st, that an act of law ‘to Prevent the Destroying of Bastard Children’ required that “if a lewd” (meaning an unmarried) “women could not prove that her child had been born dead, she would be tried for its murder, without a need for the prosecution to prove a live birth”. In 1803, Lord Ellenborough, the Lord Chief Justice sought to clarify the term ‘abortion’, and introduced an Act in the all-male House of Lords to crush a woman’s right to decide what she could do with body or her unborn baby. Any termination before 16 weeks, any concealment of a pregnancy and any failure to report a baby’s death during child birth, resulted in transportation for a minimum of 14 years... …or death. Tuesday 2nd of February 1932, Hull in the north of England. At the back of an allotment on Selby Street, a plate-layer working on the railway line spotted a small delicate bundle wrapped in brown paper. He often found junk cast among the bushes, but it was as he unwrapped it, that he saw a tiny pale foot. An autopsy confirmed that this baby boy was not even a day old, and with “no marks of violence, the body had been treated gently” by someone who clearly loved him, but knew she couldn’t care for him. Three weeks later, CID arrested 28-year-old Miriam Forsyth who confessed “it was born upstairs when mother was out. It cried very little, I put it under the bed, then it went quiet", and being charged with the “unlawfully disposing of a child and concealing the birth", her sentence was passed. “Guilty”. But what has this got to do with Edith McQuaid and her dead baby? Nothing… and everything. 1932 was an era of change. With the world still struggling from the Great Depression and the seeds of a second World War looming, that year saw the founding of the British Union of Fascists, the National Hunger March saw street battles by millions of unemployed men, John Logie Baird had demonstrated a precursor to television two streets east in Soho, and even though, Amelia Earhart became first woman to make an non-stop transatlantic flight, the world was pushing towards a brighter and more technological future, yet the laws which governed women’s bodies remained centuries in the past. Born in 1913, Edith was a working-class girl from East London, whose family (it is said) originated from Ulster in Northern Ireland. Her start in life was as unremarkable as most therefore we know little about her life. Educated to a basic level, aged 14, she left school, only she was not expected to have a career, just a low-paying job as a domestic servant to a lady of the kind of class she could never hope to be. Raised as a Protestant to Victorian parents in the progressive 1920s, whereas some girls experienced a sexual freedom unlike those before them, being poor, it’s uncertain what Edith knew of love or sex, if she even knew anything as the life she lived was dictated by society and those who made the laws. In 1930, aged 17, she started working for Mrs Lewis as a servant at her main home in Golders Green. Scrubbing and serving 14 hours-a-day, 6 and a ½ days a week in a job which was physically demanding, given basic food and board with next to no time for herself, and paid a paltry sum of just £3 per week. That was her life, but it was about to change forever. In April 1931, having met an unnamed man – maybe a friend, a lover, a fellow servant, or a relative of Mrs Lewis – what began as a friendship blossomed into something bigger and with hormones raging, their bodies entwined in a loving embrace. The love was exciting and the sex was brief, but with Edith soon discovering that she was pregnant, before those words left her lips, the child’s father was gone. She never uttered his name at the inquest or the criminal trial, but as a young unmarried girl, she was in a predicament she had never experienced before, and she would face it alone; if her family found out she was pregnant, they’d disown her; if her employer found out, she’d lose her job; if the law found out, her baby would be taken from her and she’d be branded as sinful, and left homeless and destitute. This was a scandal which could ruin her life… it also forced her to make a deadly decision. Friday 5th of February 1932, three days after the baby’s body was found in Hull, on the western side of Southwick Green in West Sussex, George Stevens, a greenskeeper found a small parcel. Wrapped in newspaper, he too drew his breath as protruding was a tiny pale foot. Again, an autopsy showed no marks of disease, disability or violence on this baby boy who was carried to full term, but around its neck, a long bandage had been wound three times to strangle him. An investigation failed to find its mother, and although unrelated, it was the second of two dead babies found here within three days. Was this a murder? Yes. Was the culprit evil in the eyes of the law? Yes. Did the public see her as cruel? No. But what has this got to do with Edith McQuaid and her dead baby? Nothing… and everything. Edith’s scandal was one not of her own making, and she could do almost nothing about it. She couldn’t keep the baby as she was unmarried, and she couldn’t terminate it as the law prevented it. She had two options; carry it to full term, and either face the consequences, give it up for adoption, or kill and dispose of it herself, or (illegally) try and terminate it, before anyone knew she was due. It’s easy to say ‘well why didn’t she not have sex’, but with sex education almost no-existent (especially in a Protestant family of the 1930s) and with even basic contraception not available for the masses via the NHS until 1961, between 1923 and 1933, 15% of all maternal deaths were due to illegal abortion. For thousands of women every year, across the 1920s and 30s, many had no choice but to resort to a back street abortionist; an unnamed man of dubious qualifications who – for a substantial fee - sluices out her womb with a caustic solution of acids and disinfectant, fishes out the foetus with a wire scraper and flushes it away, with every unsanitary action risking infection, injury, coma and her own death. A less risky but equally dangerous option were purgatives, which – as an open secret – were advertised in newspapers as “a cure for menstrual blockages”, and although many were illicit compounds of ergot and tansy oil, many resulted in seizures and organ failure. Some women tried even harsher methods, like overdoses, vaginal plunging, a stomach punch or a fall down a flight of stairs. Some were fatal but many did nothing but injure, and although we can’t be certain, it’s likely Edith had tried these too. Which is not to say that these women were alone. Many doctors were sympathetic to every woman’s plight and - sick of seeing the untold suffering and death sweeping the land in the name of morality and religion - disagreeing with the law, although abortion was illegal, risking their own careers, many doctors signed off the baby’s death certificate as ‘puerperal sepsis’, a severe (and incurable, before the invention of penicillin) bacterial infection, also known postpartum infection or childbed fever. Across the 1930s, women’s rights groups and Members of Parliament repeatedly called for changes in the law as the death toll rose. In 1934, with the Conference of Co-operative Women calling for the legalisation of abortion, this led to the establishment of The Abortion Law Reform Association in 1936, and – with the tide of public opinion turning – to cut the number of mothers and babies unnecessarily dying every year, in 1967, the Abortion Act was passed, allowing legal terminations up to 28 weeks. It was centuries too late, but a start, and to ensure that it wasn’t prohibitive for the poorest of women, along with contraception, all abortions were free through the National Health Service, as it is today. Sadly, these changes in the law and society came too late for Edith McQuaid and the unwanted baby in her belly, as across 1932, more babies meant more deaths and more grieving women, who – given the chance - could truly have loved their children rather than being so terrified of the consequences… …of being single mother. Wednesday 3rd February 1932, two days before the dead baby was found in West Sussex, and one day after the one found in Hull, an unmarried 25-year-old woman walked into Cinderford police station in Gloucestershire, having been seen throwing her baby into the River Severn. Jilted by her fiancé, she had tried to put it up for adoption, but with her homelife unpleasant, she later claimed “my child could do better off elsewhere”. The icy cold river was searched, but all that was found was the baby’s glove. By the August of 1931, being (she guessed) three or four months pregnant, Edith was lucky to be able to hide her sin and disguise her changing body as her uniform was baggy and she was short and a little bit plump. No-one noticed an ounce added daily as this insignificant little girl grew, just as long as she scrubbed, polished and fetched over long days with very little breaks, but her body couldn’t cope. Whereas once she was a small but sturdy girl, hormones had loosened her ligaments making standing, lifting and bending difficult, as stabbing pains and cramps gripped her legs, pelvis and back. Headaches and congestion left her sluggish, piles and constipation left her distracted, and along with dizziness, confusion, leaking breasts, vaginal discharge, as well as swollen ankles, hands and feet, it wasn’t long before Mrs Lewis was alerted by the daily sounds of Edith retching and enquired “are you expecting?”. In the 1930s, there was no sick pay, no maternity cover and no employee tribunal, you were hired to do a job, and if you couldn’t do that job, you were sacked, losing your wage, and in Edith’s case, food, a warm bed and a safe place to hide from the bitter wind and wagging tongues as the scandal brewed. Whether she had a plan will never be known, but the same month she was tried for murder, more babies were found dead having been murdered by their mothers, stuck in a dire situation like Edith’s. Tuesday 2nd of February, the same day that the baby boy was found in Hull, a dead baby girl was found in Leicester wrapped and dumped in a discarded pan. Thursday 18th of February, a baby boy was found in Bayswater, dead for five days and its skull fractured. Sunday 21st of February, Leeds, 19-year-old domestic servant Doris Dowling was arrested after her dead baby boy was found hidden in a suitcase. And on Wednesday 24th of February in Belfast, Annabella Hunter confessed that over five years, she had “unlawfully concealed the bodies four newborn babies by enclosing them in a box or a suitcase”. Across the early 1930s, dead babies were being found dumped at a rate of one every few days, having been concealed and miscarried, or murdered by their mothers before they breathed their first breath. Those cases of infanticide you’ve heard from across February of 1932 were just the tip of the iceberg. Was this an epidemic? Yes, so much so it was debated in Parliament, but unlike a disease, it was one that could be cured with the stroke of a pen to eradicate the unfair laws which ruined so many lives. The final months of Edith’s pregnancy were the worst, as alone and frightened, she hid the truth from her parents, employer, and possibly her friends for fear that one of them would blab. With her lungs, heart and stomach twisted and displaced into a part of the body it didn’t belong, she was exhausted. But it would have been the psychological consequences of the changes in her body which hit her worst. It wasn’t understood in the 1930s, but prenatal depression affects 10 to 15% of women, being caused by physical and emotional changes, increased stress, broken sleep and exhaustion, all of which Edith would have suffered as a lone young girl with no experience of childbirth and no-one to protect her. It wasn’t a failing in her mental make-up, as anxiety, panic attacks, irrational fears and mood swings are common in pregnancy, and although many women who murder their babies may have a history of depression, psychosis or schizophrenia, a rapid drop in hormones like oestrogen and progesterone can trigger mania, psychosis, paranoia, hallucinations and – in some cases – it can lead to infanticide. In fact, babies under the age of 1 are the demographic most likely to be murdered. Edith confided in no-one about her fear as she lay alone in her coarse horsehair bed at 27 Old Compton Street, feeling every kick as the baby grew bigger, and knowing there was nothing to stop its arrival. Whether she was in the grip of depression or if her mind was unbalanced will never be known, but we know one thing for certain, had those unfair laws been changed, the baby inside her may have lived. Friday 1st of January 1932, New Year’s Day. As the sun rose across Soho’s frosty streets, the New Year's revellers staggered home with booze on their breaths as their sozzled merriment made way for a piddle against a wall. That night, Mrs Lewis had held a party at her flat, but with her guests and herself having gone, it was Edith’s job to tidy up. At an unknown hour, in the quiet of the attic, having laid newspapers on the floor to soak up the blood, standing upright (for fear of staining the sheets), Edith gave birth to a baby boy as silently as she could, clenching her fists to fight back the pain and gritting her teeth so her screams became just a muffle. Her boy was pale, tiny, but weighing just 5lbs, he went to full term but was badly malnourished. At her inquest, she said little about his death, except “the baby did not move or cry. I thought it was dead”, which could have been true as the mortality rate of babies in the 1930s was almost one in ten, and with no-one to help her – no midwife, no mother, no friends - we only have her word to go on. The Coroner would ask “did you hit the baby with an object?”; as skull fractures suggested to the pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury that “considerable violence caused these injuries... likely caused by a fall” as Edith claimed having given birth standing up, “by banging it’s head on some hard object” such as the floor, “or even an axe” as in the course of her duties, Edith admitted she used one. The baby was alive when it was born, we know that, but if she had committed neonaticide, the wilful murder of a baby by its parent in its first 24 hours, according to those who knew her, she was cold, distant, emotionless and confused, she would state, “if I had murdered my child, I cannot remember it” as that day and all of the days since had become a blur as if none of it had ever happened. But there were other reasons why the baby could have suffered such horrific injuries. Fearful that Mrs Lewis or the housekeeper would discover her shameful secret, believing the baby to be dead when in fact (Sir Bernard would state) “it was alive but in a coma”, she had wrapped the silent baby in her bloodied petticoat, put it in a hessian shopping bag, hung it on the back of a kitchen chair, and – being unaware of its contents – the housekeeper admitted she had dropped it, at least twice. The baby in the bag was found by a neighbour on the 4th of January, four days later, having spotted its tiny pale foot sticking out, and although a doctor said it was “cold, but alive”, it died moments later. As was procedure, Edith McQuaid was arrested, taken to Vine Street police station, and charged with the concealment of a pregnancy and a body, denying a burial, and the wilful murder of a bastard child, which – 33 years before the abolition of capital punishment – was punishable by a death sentence. She refused to name the father (but possibly she didn’t know him), she said that no-one knew about the baby (but perhaps she was protecting them), and although she claimed she had given birth at Charing Cross Hospital, she couldn’t recall any details, she wasn’t listed as an admission, and described as “in a state of shock and confusion”, although a prisoner, the officers didn’t treat her like a criminal. On Thursday 18th of February 1932, the same day that a baby boy was found dead in Bayswater, Edith pleaded ‘not guilty’ but was charged with wilful murder at Great Marlborough Street Police Court. Permitted to sit in the dock, the magistrate Mr R E Dummett quietly listened as she wept through her testimony. Sympathetic to her plight as he had heard many cases similar to hers in the preceding years, and - that month alone – so had most magistrates from Hull, West Sussex, Leicester, Gloucester and Belfast to London, but with enough evidence to convict, she was committed for trial at the Old Bailey. Clerk: “Foreman of the jury, how do you find the defendant?”, Foreman: “Guilty”. And with a resigned sigh, the judge declared “for the killing of a bastard child, I sentence you to death” and upon his white wig, he donned his black cap, and proclaimed her fate “you will be taken from here to whence you came, kept in close confinement, and upon that day, you shall be taken to a place of execution and there you will be hanged by the neck until you are dead. May God have mercy on your soul”. (End) As with so many mothers whose poor mental health or dire situation resulted in infanticide, Edith’s punishment was her execution, only she never made it as far as the gallows or even the Old Bailey. In 1922, 10 years prior, the Infanticide Act was introduced to differentiate it from murder and recognise the socioeconomic stresses put on pregnant women, especially those who were poor and unmarried. It effectively “abolished the death penalty for a woman who deliberately kills her newborn child while the balance of her mind is disturbed”, but with the law slow to catch-up, women like Edith still had to be sentenced to death, even though in most cases the charge was often later reduced to infanticide. It was a cruel pantomime caused by the laws failure to catch up, and even among the judges who were duty bound to enforce it while the lawmakers dithered, it became known as ‘the black cap farce’. With the magistrate deciding that murder could not be proven, and with Edith in a very clear state of distress, she was charged with infanticide and the lesser offence of concealment, and taking pity on her, she was bound over for two years, and sent to a convalescent home for six months to recover. Her trial was not unique, many of the women we mentioned whose babies were found dead were sentenced to death, but few saw prison time, some were sent to asylums, many were acquitted, but the last women to be executed for wilfully murdering her own child was back in 1849. That’s how long the tide had been changing, but with the lawmakers slow to react as society changes, it took a century. After her release from convalescence, Edith McQuaid disappeared from records, it is unknown if she married, had children and went on to lead a happy and fulfilling life as a mother… but let’s hope so. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast - #285: The Suitcase of Death (Jemma Mitchell / Mee Kuen Chong)19/2/2025
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
9 Brondesbury Park @Googlemaps2025 / April 2015
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FIVE: On Friday 11th of June 2021 at 6:23am, 34-year-old Jemma Mitchell left her home at 9 Brondesbury Park in Wilsden to visit her friend and fellow Christian Mee Kuen Chong known as Deborah. She was wheeling behind her an empty blue suitcase, five hours later, the suitcase was full and her friend was dead. But why?
