Miscellaneous Criminal Cases

The outcome of the trial to which bluebell referred on 23rd June.

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/man-guilty-of-killing-two-ex-girlfriends-five-years-apart/ar-BBDNSH4?li=BBoPWjQ&ocid=mailsignout

There's a programme about this case at 9 tonight on Channel 4.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-40553713

A very bizarre sounding one.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4703892/Police-officer-shot-Justine-Damond-identified.html

There's a new programme on Channel 5 tonight at 21.00, called "A mother's story", about Sarah Payne who was abducted and murdered in 2000.

I bought the book "Letters to Sarah" last week but aint read it yet.

One of her brothers will be speaking tonight about how guilty he felt at the time.So sad.

I'll be watching this. Her brother and sister were on GMB this morning, heartbreaking

I don't think that he feels any less guilty now from a trailer I've seen.

He must be tormented by knowing that if he'd gone after Sarah a minute or two sooner, she wouldn't have been taken. It's not his fault of course but how can he avoid thinking that.

There was a less well covered murder in 1988 when a 9 year old girl was briefly left in charge of her 2 year old sister in a playground and, while she wasn't paying attention, a 12 year old boy abducted the little girl and killed her.

I can't find a fairly recent article in which the sister described her continuing anguish but here's one from 2001.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/why-victims-deserve-so-much-better-9135075.html

I vaguely remember that case but as you say, so not much publicity.

I can't imagine how you would get over something like this.

Here's a link to the programme.

https://www.my5.tv/sarah-payne-a-mothers-story/season-1/sarah-payne-a-mothers-story

Another case with some similarities to the Sharona Joseph one: a 4 year old girl somehow wandered out of her house early one morning and was found and killed by a boy whom I think was 13.

I wonder if anyone can remember more of it than I can. I know that it was in 1977 during the Queen's 25th Jubilee celebrations; the girl's name was Tracy or Tracey with a surname beginning with M (something unusual like Muers) and possibly in the Greater London area.

http://www.ilfordrecorder.co.uk/news/police-officer-given-community-order-for-making-indecent-images-of-children-and-possessing-extreme-animal-porn-1-5124848

"Career in jeopardy" - I should think so too!

A dreadful one - whatever can have been the motive?

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/loyal-dogs-stayed-with-owner-after-he-was-brutally-knifed-to-death-while-walking-in-woods-near-home/ar-AApEhlJ?li=BBoPWjQ&ocid=mailsignout

With acknowledgement to the Facebook group Friends Who Like British Nostalgia 1940 to 1980. I'm not sure that this story can be classed as nostalgic though!

On this day 8 August 1963, to hit the headlines was the news of the great train robbery.
The Great Train Robbery was dubbed ‘The Crime of the Century’ . The gang stole approximately £2.6 million from a Royal Mail Train at Bridego Railway Bridge in Buckinghamshire, England in 1963.
Despite meticulous planning, every member of the group at the scene was captured, except for one unnamed man who was supposed to act as the replacement train driver. Only two informants escaped prison for their role in the robbery.
The Plan
Although there is uncertainty over who came up with the idea, most sources suggest a Salford postal worker called Patrick McKenna provided the information that piqued the interest of Buster Edwards and Gordon Goody. McKenna told the two career criminals about the large sums of money on board the Royal Mail trains and over the space of a few months, Edwards and Goody devised a plan. They were aided by Roy James, Charles Wilson, and Bruce Reynolds, with the latter deemed the ‘mastermind’ behind the scheme.
Although the group was seasoned criminals, they had no experience in train robberies, so they sought the help of another London gang called The South Coast Raiders. This group included Richard Cordrey, a man capable of rigging track-side signals to bring a halt to the train. Other people such as Ronnie Biggs were added, and the total number of men involved in the actual robbery was 16.
The Robbery
On August 7, 1963, a 12 carriage Travelling Post Office (TPO) train started its journey from Glasgow to London. It left at 6:50 p.m. and was due to arrive at Euston Station at 3:59 a.m. on Thursday, August 8. The gang’s target was the High-Value Packages (HVP) coach which was the carriage just behind the engine. It would normally carry approximately £300,000, but as the previous weekend had been a Bank Holiday weekend, the total value was over £2.5 million.
At around 3 a.m., the driver, Jack Mills, saw what proved to be a false signal at Sears Crossing just past Leighton Buzzard. Mills stopped the train and his co-driver David Whitby left the diesel engine to contact the signalman to find out the issue. Whitby saw that cables from the line-side phone were cut, but as he returned to the train, he was accosted by members of the gang and tossed down the railway embankment.
Another masked man boarded the train and knocked Mills out with a blow to the head. The thieves separated the engine and first two carriages containing the HVP. The plan involved driving the train another mile to Bridego Bridge where the money would be loaded onto Land Rovers which would then drive to a hideout.
However, the gang made a grievous error. They used a man known as ‘Stan Agate’ (real identity unknown) to drive the train, but upon entering, he realized the diesel engine train was far more complicated than the smaller ones he was used to driving. The panicked gang roused Mills to continue the journey. While staff in the two front carriages were harassed by the thieves, the rest of the employees in the remaining 10 carriages had no idea there was a robbery.
The Getaway
Upon reaching Bridego Bridge, the gang unloaded 120 sacks by creating a human chain and ordered a member of the Post Office staff not to move for half an hour. They drove along country roads and listened to police broadcasts on the radio before reaching their hideout at a rundown location called Leatherslade Farm. Then they divided the money into 16 equal shares after discounting some cash for other gang associates.
The order given to the Post Office staff member was a crucial mistake as the police quickly ascertained that the gang would be no more than 30 miles from the scene of the crime (the farm was 27 miles away). When the group learned this news, they moved their escape plan forward to Friday from Sunday. They needed new cars as their getaway vehicles were seen by the Post Office staff, so a couple of gang members traveled to London to find new vehicles.
A resident contacted the police after viewing the comings and goings at the farm as ‘suspicious.’ Although the robbers attempted to wipe their fingerprints clean at the scene, they hired someone called ‘Mark’ to clean the farm or burn it down to destroy the evidence. He failed to comply so when the police arrived, they easily found traces of the gang’s identity. For example, they found fingerprints on a Monopoly board as the robbers played the game using real money.
Despite the breakthrough, the investigation didn’t start well. However, things changed when a Train Robbery Squad was formed and led by the renowned ‘One Day’ Tommy Butler. After receiving the names of the gang from informants, the Squad started to pick up the criminals one by one. Roger Cordrey was the first to be apprehended just six days after the theft. Eight other members were captured by the end of 1963. Edwards surrendered to the police in 1966 after living in Mexico, while Butler caught Reynolds and Wilson in 1968.
Trials & Escapes
The majority of the gang members were tried in 1964 received extremely harsh prison sentences. Seven men were sentenced to 30 years in jail, two others received 25-year terms while Cordrey suffered a 20-year sentence and William Boal got 24 years in prison. One of the men, John Daly, was almost certainly involved in the crime but the court cleared him of wrongdoing. Some of the men escaped from prison, but only Biggs remained at large for any extended period. He escaped from jail in 1965, returned to Britain in 2001 and surrendered to the police. Biggs served the remainder of his sentence and was released in 2009.
At this time of writing, Bob Welch is the only known robber who is still alive. Investigators believe several others took part in the Great Train Robbery with names such as Bill Jennings, Alf Thomas, and Danny Pembroke mentioned. Although the police recovered less than £400,000, none of the gang fared well after the robbery. Wilson was murdered in 1990, James, Hussey, and Wisbey spent more time in prison, while Edwards committed suicide in 1994.

