Interrogations-and-Confessions-Handbook

Miscarriages of Justice and False Confessions 167
Perry’s case resulted in legal re-evaluation of uncorroborated confessions in
England, although a ‘corroboration requirement was never universally accepted
and was not applied to prosecutions other than murder’ (Ayling, 1984, p. 1126).
In more modern times there have been four highly publicized alleged false
confession cases that all resulted in a public inquiry. These are the Timothy
Evans case (Kennedy, 1988), the Confait case (Price & Caplan, 1977), the
Cyprus spy trial (Calcutt, 1986) and the ‘Guildford Four’ (Kee, 1989; McKee &
Franey, 1988). The ‘Guildford Four’ case is most recent and in view of its
complexity and significance it will be discussed with the ‘Birmingham Six’ in
Chapter 17. The case of the ‘Birmingham Six’, as seen in Chapter 3, resulted
in the setting up of the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice (1993). The
Timothy Evans and Confait cases will be discussed briefly in this chapter.
Timothy Evans
On 30 November 1949, Timothy Evans, who was 25 years of age at the time,
walked into Merthyr Police Station in South Wales and voluntarily confessed to
having disposed of his wife’s body down a drain outside his home at 10 Rillington
Place, North London. He made two statements to the police in Wales. The first
statement consisted of his telling the police that his wife was pregnant and
had died after he had given her some abortion pills that he had obtained from
a stranger in a cafe in East Anglia. The Welsh police telephoned the Notting
Hill Police in North London about Evans’ statement. They went around to 10
Rillington Place, inspected the drain and found no body there. Being confronted
with this, and the fact that it took three policemen to lift the manhole cover,
Evans was interviewed again and made a further statement. He then implicated
his landlord, Christie, who had allegedly performed an abortion on his wife
and told Evans that she had died as a result of medical complications. Evans
said that Christie had told him that he had disposed of the body in one of the
drains. Evans told the police that after his wife’s death Christie had arranged
for their baby daughter Geraldine to be looked after by a couple in East Anglia.
Unknown to Evans was the fact that Christie had strangled to death both his
wife and his baby daughter about three weeks earlier.
After a subsequent search at 10 Rillington Place, the police found the bodies
of Evans’ wife and daughter in a wash-house. Evans was brought to London and
interrogated. He made two detailed statements on 2 and 3 December and in
both he confessed to the murder of his wife and daughter. After his appearance
in a Magistrates’ Court Evans was remanded in custody and taken to Brixton
Prison, South London, where on admission he confessed again to the Principal
Medical Officer. The following day, during a visit by his mother, Evans retracted
his confession after his mother asked him why he had committed the murders.
I didn’t do it, Mum. Christie done it. Ask him to come and see me. He’s the only
one who can help me now (Kennedy, 1988, p. 141).
Unfortunately, for Evans, Christie and his wife became prosecution witnesses
at Evans’ trial and gave evidence against him.