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a brown symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Kilburn'. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Brondesbury Park in Wilsden, NW6; four roads south of Karl Hulton’s bungled taxi heist, three roads east of the botched burglary of Bernard Cooper, four roads south of the little drummer boy, and three streets west of the PIN number murder - coming soon to Murder Mile. Brondesbury Park is a middle-class street where most homes sell for £1-4 million. Being a bit showy, it’s easy to imagine that many neighbours are desperate to outdo one another; if he has a garage, you build two; if she has a pond, you dig a pool; if they decorate with Laura Ashley wallpaper at £100 a roll, you cover the outside walls in Armani with gold leaf; and if they dare have an open-plan kitchen, you hire a 24 hour in-house Michelin-starred chef to deliver you mega cheese toasties in bed. Sorted. It may sound pretty pathetic, but for some people, their life is that kind of one-upmanship. Back in 2015, at 9 Brondesbury Park stood a little two-storey house. Compared to the others, it was modest and simple, but desperate to keep-up with the Jones’, Jemma Mitchell and her mother Hillary decided to renovate and add an extra floor. Anyone else would have killed to live in this lovely little home on a nice street in a good part of town. And yet, to finish the build, that’s just what Jemma did. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 285: The Suitcase of Death. On the surface, this may seem like a story about two friends who truly cared for each other. And it was. But whereas one was dedicate to their friendship, the other had just one thought – money. Born in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in 1954, Mee Kuen Chong was raised in a loving hard-working family during the peak of the Malayan Emergency, a brutal guerrilla war between communist rebels fighting for an independent state from their colonial oppressors, and (of course) the British who were fighting to protect their economic interests in Malaya. Across 12 years, of those reported, 2400 civilians and 6700 soldiers were killed, many were imprisoned, and at least 810 men and women simply vanished. For the Malayans, the fight it was for freedom, for the British it was about money and power. Agreeing to independence in 1957, the state of emergency ended in 1960, and the country went on the flourish. Mee, who everyone knew as Deborah, was a spiritual women and a passionate Christian who had seen a lot of hardship and grief in her community, and believing that she must always help those in crisis, she opened her door to any strangers for a hot meal, some clean clothes and a safe place to sleep. By the 1990s, as she entered her 40s, with both Britain and Malaysia in an economic boom, Deborah came to the UK for work; she married, she became a British citizen, she and her husband worked hard, they saved, they paid off their mortgage, and although not considered wealthy by any standards, being financially astute, they ensured that they would live comfortably without worry into their later years. Sadly, it was not to be, as with her husband dying and her family back in Malaysia, she was left a widow with no children, but aided by her good friends as well as her faith, she was safe and secure… for now. Since at least 2003, Deborah had lived in a modest two-storey semi-detached house at 196 Chaplin Road in Wembley, a nice middle-class enclave where the neighbours looked out for one another, and valued at almost £700,000, having retired with her mortgage paid off, she was comfortable and well. Described as small (being just 5 foot 2 inches tall) and slim (about 7 stone and 10lbs), Deborah was no threat to anyone, and said to be “chatty and sweet with a childlike nature”, to assuage her loneliness, she rented out her rooms to lodgers, but always planned to leave her home in her will to the homeless. Only this wasn’t just her home, this was her church. At the start of 2020, Deborah’s home on Chaplin Road was registered as The Sons & Daughters of The King, a charity providing support for survivors of abuse, human trafficking, sexual exploitation and it counselled those who had experienced coercion and domestic violence. Using their Christian faith as a cornerstone, Deborah and her friends bought safety and support to those who needed it most. Deborah thrived on helping others, only she was also struggling herself. Five years earlier, her friends had noticed that she’d become more passionate, animated but increasingly paranoid, and although a small frail pensioner, her irrational actions had already caused one lodger to move out. In 2015, her doctor noted in her records that she was suffering from “acute stress and a schizoaffective disorder”, which resulted in moods swings, anxiety, depression and risky behaviour, especially around money. As a lone widow, a community mental health team assessed her, she was prescribed antipsychotic medication, and across the next few years, she stabilised. Her faith, her friends and her charity work kept her happy and safe, and yet a new friend in her life who she trusted would destroy everything. Born in Australia on 22nd of July 1984, Jemma Mitchell was raised in Altona North, a Melbourne suburb where families live in peace, and as one of two daughters to their mother Hillary who worked at the UK's Foreign & Commonwealth Office, they never went without and were both educated well. In 2000, aged 16, Jemma’s family came to Britain after her parents divorced, and gifted a great start in life; she was educated at the prestigious King Edward's boarding school in Surrey; in 2004, she began a degree in Human Sciences at King's College London in which she excelled in experimental anatomy and human dissection, she graduated with a First, she was awarded the Hamilton Prize for Anatomical Excellence, and later became a qualified osteopath having studied at the British School of Osteopathy. She was intelligent, confident and impressive, she could achieve anything she set her mind to, but as her old friend, Nick Novachevski would later say “money issues always bought out the worst in her”. In 2008, Jemma returned to Melbourne and practiced as an osteopath – detecting and treating health problems by the manipulation of muscles and joints – where she remained for seven years and owned her own home in Helensvale, a suburb of the City of Gold Coast in Queensland. She was a success, she lived a good life, she was well liked, respected and was later described as ‘a woman of good character’. But one problem bought her back to Britain with a bump… …and that was their family home in Brondesbury Park. Flying back in 2015, Jemma instantly began struggling, as although educated here, not being registered with the General Osteopathic Council, she couldn’t practise as an osteopath in Britain. Living off her savings, those stresses causing a deep rift with her sister, culminating in her being issued with a non-molestation order (banning her from intimidating or harassing her sister and brother-in-law), but as a prickly and highly strung individual, she breached the order and was given a conditional discharge. With the family fractured, and with Jemma being unmarried, jobless and childless, their family home at 9 Brondesbury Park became her obsession, and needing renovations, it also became a money pit. In October 2015, the house was a basic two-storey, three-bedroomed, brown-bricked detached block from the 1930s, it was nothing special and all it really needed for this family of two was modernising. It was a perfect little home, but envious of her neighbours, in January 2018, they had the whole thing reduced to rubble, with the plan to replace it with a three-storey monstrosity with two kitchens, two bathrooms and at least four bedrooms, which was of equal size to the homes either side, if not bigger. Jemma wasn’t working and Hillary had retired, so their savings had to fund the build entirely. But by adding an extra floor and paying out £230,000 to two builders, one of whom had refused to complete the work, by the end of 2019, they had no savings, no roof, and the building was barely fit to live in. Covered in scaffolding, with two floors not even watertight, Jemma & Hillary lived on the ground floor of this unsafe half-built home, and over the next year, they let it go to ruin. Prosecuting lawyer, Deeana Heer KC stated “everywhere there were boxes, suitcases, freezers, old mattresses, filth and building materials. The kitchen was dirty, with rotting food on the stove… paperwork covered the surfaces... the bathroom was stained and in a poor state of repair, and it looked like a hoarder's residence". Through their own greed and neglect, their dream had become a nightmare… …but what had any of this got to do with Deborah Chong? To escape the stresses of the renovations, as a Christian, Jemma needed an outlet, and like Deborah, her faith was her sanctuary. In August 2020, just weeks after we all experienced a little hit of freedom after the first Covid lockdown, they met at a church they both attended, and they become firm friends. This wasn’t a ploy by Jemma to snare a likely victim, they really were good friends, as the 100s of text messages between them would testify, and seeing that Deborah still struggled with her mental health, Jemma used her skills as an osteopath to help her and many others who attended the spiritual healing sessions at Deborah’s home, of which Deborah later said "I was being healed by Jemma and Jesus". With 33 years difference between them, Jemma often acted like a protective daughter to Deborah, as she struggled to walk unaided, and (exacerbated by the lockdown) even with medication, her paranoid schizophrenia ran rampant. On 1st of March 2021, her mental health team were alerted by theFixated Threat Assessment Centre at Buckingham Palace that Deborah believed she was in a relationship with Prince Charles, that he spoke to her through YouTube, and that, although unthreatening in any way, she had sent a series of bizarre letters to the future King, and the then-Prime Minster, Boris Johnson. Deborah was physically frail, mentally unstable, and with her schizophrenia causing her to make risky financial decisions, she was vulnerable and needed protection from those who would exploit her generosity. And although, Jemma offered that protection, what she saw in Deborah wasn’t a friend… …but a big fat bank account to refill her money pit. As Detective Chief Inspector Jim Eastwood who led the investigation would state “desperate to obtain the money she needed to complete the renovations, (Jemma) took advantage of Deborah’s good will”. For almost a year, from the month they first met to the month she would murder her, Jemma applied continuous pressure to get Deborah to transfer £200,000 to her own bank account and even suggested that (to avoid inheritance tax) that she should sign over her £700,000 house in Wembley to herself. Deborah was vulnerable… but she was still financially astute. Seeing that Jemma had let her home go to ruin, she (rightly) berated her for living like a “hoarder”, she wisely advised her “more construction will cost more money you don't have. Sell the house, enjoy the money, life is too short" as even unfinished, the house was worth at least £4 million. But with Jemma too stubborn to listen, on the 7th of June 2021, Deborah rescinded her offer to financially help her, and the next day, Deborah texted Jemma: “until you sell house, I won't want you to come to me or my house. I'm stressed to the core". Money had split their friendship apart, the house lay in ruins, and even though Jemma still had £93,000 in the bank, this co-called devout Christian would break at least three of the Ten Commandments… …such as ‘thou shalt not steal’ and ‘thou shalt not kill”. On Friday 11th of June 2021, Britain was emerging from a second lockdown, as schools re-opened but non-vital shops were shut, with masks and social distancing mandatory. With Jemma suggesting they meet, Deborah agreed with the caveat ‘no talk about house or money’ but her fate was already sealed. At 6:23am, her face hidden by a black hat, scarf and a Covid mask, Jemma exited the plywood gates of her half built home at 9 Brondesbury Park; her backpack filled with cleaning products, an orange rope, a saw, bin bags and possibly a hammer, and she wheeled a large but empty bright blue suitcase. She was alone, the streets were empty, and as she rode the tube to Wembley Central, it was only a 45 minute trip to Chaplin Road, but arriving at 8:01am, it’s likely she stopped for supplies, maybe a knife. That day, the lodgers were out and Jemma knew that as she rang the bell. Over the door, a sign read ‘agape selfless love for all’, meaning to sacrifice oneself to help others, and though that’s how Deborah lived her life, Jemma was only here to help herself. As planned, she was let in, they sat, had a cup of tea and chatted, but what happened inside will never be known, except that Deborah never left alive. Pathologist Dr Curtis Offiah said “she sustained a complex head injury at or around her time of death", but due to decomposition, it couldn’t be determined if she’d been hit with a blunt object or against a hard surface, whether accidentally or intentionally. Either way, no surface or weapon was ever found. With her either unconscious or dead, Jemma tied her up using the length of orange rope, and carefully opening each drawer with gloved hands so as to not make it look like a burglary, she stole Deborah’s bank cards, passport, driving licence and naturalisation papers – everything she needed to steal her life savings – and having gained access to the room of Virgil Gheorghita, a lodger who had died just a few months earlier, she also stole his passport, his ID, his statements and his defunct mobile phone. It was premeditated, it was callous, it was cruel, and it was all for the sake of money. Then possibly in the bath, making full use of her human science degree and award winning knowledge of human dissection, she cleanly cut-off of Deborah’s head. Why she beheaded her remains a mystery. Maybe it was to disguise her identity, as Deborah’s corpse was then stripped and redressed in clothes meant for a larger women, possibly to make the police believe she was a refuge, rather than a citizen. With the wound wrapped in towels and tape, in an act of outrage at being denied the money, Jemma stuffed Deborah’s tiny body into the bright blue suitcase with such force that she snapped several ribs and dumped the head in the corpse’s lap. She cleaned-up so thoroughly that the lodgers didn’t suspect a thing, and even the forensics team would later struggle to find a print, a hair, DNA or blood spots. At 1.13pm, five hours later, a neighbour’s CCTV captured Jemma leaving the house; in the backpack was her ‘murder kit’ (which would never be found), a small red suitcase belonging to Deborah was filled with paperwork, and the blue suitcase was almost 8 stone heavier than when she wheeled it in. Over the next two hours, she tried to drag both cases the full five miles back to Brondesbury Park, but with the wheels buckling under the weight, and frequently needing to kick them to get it moving (and cursing the corpse for making this so difficult for her), after nine failed attempts, she hailed a taxi. And in the mess of Jemma’s half-built house, the body festered for the two weeks that she laid low, only leaving her house twice; once to have her finger set at St Thomas’s hospital having broken it when she attacked Deborah, and to go on a date at London Zoo with a man she met on Christian Connection. But such a popular, kind and vital woman couldn’t simply vanish without anyone noticing. With her lodger reporting Deborah missing, posters were placed across London and with an appeal by the police, as the last person to text her, they questioned Jemma who claimed “she went to stay with friends close to the ocean, she had been depressed", but Jemma knew that soon they’d find the body. On Saturday 26th of June 2021, even though she had her own car, using the dead lodgers credit card, Jemma hired a blue/grey Volvo XC40 from Hertz at Brent Park. Hidden by the gates of her drive, with a white plastic sheet underneath, she heaved the blue suitcase into the boot which stunk of decay and having re-activated the dead lodger’s phone, she plotted a route to Devon, leaving her phone at home. Why she chose to drive to Salcombe is unknown, but as one of the most south-westerly parts of the UK, it took her 4 hours 30mins to travel 215 miles, with brief stop for fuel and coffee outside Bristol. According to the GPS, she was heading to Bennett Road, a remote spot surrounded by woodland, very few houses and seaside coves along the Kingsbridge Estuary, by then being just 2 and a ½ miles away… …but that day, luck was against her. On Island Street, her front left tyre blew, the oversized car ground to a halt on this tiny alley barely big enough for one car, and speckled with a bar full of locals and a branch of the Co-op, she drew a crowd. Running on a flat and with no idea how to fix it, she limped the car to Marlborough Garage on Gould Road, where Lee Gardin, an AA mechanic stated that she looked “shaky, distressed and confused". The car’s tyre was flat, the spare was in the boot under the suitcase with the headless body in it and with the stench permeating – which he described as “a very odd smell… something I’d never smelt before" - he only saw blankets and pillows as Jemma opened the boot removing the spare tyre herself. It was 8:49pm, barely 30 minutes before dusk, when the car left the garage on four fully-inflated tyres. Her plan was to bury the body, hiding it where it would never be found, but with the dark approaching and strange cars likely to raise suspicion, in a remote spot on Bennett Road, she wheeled the suitcase down a set of stone steps (of what was in fact a public footpath), she dumped the body behind a fence, tossing the head (missing two spine bones and the larynx) barely 30 feet away, and then drove home. Having had it valeted, she returned the car back to Hertz shortly before 7am on Sunday 27th, and after all that planning and preparation, she flung the bright blue suitcase on top of her neighbour’s shed. The body was found that morning by a dogwalker. Four days later, they found the head. And although she had been stripped of any ID, bafflingly her handbag contained a piece of orange rope, excerpts of The Bible and a business card of an evangelical church that both Deborah & Jemma regularly attended. On 30th of June 2021, to aid her alibi, Jemma filed missing person’s report. But there was no concern shown, only for herself. On the 1st of July, the day the head was found, Jemma forged Deborah’s will leaving 95% of the £700,000 estate to herself as a trustee, and the rest of it to her mother, Hillary. The faked will was supposedly signed off by Deborah herself and witnessed by Virgil Gheorghita (who was dead) & Sanjay Samson (who hadn’t seen her since 2013), but it was clear Jemma had copied their passport signatures, having first read a handy guide called 'The Dos and Don'ts of Claiming an Estate'. With murder established, the Police had one suspect – Jemma Mitchell - the last women to text the victim before she went missing, and armed with CCTV from both houses, and (even though she had thoroughly cleaned it) inside the suitcase pocket she’d left a tea towel with traces of Deborah’s DNA, on 6th of July at 11:45pm, officers kicked down her door and arrested her, and yet she didn’t ask ‘why?’. The evidence was clear as day to Detective Chief Inspector Jim Eastwood. They had CCTV footage from Brondesbury Park, Chaplin Road, Hertz rental, St Thomas’s hospital, Marlborough garage and the Co-op on Island Street. Witnesses statements from the lodgers and the mechanic. Sections of the orange rope was found in Jemma’s home, along with the dead lodger’s phone, passport and bank details. They also found the fake Will which had been backdated to 27th October 2020, and the original which left everything Deborah owned (including her home) to her charity, The Sons & Daughters of The King. And bafflingly, Jemma’s wall calendar on which she had written: “June 26, 8am, collect body”. (End) Held on remand at HMP Bronzefield, 34-year-old Jemma Mitchell appeared via video-link at Wilsden Magistrates Court in which she pleaded not guilty. Tried in Court 12 of the Old Bailey from the 11th of October 2022, Deanna Heer KC put forward the “basic and bald" evidence, with Jemma’s defence that there was none of her DNA found, that the day-trip Salcombe was a spontaneous holiday, and with her half built house worth £4 million and £93,000 in her own bank, she had no motive to kill Deborah. The jury deliberated for seven hours, being asked to consider “a charge of manslaughter if she had cut off her friend's head and disposed of her body, but had not intended to kill her”, as she later claimed. On the 27th of October, Judge Richard Marks KC summed up “you have shown absolutely no remorse and you are in complete denial as to what you did, notwithstanding the overwhelming evidence. The enormity of your crime is profoundly shocking, even more so given your apparent religious devotion and that Deborah Chong was a good friend who had shown you great kindness". She was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum of 34 years, and won’t be eligible for parole until October 2056. Speaking outside of the court to journalists, Jemma’s mother Hillary defended her daughter by stating she was “absolutely agog” that she had been convicted with “so little forensic evidence”, and although an appeal was lodged, again citing the fact that no blood was found in Deborah’s home, again it failed. Jemma’s motive was pure greed not desperation, as with money in the bank, a home overseas, a good career she could always return to, a qualification she could easily pass, and a modest two-storey three-bedroomed house in a nice part of town, her wealth wasn’t enough for her and it drove her to kill. Now, because of her greed and selfishness, she is stuck inside the smallest room she’ll ever live in, a prison cell measuring six feet by eight, with a poor view, a lumpy bed, a snoring cell-mate, bland food, no freedom, and if she’s ever released, she’ll be the same age as Deborah when she murdered her. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of.
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
5 Westbourne Park Road - Copyright @Googlemaps2025 April2019
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FOUR:
Monday 31st of October 1960, at 5:30pm, the body of 53-year-old William Davies was found inside the top-floor flat of 5 Westbourne Park Road in Bayswater, London, W2. There was no sign of a break-in, no struggle and no obvious robbery. He was found on his knees, with a knife in his chest, and even though all the evidence pointed to this being a suicide, the police knew it wasn't.
