Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

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Whodareswins
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by Whodareswins »

Surname of the murderer was Palmer, older brother of Nigel Palmer.

TABBYCAT
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by TABBYCAT »

If you are referring to the murder of the old lady shop keeper on Lodge lane I can assure you that the murderers name was not Palmer (The boys mother was a personal friend). I'm sure Iansmith who was an officer involved will concur if he remembers his time on the case.

jim
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by jim »

Whodareswins wrote:
Wed 08 Feb, 2023 12:54 am
Surname of the murderer was Palmer, older brother of Nigel Palmer.
To the creator of this post :- As far as I am aware it has always been an offence to disclose publicly the name of an under age offender unless the judge hearing the case decrees otherwise. Be warned.

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uncle mick
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by uncle mick »

jim wrote:
Wed 08 Feb, 2023 12:33 pm
Whodareswins wrote:
Wed 08 Feb, 2023 12:54 am
Surname of the murderer was Palmer, older brother of Nigel Palmer.
To the creator of this post :- As far as I am aware it has always been an offence to disclose publicly the name of an under age offender unless the judge hearing the case decrees otherwise. Be warned.
There is an article in The Times on 22nd April 1975 naming the offender he was 18 ??? it wasn't Palmer

jma
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by jma »

This link seems to be to a fairly contemporary (January 1977) piece by the late Dennis Hoban who was then the head of Leeds CID. You have to sign up to read beyond the first page so I've not bothered

https://vlex.co.uk/vid/the-murder-of-old-896690688

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uncle mick
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by uncle mick »

Here's the article from The Times 22nd April 1977
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Also there was a television programme on the BBC on 10th June 1992 about the case
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TABBYCAT
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by TABBYCAT »

The times report is dated April 1977 if I read that correctly so possibly erroneous as I think it should be 1975.
The incident was in 1974 and he was I believe 16 or maybe 17 at the time and attended school with my brother, he served 8 years at Her Majesty's pleasure which I believe was the type of sentence handed out to young offenders at the time and committed other offences on release.

As for Jim's comment about naming offenders of a young age I wouldn't know perhaps our retired officer members could shed light on that.
I'm also a bit wary about why the original poster has mentioned a certain name plus that of his brother. Not some kind of character assassination I would hope?

Also missing from the times report is just how he "silenced" her which was horrific in the extreme.

The attached is an excerpt of the writings of Dennis Hoban as pointed to by jma.
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jma
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Re: Murder in Beeston, ca. 1974?

Post by jma »

The murder was 2 April 1974 probably the first of the newly-formed West Yorkshire Metropolitan Police. At that time, steering groups had been steering, working parties had been working etc but the policing still had to be done. I was on "rotary leave" for 1 and 2 April, which were Monday and Tuesday. On the Monday morning, I received a call to be at the chief constable's office at the new force's HQ in Wakefield at 10 am on Wednesday 3 April. I wondered if it was an April Fool stunt but the person who rang me had little sense of humour. In Leeds, people being promoted got the call "to go and see the chief" and were immediately promoted so nobody was really sure what was going on. Anyway, there was quite a big batch of promotions but Ronald Gregory was doing it "his way." We were being promoted in due course, in my case the following Monday 8 April.

In the meantime, as was normal in Leeds, by far the greater part of the operational CID was drafted to Dewsbury Road - as the police division was still called - to work on the murder committed on the Tuesday. I was left at Ireland Wood in CID, being treated by most people as a detective sergeant with what was a minimum staff.

At some point, the mass fingerprinting policy was adopted but it was controversial and no way of safeguarding against ringers was adopted. Initially, there was no way of knowing it had happened because once a person's fingerprints had been taken and eliminated they were destroyed. As Ian Smith explained earlier, it was only when the fingerprints of the person eventually convicted were routinely taken on arrest for an entirely different offence, that he was identified.

That's a broad explanation of why there were delays between the murder and conviction

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