I've just heard about this case of an alleged kidnapping which, from comments that are popping up all over the place, is likely to be a load of old baloney.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40862148

Freedom wrote:I've just heard about this case of an alleged kidnapping which, from comments that are popping up all over the place, is likely to be a load of old baloney.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40862148

Yes some really weird stuff coming out about this one, apparently she went shopping with her kidnapper for shoes!!

[snipped]
As more details emerged about the episode, including that she went shopping for shoes and groceries with her captor, her lawyer and an agent spoke out to defend her.

Lawyer Francesco Pesce said it is "evil" to suggest she was involved while Phil Green, of Supermodel Agency, said what took place was "real and very frightening for all concerned


further on...

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "So she thought that the best idea was to go along with it and to be nice in a way to her captor because he told her that he wanted to release her somehow and sometime and she thought that the best thing to do was not to go in conflict with him.

"So she abided to his request, 'let's go and buy groceries' and 'you need shoes, let's go buy shoes', and she didn't try to flee.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/chloe-ayling-latest-chief-suspect-in-kidnap-claims-he-is-innocent-a3607141.html



Now her mother is wading in...

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/mother-of-kidnapped-model-chloe-ayling-people-are-making-up-lies-about-her-shell-speak-out-when-shes-a3607391.html

I'm just waiting for doubters to be called haters........

So these merciless sex slave traffickers decided to let her go when they found out that she has a young child..........

It's 40 years since this horrifying case of hostage taking and murder in Derbyshire.

http://www.derbyshiretimes.co.uk/news/40-years-on-four-members-of-same-family-held-captive-and-killed-by-escaped-convict-in-derbyshire-1-8338409

Freedom wrote:A dreadful one - whatever can have been the motive?

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/loyal-dogs-stayed-with-owner-after-he-was-brutally-knifed-to-death-while-walking-in-woods-near-home/ar-AApEhlJ?li=BBoPWjQ&ocid=mailsignout

More about this one. The theory of mistaken identity seems plausible.

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/elderly-dog-walker-stabbed-to-death-at-beauty-spot-was-involved-in-bust-up-shortly-before-he-was-killed/ar-AApQpjd?li=BBoPWjQ&ocid=mailsignout

You would have thought that anyone wanting to indulge in a bit of vigilante justice would at least make sure that they got the right person, to understand the idea that there can be multiple people sharing the same name is hardly something that requires a degree in nuclear physics!

I am struggling with the idea that it could be a murder committed because he was mistaken for someone with a different name, who isn't even alive, I just can't see anyone making such a basic mistake when they must have done a fair amount of research to find out where he walks he dogs.

As I say, it's just a possibility.

Mind you, there have been cases of baying mobs of self-appointed vigilantes hunting down paedophiles. Remember when one of the Sunday papers published photos of convicted sex offenders; there were attacks on people with similar names or physical appearance.

I can remember when a Paediatrician was targeted because vigilantes mistook them for a paedophile,that was when Sarah Payne went missing.

I was thinking about that!

I don't know whether it's an urban myth but apparently the female doctor had a board outside her house saying that she was a paediatrician. How could anyone, even the most stupid Sun reader, think that a paedophile would advertise himself or herself in that way, I don't know.

P.S. Apparently it is true.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/aug/30/childprotection.society

Freedom wrote:I'm just waiting for doubters to be called haters........

So these merciless sex slave traffickers decided to let her go when they found out that she has a young child..........

The Sun isn't buying her story!

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4226976/inside-chloe-ayling-abandoned-house-kidnap/

An arrest and charge in the dog walker murder.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4787752/Man-23-charged-murder-dog-walker-83.html