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a black symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Bayswater' off Paddington Station. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: this is just a selection from various sources:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Westbourne Park Road in Bayswater, W2; one street north of the suicide pact of Barbara Shuttleworth’s unrequited lover, one street west of the old lady killer, two streets north-west of the fake SAS initiation, and one street south of the cat pate - coming soon to Murder Mile. At 5 Westbourne Park Road stands a three-storey brown-bricked Georgian terrace. As is typical in this area, it has pretentious white doric columns on either side of the door as if an ancestor of Julius Caesar lives there, when it’s probably a corporate lawyer called Farquar, his Russian dial-a-bride whose name looks like someone fell on a keyboard, their two sons Tarquin & Fortesque, a daughter called Avocado Plum Cake, and they all have their own scooter rack, briefcase tree, humus maker and S&M dungeon. Back in the 1960s, being more of a rundown area, this was a slightly better than average lodging house, where – it was said, using a parlance of its day –some of the lodgers were of an “artistic persuasion”. With homosexuality still illegal and punishable by a fine or some prison time, this was considered a safe space for its residents, one of whom was a 54-year-old openly gay butler called William Davies. With his life having taken a tragic turn over the two years prior, William had grown despondent with what his existence had become and seeing no happiness in his future, he took his own life. And yet, a small (and almost insignificant) detail told a bigger picture; one of greed, lies, and (possibly) murder. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 284: Dead Man’s Hand. Monday 31st of October 1960, as dusk broke and the evening set in, the casual murmur of communal living echoed inside of 5 Westbourne Park Road. Owned by the landlord Ernest Kyffin, in the basement and ground floor lived Ms Margaret Morris with her best friends Ken Tylisen & actor David Hart, the first floor was split into two for Mr & Mrs Fermie and Mr & Mrs Perrin, on the second lived William’s sister Annie (only that week she was on holiday), and the small attic flat was occupied by William. Being about 5:30pm, the tenants were coming home, checking their post, popping the TV’s and radios on, and Ken’s dog barked excitedly as the house filled with the smells of cooked meat and potatoes. It had been an ordinary weekend as everybody went about their business in this pleasant little house where they all looked out for one another. It was typically quiet, as they all respected each other’s privacy, they were never any issues and as he always did, Mr Perrin had popped a half pint of milk and the Sunday papers on the second floor landing for William… only 36 hours later, they were still there. At 5:35pm, as he had been unwell and was going through a rough patch, being a good neighbour, Mrs Perrin and the landlord climbed the stairs up to the attic to check that he was okay. Nothing raised their suspicions; the landing light was on, but then it often was; the single window was shut, but the night were cold; and the bedroom door was open, which is how William often left it when he was in. With the light off, the only illumination was an orange glow from the gas heater which cast a shadow across the bed, it being empty except for the bedsheets and pillows piled up. In the dark, William was nowhere to be seen, but then having switched on the light, they froze at the tragic sight before them. PC Hudson arrived at 5:40pm to secure the scene, and at 6pm, Doctor Roughton certified him as dead. As was standard procedure in any suicide, a detective was called in to establish the facts, in this case, it was DI Walters. As an experienced officer, the scene was a familiar one; with no signs of a break-in, no marks suggesting a struggle, nothing obviously stolen and with none of the tenants having seen or heard anything usual in the last 36 hours, it was likely that the perpetrator of this crime was William. Beside the bed, lay two glass tumblers and a cup; one had a brown liquid in it said to be ale bought as an off-sale from a pub hours before his death, one had water in which he’d used to take two headache tablets (the empty Aspro packet on the bedside table), and the only fingerprints found were William’s. Witnesses state that at the bars he visited that night – The Prince Albert, The Oak, The Three Bells, The Redan and the Carmalite Club where (as an openly gay man) he was known – his blue overcoat, grey suit and waistcoat he had draped over the armchair, his beret and bowtie was on the dresser, and still wearing a green pullover, no underpants but a pair of cord under trousers, the police report states “this is a type of clothing a person who indulges in perversion would wear”, meaning anal sex. As expected from a gay man who often bought men home, the sheets and pillows had been arranged, as the police report states “to assist in some form of gross indecency”, but with no cuts or bruises to his body, on initial inspection, either the sex was loving and consensual, or it hadn’t taken place. A while later, William had slipped on his brown suede shoes as if he was planning to escort that night’s date out of the flat, and as heard by several of the tenants, the man then calmly left of his own accord. Nowhere in the room was a suicide note found, but then with his head clouded by grief, it’s unlikely he was thinking of others in his final moments alive. Standing alone, the evidence showed that with a six-inch sheath knife in his right hand, he had plunged it two inches deep into his left lung and with the blood dripping vertically and not one drop anywhere else as he didn’t flee or stagger, having pulled the blade out of his chest, he slumped to his knees where he was found, his arm and head on the bed. By the time his body was discovered, rigor mortis was complete and he hadn’t been moved. The Police report states that “it was suggested that this was a case of suicide”, that a lonely gay man wracked with grief and despair had tragically killed himself, possibly after one last rejection of a potential lover. But what had driven him to take his own life? Born on 2nd of February 1906 near Port Talbot in Wales, William Davies was one of five siblings raised in the mining town of Cwmafan. Being thick with belching chimneys and the clank of industry, as a delicate boy who enjoyed reading and hated that everything he touched was caked in a layer of coal dust, he knew he wasn’t built to be a labourer or a miner, and sought out a place he would fit in. Educated to a decent level, although at least one sister and a brother were teachers, William did his bit for King & Country by serving in the Army during World War Two, but for the bulk of his career, he worked in hotels as a silver service waiter, and later became a prestigious butler at Fishmongers Hall, Buckingham Palace and five months before his death, he was a butler at Princess Margaret’s wedding. Said to be easy going, cheerful and sociable, everyone agreed he was chatty and fun, but 1958 was a bad year for William, and although he painted on a smile, it saw the start of his downfall. With his asthma getting worse and his lungs so weak he sometimes struggled to walk, he was forced to live on benefits, and with a feeling of shame, his sister had to pay his rent and gifted him a weekly allowance. Those who knew him said he was quiet and pleasant; the shopkeepers said “he was a good customer”, across most pubs in Paddington they said “he drank, but never caused any trouble”, he had only one criminal conviction being the theft of an Easter Egg to give to his sister, he had a small pocket of close friends and no enemies, and although by 1960 it was still illegal to be a homosexual in Britain, he was openly gay, he flaunted his flamboyance, and he was well known on the gay scene as ‘Bert the Queer’. For several years, William had lived with an older gentleman, a grey-haired well-dressed civil servant called Percy Sellers, they lived together in a flat off Westbourne Park Road with his sister Annie, and the two men lived happily as a couple. Percy was his love, his life and his everything, but in 1958, at the delicate age of 71, Percy died suddenly, leaving William alone, but also broken and distraught. He was lonely, tired, sick and in the quiet of his room, he often got depressed. His autopsy, conducted by Dr Francis Camps, confirmed “the blade penetrated the upper lobe of left lung causing massive haemorrhage… it was consistent with the knife and its subsequent withdrawal”. Asked if it could have been an accident, Dr Camps stated “it’s almost impossible to have been caused by falling upon the knife unless in some grossly abnormal posture. Further, had the full weight of the man’s body fallen upon this knife, penetration would certainly have been greater”. With scarring due to asthma on his lungs, it was confirmed that this had hastened his death, which took barely a minute. On the surface, it looked like a regular suicide... …yet the truth was lying in the dead man’s hand. The man who had visited William’s flat that night was 21-year-old Istvan Szabo, a Hungarian refugee. Born in Tallya, a small village 35 miles north of the capital on the 13th of February 1939, he was raised in poverty and conflict as the Second World War loomed on the horizon. With Hungary having sided with the Axis Powers (Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy & Japan), even before he was able to speak, Szabo’s country was chaotic, as in 1944 they unsuccessfully tried to switch sides to join the Allies, they suffered under the Soviets and the establishment of the People's Republic in 1949 lead to the Hungarian uprising in 1956, which culminated in Soviet tanks invading and the Hungarian people fought back. Leaving school aged 12, he aided his father in running their small farm and although he was a labourer at the stone quarry, the uprising gave him a reason and an opportunity to flee. Alone, aged 17, Szabo entered England as a refugee on 12th of January 1957 (about the time that William’s lover died) and billeted at Butlins Holiday Camp in Skegness, he was registered as an alien on the 20th of October 1959. He had no family, no friends, he spoke modest English, and for the two years he was here, he struggled. Based on his record, he tried hold down several jobs – as a labourer in Deepcar, as a miner at the New Monkton Colliery in Barnsley, as a machinist at a textile factory in Preston, all short term jobs for small pay – but being immature and lacking intelligence, he also got several small convictions for wounding, twice taking a car without permission, the theft of some food and the forging a postal order for £2. He was hardly a big time gangster, but a silly mistake by this stupid boy would change both their lives. In October 1959, having moved to London, this should have been the fresh start he needed, only once again he treated life like it was game. Across the next year, he had three jobs (as a labourer, a servant and a kitchen porter) which he lost or left in quick succession, he served six months in prison for theft, and upon release began working as a packer at an office furniture company earning just £9 per week. As far as we know, Szabo didn’t know William, and they were as different as chalk and cheese. William was an immaculately-dressed poetry-loving butler who was polite, quiet and caring. Szabo was a thick-set uncouth youth with a crew-cut, who was grubby, rowdy and rough looking, and in an impenetrable Hungarian accent, he tried to speak like an East End gangster, only this always came off as laughable. Besides, set aside their 33-year age difference, and everybody knew that William was gay. He wasn’t only openly gay, he was flamboyantly gay, and yet, as a lad who it was said ‘liked the girls’, Szabo was raised under homophobic laws of the Soviets, so it doesn’t make sense that they would ever meet… …but they did. Saturday 29th of October 1960. At 1:45pm, William waved goodbye to his sister Annie at Paddington station as she headed off for a week to see her family in Port Talbot. With no real plans that weekend, William met his pal, Janie Irons outside her flat, and sat in their usual seats at the Three Bells Club. Drinking a half pint in each pub, such as The Redan, The Prince Albert and The Oak, they were said to be merry, and Janie recalled “William looked as if he was expecting to meet someone”, but never did. “He never said who this person was, but he was often on his own and would happily talk to anyone”. With ‘last orders’ called at 10:30pm, they headed back to Janie’s flat to watch the telly until shutdown at 11:25pm, he was said to be as chatty as always and expressed no grief or gripes, and (although the evidence suggests he ended his life that night), he made plans to meet Janie for lunch the next day. At 11:30pm, as he regularly did, he headed a few doors down to the Carmalite Club at 57 Westbourne Grove, a gay-friendly member’s club where he was known and liked. He signed in as ‘Mr Sellers’, the name he used when his beloved Percy was still alive and this was their nightly hangout, but after 30 minutes, he told Reginald Rice, the owner “I’ve had enough to drink. I’m going home to bed”. He was wearing the clothes he died in, he was alone, he was in a good mood, and no-one followed him out. Those details were corroborated by multiple independent witnesses, yet although he was seen and heard arriving home at 12:20am, that seven minute walk took him almost triple the time. But why? The only eyewitness to the missing minutes was Szabo, who Janie (William’s closest friend) confirmed she had never met before, and neither had his sister Annie, or the tenants who he lived with. Szabo would claim “I was going home from Praed Street to St Stephen’s Gardens”, a route which goes along Westbourne Park Road, “and this bloke followed me. I couldn’t get rid of him. I tried going fast, but he started running after me”. William wasn’t known to be predatory, but he was lonely and drunk. Szabo would later claim “It was midnight, he catch me, he say good evening, he ask me ‘what about a drink’ as he have no-one to keep him company”, and being a statement so speckled with inaccuracies that it ignores that fact that William was more than double Szabo’s age and had asthma so bad that running was almost impossible, that Szabo did drink, and although the police report states “there is little doubt that they went there for the purposes of indulging in homosexuality but what transpired in the room will never be known”, if Szabo wasn’t gay, why did he willingly enter a gay man’s flat? At exactly 12:20am, they entered 5 Westbourne Park Road. We know that, as hearing the door, Ken’s dog started barking at the stranger, and coming out of the ground floor bathroom, both Ken and David stood just inches away from William and Szabo, at which William introduced him as “my friend”. They went up to the attic flat, the door was locked behind them, and none of the tenants heard a sound. According to Szabo, they both had a glass of ale, and once this was drank, William suddenly turned. “He went down on his knees and pulled my zip off. He says to show him my body. I told him I won’t”. The boy said he was terrified as the older man kissed his neck, “he says I have nothing to worry about if I do what he says”. Szabo tried to flee, “but he took the key. He says sit down. He started to undress and he told me to do the same. Then I told him I won’t do it”. It was then that William pulled out the knife. “He say he like me very much. He say he kill me if I do not. And as he lift his hand”, in a stabbing striking motion, “I grab his wrist, twist the knife round and kicked him with my knee in the bollocks”. In Szabo’s own words, he was defending himself from being raped by a predator, but as William fell with the knife in his hand, ”he fell on the bed and the knife run in deep in his chest. He tried to get up but he couldn’t. I seen the knife was in his hand. I got frightened, I was scared to death, I ran”. That was his statement, and although entirely possible, it was littered with mistakes. They arrived at 12:20am, the attempted assault supposedly occurred after one drink, but as Margaret on the ground floor heard Szabo calmly leaving (not running) at 2am, what happened in those missing 90 minutes? He said William fell on the blade, but the autopsy states this was impossible. The bed was disarranged “with the pillows placed to assist some form of indecency” as the police report says, but if Szabo had fled before any assault by William took place, why were faint bruises and scratches found on William’s body but not Szabo’s, why was William missing £3 that his sister had given him, why was William’s anus dilated consistent with anal sex and why did a swab test on it prove positive for semen? It can never be proven to be Szabo’s, but if William was a rapist, how did he get Szabo to violate him? Initially, the only fingerprints found in the room and on the drinking glasses were William’s, but later finding a partial print on a bottle, we know he wiped his prints off everything he touched, but missed that. There also didn’t seem to have been a robbery as the room looked neat, so (although he claimed he was in panic) he tidied up, and took a cigarette case, brown leather gloves and a leather note case. At the time that William’s body was found, Szabo bragged to his lodger “I had a fight and stabbed a bloke”, stating with glee details only the killer would know, “I struck him in the left breast. He fell to his knees gurgling and blood came out of his mouth and nose”, and eerily mirroring the autopsy’s assumption, “I put his gloves on, pulled the knife out, wiped the fingerprints off and stuck it back in his dirty hand” as if he had stabbed himself. When the lodger asked “what was his name?”, Szabo replied “William Davies”. Only, that Sunday night, this supposed suicide hadn’t been reported in the papers and he claimed he didn’t knew William’s name, as in his statement as he only called him ‘the bloke’. As for the knife, none of William’s friends or family recall him owning one, but when Janos Puskop, a colleague of Szabo’s was questioned, he stated that Szabo owned an identical sheath knife engraved with the maker mark of ‘William Rogers’, having been threatened with it just three days prior. On Wednesday 2nd of November 1960, with the ‘supposed suicide’ now confirmed as ‘a murder’ and the newspapers stating that police were seeking a man matching Szabo’s description, armed with his woefully flimsy alibi, he gave himself up to PC Victor Ridge who was on duty in St Stephen’s Gardens. Taken to Notting Hill Police station, he repeated to Inspector Walters “I don’t know this man. I have never seen him before”, but he still gave himself time to brag “he came at me with a knife. I blocked his arm. I have done a bit of judo. He fell on to the bed. I saw blood. I got up and ran for my life”. At 5:30pm, he gave a voluntary statement, but by 9:40pm, they had charged him with murder. For the police and the pathologist, at first glance “it was suggested that this was a case of suicide”, but they both knew that it wasn’t. Upon his arrest, William’s lodging was searched, and along with the possessions he had stolen, he had recently burned some letters on the fire (their contents impossible to determine), blood was found on his jacket sleeves which he had hastily tried to sponge-off (only that wouldn’t have been there if he hadn’t touched the knife as his statement claims), and he also had a key ring with 14 keys on it; one for his room, one for the front door, one for his bike, several for his work, and one for the street door at 5 Westbourne Park Road, and one for the door of William’s flat. Any killer who had mistakenly taken a key would have thrown it away, but he had them on a keyring? And of course, the final piece of the puzzle was the clue he had left in the dead man’s hand. Although inexperienced in the ways of murder, Szabo had done almost everything right; popping on William’s leather gloves (later found in Szabo’s lodging caked with blood), he used a hankie to wipe off his prints (which he later burned), he pulled the blade from William’s chest (and having seen which hand William smoked with) and placed the knife into his right hand as if he had stabbed himself. It was nearly perfect. The problem was, the blade was facing the wrong way. (End) It was a simple mistake which he could only have known if he had stopped and thought about it. If William had stabbed himself in his chest, the tip of the blade would be facing towards him, not away. Quickly ushered from coroner’s Court to committal at Marylebone Police Court, with such a wealth of evidence against him and the investigation needing only a few loose ends tied up, the trial was held at the Old Bailey on the 12th of December 1960, barely six weeks later, before Mr Justice Thesiger. Pleading ‘not guilty’ to the charge of murder but guilty of robbery, across three days the jury carefully considered the evidence, and yet it didn’t take long for them to come to a conclusion. Guilty of non-capital murder, as they didn’t feel it was premeditated and aggravating circumstances suggested that they were uncertain whether William had lured Szabo to the flat and had attempted to assault him. On the 23rd of December 1960, Istvan Szabo was sentenced to life in prison as the death penalty could not be considered, and with at least 15 years to be served, the judge decreed “should you be released, I recommend you be deported to the country you came from”. With his name being common and shared with a famous Hungarian film director of that era, it is likely he returned home, but uncertain. The trial answered one question, ‘did Szabo kill William’, but why he did it will never be known. If it was a robbery, was William a chance encounter, a planned target, and if so, did Szabo use himself as gay bait for an elderly drunk? And if this was a failed sexual assault, why (if they did) did the men have what resembled consensual sex? It’s a mystery lost in the midst of time, which might have ended up as a ‘death by suicide’, had he not left a seemingly insignificant detail in the dead man’s hand. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast - #283: The Vice Girl Killer - Part 3 of 3 (Justin Martin Clarke)5/2/2025
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
Noke Lane where Paul Milburn's murder took place @googlemaps April2019
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-THREE:
On the weekend of the 24th and 25th of January 1987, two sex-workers vanished from two street (Sussex Gardens and Cleveland Terrace) near to Paddington Station. With their beaten, strangled and mutilated bodies found barely 24 hours apart in places where they didn't belong. The police quickly confirmed that a crazed killer was on the loose. But still unsolved today, it remains one of the most perplexing unsolved double murders in Britain. But who was he? MURDER ONE:
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Wednesday 15th of July 1987, on the last day of the inquest into the murder of Racheal Applewhaite, using his full diplomatic immunity, the police’s primary suspect flew to the safety of Mexico. But having ruled out both cases being linked, Detective Superintendent Jim Hutchinson stated “Guillermo Suarez was no longer suspected in the murder of Marina Monti”, ruling out a spree, a serial, or a lone killer. It's a brutal occupation where some of the most vulnerable women face dangers every night, whether robbery, assault and rape, with sex workers the second most likely demographic to be murdered. Both killings had all the hallmarks of most prostitute murders being attacked by either a punter or pimp, but with every similarity highlighted and every difference dismissed, the fact that two men had chosen that date and place to murder two sex workers in a seemingly identical way was entirely coincidental. Before Guillermo had fled, police were already investigating another suspect in Marina’s murder, stating before the coroner “we believe we know who her killer is, we just can’t prove it”. In their eyes, he knew the West End, he had probably worked as a pimp or drug-pusher in Bayswater, had a history of theft, assault and violence against women especially sex-workers, and was dangerous and unstable. While police and the press mistakenly believed that both murders were connected and that therefore Guillermo must also be the murderer of Marina Monti, that gave her real killer his chance to flee. But who was he? Sources list him by several of his aliases, whether Mark Mellor, Justin Maher-Clarke or Martin Anthony Maher, but in truth, born in Birkenhead near Liverpool in 1956, his real name was Justin Martin Clarke. Few details exist about his early life – his upbringing, his schooling, or why he turned to crime – but what became clear was that Clarke was angry, erratic, selfish and cruel. Everything he did was to suit himself, and with no empathy, other people were merely there to be used, abused and discarded. Said to be six foot tall, well built with broad shoulders and (what was later described as) “mad staring eyes” like Hannibal Lector, it’s unsurprising that he was a bouncer in Merseyside’s roughest nightclubs. But what made him stand out, beyond his gruff demeanour was his accent; strong Liverpudlian with a odd twang of South African, but rapid fired in a high-pitch staccato as if ever word was a red hot bullet. Growing up in a hostel, he began his criminality in his teens, and first gained notoriety under the alias of Martin Maher, when in 1977, aged 21, he was convicted of two burglaries, stealing a TV, jewellery worth £6000, and many irreplaceable heirlooms, leaving both homeowners traumatised. Unwilling to aid the police, he was found guilty and sentenced to two years in prison, but he barely served one. In 1978, as he often did when things got hot, he fled the country. Where he went is uncertain, but we know he joined the French Foreign Legion; a military unit which accepts men from any nation willing to fight for France (which Clarke was, as although he didn’t give two hoots about the French, he loved a good scrap) with the criteria being you had to be young, fit, and with no ‘serious’ criminal record. With the training said to be physically and psychologically punishing, he quickly became adept at hand-to-hand combat, weapons training, survival, urban warfare, interrogation, and escape and evasion. He was trained to fight and to kill, and with his only mission ‘to survive’, he was a fearless brutal soldier. Where he fought is unknown, as in the FFL, anonymity is guaranteed (it own diplomatic immunity), but although in the late 70s and early 80s, the Legion were engaged in bloody conflicts like the Battle of Kolwezi (in the DRC) and in Chad for Operation Tacaud 4 and Operation Sparrowhawk, his accent suggests he had served in South Africa, where they trained the South African National Defence Force. It was the perfect job for a violent man with no compassion, as he learned to hurt others and bend them to his will, and skilled in torture and strangulation, he befriended bad men who ran trafficked women in brothels and kept their girls in check with daily beatings, as well as sadistic mercenaries of a similar psychotic mindset, alongside gun smugglers, drug runners, fascists, warlords and terrorists. By the early 1980s, Clarke returned to the UK, although what year is uncertain, as well as why? It is unknown whether he served the full five years, or if he was arrested or kicked out for war-crimes. But again, possibly having fled when things got hot, London is where he made the most of his ‘new skills’… …as a violent West End pimp. Again, his movements were impossible to pin down as he used so many aliases to disguise his nefarious income. Often, Justin Clarke would state he was just a ‘security guard’ in a Bayswater hotel, when in truth, he was an enforcer for sex traffickers and - it is said - he ran (what was euphemistically called) an ‘escort agency’ which was in reality a low-rent brothel where many girls lived in fear of his wrath. We know he commanded the red-light districts of Bayswater, Notting Hill and Paddington, especially the pick-up spots like Sussex Gardens and Cleveland Terrace, he was feared by the girls who he forced into sex-work, they paid him protection money, and were violently assaulted if they didn’t, or worse. Whether he knew Racheal and Marina can never be confirmed, but it is likely, just as we can never be certain whether both girls were friends or strangers. And yet, we can get a brief glimpse at his life in London based on the type of crimes he was awaiting trial for in 1987, the year of the double murder. In 1983, he deceived the Chartered Trust insurance company out of £3500. Between August 1985 and March 1986, he lived off the immoral earnings of a 20-year-old prostitute from West Kensington who - it is said - “worked for his escort agency”, in August 1985 he coerced or forced another teenage girl into sex-work, in November 1986 he caused the Actual Bodily Harm of prostitute Madelaine Greydon who – again – he had violently beaten and strangled, and on the 15th of January 1987, just one week before both murders, he sadistically beat and robbed prostitute Joann Flynn for the sake of just £20. These were not out-liars in his criminal career, these were the crimes the police had enough evidence to charge him with – and given how rare it is for prostitutes to willingly face their pimp in a court of law, knowing that regardless of the outcome, they would be beaten, disfigured or killed in revenge - his assaults on the prostitutes who were forced to work for him were likely to be frequent and vicious. Which begs the question; was this why Marina Monti was so eager to meet that unidentified man on All Saint’s Road at 11pm, as although she’d cashed a £240 benefits cheque, she needed another £50? Did she know him, did she fear him, or did he find her first and drive her to Mitre Bridge? Across the weekend of Saturday 24th of January 1987 when Marina Monti was murdered and Monday 26th when the body of Racheal Applewhaite was discovered, we have no idea where Justin Clarke was. There was no known evidence of what he was doing, whether he was in Bayswater, Shepherd’s Bush or Kensington, or even if he drove or owned a small light-coloured car, possibly an orange Mini. But one thing we know for certain is that on the day both murders were reported… …as he often did when things got too hot, Justin Clarke fled the country. Like so many elements of these two murders, this could have been a coincidence, as awaiting trial for fraud, ABH and pimping, maybe he was fearful of serving another stint in prison? Or maybe, knowing that murder carries a life sentence, the only place he felt safe was 8000 miles away in South Africa. Entering illegally, under an alias, 31-year-old Justin Clarke hunkered down in the notorious Hillbrow area of Johannesburg, a crime-ridden den of inner-city squalor awash with drugs, sex and death. Again, claiming to be a ‘security guard’ in (what was conveniently) the red light district, he stuck out like a sore thumb being tall and solidly built with glaring eyes, and a voice like he was having a sneezing fit. As one of the Met’ Police’s usual suspects, having been arrested on an illegal immigration warrant, on the 24th of March, three weeks after Guillermo Suarez was released, two detectives escorted Clarke back to the UK, where they reported “he is being questioned about other attacks on prostitutes”. But again, maybe this was just another coincidence? On Friday 3rd of April 1987, although he proved hostile throughout, questioned at Kensington Police station by the same detectives who had quizzed Guillermo Suarez, he later re-appeared at Horseferry Road Court having been charged with fraud, ABH and pimping, as well as the murder of Marina Monti. Held at Brixton Prison, Justin Martin Clarke was tried at Southwark Crown Court on Wednesday 19th of August 1987, just four days after the inquest. On the charge of robbery, as the victim was too afraid to testify, that case was dropped; the fraud was rescinded owing to a lack of evidence, both assaults could not be proven, and with his defence counsel stating “he has always denied committing the murder and any other offence, although he believes the police are convinced he is guilty of murder”… …that day, Justin Clarke walked free. It’s an unsettling thought, but had the police and the press not been so insistent that – being desperate to find a connection linking these two coincidental murders to Guillermo, or a spree or serial killer –this might not have given Clarke enough time to destroy any proof of his guilt, if indeed he was guilty, as with two inquests and one criminal trial having failed, maybe the police were clutching at straws? After the trial, like any innocent man would do, he got on with living an honest life. Said to have moved to Hendon in leafy north-west London, in December 1991, he married Androulla Pallikarou, a Greek lawyer who specialised in wills, probates and residential properties, and that year as a mature student, he began studying law at the University of Luton specialising in Tort law (which deals with civil wrongs). With no known arrests over the next six years and none of his aliases appearing in any newspapers, he didn’t flee the country, he didn’t hastily change his address, and he didn’t frequent his old haunts in Bayswater. In April 1993, after half a decade of freedom, he was a married man who was taking his exams in a degree which could positively impact his life and lead to peace, happiness and harmony… …only crime was always a part of his life, especially killing. As a side hustle, even amidst the peace of St Alban’s, Clarke remained in the shadows of criminality, we know this as he was later charged with supplying class B drugs, and with two associates equally as keen to cheat and steal, they began perpetrating several frauds in which they targeted drug-dealers. The scam was simple; having purchased several kilos of paraffin wax from an arts & crafts shop, they boiled it down on the kitchen hob, added a brown dye, set it using thin baking trays into half kilo bars, added a gold seal to each (taken from boxes of Ferrero Rocher chocolates), sprinkled them with coffee granules and wrapped these nine bars in cling film, so they’d look like £23,000 worth of cannabis resin. As a selfish conman with no empathy, it’s unsurprising that Clarke’s insane brain had spawned this kind of caper, given that he would beat up a prostitute for the last £20 in her purse, or even worse. His victim was Paul Anthony Milburn, a 42-year-old self-employed builder and father of two, who was renovating his semi-detached home on Sunbury Lane in Walton on Thames following his divorce. He wasn’t a big-time drug dealer, as he only did it to when he needed to and he was short on quick cash. On Monday 26th of April 1993 at 3pm, Paul borrowed a pal’s black B-reg Saab 900 turbo, and with a friend nicknamed ‘Ginge’ beside him, they drove 33 miles from his home to a pre-arranged spot at the car park of the Little Chef at Chiswell Green, a roadside eatery off the North Circular at St Alban’s. While families sat eating their Jubilee pancakes, Paul’s Saab pulled up, he saw the two dealers he knew and the four men politely chatted. Clarke was nowhere to be seen, as knowing that Paul didn’t like or trust him, the deal would be off if that psychotic scouser was spotted, having scammed Paul before. Besides, that day, he had been “talking incoherently” and even his own associates didn’t trust him. At a little after 4:20pm, having agreed to buy nine bars of what he thought was cannabis for £2250 a bar, the two cars headed off in convoy to a secluded location where the deal could take place, far away from any cameras, police cars and prying eyes. Barely half a mile south-west, they drove up Noke Lane, a quiet agricultural rabbit-run surrounded by high hedges, long fields and a smattering of farms. The day was bright and clear, and the lane was quiet and isolated, as both cars pulled up, one behind the other. Keeping the mood light with a bit of cheeky banter and blokey football chat, the dealers discretely moved the nine half-kilo bars into the boot of the Saab, and with the deal done, Paul reached into the glovebox to pull out the slightly-discounted £18000 in used notes he’d agreed to pay for it. The scam was done, Paul was unaware that the drugs were fake, and the money was inches away. For the sake of the deal, Clarke had agreed to stay out of the way… …but being the epitome of unstable, from the bushes, he burst out brandishing a US Army .45 calibre pistol, as he ran towards the Saab. Terrified, Paul’s pal ‘Ginge’ fled across the open fields for his life as this thick set ex-soldier ran screaming towards them with his wild staring eyes, but as he frantically tried to start the engine, it was as Paul hunkered down that Clarke slammed his fist into the window. Making a hand-sized hole which showered Paul in shards of glass, it was as the Saab’s engine roared and tried to pull away that Clarke ran alongside it, the wheels mounting on a grass verge as the tyres slipped losing traction. Paul was alone, defenceless and afraid, but it was as Clarke shoved the pistol through the hole, that from inches away, he fired once, and slumping forward, the car ran into a hedge. Entering his right shoulder at point blank range, the bullet passed through his upper ribs, both lungs, his heart, it disabled both arms, and as several massive haemorrhages from all his vital organs flooded his weakening chest with blood, it embedded into the passenger’s seat, as within seconds, Paul lay dead. Diving into his associates’ car, Clarke shouted “Drive or I'll put one in your f**king head”, as the car sped away, leaving behind a fleeing witness, a dead body, the fake drugs, £18,000 and his own blood. It was all for nothing, but his deranged desire to kill. With the Saab blocking the lane, the body was found minutes later by a mother doing the school-run. Detectives initially stated “it did not appear to be a professional killing”, as the scene was awash with evidence like the bullet, glass fragments, foot marks, fingerprints and bloodstains, and coupled with advances in DNA profiling, whoever this killer was, the Police had the evidence to arrest and convict. On the 12th of May 1993, two weeks later, one of the dealers was arrested in Worcester Park. Charged with conspiring to supply drugs, as a result of his questioning, he gave a name - Justin Martin Clarke. Launching one of Britain’s biggest manhunts, police searched Birkenhead, London, Ireland and offered a £10,000 reward for information on BBC’s Crimewatch and ITV’s CrimeNet alongside his name, details and a photo, with the public warned “he’s armed, extremely dangerous and not to be approached”. Having driven south to the county of Kent, as he crossed Dartford Bridge, Clarke threw the bullet casing into the River Thames, but – like a coldblooded coward - as he always did when things got hot… …he fled the country. Hopping a late-night ferry from Dover to Calais, he hid-out in Paris, re-associating himself with his old comrades from the French Foreign Legion. The Police tried to track him and his aliases, and knowing that this “dangerous fugitive” had connections to the IRA, the FFL, the SANDF and Islamic terror cells in the Middle East, the British Government issued an International Arrest Warrant. The net was closing in on him, but with Bosnia & Herzegovina not being part of The EU, they didn’t receive the warrant. Across the 1980s and early 1990s, the former Yugoslavia was a country in chaos, torn apart by inter-ethnic wars, political corruption and genocide. With many militia groups needing experienced soldiers who’d fight for a wage and would kill without question, it was a great place for a sadistic killer to hide. Clarke enlisted in the Army of the Republic of Bosnia & Herzegovina, where although he was regarded as a bully, a drunk and a womaniser, far from the ramifications of a war-crimes trials, he was praised for his brutal and aggressive fighting which earned him the nickname of ‘The Truck’. He served for so long, that in 2007, aged 51, he was given Croatian citizenship and qualified for a full military pension. But evil will always be evil. Semi-retiring to the coastal village of Baska, although he had married a local girl, had a son and seemed to be living an ordinary life as “a security guard at the hotel Dubravka”, working as a criminal enforcer for a warlord and kingpin, he smuggled arms and drugs, he blackmailed officials, he took whatever he felt was his, and threatened locals at gunpoint by bragging “I could kill you with a fucking phone call". Between 1995 and 2007, although he had repeatedly terrorised the town into a state of fear, Clarke was arrested at least five times by Croatian police, but with powerful men in his pocket, his crimes were dismissed by the State Attorney, and not once were the British authorities told that he was there. Clarke was feared, especially because being a violent drunk with no morals, he loved bragging about those he had hurt, claiming “I was questioned by the police in 1987 about a woman I’d murdered”. If he had murdered Marina Monti, he wasn’t grief stricken, as to him this was a badge of honour. Had he lived an ordinary life, he could have remained hidden in Croatia until today, but as always, his arrogance took a step too far. In 2007, finally arrested for the assault of municipal commissioner Jeka Rošcic, with the authorities closing in, when things got hot, he fled, leaving behind his wife and child. Flying to Qatar in 2007 under a forged passport, Clarke got work as a minder for the Saudi royal family, he was hired as a security expert for the Qatar-arm of international engineering firm, ‘Konstruktor’ and across that year, he was living in a self-built fortified camp in the desert surrounded by concubines. But even here, his luck was running out, as the selfish psychopath left a slew of enemies in his wake. Following a tip-off, the Met’ Police flew two detectives out to interview staff at the engineering firm, as Qatar was a country where the international arrest warrant was valid. Only having been forewarned by the one friend he had left, they missed him by minutes, as grabbing a worker’s passport, he fled. Again, Clarke had vanished, this time heading to Hungary, and there they lost him. Every year since, the police issued a new appeal to find him, refusing to give up in the hunt for this dangerous fugitive, but every year he seemed to vanish further and further into obscurity, until he made a simple mistake. 29 years after the murder of Marina Monti, and 23 years after the killing of Paul Milburn, Justin Clarke sent a letter to his 81-year-old mother in Henley-on-Thames, and the Police intercepted that mail. Aided by the German authorities, on Thursday 4th of February 2016, a six-foot scouser with a strange accent was arrested in Berlin and extradited to Britain. In his possession was a Dutch ID card in the name of Michael Anderson, but his fingerprints were a perfect match to Justin Martin Clarke. As was his method, he refused to co-operate giving only “no comment” answers, but the Major Crime Unit of Beds, Herts & Bucks Police who had tracked him, knew they had the evidence to convict him. Tried at Woolwich Crown Court on 15th of January 2018 before judge Sir Peter Openshaw, he refused to have a lawyer present and – from his cell in HMP Bellmarsh – he pleaded ‘not guilty’ to conspiracy to defraud and the supply a Class B drug, possession of a firearm and the murder of Paul Milburn. Found guilty, on the 2nd of February 2018, 62-year-old Justin Clarke was given a life sentence meaning he must serve a minimum of 25 years in prison, and won’t be considered for parole until he’s 87. (End) A violent unstable psychopath was off the streets for good, but what remains uncertain is whether it was him who murdered Marina Monti? With no witnesses nor fingerprints, in 1996, her murder was 1 of 32 cold cases the CID were re-examining with advances in DNA profiling, later extended to 220, but it proved inconclusive, and again, those 220 cases didn’t include Racheal Applewhaite’s murder, as they knew they had the right suspect, but evidence and diplomatic immunity had thwarted them. As of today, 38 years later, the murders of Racheal Applewhaite & Marina Monti remain unsolved. With the questioning derailed by the press and the investigation stymied by a belief that this had to be a spree or serial killer - akin to Jack the Ripper - rather than (what it was) a series of coincidences, we may never know why these women were killed, maybe a robbery, hatred, a debt, or a cruel sadist? With Guillermo Suarez and Justin Clarke claiming their innocence, we can never be certain whether Guillermo killed Racheal and Justin killed Marina, if one of them killed both girls, or with both men seen as likely suspects, did this give an alibi to the real killer who got away with murder, twice? The one thing we do know is that had these women been diplomats or politician’s wives, they would have been treated better by the press, the public, and their outcome may have been a very different story. With Marina cremated in Hendon on 7th August of 1987 and Rachel in Kensington & Chelsea 12 days later, sadly the identity of the Vice Girl Killer remains a mystery that both women took to their graves. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast - #282: The Vice Girl Killer - Part 2 of 3 (Racheal Applewhaite)28/1/2025
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
entrance to Sydney Close, SW3 @Googlemap Sept2023
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-TWO: On the weekend of the 24th and 25th of January 1987, two sex-workers vanished from two street (Sussex Gardens and Cleveland Terrace) near to Paddington Station. With their beaten, strangled and mutilated bodies found barely 24 hours apart in places where they didn't belong. The police quickly confirmed that a crazed killer was on the loose. But still unsolved today, it remains one of the most perplexing unsolved double murders in Britain. But who was he? MURDER TWO:
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a red symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Bayswater' off Paddington Station. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Sunday 25th of January 1987 at 9:30pm, around the time that the body of Marina Monti lay on a cold hard slab in Kensington mortuary awaiting a post-mortem, Rachael Applewhaite and an unidentified ‘olive skinned’ male entered The King's Head pub, just two streets south of the red light districts of Sussex Gardens, Cleveland Terrace and Paddington Station, where she was often picked up by punters. Said to be “so drunk she couldn’t walk”, several eyewitnesses (including a friend Deborah Mezen, and several customers and bar-staff) confirmed that she wasn’t wearing her usual clothes – a black jumper, a blue denim skirt and blue shin-length denim boots – being a fashionable look for the era. Instead, she wore a second-hand navy-blue and purple hotel maid’s outfit made from hard-wearing polyester, which being a Size 12, looked like embarrassing hand-me-down as Racheal was barely a Size 10. The uniform wasn’t hers, her own clothes were missing, the white plastic bag she was carrying wasn’t big enough to hold them, and she hadn’t been back to her flat, where her boyfriend Ian was waiting. This could have been a mildly memorable moment in any pub, but it made the last official sighting of Racheal all the more credible, as she had argued and fought with Deborah who had mocked her outfit. Asked to leave just shy of ‘last orders’, she left with the man, who was said to be sober, and witnesses state that he drove her away in a small, possibly light coloured car, its make and reg number unknown. Murdered hours later, that sighting posed three big questions: if this was a pre-meditated attack by a pimp, a drug dealer or a spree-killer with a hatred of sex workers akin to the Yorkshire Ripper, why was she taken to a pub where she was known and dressed in a way which drew attention to her? Why did he allow his face to be seen? And if he had lashed out in a pre-sex rage, why did he murder her? Four days later, having autopsied both bodies, the detectives confirmed “we feel that both cases are linked” and the work of “a very violent man”, as there were too many similarities to be coincidental. Both women were a similar age, weight and size being barely five foot tall, they were sex workers for four years, they worked the same streets with possibly the same pimp, and they might have known each other as they picked up clients a couple of hundred yards apart, but that’s all that connects them. They vanished without a trace, their last client owned a small (possibly light coloured) car, and their bodies were found dumped miles from where they were last seen and in a place they didn’t belong. Both women were strangled with the ligature – a belt or tie – but never were found, both were beaten about the face and head but there were no obvious defensive wounds, there was no sexual assault, no proof they’d been robbed, and in some items of clothing were missing, in both cases, their boots. But there was one difference between both murders… …Racheal’s was much more savage. Monday 26th of January 1987. South Kensington. Two miles south of the pub where Racheal was last seen, a resident living in the affluent Sumner Place was returning from a weekend away. Driving down the busy A308 Fulham Road, she pulled up at a gap between a café and a dress shop, she opened the unlocked wrought iron gates and drove into a private area known as Sydney Close. It’s a place you would only know if you were one of twenty residents who parked their cars in these private garages. Arriving a little after midday, being cramped and surrounded on all sides by the backs of four and five storey Victorian terraced houses, even on the brightest days the sun struggles to reach the floor, but at night, being unlit, it is only illuminated by the odd bedroom window and the occasional headlight. Like the layby at Mitre Bridge junction, the killer had chosen a location which was isolated and dark. At the rear of 30-31 Sumner Place, the resident didn’t need to unlock her garage as she never used it for storage, but as the green steel door rose up, at the back corner, her headlights illuminated what she described as “a bundle of rags” - a phrase identical to the security guard who’d found Marina’s body - as her eyes were drawn to the bare pale legs of a small woman curled-up in the foetal position. The police arrived within minutes and the scene was sealed off. As before, the body looked as if it had been dumped from a car, but this time the killer had reversed in so it wouldn’t be seen by the flats overlooking it. With no signs of a struggle or any bloodstains, that proved she had been murdered elsewhere and driven her in the boot of the car. And with it being a frostless night, the tyre marks were illegible, but the axel width suggested they were from a small car. As with Marina, Racheal’s boots were missing (and were never to be found), and with her feet being bare but not dirty, she had removed them herself but hadn’t walked there. So why had he kept them? Her clothes were the same purple and blue hotel maid’s outfit she was seen wearing in the pub just hours before, but with no traces of mud, dirt or oil, she must have been killed inside a room or a car and was only taken outside when her killer carried her out, only now they were badly bloodstained. Like Marina, Racheal had been beaten about the head and face until she was rendered unconscious. With a ligature, she had been strangled from in-front as this defenceless woman lay limp and helpless. But although Marina’s injuries were limited, upon Racheal’s legs and face were the bruised imprints of a man’s Size 7 or 8 boot, as he repeatedly stamped on her body, breaking her nose, cheek and teeth. And yet, he hadn’t stopped there. Detective Sergeant Jim Hutchinson described Racheal’s injuries as “frenzied and horrific… two or more instruments were used to batter her about the head and face”, one of them believed to be either a wrench or a tyre-iron, stating “and we cannot rule out a chainsaw”. This wasn’t a killing in panic, as either someone truly hated her or didn’t want the body to be identified. That differentiated the killings, but was Marina’s mutilation cut short? One theory quickly dismissed was mistaken identity as Racheal had mousey brown hair and Marina’s was black. Another was a vengeful drug-dealer, only Racheal’s vice was drink. And although the press tried to attribute it to a copy-cat, that was impossible, as the first murder wasn’t reported until the second body was found. The autopsy was conducted by pathologist Dr Iain West who said it was impossible to pin down an accurate time of death as the body had been moved from a warm interior, to a slightly chilly car with its heating intermittently on, and into a cold and damp garage on a night barely above freezing. As an estimate, rigor mortis stated she had died eight to ten hours before she was found, so between 2am and 4am, but owing to the haemorrhaging she had suffered, she wasn’t dead when she was dumped. Having been subjected to horrifying injuries (using feet, fists and several tools) while she was still alive, she had lain there - unconscious and possibly paralysed - inside the closed garage in an isolated area that very few people knew about or would pass, bleeding and barely able to breathe, as she lay dying. Her killing was almost certainly committed a man without any compassion, someone who could kill at will, who had a history of physical assaults on women and sex-workers, who they trusted as neither woman was abducted, and with no empathy, he saw prostitutes as someone to be used and discarded. With such levels of violence, the police suspected he was likely to be a man was who unstable… …but who was he? With no witnesses to her murder, no clue as to where she was killed, no sighting of the car which had dumped her, and no idea who the ‘olive skinned’ man in the ski jacket she was last seen with in the pub was (or even if he had murdered her), detectives had to rely on the limited evidence they had. With her bag nowhere to be found, a positive ID was made by her boyfriend Ian who had reported her missing. Questioned over their disappearances, Racheal & Marina’s boyfriends remained as suspects as many men were, but with alibis and witnesses to prove their innocence, they were eliminated. All the usual suspects were rounded up – pimps, punters, perverts, addicts and prowlers, as well as the former owner of an illicit escort agency in Bayswater who lived off the earnings of prostitutes and was questioned over the assault of others – but there didn’t seem to be a suspect who stood out. Racheal’s murder was as mysterious as Marina’s, but what baffled detectives most was the purple and blue polyester uniform she was wearing for no known reason. When examined, the blouse’s label confirmed it was made by Warren Petites, a manufacturer of uniforms to the hotel and catering trade which were sold in shops and via mail-order. It wasn’t unique enough to identify who had bought it and it was the type used by mid-range boutique hotels across London, but also Britain and Europe. It wasn’t Racheal’s as it was a size too big and the arms creased in the wrong place, but faintly written in pen on the label, months if not years earlier, someone had scrawled in permanent marker ‘P Suarez’. It was faded from numerous washes, and although police suspected that this was its original owner, they were unable to find a ‘P Suarez’ missing from any local hotels, or any uniforms reported stolen. If her killer was a pervert who took pleasure in stealing his victims boots and in one case, dressed her up a like hotel maid, the Police warned others that “this terribly dangerous killer could strike again”. With no witnesses to her death and her timings a mystery, although said to be passive and quiet, the only likely suspect in her killing was the man that Racheal was last seen alive with. On Thursday 5th of February, barely a week after her body was found, Police issued a Photofit of him. It was a risk as if he was the killer, it could cause him to go into hiding or flee, but they desperately needed to find him. Blessed with reliable witnesses, each article stated “Police want to speak to a man of continental, maybe Greek or Arabic appearance, 5ft 9in, 35-40, hair black with specks of grey, wearing gold rimmed glasses and maybe a ski jacket, and on his left finger of his left hand was a large gold medallion ring”. Sadly, it failed to give them the leads they needed, so on Thursday 26th of February, detectives broadcast an appeal on the BBC’s Crimewatch, a successful TV show which drew in 14 million viewers. At this point, he was only a witness who police believed had information vital to the case - and having televised a recreation of her last sighting in the King’s Head pub, the unusual uniform she was wearing, where and how her body was found, and accompanied by a description and the Photofit of the man - police at the murder incident room took a few hundred calls from friends, associates and witnesses… …one of whom was the man himself. Watching TV, recognising the girl and seeing his own face staring back at him, that night, having first called his wife in Mexico, two days after its broadcast, 42 year old Guillermo Suarez walked into Kensington police station where detectives were shocked at how perfectly he matched the Photofit. Guillermo Suarez was an administrative attaché at the Mexican embassy in West Kensington, roughly half way between the street where Racheal was picked up by her punters and his third floor flat at the exclusive Coleherne Court in South Kensington, which – coincidentally – was barely half a mile west of the garage where Rachael’s body was found. He also was the owner of a small light-coloured car. When questioned, he confirmed that he was with Racheal in the pub that night, that he’d picked her up for the purposes of sex, and that the maid’s uniform belonged to his wife who – although in Mexico – sometimes visited him in London and worked at various hotels. Initially he denied leaving the pub with Racheal, but when confronted with witness testimony, he changed his story, and stated that after they left the pub, he drove them back to his flat, where in his wife’s wardrobe “she took a fancy to it”. This made no sense, as the uniform was unfashionable, uncomfortable, her denim skirt, boots and black jumper were nowhere to be seen, and it was the wrong size, so much so it was laughable. Asked if he dressed her up as part of a sexual fetish, he refused to answer the question as he feared it might incriminate him, with detectives later stating that “we don’t know what happened to her own clothes, nor do we have a satisfactory explanation as to why she wanted to take this new set”. Police said “he had offered himself as a witness of his own accord” and was treated accordingly, as a witness. But that night, always eager for the latest scoop, even though he hadn’t been charged with any crimes, the Daily Mirror and the Daily Mail – two tabloids famed for printing incorrect information, then days or weeks later in a barely visible column hidden inside where no one would read it issuing a retraction of their accusations – having already incorrectly listed his name as Jose and his job as a ‘Top Envoy’ when he was little more than a middle ranking administrator, they printed his details and a photo beside the headline of ‘I am TV Murder Suspect’, which in the public’s eyes made him as good as guilty. Details of the case had been leaked, possibly by a bent copper willing to blab for some cash to a sleazy hack, and - of course – they only printed the most sensational details, which derailed the questioning. Having admitted to paying Racheal £20 and having sex with her in his flat in and around the time that the pathologist said she had been viciously attacked which led to her death, detectives were later able to confront him with the evidence that witnesses had positively identified him as the man last seen with the victim, and that between the 31st of January and the 7th of February, one week after both murders were reported, Theresa Mellett, the manageress of a dry-cleaners a few streets from his flat identified him as a man who had “taken in a bag of bedding that was soiled with blood. He told me his wife had an accident”, but when the police checked, his wife in Mexico hadn’t visited him for months. The evidence was circumstantial, but Police later confirmed “although he had offered himself up as a witness, as a result he was arrested”. Guillermo Suarez was locked up for 1 ½ hours and questioned for 30 hours, but on the 1st of March, as they couldn’t charge him, he was de-arrested and released. Forensic tests were carried out on his car and his flat, but they were unable to prove whether Racheal was there or if this was where she had been murdered, and fearing another leak of information to the tabloid press, it was never reported what make of car he had, or if his boot prints matched those which had stamped on Racheal’s face. On Monday 23rd of March, Guillermo Suarez was interviewed a second time by detectives, this time about the double murder of Racheal Applewhaite and Marina Monti… … but again, lacking conclusive evidence, he was released without charge. Many questions we will never know the answer to, as after this point, the information fed to the press dried up; we’ll never know what he said happened to Racheal after they had sex, whether he knew of or had been to the garage in Sydney Close, whether he owned the orange Mini which picked Racheal up earlier that night, whether he took prostitutes to the layby at Mitre Bridge, whether had sex with Marina at the Lion Court Hotel, or if any of his fingerprints or items containing his DNA were found. In both murders, police said, he was the most likely suspect, but then a force more powerful than the police took control of the investigation, as although not high ranking Suarez was entitled to protection. Granted by the 1961 Geneva Convention, diplomatic immunity offers a degree of legal protection to the diplomats, their families and staff from criminal and some civil prosecution. Designed to prevent international incidents between governments whose relations may be strained, it ensures that a blind eye is turned to minor crimes like speeding or drink driving, but with rape, manslaughter or murder, if the diplomat is charged, they would be ‘expected’ to waive their immunity, but this is not a given. In 1986, one year before, 39 criminal offences were committed in the UK in which diplomatic immunity was used, including a US diplomat’s husband who was charged with the sexual assault of a child. When Suarez was arrested, it was reported “the Mexican charge d'affaires in London was summoned to the Foreign Office where he was told that the British expected the Mexican authorities to waive his protection”, but instead aided by the Mexican Ambassador, he refused to answer further questions. And like most people in powerful places their influential friends sought to protect them. On Monday 2nd of March, one day after his release, several MPs asked for the Home Secretary Douglas Hurd to mount an investigation “into the appalling way the Met Police treated this Mexican diplomat”, with none of them expressing remorse at how two women had been murdered at the hands of a maniac. On the 1st of July 1987, an inquest into the murder of Racheal Applewhaite was held at Hammersmith Coroner’s Court, as presided by Dr Paul Knappman. Having waived his diplomatic immunity, instead Suarez chose not to answer any questions for fear they may incriminate him, and with this meaning he couldn’t and wouldn’t say anything, at that point, the inquest couldn’t proceed with that charge. By the time the Director of Public Prosecutions had re-examined the case, without enough evidence to re-arrest him, using his diplomatic immunity, Suarez flew back to Mexico, where he was safe… …and there he remains, even today. John Folkes, Racheal’s father stated “I want him to come back to Britain and tell the police what he knows. It makes me sick that he has rebuilt his life in Mexico… I bet Suarez has a big house and plenty of money, all the things my Racheal dreamed of but never had and now never will”. Tracked down by the Daily Mirror one year later, it was true, he was living in a nice house in Mexico City with his wife and two children, and having left the embassy, he worked for the Epsom Computer Printing Company. Again, he refused to answer any questions, instead stating “I was innocent and simply trying to help. It's case closed as far as I am concerned”. Frustrated, Detective Superintendent Hutchinson’s reply was “the case is still open and I would like to ask Mr Suarez a number of vital questions”, but owing to a lack of conclusive evidence, the Crown Prosecution Service could not extradite him from Mexico. And that is where the case into the murder of Racheal Applewhaite remains… …unsolved, but with a very likely suspect whose guilt cannot be proven. On 13th of August 1987, at the inquest into the murder of Marina Monti, having previously stated that “we feel that both cases are linked” and the work of “a very violent man”, DS Hutchinson would confirm “I have now ruled out any link that the killings of Rachel Applewhaite and Marina Monti were connected”, stating that “Guillermo Suarez was no longer suspected of killing Marina”, only Racheal. There was no serial or spree-killer akin to the Yorkshire Ripper stalking the streets of Bayswater. There was no double murder of two seemingly associated prostitutes just streets apart. And although it was believed there were too many similarities for the murders to be coincidental – the time, the place, the small car, the ligature, the beatings, the lost clothes, the vanished handbags and the missing boots - that’s exactly what they were, two coincidental murders, but by two very different killers. (End) As of 2024, 37 years after the murders of Racheal Applewhaite & Marina Monti, they remain unsolved. With no new witnesses nor evidence, it’s a cold case which only gets colder. In 1997, Marina’s murder was one of 32 cold cases the Met’ Police re-investigated, but that didn’t include Racheal’s, as with the only suspect in her killing living in Mexico, that case would only be solved when Suarez is extradited. At the inquest into Marina Monti’s murder, DS Hutchingson’s claim that the murders weren’t connected didn’t come out of no-where, as before the coroner, Dr John Burton, he stated “we believe we know who her killer is, we just can’t prove it”, as having also extricated another man, he said “the Crown Prosecution Service feels there is insufficient evidence to charge him, but inquiries continue”. In the initial stages of their investigation, knowing the area well, all the usual suspects were rounded up; whether pimps, punters, perverts, addicts or prowlers, as well as one primary suspect who drew their attention. Said to be unstable, volatile and with a long history of violence against women, he was the former owner of an illicit escort agency in Bayswater who lived off the earnings of prostitutes and was questioned over the brutal assault of West End sex workers, who were left traumatised for life. As a robber, a pimp and a drug dealer who is currently incarcerated for a horrific murder, suspected of others and some say could even be a serial killer, just days after Marina’s murder – for no reason at all – he adopted several aliases, fled the country and went into hiding. But did he kill Marina Monti? The final part of The Vice Girl Killer concludes next week. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast - #281: The Vice Girl Killer - Part 1 of 3 (Marina Monti)21/1/2025 
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
Sussex Gardens in Paddington, where Marina Monti was picked up - copyright @Wikicommons
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond London's West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-ONE:
On the weekend of the 24th and 25th of January 1987, two sex-workers vanished from two street (Sussex Gardens and Cleveland Terrace) near to Paddington Station. With their beaten, strangled and mutilated bodies found barely 24 hours apart in places where they didn't belong. The police quickly confirmed that a crazed killer was on the loose. But still unsolved today, it remains one of the most perplexing unsolved double murders in Britain. But who was he? MURDER ONE:
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a red symbol of a 'P' just by the words 'Bayswater' off Paddington Station. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the news archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Sussex Gardens in Paddington, W2; the street where Doris Jouanette became the Blackout Ripper’s last victim, where Agnes Walsh was brutalised by the ‘sad faced killer’, where Ruby Bolton, Sharon Pickles and Kathleen Moloney picked up punters, and where Amanda Walker was last seen before being mutilated by the sadistic ‘Honey Monster’ - coming soon to Murder Mile. As a busy tree-lined street just south of Paddington Station, by day Sussex Gardens is a peaceful row of cheap B&Bs, but by night, it’s a one stop shop for the drug addled and the sexually desperate. With cars pulling up on every corner to greet a shivering wreck in a mini skirt and fish-net tights, having bartered a price for her pussy, what follows is either grunting in a doorway or a head bobbing in a bush as their feet dodge heroin needles like a spiky assault course and crack addicts straining to shit. It may seem like a nightmare, but as we’ve seen many times before, this is a place where (for more than a century) destitute women have traded their bodies to bad men - some of whom end up dead. On the weekend of the 24th and 25th of January 1987, two sex-workers vanished from these streets just south of Paddington Station. With their beaten, strangled and mutilated bodies found barely 24 hours apart, the police quickly confirmed that a crazed killer was on the loose. But who was he? My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 281: The Vice Girl Killer – Part One. As with most cases involving prostitutes, many witnesses refused to give evidence for fear of perjuring themselves, so much of their lives remain as mysterious as the motive for these senseless killings. Born in Edmonton, North London on the 13th of September 1959, Marina Alexandra Monti was one of at least two daughters to Froukje Poelstra, a native of Limburg in the Netherlands who had lived in the Yemen prior to coming to England, and Angelo Monti, a man of Italian heritage. As a petite pale-skinned girl with deep blue eyes and dark black hair, she had the exotic look of both of her parents. Little is known about her upbringing; where she went to school, where she lived, or what her parents did. It was said she had married a man called Neil Carter, but there was no proof that she ever wed. Across the sixties, seventies and most of the eighties, Marina didn’t make many (if any) ripples in life, as with few documents and nothing in any papers, it’s as if she didn’t exist, and soon she wouldn’t. By the turn of 1987, Britain was in a wintery slump; unemployment was high, the pound was weak, AIDS was that decade’s deadly pandemic, several massacres (the King’s Cross fire & Hungerford) were brewing, we were months away from the Black Monday financial crash, and in the second week of January, the Big Freeze had blanketed parts of the UK in 30 inches of snow, with the rest cold and icy. These dark cold streets mirrored Marina’s life, as with her family having left England for warmer climes (later moving to Australia), except for her on-and-off boyfriend, 27-year-old Marina was on her own. For several years, Marina had scraped together a basic living by selling sex on the streets, in recent weeks she’d begun living in a shabby DHSS hostel at the Shelbourne Hotel in Kensington (where 25 years before, Churchill’s forgotten super spy Krystina Skarbek was murdered), and with at least one conviction for soliciting, unable to hold down a legitimate job with a regular wage, she wasn’t only trapped in a vicious circle of poverty due to her past but because she was hopelessly hooked on heroin. Saturday 24th of January 1987 was a bitterly cold night as Marina walked the icy streets of Bayswater and Queensway. Dressed in red knee-length boots which matched her lipstick, and carrying a white shoulder bag (full of all her essentials, like make-up, a hair brush, underwear, condoms, her purse, tin foil and a lighter to cook up her drugs), although petite and pretty, with the streets being so deathly quiet on this hellishly frozen night, she couldn’t be as choosy about which punter she’d have sex with. At the back of the Bayswater tube station, from 9pm to 10pm, Marina earned £30 having satisfied an unnamed punter in The Lion Court Hotel at 26 Prince’s Square, a disreputable hotel where you could rent a bed by the hour. With a solid alibi, he said she had told him “I gotta go, I gotta get my stuff”, by which she possibly meant her heroin fix, and said “I gotta be in All Saints Road and need £50 by 11pm”. She left a little after 10pm, but never said who she was meeting, or why she had to do it by that hour. That was her last confirmed sighting. But who was she meeting? Was it a dealer who she owed money to, a pimp who she was afraid of, or someone who had threatened to kill her, and (possibly) others? If it was to buy drugs, it seems odd as she’d cashed-in a benefits cheque for £240 (roughly £350) that day, and even though her and her boyfriend both had an £80-a-day habit, she didn’t go to All Saints Road to score any heroin. So having not got high since that morning, her withdrawal was kicking in. Across her final hour alive, the flu-like withdrawal symptoms had taken hold of her body; her muscles ached, her stomach twisted, even amidst the frozen air she sweated with a red hot fever, and feeling sick, irritable, anxious and depressed, all she could think off was drugs, which clouded her judgement. By 10:30pm, having travelled in the opposite direction to Sussex Gardens, two miles south-east of All Saints Road, an anonymous prostitute stated she saw Marina touting for business, her red boots, white bag and red lipstick making her stand out. She spoke to no-one, she didn’t seem distressed, and at sometime between 10:45pm and 10:50pm, an unknown punter in an unseen car picked her up… …and there she vanished. Nobody saw her leave Paddington, nobody heard them drive along the Bayswater Road to Shepherd’s Bush, nobody sensed anything suspicious as they headed up Wood Lane, past Wormwood Scrubs prison and its desolate scrubland, and just shy of a defunct stretch of the Grand Union canal, this small car turned right into an isolated unlit layby used by truckers, work-crews and prostitutes. Not wanting to be seen by the police, it was a perfect spot as the sound of sex is muffled by a steady slew of trains heading east and west, and with no houses nearby, neither party would be arrested for lewd conduct. At a little after 11pm, around the time that Marina had planned to meet a man in All Saints Road, over Scrubs Lane and just shy of the Iron Bridge, a signalman working the nightshift at the Mitre Bridge junction box – an elevated cabin beside the railway, where he pulled levers to change the signals and redirect trains onto different lines - spotted the headlights of a car from roughly 150 feet away. Being dark, he couldn’t tell its make or colour, but he knew why it was there having witnessed this before. With the car’s inside light off, he saw nothing. Because of the trains, he heard nothing. And with this small two or four door car parked up for just four or five minutes, he suspected nothing was wrong as it drove away. He continued his nightshift, ate his sandwiches, and thought nothing more about it… …and yet, the Vice Girl Killer had made his first kill. At 7:15pm, 40 minutes before dawn, a security guard at the Scrubs Lane railway depot spotted what he described as “a bundle of rags in the layby”. Shimmering in his torchlight, this tiny tragic lump was covered in a light dusting of frost having been dumped at least six hours before, but it was as his torch shined lower, that it illuminated the bare pale legs of a small woman curled-up in the foetal position. With rigor mortis two-thirds complete, detectives determined she had died between 9pm and 11pm. Found in a familiar layby, the initial investigation stated it was likely that this unidentified women was a prostitute who had been driven here for the purposes of sex, and although the press said she was partially clothed, she hadn’t been stripped or sexually assaulted, as being found without any knickers, this was common in the sex trade as it speeds up the sexual transaction, as time (literally) is money. The same was said about her dark-red knee-length boots. Her feet were bare but clean when she was found proving that she hadn’t walked there or got out of the car, and as prostitutes often remove their shoes as this makes it easier to have sex in cars, the Police believed she’d been killed just before the sex. But for some reason - known only to the killer himself - he had taken with him, her red sexy boots. With her white shoulder bag missing, it was suspected that this was a robbery, but although she had cashed a £240 benefits cheque, it was impossible to tell if she had spent it, lost it, or he had stolen it. What was known was the method of her death. In the darkness of the car, he had brutally beaten her about the face, breaking her nose, fracturing an eye socket and leaving her features a bloody swollen mess, and with an unidentified ligature - said to be either a tie or a stocking - he had strangled her. As with the boots and bag, having squeezed every last breath out of her, he took the ligature and left nothing behind to identify him; no footprints, no fingerprints, no semen and no hairs. The small car (whose make and colour was impossible to tell, as on a moonless night even whites can look black) had left a few tyre marks, but after a night of drizzle and a top layer of frost, they were barely legible. For the Police, this seemed like the familiar killing of a prostitute by a punter… …but had the Vice Girl Killer already moved onto his second kill? Just 7 years after the Yorkshire Ripper, 45 years after the Blackout Ripper, 51 years after the Soho Strangler and almost exactly a century after Jack the Ripper had terrorised Whitechapel, a serial-killer of sex-workers still haunted the memories of every citizen and detective. Every time a sex-worker was found slain, it made them ask “is this a new ripper?”, as although improbable, it was always possible. Because of those killings and the frequency of which sex-workers are assaulted or raped by drunks or a slew of sad men seeking someone to blame for their own failings, sex workers often work in pairs or bring their pimp or boyfriend along should the client get rough. But they can’t always be there. The second murdered girl was 24-year-old Rachael Applewhaite. Born on the 7th of February 1963 in Gloucestershire to a loving father, mother and sister, it was said that Racheal Ann Folkes (as she was christened) had a solid and loving upbringing being raised in a hard-working lower-middle class family. Later moving to the West Oxfordshire district of Carterton, although little is known about her early life, it wasn’t burdened by trauma or tragedy, and unlike Marina, she hadn’t been abandoned by her loved ones. She was educated, she had worked, and – aged 19 - although she believed she was madly in love with a man called Grantley Applewhaite in Autumn 1981, sadly their marriage didn’t last a year. By the end of 1982, she had left home. She wasn’t a runaway as she had nothing to run from, but with her village being a too quiet for this ambitious teenager, she headed to the bright lights of London. As a big city with lots of thrills and danger, it could have been the making of her, but within the year, ending up homeless, penniless and depressed, 20-year-old Racheal was earning a living on the streets. No-one sets out to sell their body for sex, but as a lone girl who drowned her sadness with drink, she made use of what life had given her just to survive. Being mousey blonde with hazel eyes and a petite Size 10 frame, she would have known that her girlish looks would attract men, and in turn, she’d live. Between 1983 and 1987, for four years, Racheal Applewhaite barely existed, except in a few mugshots having been convicted of soliciting, her weekly signature when she cashed in her dole cheque, and at the check-in for her DHSS hostel in Earls Court where she lived with her boyfriend, not far from Marina. They weren’t friends, but some said they knew each other. It’s uncertain if they knew each other’s name, but as young women who worked on the same unlit streets, faced the same dangers, maybe had the same pimp, and probably picked up the same punters, they may have warned each other of the men to look out for. Their connection may have been merely a quick nod in passing, or perhaps they didn’t know each other at all, but they could never know that they’d be linked in a tragic fate. Saturday 24th of January 1987, the same bitterly cold day that Marina was murdered, Racheal was in her DHSS hostel, with her 20-year-old boyfriend Ian. They’d been together for just six months, but the honeymoon was over, as too often being broke, they spent their meagre earnings on alcohol. The press said Racheal was a heroin addict, but this was wrong, as unlike Marina, drink was her demon. That day, she received no calls, no visitors, she didn’t seem usually upset and she had no-one to meet. That evening, on a small black and white television, Ian & Racheal watched BBC One. At 5:20pm was US sitcom Perfect Strangers, at 5:45pm was the now-problematic kids TV show Jim’ll Fix It, and as the fluffy British sitcom Hi-De-Hi started at 6:20pm, Racheal got changed into a black jumper, a blue denim skirt and blue shin-length denim boots. Escorted by Ian, they walked to Earls Court tube station and caught the District Line tube to Paddington, where she plied her trade just shy of this bustling station. Just three streets south and almost identical to Sussex Gardens, Cleveland Terrace is another street where – even today – punters pick up prostitutes and shabby little rooms can be rented by the hour. Standing on the eastern edge of Cleveland Terrace near to the station, it was a perfect spot being busy but discrete, opposite the Prince of Wales pub and nearby to a raft of unlit car parks, garages or mews where – spending a maximum of 25 to 30 minutes per client – she could assuage their sexual needs. Ian said they had arrived a little after 7pm, and even though a blisteringly cold wind howled, it wasn’t long before a car pulled up. It was a small, two-doored, orange Mini, its licence plate unknown. Being tiny, it wasn’t the easiest car for two adults to have intercourse in, but it wasn’t impossible. According to Ian, the man was polite as he discretely engaged Racheal using all the right lingo in this illegal affair; (him) “you busy?”, (her) “no, fancy a date?”, (him) “sure, hop in”. And as was his duty, Ian had a brief look at the man to check he wasn’t dodgy or suspicious, and having given his okay, they drove away. Quite how he could tell if this man was mad, bad, twisted or sinister having barely had a brief glance at him in an unlit car on a dark street, yet he later couldn’t recall the man’s face, as he’d been drinking. By 7:05pm, Racheal was gone, the car having headed north up Westbourne Terrace, either leading to a side street, a mews, a park, or onto the Westway leading to Wood Lane, passed Wormwood Scrubs and up Scrubs Lane, where 12 hours later, Marina’s battered and strangled body would be found. By 7:30pm, he had expected her back, but she was nowhere to be seen. By 8pm, he was getting a bit peeved, as even on a cold night, she could hope to have sex four or five times, and several new punters had passed by. By 8:30pm, he was growing worried as she was never this late. And by 9pm, about the time that Marina had entered the Lion Court Hotel with her client, she’d been missing for two hours. Every time, it must have crossed his mind that she was in danger, but no-one expects a serial killer… …and although one was said to be lurking nearby looking for women, this time she was safe. Just after 9pm, Racheal arrived back on Cleveland Terrace, where he had last seen her. She was unhurt, she was smiling, and she was drunk. Having gone to the pub, she’d spent the money she’d earned on drink, and with Ian being furious, they argued. There was no violence, but as she tried to get into a cab Ian pulled her out and as their angry words reached an impasse, they walked off in different directions. This rift was not uncommon for Ian & Racheal, as they always knew they’d make up and would return to the same vicious circle. Had they made up right then, she would probably be alive today. But although Ian was back at their hostel at 11pm, as seen by eyewitnesses, he never saw her alive again. That night, she vanished a second time. Three and a half miles west, Marina Monti’s body lay dumped in an unlit layby beside Mitre Bridge, it growing ever colder and stiffer, as a faceless man with no known motives drove away in a small car. He had fled, taking her boots, bag and the ligature. Across the night, he had probably washed his car, cleaned his clothes, destroyed any evidence, and gave himself an alibi for the hours he was missing. His method was neither the work of an amateur nor a professional, and yet it didn’t make sense to kill her; he hadn’t raped her, they weren’t seen, there were hints of sadism or perversion (but maybe her boots and her bag were merely missing, having been left in his car by mistake?) and if it was robbery, why would anyone steal from a destitute woman, who had usually spent all of her money on drugs? That night, he might have checked the radio for reports of a woman’s body being found, but with the next day’s newspapers (even the Sunday evening edition) reporting nothing, did he believe he had got away with murder? Did it make him feel braver, did it not fully assuage his sickness, or was he merely a pimp reprimanding one of his street girls, or a drug dealer who was taking more than he was owed? Racheal had vanished… and yet again, by the morning, she was found alive and well. As an alcoholic, she had returned to the warm bosom of booze, having stayed at a friend’s house in West London. On Sunday 25th of January 1987 at about 12.30pm, as the police carted Marina’s body to the mortuary, out of the blue, Racheal phoned John, her father in Oxfordshire, having not spoken in a while. She told him she’d split from Ian, they were living apart, but like the rest of the family, he didn’t know that she was a prostitute. She never said why she called him, but maybe she just wanted to hear a kind voice? Across those next nine hours, again Racheal was nowhere to be seen… …and yet, her final sighting alive would be the epitome of strange. At 9:30pm, Deborah Mezen of Illford, who knew Racheal both by sight and name, saw her enter The King's Head at 132 Edgware Road, just two streets south of Sussex Gardens and Paddington Station. Racheal was said to be drunk, and was sitting with a man she assumed was a punter. Said to be olive-skinned and maybe wearing a ski jacket, it wasn’t him who drew Deborah’s attention. The clothes Racheal was last seen wearing - a black jumper, a blue denim skirt and blue shin-length denim boots with a white stripe – were gone. Instead, she was dressed in a maid’s outfit. Not the kind a sexy French maid would wear in a fantasy, but a cheap, navy blue, hotel maid’s two-piece outfit made of Polyester. It was generic, dull and being one size too big for her, it hung off her bones like a set of rags found in a skip. Described by some as a smock, complete with a purple blouse and a purple hankie in her breast pocket, but oddly possibly no shoes, it looked as if she was here to make the beds and clean the loo. It was so bad, it was laughable, and as Deborah and her friends began to mock Racheal across the bar, known to have a fiery temper especially when drunk, Racheal started to argue. With their fight broken up by the landlord at just before 10:30pm when ‘last orders’ was called – said to be ‘so drunk she was incapable of walking’ – Racheal left the pub carrying a white plastic bag, and was followed by the man. She had vanished twice before in the last 24 hours, but this time would be her last. (End) By Thursday 29th of January 1987, just four days later, detectives appealed for witnesses, they stated they were looking for a “very violent man” and had confirmed in the press “we feel that both cases are linked”. The murders of Marina Monti & Racheal Applewhaite were too similar to be coincidental. They were both young female prostitutes who picked up clients just off Paddington Station, they were acquaintance who were murdered within a day of each other, they had both been beaten, strangled and dumped, their boots, bags and certain items of clothing were missing (and never to be seen again), and both bodies were found in isolated spots far from where they were picked up. With the only difference being that Racheal’s injuries were much more brutal, and some say, deliberately sadistic. Posters were plastered across the city by the Police featuring their faces and the headline of ‘Murder’ ‘do you know them?’. Witnesses were slim, evidence was limited, and with few suspects, it remains a case which is as perplexing even today. Seeking a man with a history of violence against prostitutes, the police questioned (and in some cases arrested then released) several pimps, punters, prowlers, perverts, drugs dealers and addicts, even going so far as to question a security guard in South Africa. The investigation was thorough, so diligent were the detectives in their mission to convict their most likely suspect that is caused an uproar in the Houses of Parliament, upset several embassies, unsettled some precariously balanced diplomatic relations, and led to an intervention by the Home Secretary. Having got a taste for blood, there were more deaths to come, and with one man soon be arrested on suspicion of murder, was he the Vice Girl Killer or was this double-murder just an odd coincidence? Part two of three of The Vice Girl Killer continues next week. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast - #279 & 280: The Grey Man - Parts 1 & 2 (Philip Joseph Ward)11/12/2024
Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
side entrance of 1-3 Hadley Gardens in Chiswick @Googlemaps Sept2021
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond the West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-NINE AND EIGHTY:
Across the morning of Tuesday 11th of November 1941, from 8:50am to 10:20am, an armed man dressed in grey went on a killing spree across Chiswick, Hammersmith and Acton armed with two shotguns. It seemed like he was picking off random people, but having spent months rehearsing and surveilling his targets, his mission had a purpose. Of so he thought.
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MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: of PART ONE Tuesday 11th of November 1941. The Second World War had raged on for two long years and Britain was losing the fight. Still reeling from the evacuation of Dunkirk, German troops were massed at the English channel poised to invade and an eight-month blitz bombing campaign had reduced many cities to smoking and smouldering ruins of rubble, with Hitler’s plan to pummel the British people into submission… only it had failed. For most Londoners, the bombings had become a bit of a nuisance, fires lit up every skyline, guns were commonplace, and with each street tinged with the stench of rotting bodies, they carried on with life. That day was Armistice Day (later known as Remembrance Day and Veteran’s Day), where – with fresh irony – the people marked the end of hostilities between the Allies and Germany just 23 years before, and with a paper poppy pinned to their lapels, at 11am sharp, the city would fall to a 2-minute silence. As a typical middle-class suburb in Chiswick, West London, Foster Road was full of neat semi-detached houses on a peaceful tree lined street, where you rarely heard a sound above a softly spoken whisper. At 8:45am, as per usual, 28-year-old Leslie Ernest Ludford left his home at 11 Foster Road. Dressed in a smart suit and clutching a briefcase, as he worked as a solicitor dealing in divorces and conveyancing. This half-mile walk took twice as long, as being born with dwarfism, this diminutive man seemed even smaller as a curvature of the spine left him with a hunched back and propped up by a pair of crutches. To some, he may have stood out as weak, but as his father always said “it didn’t stop him, as the only thing he couldn’t do was run”. Leslie was well-respected, a keen player of the card-game Whist and was Chairman of the Brentford and Chiswick Junior Conservative Club on nearby Chiswick High Road. As he’d done so many times before, he turned onto Hadley Gardens heading towards Duke’s Avenue. The street was typically quiet; with a few cars parked up and the milkman having done his round, opposite 1-3 Hadley Gardens, Ada Dancy was selling poppies, Arthur Burgess and Matilda Mott were talking to her, Stanley Randall was in his bedroom, and Violet Pender was a few paces behind Leslie. Ada said “I didn’t appreciate the seriousness at the time”, as Violet agreed “I didn’t think it was real”, as having had a gas attack drill days before, they thought it was a practice for if the German’s invaded. But it was real, and Leslie knew it. From in-front of a dark blue saloon, a tall shadowy man raised a single-barrel shotgun to his shoulder, as its sights fixed squarely as the dwarf hobbled on wooden crutches. Stopping dead, with his eyes wide in terror, he raised his hands and Leslie screamed “don’t, don’t”, but the man showed no mercy. Exploding in a fiery burst, a 12-bore shell of lead-shot ripped apart his upper left arm, shattering the humerus, embedding his flesh with red-hot wadding and fragments of suit, as it spun him like a child’s toy. Collapsed and bleeding, as Leslie steadied himself on the wall, he screamed, as a tall man in a grey suit, a grey overcoat and a grey hat reloaded the shotgun and stalked towards him, focussed and calm. As death loomed, breathless and broken, Leslie hobbled to the side gate of 1-3 Hadley Gardens. But with it locked, as he turned, he saw that all that stood between living or dying was man with a gun. The second shot blasted a 2-inch hole in his gut shattering the wooden gate behind and spattering his blood and bits of his undigested breakfast across the path, as Leslie slumped to the ground. Only the grey man didn’t want him scared or injured, but dead, as he fired again from just a few feet away. Crumpled in a bloody heap, the third shot blew a 4 ½ inches hole from Leslie’s groin to his belly button, lacerating his bladder, his intestines, his pelvis, parts of his spine, and with three gaping wounds to his torso which had shredded his left lung, he was slowly drowning in his own blood, acids and toxins. In panic, the poppy seller and two others hid inside 15 Hadley Gardens, but being deaf and having not heard them, Violet Pender walked on. “I hurried along the pavement thinking I would get out of the way and when I got outside of the house, I heard another shot and I felt a pain in my right thigh”. Staggering to the junction of Duke’s Avenue, passersby dragged her into the surgery of Dr Evans, and as the assailant’s car roared away down Foster Road, this usually quiet street descended into screams. Ambulances arrived at 8:52am, two minutes after the call. Violet was lucky, as although suffering wounds to her right thigh and buttocks, with no broken bones or severed arteries just superficial cuts, she was bandaged, stitched and later made a good recovery. But Leslie was ghostly pale by the time the doctor arrived, having lost two pints of blood which was a lot for his tiny frame. And although barely alive, it was as he was driven to West Middlesex hospital that Sergeant Hammond saw his lips move, “I put my head down to him, raising it slightly from the stretcher and I heard him say ‘Brent. It was Brent’”. He then fell unconscious, and died of his injuries. But who was ‘Brent’? The street was littered with evidence, as beside Leslie’s scattered and bloodstained crutches, five empty shotgun shells were found with their shiny brass-caps bearing the words ‘Eley & Kynock’ and ’12 bore’. But having been passed from person-to-person, any hope of finding a fingerprint was lost. The same was said of the killer’s description, as although Police interviewed the six living witnesses, they could all remember was the gun, the blasts and the fear, but not him. Said to be tall, of average build and in his 20s or 30s, dressed in grey and with his face hidden by a grey Trilby hat, he was a Grey Man in every sense of the word, he was forgettable, as all agreed “I doubt I’d recognise him again”. What baffled Police most was the lack of motive. Leslie’s killing was deliberate, but why target him? By all accounts, he was a pleasant man who lived a quiet life with no debts, enemies or secrets. Being unmarried, he had no jealous lovers. Being a staunch Conservative, he had no Fascist leanings. Being a little dull, he played cards, but never for money. And given the era, he wasn’t a suspected German spy or a British double-agent, as owing to his disability, he was declared unfit for serve in the military. Violet’s shooting seemed random, as she only knew Leslie by sight, she knew no-one called Brent, yet if he’d tried to kill her for being a witness, why didn’t he kill those who had huddled in a nearby house? What was certain was that Leslie’s killing was deliberate, and given his unique look, it wasn’t a case of mistaken identity. With witnesses seeing a dark blue Hillman Minx parking up just minutes before, as planned, the killer had waited, targeted and gunned Leslie down in cold blood. He knew where Leslie lived, and he knew his route and timings having kept surveillance on him in the days and weeks prior. But who was ‘Brent’, and why did he want Leslie Ludford dead? A small clue was gleaned from the scene, as although terrified, Matilda had memorised the licence plate of the car - GGC83. At 9:10am precisely, as detectives started trawling every garage, showroom and hire company, its details were transmitted to every constable and wireless cars in every borough. With the hunter now being the hunted, the Police thought it was only a matter of time before Leslie’s killer was caught and brought to justice. And yet, before the police and ambulances had even arrived… …the Grey Man had moved onto his next target. Five minutes west, having snuck along the backstreets, at exactly 8:55am, the dark blue Hillman Minx pulled into St Mary’s Grove, another quiet residential street where the middle-classes live in silence. He didn’t rush, he wasn’t indecisive, and he wasn’t prowling for victims to kill, as having rehearsed this, he calmly pulled up outside of a two-storey semi-detached Victorian home at 1 St Mary’s Grove. This was the pleasant little home of two sisters; 58-year-old Annie New, a spinster who lived alone in the ground floor flat, and 56-year-old Emma Jane Crisp and her husband Thomas who lived upstairs, with their flat a little quieter, as during the blitz, their daughter Phyllis had evacuated to the country. Just like Leslie, they seemed an unlikely target, and yet the Grey Man was specifically hunting them. Opposite, Mrs Kimpton saw a car pull up, a tall man in a grey suit and hat get out, he walked up the path towards the door, he rang the bell and gave it three loud knocks. Inside, Annie went to answer it, but with her sister Emma saying “it’s the milkman, I want him”, she beat her to the door. Only when she opened it, no-one was there. She looked, but the milkman was a few houses away, and seeing a newspaper at her feet, it was as she bent to pick it up that she spotted a man sitting in a car’s backseat. With its long barrel perched on the car’s right rear window, from inside, the Grey Man fired. Exploding in red-hot fury, both sisters were shot with the first blast. Partially obscured by Emma, Annie was hit in the right forearm as the lead shot ripped at her flesh, described as a “sharp stinging pain”. Emma had sustained the brunt of a double-barrelled shotgun’s brutal force, as with a 117 wounds to her hand, abdomen and chest, her right kidney and liver were lacerated, her right lung collapsed, and leaving a 14-inch hole in her body, blood flooded her plural cavity, as she cried “I’ve been shot”. Staggering backwards, Annie tried to pull her sister away from the line of fire, but before she could, a second shot shredded Emma’s left elbow, forearm and buttock, leaving 174 wounds and a 10-inch hole. And as calmly as he had arrived, the assailant got back into his Hillman Minx and drove away. Screaming for help, Mrs Calcott called the Police from a phone box and they were there in minutes. Rushed to West Middlesex Hospital, where Leslie Ludford lay dying, Annie was permanently disabled, disfigured and traumatised for life, but despite the surgeon’s best efforts, Emma died at 5:25am. The crime scene was a carbon copy of the first; with the same car, the same method, the same shotgun shells, the same suspect – a tall Grey Man who was vague and forgettable – and similar victims, having no known connection to the government, the military, any political group, or any kind of criminality, they didn’t know Leslie Ludford or Violet Pender, and they had never met or knew as man called ‘Brent’. Yet, this killer had specifically targeted either one or both of these seemingly innocent sisters. It seemed unusually random, only the car’s licence plate led to a likely suspect. Detectives discovered that the killer’s Hillman Minx was a hire car, owned by Queensbury Hire Services and rented out for four days from Sunday 9th November at noon to Thursday 13th having paid a deposit. The renter, a Mr P J Ward, which was suspected to be an alias had supplied all the relevant documents, which it was assumed was either forged or stolen. But the man himself was said to be ‘forgettable’. Records showed that Mr Ward, a vague man dressed in grey, had hired the same car three times prior, in February, April and August of 1941, and over four days, each time he drove roughly 65 miles. He used the right petrol coupons, paid promptly, was never late and the car was never dirty or damaged. With a brown suitcase on the backseat, it was clear he’d been rehearsing his killing spree for months, but what connected each victim, and who was the Grey Man; Mr Ward, ‘Brent’, or somebody else? Having left an address on the contract, again the hunter was the hunted, as Police used every resource to find this armed assassin. But before they had arrived at the double shooting on St Mary’s Grove… …again, the Grey Man had moved onto his next target. Two miles east, having driven through the narrow backstreets of Hammersmith to Ravenscourt Park, at 9:05am, barely 20 minutes after the shooting Leslie & Violet and 10 minutes after Emma & Annie, the killer’s Hillman Minx was slowly heading north along Westcroft Square towards Hamlet Gardens. Out of her flat at 34 Westcroft Square, 36-year-old showroom assistant Kathleen Guyver left to post a letter. By all accounts, she was an ordinary law-abiding singleton with no known connections to crime, anything sinister nor any of the four earlier victims, and yet it was clear that he was targeting her. William Porter, a road sweeper and Nellie Heath, a neighbour saw the same car, driven by a tall man in a grey suit, enter via the east as if he was heading towards her home and park up in Hamlet Gardens. Kathleen didn’t stop, turn or change direction, she showed no fear or apprehension, instead she calmly walked along the right-hand path on her pre-planned route. But as she passed the car… (bang) from two metres, the muzzle of a double-barrelled shotgun exploded, blasting two holes in her left side. Seeing the car pull away, neighbours said the blast sounded like an exhaust backfiring, but it wasn’t until they saw Kathleen stagger and blood pour from her side, that they realised she had been shot. Rushed to DuCane Road hospital in Shepherd’s Bush, a 1 ½ inch gunshot wound to the left wrist was surrounded by an outer ring of lead shot, which splintered her radius. A second gunshot had narrowly nicked her abdomen and left a 3-inch wound on the inside of her right forearm. But miraculously, with the corner of her handbag completely blow off by the first blast, and a fountain pen and a pencil blown into pieces, this had saved her from more devastating injuries, disability, and maybe even death. Taken to DuCane Road hospital, Kathleen made an almost full recovery. Like so many others, she could only give a vague description of her assailant “30s, dark hair, I cannot describe him further and I do not think I would know him again”, and she denied knowing anyone named ‘Brent’ or Mr Ward. So, was he a stranger, or was this a sinister code of silence by those too afraid to utter his name? That morning, 74 miles north-east in Suffolk, Police burst into his lodging at Newmarket, some clothes and a suitcase was missing, but shotgun shells of the same type were found. Said to be 6ft tall, mid-20s, slim, balding, and always wearing the same grey suit and hat, the landlady only knew him as Philip Joseph Ward. She knew very little about him, and said he was quiet, polite and kept to himself. When detectives looked into his past, they discovered that Phillip Ward was a Private in the 317th Searchlight Battery stationed in Newmarket, having been assessed as ‘Grade 1’ on 15th July 1940. His Commanding Officer described him as efficient and quiet but very much “the grey man” of the unit. Given training as a rifleman, that week he was on 7 days leave, as he had three times prior that year. Almost no-one knew him, not his colleagues nor the lodgers, with the landlady remembering “every week, he received a registered letter. He is very secretive and has never given any information about himself”, but his parents did live in West London, and his last known address was a lodging in Chiswick. Some people knew him as Ward, one man knew him as Brent, but most people didn’t know him at all. So, why was he targeting this group of seemingly unrelated victims? If indeed he was? With every officer alerted to find the car, as the Police raced to his West London lodging, detectives were getting closer to apprehending the Grey Man. Only, before they had arrived at the last shooting… … the Grey Man had moved onto his next target. Two mile west, having driven in an odd zig-zag pattern across Chiswick and Hammersmith, at 9:15am, the Grey Man pulled up at 4 Bollo Lane, a two storey Victorian terrace beside the Piccadilly and District Line tube. He knocked, rang the bell, and waited, but his victim wasn’t in. Half an hour earlier, he’d done the same as neighbours had seen him, but with Mrs Henrietta Sell, a 52-year-old housewife and mother-of-three out doing her shopping, his plans had now been scuppered twice… or so he thought. Trailing her shopping basket behind her, Henrietta was strolling up Bollo Lane just three minutes from her home, when the Grey Man spotted her. She didn’t know his face, his car, and as he parked up outside of the Fairlawn Café, she assumed he was just another customer heading in for a cup of tea. She wasn’t afraid, worried, or suspicious, so much so that she didn’t even see the muzzle of his shotgun poking out of the driver’s window, as all she would remember was the flash, the blast and the pain. Two shots shattered her left arm, as from a few feet away, the fiery explosion blew off her left thumb at the joint, it eviscerated the soft tissue of her palm, and it severed the humerus at the elbow, so as she staggered into the café, her lower arm dangled and flapped, held together by tendons and skin. Collapsing in shock and blood-loss, Henrietta screamed “the Germans, the Germans have shot me”, and as customers ran to get towels to stem the bleeding, Henry Gaskin & Henry Saville dashed outside. Seeing a grey shadowy man driving away in a dark blue saloon, Gaskin boarded Savile’s truck. Flooring this six-wheeled beast, they sped up Bollo Lane towards Acton Town station with the choking fumes of the accelerating car growing ever closer. But as the truck approached the level crossing, the warning lights flashed, the gates closed, and as the train sped through, the truck braked and they lost him. Like most victims, trauma had scrambled Henrietta’s memory, as all she could recall was “everything happened suddenly, I didn’t see his face. I just remember a long black gun and then everything went blank”. Rushed to Acton hospital, miraculously she survived, but her arm had to be amputated. Once again, a dangerous mass-murderer was unleashing a killing spree in West London. Henrietta Sell had been specifically targeted just like the others, and yet, she didn’t know ‘Brent’ or a Phillip Ward. That morning, Police raided his lodging at 78 Barrowgate Road in Chiswick. As a large three-floored boarding house owned by Jessie & Edith Burrows, Mr P J Ward had stayed at ‘Garthowen’ four times that year, and always for four days. He carried a brown suitcase, he often sent a large truck head of him, he had no guests, no calls, and spoke to anyone. Said to be softly spoken, he was no bother, he always paid on time, he never talked about himself and he was easily forgettable. It was no coincidence though that the home of his first victim, Leslie Ludford was just one street south. In his room, Police found the paperwork for a 12-bore double-barrelled shotgun bought for £26 & 7 shillings on 24th of January 1941 from J Rigby & Co, and 8 weeks before the killing spree, a single barrel 12-bore knock-about shotgun for £4 & 5 shillings from the Midland Gun Company in Birmingham. Both were paid for in cash by P J Ward, delivered to Troop 3 of 317th Searchlight Battery in Newmarket, and as hunting rifles, they were powerful but precise weapons used for shooting at distance with accuracy. As expected, his suitcase was missing, but in his trunk were a selection of recent receipts showing that this very organised man had prepared not just for a single hour – in which he had already murdered Leslie Ludford & Emma Crisp, seriously injured Violet Pender & Annie New, and left Kathleen Guyver & Henrietta Sell on the critical list – but that he had meticulously planned at least two days of killing. He had a passport, 7 torch batteries, 4 packs of cigarettes, 10 chocolate bars, several bottles of ginger beer, 1 pack of tea, 5 bars of soap, gun oil, a cloth, a pack of safety pins, a ball of rubber bands, 2 fancy dress masks, and a knife and chopping board showed that he had made enough sandwiches to last. So far, he had only fired 10 shots all with deadly accuracy, but in total, he had purchased 200. ‘Brent’, Ward or whatever he was really called was hellbent on annihilating a cabal of conspirators who had wronged him, and finding two memo pads dated October 1939 and September 1941 in which Leslie Ludford was repeatedly named, it was clear that he had been planning his attack for four years… …and now the Grey Man’s day of reckoning had come. Tuesday 11th of November 1941. Armistice Day. At precisely 6:45am, he awoke in the single bed of the ‘Garthowen’ lodging house. He washed, dressed in his grey suit, grey overcoat and grey Trilby hat. At 7:30am, he ate a modest breakfast of powdered eggs, toast and tea and quietly read the newspaper. At 8:30am, he bid the landlady a ‘good day’ as he carried a brown suitcase to the garage, and moments later, he left in a hired dark blue Hillman Minx. No-one saw him leave, or suspected he was about unleash a devastating massacre. His victims were strangers to each other, but still bitter after four years, those he had killed were just the beginning. The concluding part of The Grey Man continues next week. UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: of PART TWO Tuesday 11th of November 1941. Armistice Day. The Grey Man’s day of reckoning had come. 8:50am, Leslie Ludford was murdered in Chiswick as Violet Pender was shot in the legs. 8:55am, Emma Crisp was gunned down on her doorstep, with her sister Annie on the critical list. 9:05am, Kathleen Guyver narrowly escaped her execution in Hammersmith. And 9:15am, housewife Henrietta Sell had her arm blown off in Acton and was lucky to still be alive. Two dead, four injured, over three miles in 25 minutes. Armed with 200 shotgun shells, a tank of fuel, a fast car, a forgettable grey suit and enough food to last two days, his killing spree had just begun. Having outrun a truck on Bollo Lane and with armed officers hunting him and his car, any other mass-murderer would have fled. Being calm and calculated, there was no hesitation in his actions, as he wasn’t randomly killing strangers, but specifically targeting those he’d kept surveillance for months. And although he was a wanted man, he headed 1 and a ½ miles south, and back towards Chiswick… …as the Grey Man moved onto his next target. 9:25am. Grove Park Road, two streets south of Emma’s murder and three streets from his lodging, the dark blue Hillman Minx drove along this quiet residential street. It was empty, except for one woman. 24-year-old Winifred Allenby strode confidently from the supply depot of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force at 24 Hartington Road. As an Aircraft Woman 1st Class, Winifred wore a very identifiable uniform of black shoes, tie and stockings, a blue skirt, shirt and tunic with gold buttons, and a blue peaked cap. Heading back to her hostel at 66 Grove Park Road, under her right arm was slung a gas mask in a green canvas bag (as was the law), and under her left arm, she was struggling with a bundle of bedsheets. Like every victim prior, she was undertaking a mundane task on a seemingly ordinary day, as with a poppy pinned to her lapel, her only thought was to get her duties done before the two-minute silence. Roughly 50 yards from her hostel, a blue saloon passed by, she didn’t know the car or the driver. Its speed was steady, as just two metres in front of her, it pulled in, as its nearside wheel struck the kerb. She wasn’t scared and she didn’t slow, as Winifred recalled “as I approached, I noticed the barrel of a gun protruding from the passenger’s window, the driver was crouching down taking aim. I stopped”, and with Britain readying itself for the impending German invasion, this was not an uncommon sight. Terror was coming to the Britain’s streets, only for Winifred, it would come sooner than she thought. “Actually I thought he was going to fire at the house. I started walking again and was about level with the rear wheels, when the barrel turned towards me”, as from barely a few feet away, “it exploded”. Blasting her with a force of 2300 foot-pounds, Winifred’s slender 8 stone frame flew hard against the brick wall behind her with the same kinetic energy as if she had been hit by a car at 60 miles an hour. Engulfed in a wall of smoke and a shattered cloud as woollen fragments of blue and grey exploded in a mushroom-like haze, the car calmly sped away, as Winifred lay on the path, silent and motionless. She should have been dead, as that was the assailant’s aim, but fate was on her side. Shaking her head as if she couldn’t believe what had happened, she got to her feet, she felt no pain, she saw no blood, and she hadn’t got a single scratch or cut on her face or body. She had been hit, but she wasn’t hurt. Winifred was lucky, as although the shotgun was aimed directly at her torso, with her carrying several thick layers of woollen bedsheets over her left arm – still smouldering with its lead shot embedded – it had taken the full force of the blast. “So, I went straight to the hostel and reported it to the Police”. Like others before her, Winifred didn’t know a man called ‘Brent’ or Ward, she had no connections to any of the victims, her name didn’t appear in any of the memo pads which were found at his lodging, and although her attack had seemed as random as the others, it was key to the whole killing spree. The Grey Man was angry four years after a cabal of conspirators had wronged him… …they were all connected, they just didn’t know it. ‘Brent’ was an alias, but the Grey Man’s real name was Philip Joseph Ward. Born on 16th of April 1910, five miles west in the working-class suburb of Hanwell; his military experience was brief, he wasn’t a fascist, a Nazi, a mafia hitman, a German spy or a British double agent and he had no criminal record. He was an ordinary boy living in a modest flat at 13 Half Acre Road as one of several siblings to William & Hermia, until aged 12, he was concussed and hospitalised having struck his head against a wall. Prior to that his father said “he was a happy little boy, but overnight became awkward and troublesome”. In 1925, aged 15, having begun complaining of hearing voices and people laughing at him, doctors at Bethlem Hospital said it was “suffering the aftereffects of concussion”, but it clearly something worse. In 1927, Maida Vale Hospital for Nervous Diseases suggested he be committed to an asylum, only his parents were against this. In 1931, after an attempt to take his own life, diagnosed with Schizophrenia (in which he was depressed, solitary and fixated on the idea that there was a conspiracy against him) - with anti-psychotic medications like Chlorpromazine not available until the 50s - being admitted as a voluntary patient at Stone House Asylum, on the 14th of January 1932, he was certified insane. After a year inside, feeling that he wasn’t getting better but worse, Phillip discharged himself without permission and returned home to Hanwell under his parent’s supervision. It seemed the best solution, but over those three years, in their words, “he became unbearable”. He was sullen, violent, and being hopelessly paranoid, he believed his loving family were against him. In 1936, of his own volution, for the sake of his siblings, Phillip left home, but unable to work, his father would send him £2 a week. By 1937, aged 27, he was living alone in a small lodging on Horn Lane in Acton. Given anti-depressants, he didn’t steal, fight or drink, and he didn’t spiral into criminality. Said to be a tall, vague and a quiet man, he kept to himself and was largely forgettable. Being a passionate reader, he was well-educated, and - although he never worked, had few friends and never had a girlfriend - he busied himself with social clubs. To many, he was an insignificant man who breezed through life without a care... …but everyone has their breaking point, and as a paranoid schizophrenic, his would lead him to kill. That year, being only slightly political, Phillip joined the Brentford & Chiswick Junior Conservative Club at 443 Chiswick High Road, seeing it as a good place to meet likeminded people, as it engaged in charity work for local causes, canvassing for their MP, and frequent games of whist. Its chairman was a local solicitor who walked on crutches having been born with dwarfism, whose name was Leslie Ludford. Phillip wasn’t a popular member of the club, in fact few people said they knew him, as being seen as an outsider, he insisted on using the alias of ‘A Ross Brent’, even though everyone knew him as Ward. In a later psychiatric report, he described the conspiracy as “a campaign against me… I was treated in a shameful way… they communicated with each other and made me an outcast and spoilt my life”. It began with his unwanted affections of several female members of the club, especially a young lady called Barbara Newmark. On 6th of April 1937, he wrote in his memo pad of the first time he fell in love with her “she had come up the passage with the burst of a smile and it passed and she grew more and more sober each moment, giving me the embarrassed feeling that she was uncertain of me”, and although she wasn’t keen, by September he sent her postcards daily - we known this as he kept a list. His memo pad was full of fantasy like “once Barbara caught my attention by thrusting some snapshots into my hands”, which was untrue, as she was said to be a timid girl who was betrothed to her beau. With several girls and their parents complaining, the committee were keen to “prevent him from being a nuisance”, so threatening to cancel his membership, Phillip was given a warning, which he took well. Only the pestering of the girls didn’t stop, as one said “it was extremely unusual and offensive stuff”. On the 23rd of November, while playing a game of whist, witnesses stated “Ward suddenly overturned a table and made a dash for Leslie Ludford’s throat”, barking “just because you are a cripple, you think you can do as you like”, and he also struck another committee member as he was being turfed-out. On 30th of November 1937, an official letter was sent by all members of the committee that “we have passed the following two resolutions: 1 – that Mr A R Brent’s membership of the branch be cancelled. 2 – that Mr Phillip Ward’s membership of the branch be cancelled. The two resolutions were passed to avoid any confusion as to the person concerned. And should you endeavour to enter this branch after this date, such steps will be taken by the officers to ensure your removal as they deem available”. And although, across the year, many letter were sent back-and-forth as Phillip argued a moot-point, at the top of every letter from every committee member was written their current home address. That was it. That was the conspiracy. The cancellation of his membership to a meaningless social club. To others, this would have been nothing but a mild inconvenience, but to a paranoid schizophrenic, this so-called conspiracy by at least 30 alleged conspirators was the real reason his life was collapsing. The letters continued and his rage escalated well into the next year, but in September 1939 when the Second World War began and the club was forced to close, with no outlet, his rage could only fester. By 1941, all the committee members had forgotten about Phillip Ward… …but going unmedicated, the Grey Man felt he was due a day of reckoning. Across eleven months, Phillip had planned his killing spree with precision. He’d selected two powerful shotguns which were easily hidden in a suitcase, 200 shells which were purchased legally, he’d rented a fast car having stored up enough petrol coupons, and having kept a detailed surveillance on each committee member’s home, he’d picked the perfect time to kill them, and three times he’d rehearsed. On his first attempt in February he drove 70 miles, in April 65 miles, and by August, he’d got it down to 62 miles. Eliminating the slack, his November attack would be the epitome of efficiency, as with no fuss, he’d drive from one location to the next, until everyone on his hit list was dead or disabled. Allowing for changes, he was so calm, he had even made enough sandwiches to last at least two days. His first victim, Leslie Ludford, was the chairman of the Conservative Club. Others especially those who he said had “conspired against me” were the vice chairs Peter Bulwar & Mr J Brett, treasurer Mr D Moore, secretary Miss Jean Crimpton, as well as committee members Mr Audrey, Lydia Isaacs, Gerald Davidson, Freddie Williams, Christopher Fuller, Miss Lewisohn, Doris Moore, Doris Appleby, Mr & Mrs William Brett, Douglas Thorburn, and Mrs Stacey, who was political agent for the Conservative Party. And yet, so far, across the first hour of his massacre, only one of them had been targeted. At 9:25am, having fled the shooting of Winifred Allenby on Grove Park Road in Chiswick, he drove 4.3 miles northwest on a 17-minute journey to Rathgar Avenue, another quiet residential street in Ealing. At 9:47am, Miss Agnes Hunt, a 60-year-old retired school mistress left her home at 1 Lyncroft Gardens and arriving at the junction of Rathgar Avenue and Somerset Road two minutes later, she saw a dark blue saloon. It’s engine on, fumes spewing from the exhaust, and inside, a lone man wearing no hat. As before, she didn’t know the man or the car, but as she crossed in front of him, he pulled a shotgun up to his shoulder, and having got her squarely in his sights, he fired… (bang)… but missed. Not a single lead shot had hit her, she wasn’t even winged, and as Agnes stared directly at him, she got a good look at his face; “early 20s, balding, clean shaven, dark eyes, sallow complexion, and he looked angry”. Speeding off, leaving her stunned, she called the Police stating “I’d spot him, as I never forget a face”. It was uncertain how he missed or why didn’t take a second shot, but a greater mystery remained. He murdered Leslie Ludford, chairman of the committee for conspiring to cancel his club membership. Violet Pender, it was assumed was an unconnected passerby who was shot because she was a witness. He then shot Emma Crisp & Annie New at 1 St Mary’s Grove, only neither of them were club members. But Emma’s daughter Phyllis (who was part in his dismissal) was and although in 1939 she lived at that flat, having been evacuated to Peterborough, it’s likely that having seen her address on a letter, he hadn’t twigged that after four long years, a blitz bombing and a global war that she might have moved. Likewise, neither Kathleen Guyver, Henrietta Sell nor any of their relatives were club members, but as many members had very little to do with him and visa-versa, having got the wrong address, it’s likely he only thought he’d got the right house, having kept surveillance on someone he assumed was right. His attempted murder of Winifred Allenby was tenuous, as with it believed he had mistaken her for Barbara Newmark - the girl whose complaint led to his dismissal - this made no sense as she had joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service and not the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. So was this simply a case of mistaken identity, and if so, why did this obsessed man not recognise the girl he claimed to love? Having begun with a cast iron plan, his killing spree was slowly becoming random, as like many others, Agnes Hunt, the ex-school mistress had no known connection to her attacker, the victims or the club. In a later psychiatric report, Phillip stated “the killing of others (all co-conspirators) is justified, as only by such means can the conspiracy be brought home” to those who wronged him. Unable to find those he blamed, as the spree progressed, his schizophrenia created its own logic, and even if those he killed were innocent, in his mind, everyone was part of a conspiracy against him, even when they weren’t. And yet, before the Police even knew about Phillip Ward… …the Grey Man had moved onto his next target. Having left Agnes Hunt unharmed but stunned, the Hillman Minx was driven up Northfields Avenue, along Argyll Road, 1 and a ½ miles north to Bruton Way, another quiet residential street in West Ealing. At exactly 10:10am, it pulled outside of number 33, a two-storey semi-detached house with a garden. Playing in the street, 4-year-old Robert Stubblefield and 3-year-old Geoffrey Thomas saw the car pull up, a tall grey man get out, and barely noticing them, he walked up a neat little path to the front door. This was the home of 57-year-old housewife Edith Amelia Barringer. She didn’t know him, his alias, and neither she, her husband nor anyone at this address had been a member of the Conservative Club. Inside, hearing a knock and the doorbell ring, her day-servant Elizabeth Eames was about to answer it, but believing it was a rep from Mead & Jefferies who were here to repair her radio, she went herself. Oddly, through its smoked glass pane, Edith didn’t saw a man’s outline, as when she opened the door, no-one was there. No-one, except getting into a car’s backseat was a tall man in a grey suit and hat. “Are you from Mead & Jefferies?”, Edith called. “No”, the Grey Man replied “are you Mrs Barrington?”. Her words were the truth, “yes, it is”, and yet, although she wasn’t the right one but a woman with a similar name, in his eyes, he’d found another conspirator, and those three short words meant death. Like a thunder strike, the double gunshots boomed off every window in the street, as hit with a sonic wall of energy, Edith was blown off her feet and slumped in a blooded heap. Through a smoking hole in her coat, a 3 ½ inch gash had been blasted in her abdomen as her steaming intestines protruded. And ringed by 23 lead shots, they’d shattered her ribs, right kidney and embedded in her lumbar spine. With her pelvis full of blood and her lungs collapsing, although she was rushed to hospital, despite the doctor’s best efforts, she died at 11:40am. Another was dead, as across one hour, three were killed, four were critical or wounded, two had miraculously escaped, but only one had belonged to the club. Death had come to West London, and then, as swiftly as it had arrived… …the Grey Man vanished. No-one knew where he went. It was said that he headed to Sudbury Hill and hid in a side-street; eating his sandwiches, drinking a ginger beer and having a smoke. At some point he polished his single-barrel shotgun, and (as a soldier), at 11am, he may have paid respect to the fallen in the two-minute silence. It’s an irony that may have been lost on him, as with a tank of fuel, two shotguns, 187 12-bore shells, and a list in his head of at least 30 co-conspirators he needed to kill, after an hour, he headed north. But with every available officer ordered to arm themselves and head to west, his killing spree would come to a close. (Radio) “All cars, be on the lookout for dark blue Hillman Minx saloon, plate GGC83, driven by a Phillip Joseph Ward, 31, 6-foot, in a grey suit and hat, he is armed and very dangerous”. With so many dead, and fearing so more deaths, the Police were going to stop him - dead or alive. At 11:45am, seen by Sergeant Frostick on Station Road in Harrow, the officer jumped on the running board and tried to ram the car into a hedge, but speeding away, he was thrown into the road. Five minutes later, seen by PS Sutton & PC Cook on Headstone Lane in Pinner, they commandeered a truck and tried to block its path at Brooks Hill, but again, driving recklessly, the car swiftly accelerated away. Then at 12:03pm, three hours into his massacre, a Police radio car spotted him at Stanmore Broadway. Chased down Spur Road, the two cars sped onto the Watford bypass, he swerved a police barrier, but with the police getting the better of him by going the wrong way up a roundabout, they sideswiped the Hillman Minx, ran it into a kerb, and forced it to a dead stop. Through their windscreen, PC Percival aimed a loaded rifle at his head and dragging him from the car, PC Laver handcuffed and arrested him. “Alright, I give in”, Phillip said, and it was lucky that he had, as although he had enough shotgun shells to kill every club member three times over, he was armed with a knife for when he ran out of shots. Held at Edgware Road Police Station, Inspection Ward cautioned him and “I told him I was going to charge him for a man’s murder in Chiswick”, at which he replied “do you mind telling me his name again”, but when told “Ludford, Leslie Ludford”, he replied “I say I am innocent, I do not know him”. But was this an alibi, confusion, or a symptom of his sickness? (end) The next day, Wednesday 12th of November, a line of women booed the van as he arrived at Acton Police Court. Grinning broadly with vacant eyes, beside a solicitor supplied by his father, he stood in the dock to state his name and to hear the charges against him. But when asked how he pleaded, he didn’t understand what was happening, and his only concern was the £37 the Police had confiscated. Assessed by two noted psychiatrists and the medical officer of Brixton Prison, with Phillip Ward said to be hostile, distant, remorseless and constantly speaking of “a conspiracy”, Dr Grierson said “I am of the opinion that he is suffering from Schizophrenia… and that when received, he was insane, that he was insane at the time of the crimes and he is still insane. I consider him fit to plead but in view of the varying moods associated with the disease, I can only express a final opinion on the day of the trial”. It began on Wednesday 21st of January 1942 at the Old Bailey, but with Phillip Ward unable to focus, instruct his defence counsel, and having already been certified insane ten years before, Justice Gerald Dodson QC stated “he is unfit to stand trial and should therefore be detained at the King’s pleasure”. Sent to Broadmoor Psychiatric Prison on an indeterminate sentence, although schizophrenia’s cause is still unknown, inside he got the help and medication he badly needed, and – unable to harm anyone – he spent his days in silence, reading books in his cell, where he remained for the rest of his life. In January 1972, either at Broadmoor or Newbury Hospital, he died aged 61. The massacre of the Grey Man remains one of West London’s worst mass-murderers, yet it is almost entirely forgotten. So before the memories of the dead are lost forever, we’ll spare a thought for those he killed or hurt; Agnes Grace Hunt, Winifred Allenby, Kathleen Irene Guyver, Henrietta Mabel Sell, Annie New, Violet Mary Pinder, Edith Amelia Barringer, Emma Jane Crisp and Leslie Ernest Ludford. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of.
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the infamous 'From Hell' letter
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond the West End.
EPISODE TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-EIGHT:
Across October and early November 1888, when 'Jack the Ripper' slayed several women in the East End of London, a smaller and largely forgotten sexual sadist was attacking women in Soho in the West End. Masked using a series of baffling distractions, his crimes were made possible owing to the fevered frenzy in the midst of a mini media mania committed in the Ripper's shadow. But who was he, was it a hoax, or did he even exist?
THE LOCATION:
The location is marked with a teal symbol of a bin just by the words 'Soho' off Wardour Street. To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other maps, click here.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from the National Archives and the Metropolitan Archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Bourchier Street in Soho, W1; a few paces east from the spot where Captain Ritchie was bricked, a few doors west from the last plea of Henry Hall, a few doors up from the beating of Baby Richard, and the same street as the dog who saw it all - coming soon to Murder Mile. Formerly called Little Dean Street, Bourchier Street connects Dean Street and Wardour Street. As little more than a dark drab alley where the eateries of Old Compton Street park their sticky oozing bins and the frequently soused empty their bladders, for good reason, it’s the most avoided part of Soho. For those who don’t watch where they’re walking, a common items to step on in this street are usually a puddle of piddle, a splat of sick, a splash of gentleman’s relish seconds after a sex show, a used condom (of course), a pair of spoiled trousers, a pineapple shaped butt-plug, dirty syringes and faeces. Yet, these aren’t the oddest things found on this street, as back in November 1888 was found an eye. A human eye, fully intact, red raw from a recent trauma, and bobbing about in an overflowing gutter. Barely yards away, the body of Eliza Shad lay in her bed, recently dead. Only no-one would find her body for days, as with this speck of West London gripped by the panic that an infamous East End killer was stalking the denizens of Soho, they were looking the wrong way at the wrong thing. But why? My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 278: In the Ripper’s Shadow. Three miles east of Soho in the similarly dank and sleezy working-class district of Whitechapel, gossip was forming in the terrified mouths of its inhabitants that a sadistic serial killer was slaying women. Rumblings that something sinister was brewing had begun since the unsolved murders of Emma Smith and Martha Tabram. On the 31st of August, the sadistic killing of Mary Ann Nichols sparked a manhunt for an extortionist nicknamed Leather Apron leading to misinformation, accusation and anti-Semitism. On 8th of September, with Annie Chapman’s body found in the back yard of 29 Hanbury Street, both deaths were connected, some say tenuously. But following the double-murder of Elizabeth Stride on Berner Street and Catherine Eddowes in Mitre Square - half a mile and 45 minutes apart – so desperate were the Police to arrest him and so ravenous were the press for stories, that on the 1st of October, the infamous Dear Boss letter was made public and the name Jack the Ripper would forever be known. With a city in panic, tabloids slathered over the sensation of a serial killer on the loose, especially when George Lusk was posted half a human kidney. And although some supposed facts and alleged evidence was fabricated when the newspaper’s circulation waned, a mass hysteria enveloped the East End and as the petrified public clambered for more, a dark tourism sprung-up as flocks of grisly gorpers dashed to Whitechapel, with it culminating (some say) on the 9th of November and the massacre of Mary Kelly. Whether he existed or not, the idea of Jack the Ripper turned the East End into a frenzy of fear… …and yet, at the same time, a little piece of horror went largely unreported in Soho. It start unremarkably. Friday 5th of October 1888 was typical of most days in Soho. Hours before the dawn-light had cracked the sky and shone a blast of brilliant light on Berwick Street, the costermongers and traders were setting up the market for the day. Being surrounded by slums, hostels and tuppenny lodgings, vendors sold affordable fare for the most impoverished; like bread, eggs and fish, vegetables like potatoes, carrots and parsnips, fruits like apples but nothing exotic, and - being abundant and cheap - oysters. At around 7am, an unnamed Constable who had been patrolling his beat along Wardour Street, turned onto the light bustle of Peter Street, and as he entered the market, his nose recoiled at a horrific smell. So pungent it made his eyes water, this reek of rotten cabbage was enough to make him retch, as in the gutter – swarming in flies who feverishly fed off its decomposition - lay a coiled pile of intestines. No-one thought for a second that it might be human, they just assumed it was animal, probably a pig. It had gone unnoticed and ordinarily it would have been ignored, but with the Constable being a proud local who liked his streets clean, he insisted the cat meat trader, a man called Tam clean up the out-of-date offal from the gutter, even though he had no intestines on sale. Sparking a big old hullaballoo of loud voices, before the festering guts could be got rid of, a pack of hungry dogs had wolfed it down. Tam was given a stern warning, and later released, and that was it. As I said, it started unremarkably, with this side of Soho seeing a few minor crimes that morning, including a watch theft, a broken vase, and at nearby 28 Peter Street, a prostitute called Eliza Smyth claimed she’d been groped in her sleep. It was just an ordinary day in Soho, if anything, it was a bit quiet. Six days later, in the mid-afternoon of Thursday 11th, a group of kids were heard squealing hysterically on the corner of Denman Street and Denman Place, just off Piccadilly Circus. With a local seamstress growing increasingly annoyed by their noise, she was ready to clip them about the earholes, when she saw what they were poking and prodding excitedly – on the spike of an iron railing was a bloody heart. Fresh, red and dripping, everyone assumed it was a pig’s (probably stolen off the market) and with the tale of the intestines having not made it this far, she tossed it in a basement and it was eaten by rats. That day was just another ordinary day in Soho, except a few doors down at an undisclosed lodging, a prostitute nicknamed ‘Swiss Annie’ woke from an overlong sleep, in which she felt unusually woozy, her throat felt sore and her breasts felt tender. Being ashamed, she told only her closest friends. With news of the East End ripper permeating from one red-light district to another, these seemingly insignificant events in Soho wouldn’t be recorded until weeks later, so their accuracy is questionable. But the next one isn’t. Tuesday 16th of October, the same day it was said that George Lusk received the infamous ‘From Hell’ letter and half a kidney, on Sutton Row off Charing Cross Road, human teeth were found scattered, all were bloody with their roots till intact. It caused a commotion, as all were different shades of yellow and brown, many were rotten, but there were too many for a single mouth, some said as many as 50. Two hours later and 40 feet north in Falconberg Mews, a prostitute nicknamed ‘Lady Jane’ or ‘Lazy Jayne’ was found collapsed and semi-conscious, her petticoat missing, her breasts and neck sore, and although she had no head wound nor missing teeth, she also had no memory of how she got there. Jayne Jones (an alias) gave a statement, only it was destroyed when Vine Street Police Station closed. But were those two incidents – the teeth and the attack – connected or a coincidence? With Whitechapel only three miles away, and the name ‘Jack the Ripper’ on everybody’s lips, rumours started to circulate that – maybe – Soho had its own sexual sadist who had already made his first kill. Over the weeks of mid-to-late October 1888, the city saw an unusually cold fog descend and shroud its streets in a choking cloak of impenetrable grey, synonymous with depictions of the Ripper’s London. It is said, although reports were sketchy, that more body parts were found scattered or neatly placed. Monday 22nd, Hanway Place in Fitzrovia, a ponytail was spotted having been hacked-off near the scalp, yet it was bloodless and fleshless. Some suggested an impoverished women was on her way to sell it as wealthy ladies paid a pretty penny for good wigs. Yet, just south on nearby Hanway Street, Emma Jewson awoke in her bed, feeling dizzy, confused with five bruises to her throat in the shape of a hand. But again, was it connected? With domestic violence and drunkenness so commonplace, the Police dismissed this as “a good time girl” who “got what she deserved” from her husband or her punter. Thursday 25th, Baimbridge Street at the back of the old Horseshoe Brewery, a liver was found. Said to be human, although it was impossible to differentiate it from a pig’s, witnesses said it was “wrapped in a woman’s dress”, some said it “sat on a cloth”, and others said it was “near a cloth”. That day, Alice or Anna Dedmun was choked unconscious by a left-handed man in the nearby Horseshoe Hotel. Her liver wasn’t removed, neither was Jayne’s teeth or Emma’s hair, yet rumours spread that the body part belonged to each victim and was a grisly trophy or as a warning to others. And although a plausible reason could be given for each – whether unwanted animal offal, the theft of a barber’s tooth jar, or a simple purchase from a butcher’s stall - it was all about to take a much darker and sinister turn. Sunday 28th, on Flitcroft Street (then called Little Denmark Street), a dirty severed finger was found. Rumours said it had “nail polish” or “a wedding ring”, but with no proof it was a woman’s, we can’t discount that this area of St Giles was full of factories and accidents were commonplace. And yet again, in a doorway at 23 Denmark Place, ‘Minnie’ Jones, a Welsh prostitute was strangled and almost killed. With no memory of the attack, her assailant or the moments prior, her skirt was ripped, she had five bruises to her throat and neck as made by “a leftie with big hands”, she had a missing finger only this wasn’t hers, and yet, a cut had been sliced into her right cheek in the shape of a ‘W’, or two ‘V’s. Again, this could be seen as a coincidence, a remarkable coincidence, if indeed it was true. But could this have been a bizarre distraction by the assailant to draw the public’s attention from his real crimes? It was an era of excitable frenzy, when people wanted to believe that a serial killer was on the loose, or that – as some gossips cruelly suggested - that ‘Minnie’ had done this to herself for attention. Before the murder of Eliza Shad, one more body part was found - a tongue, pinned to a door on Smith’s Court with a note which read “I lov rippin hors” (all badly written and misspelled) with a trail of blood leading through a door, upstairs to an empty lodging. Occurring not long after the Whitechapel double murder and the publication of the ‘Dear Boss’ letter in which its author claiming to Jack the Ripper stated “am down on whores and I shant quit ripping them till I do get buckled”, this could be a copy-cat, a hoax, or maybe it never happened? That’s the curse of attempting to unearth fact when the press and the people are more fascinated by salacious guff or grisly aspects, that the truth gets lost in a quagmire of lies. With the East End Ripper taking all the newsprint, Soho’s seemingly insignificant little sex-pest was barely reported. Recounted weeks and (in many cases) months later, by then, those memories had become hazy and exaggerated. For many, it was uncertain if he was fake, or a sadist hiding in the Ripper’s shadow… …yet that didn’t stop a mini mania from erupting across Soho. By the start of November 1888, as several Ripper suspects were named and blamed with the so-called evidence against them being so flimsy it wouldn’t stand up in a court of law, a similar witch-hunt was underway in Soho, as the easily angered with their own axe to grind set out to accuse any undesirables. As happens when mouths run faster than brains, any man seen with either victim in the hours prior was hounded and anyone seen walking by at the time was said to have been “suspiciously loitering”. One suspect was said to have “had a knife”, only it was later said he was “eating an apple”. One man was said to have been seen “fondling” one of the women, only he turned out to be her boyfriend. And one mysteriously “had his face always covered with a hanky”, yet it turned out he had a winter cold. Seizing the opportunity to stick the boot in on anyone they had a gripe with, abandoned wives blamed their unfaithful-husbands, businessmen blamed their ex- partners, and sibling rivalries exploded into finger-pointing, as anyone with a grudge, used this series of unsolved attacks to settle an old score. Therefore its unsurprising that – even though not one of the women had any memory of her attacker – that a list of alleged “eyewitness” descriptions “by the girls” drifted from street to street with little embellishments added in each retelling. The men they were on the hunt for included “a man in his 20s, average height and build in a black suit and hat”, as lynch mobs love vagueness. “An Irish labourer, 30s, big hands, fat head, scarred and a dirty suit”, as well as xenophobic descriptions like “a drunken Pole”, “a swarthy foreigner”, “a Jew with sinister eyes” and any enemy of the era whether homeless, disabled, depressed or disfigured, the mentally unwell, homosexuals, and those seen as degenerates. In short, the usual suspects for bigots and racists. Some blamed it in Soho murderer William Crees even though he’d been in Broadmoor since 1883, a shooting that month on Frith Street was tenuously linked even though none of the victims were shot, with some saying it was an extortion gang, some said it was a prostitute was taking out her rivals, a corrupt copper doing the job the law wouldn’t allow him to do, and others blamed opium and Absinth. As for the body parts, some suggested it was the work of a rogue mortician, a dodgy undertaker, or a lazy barber (as in that era, for the poorest, a hairdresser was also a dentist and a surgeon). It was implied it was a prank by medical students at the London School of Anatomy on nearby Dean Street, and that it was (somehow) an advert for the new play ‘The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde’ which was causing a sensation on the West End stage. But many locals believed it was the tabloid press trying to conjure up a little excitement as had gripped the East End, only being so corny, no-one believed it. Fearing a panic, the Police (said to be under the guidance of local business leaders) were keen to keep a lid on this, as where there’s fear there’s panic. In their favour, the East End Ripper was so infamous that this West End Fondler (and some say, strangler) had hijacked all the press coverage, and with any link between the victim and a body part being so ludicrous, it was dismissed as a mere scaremongering. It died, before it even became a thing. And unlike Jack the Ripper, he wasn’t given a sinister nickname. The problem was (as much as the people wanted a scare story) this wasn’t a series of victimless crimes, as women had been attacked. All were unusually similar, having been drugged, fondled and strangled to the point of near-death, it was said “one had been bitten” and he had escalated to minor mutilation. If connected, someone had deliberately laid a series of distractions as they wanted time with each woman, so it’s possible that – if this was one man - he had chosen them, as this required planning. This frenzy of excitement died as quickly as it arose, and yet, as rumours spread, any new victims found it impossible to be believed, so they didn’t report it. For many women, this was real, but with the myth becoming little more than a joke, many weren’t believed by their own families, let alone by the Police. Only for one more women, this would end in her death. Eliza Shad was a 23-year-old mother-of-one, at least that’s what we think. Said to have been born in or about 1865, she doesn’t appear on any census and she doesn’t have a birth or a death certificate. Conspiracy theorists might decry this as the corrupt elite trying to erase her history to hide a sinister plot, but many records have been lost in office moves, destroyed in the blitz, mistakes made when they were digitised or mis-transcribed when they were first written, and with even official documents like autopsy reports and police files listing a person by their alias, what we know about Eliza (if that is her name) was reported by those who claimed to know her, so must be taken with a pinch of salt. Eliza’s life was the epitome of tragic. It was said, the first sounds she uttered was her wailing tears which echoed down the dark cold walls of a local workhouse infirmary. She wouldn’t remember her father, as before she was born, he had abandoned his wife and children having become a slave to the demon drink and his fate was unknown. As for her mother? She never felt her hug, as like so many women before her, she died in childbirth. Raised by an older sister who was little more than a child herself, she received a basic education and was trained to mend clothes and cook, so at best, she would become a wife or a servant. As far as we know, she never married, so not being seen as a person in her own right, her life went undocumented. Like many of the most impoverished, she lived a hand-to-mouth existence, never knowing if she’d eat that day. Being transient, she never had a home, at best she scraped together a few pennies for a bed in a hostel or a lodging, and at worst, she slept in doorways, sheds or outhouses, shivering in the cold. With no family, it was said her first baby died before it took a breath. The second she had miscarried having been beaten by her drunken boyfriend. And bruised black and blue, her third child was taken by the beadle as she was deemed an unfit mother simply because she couldn’t escape her horrific life. Sunday 4th of November 1888 was a brutally cold day, but Eliza’s luck seemed to be turning a corner. That morning, she went about her usual routine, by going to St Anne’s church for prayers, and having passed 28 Peter Street where a month earlier Eliza Smyth claimed she had been groped in her sleep, she headed to nearby Berwick Street market, where that same day, the festering intestines had been seen. Here she bought bread, cheese and milk, a little bacon and some welks, as in her purse she had enough money to ensure her belly was full. It must have felt odd to be eating as having tried to kick the drink, as a prostitute she would have usually squandered it, but this time, she was able to afford a lodging. It was a big step for an alcoholic, and having paid for three nights board sleeping on a filthy flea-ridden bed made of horsehair and straw in an unidentified lodging house of a Mrs Crowmar, it was something. That night, as a foul wind howled down Old Compton Street, it was said she brought back three men to her lodging on Little Dean Street, and although this dark urine-soaked alley hardly cut a romantic tone, they weren’t here for kissing and cuddling. But was one of them a sadist with an odd obsession? According to the other lodgers, Eliza was discrete, so none of the men were ever seen. No-one heard any cries or screams, as it’s likely she had been drugged. And – if this was true - having laid a bizarre distraction, he had his wicked way with her in the seclusion of her room, and no one was any wiser. On Wardour Street, beside a little path leading to Little Dean Street, a crowd had gathered, larger than usual, as they giggled with grisly fascination at the gory sight before them – a human eye, intact and red raw from a fresh trauma. Having poked it, it plopped into an overflowing gutter where it bobbed. Grabbing it by the optic nerve which dangled at the rear of this bloody bulb, a boy waved it in a girl’s terrified face, and although these spectators laughed, it drew their gaze from something truly sinister. Wednesday 7th of November, three days later, with her rent having expired, the landlady knocked on Eliza’s door and asked her to leave. Getting no reply, she entered and found her cold and dead. (end) Like a carbon copy of previous assaults, Eliza had been drugged so she lay unconscious, paralysed and at her attacker’s whim. Her petticoat had been removed and left neatly folded on a chair. Her breast was exposed and covered in a dried blood which wasn’t hers. And on her thigh was a single bitemark. Again, a small ‘W’ or ‘double V shaped’ cut was found on her cheek, although the police surgeon said it could have been a scratch from the side table. And like the others, with no defensive wounds, her throat and neck was etched the bruises of a left-hander who had taken her to the very edge of death. It seemed as if he liked to play God with these girls, by taking their lives and giving it back, but unaware that having lived such a hard life (barely covered in a sodden blanket as she slept in cold doorways), Eliza had suffered with asthma, and having taken her too far, her lungs were too weak to recover. Dismissed by the police as ‘a possible accident’ by an over amorous lover or punter, being a prostitute who they said may have engaged in indecent acts like sadomasochism, no-one was arrested or sought. And as the last of this series of bizarre assaults over a month of sadistic madness, was this a mistake, was this someone else’s alibi, or the escalation of a wannabe serial killer who had made his first kill? Investigated by Detective Thomas Bowden, the case was wrapped up and filed away as solved. No-one was brought to trial, no-one was even suspected, and it has remained forgotten for 136 years. It is unknown whether he fled, killed himself, was jailed for a similar crime which was never connected, if he was sent to an asylum, or quit owing to the grief that his odd sexual perversion had taken a life. His identity shall remain a mystery, and yet the biggest mystery remains, if any of it was even true. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of. |
AuthorMichael J Buchanan-Dunne is a crime writer, podcaster of Murder Mile UK True Crime and creator of true-crime TV series. 
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