XEMU's

The Murder that Never Was
by Bill Thompson & George Mooney

[Prisoner]PATRICK NICHOLS #302352,
H.M. Prison  Kingston,
Portsmouth,  Hants.
PO3 6AS  (England).


We have grown almost used to cases of people spending years in prison for murders they did not commit. But is this case, it is for a crime no one committed---the supposed victim died of natural causes.

Patrick Nichols, now 70, has spent the past 19 years in prison for a crime which never took place. It was alleged that on 2/4/1975 he robbed and murdered a close friend, Gladys May Heath. He was found guilty by Lewes Crown Court [in Sussex, UK] on 24/11/1975, and his appeal against conviction --- at the Court of Appeal in London on 7/7/1977 --- was summarily dismissed, in a judgement given by Lord Justice Orr. On 10/8/1977, the Daily Express then ran an article by Brian Cashinella entitled The Disturbing Affair of Patrick Nichols : is this a Murder that Never Was?

This strongly suggested that the alleged victim had died of natural causes, and that evidence of this had been suppressed; in particular that a forensic pathologist [Dr Hugh Johnson], police officers [DCI Cantle and DI Harrison], and a paid informer [John Boorer] had all committed perjury. None of these persons seem to have done much to publicly dispute such a damaging allegation. Nichols, however, remain in prison, and his only hope of exoneration is that the Home Secretary will refer his case back to appeal under S.17 of the Criminal Appeals Act.

Cashinella had obtained, for his article, an affidavit from former Det.Supt. Finley, which said there was firm evidence of senior detectives agreeing that Heath had died of natural causes, and that there was a second film record of Dr Johnson's autopsy in which the forensic pathologist said likewise. He had also held an interview with John Borer, in which the latter admitted lying on oath when he testified that Nichols had confessed -- while on remand with him in Lewes Prison -- to murdering Heath. A study of papers in the archive which Nichols has built up since 1/4/1975 suggest an even more damning picture : that Det Spt Finley was removed from the case and his evidence suppressed, likewise PC Coleman [the police officer who filmed the two scenes referred to] and that statements of other witnesses possibly favourable to the defence were withheld.

Nichols claims he was beaten during interrogation. The statement of the prisoner in the adjoining cell at the time [ statement of R.G.C. Vincent 19/11/1975, David Tysdall (solrs) Ltd ] tends to support Nichols' claim, and to cast doubts on police accounts of the interview and on Borer's prison evidence ; it's guarded language where police officers are concerned is probably because Vincent was on bail on a charge of ABH, and feared losing bail if he spoke out too explicitly. It was ruled inadmissible by the trial judge, Mr Justice Evenleigh, at a meeting in chambers with prosecution and defence lawyers. Vincent was not called because leading prosecution counsel [William Denny, QC] had threatened to recall Boorer and introduce evidence on the deaths of people acquainted to Nichols, even though ALL of these deaths were from natural causes and had been PROVEN to be so. Unfortunately for Nichols, the defence lawyers [Patricia Coles QC and Dennis Norman] bowed to this blackmail.

an unfortunate misunderstanding...

Evidence was produced of the unfortunate death of Kathleen Clinton- Dynes, age 46, who had collapsed and died on 15/2/1975 outside Nichols' home in Shakespeare Road, Worthing; although the forensic pathologist [Dr Johnson] found that this person had died of inhaling her own vomit, and the jury at a coroner's inquest held on 20th March returned a visit of misadventure. Nichols had panicked when he found Gladys Heath dying, because he feared the police would hold him responsible for her death as he felt they had in the case of Clinton Dynes earlier. Instead of phoning for an ambulance, he fled the scene, initially denying to the detective that he had been at Heath's house in Clifton Road that day -- though, since this initial denial, Nichols' statements have remained remarkably consistent in substance and in detail. At the trial, however, this was carefully exploited by Denny QC for the prosecution. Asked why he fled, Nichols could only answer he was afraid; asked why he was afraid, he could only have answered by introducing the death of Clinton Dynes himself.... and thus, as Denny intended, risk intimidating himself in the eyes of a gullible jury.

The defence engaged a pathologist [Professor James Cameron] specifically for the purpose of performing a second autopsy on their behalf. Yet he failed to examine the body --- although it was available for him to do so --- and instead based his ''conclusions'' on a consultation with the prosecution pathologist, Doctor Johnson. Indeed, the evidence might suggest that Prof. Cameron put an idea or two into Dr Johnson's head. Dr Johnson gave evidence at the trial that the position in which Heath's body had been found was an artefact : that she had been killed while sitting in a chair in the front room, despite the complete absence of any sign that a struggle had taken place there, and later dragged to the bottom of the stairs. Strangely, we DO NOT find any mention of this theory before the trial in Dr Johnson's post-mortem report, but we DO find it in Prof Cameron's report to Nichols' solicitor David Tysdall. This should have been easily settled by hypostasis [the tendency of blood to sink downwards after death once it is no longer being pumped round, so creating an immutable stain at the then bottom of the body which records its position at death], but such evidence is never cited either in the trial testimony or the prior reports. See the statement of H.R.M. JOHNSON on 16/4/1975 to Sussex constabulary in Regina v Patrick Nichols [1975], and the report by J.M. Cameron on 6/7/1975 to David Tysdall (solrs) Ltd.

informant's u-turn...

John Boorer retracted his evidence against Nichols on 17/6/1976, in a statement taken by Peter Atkinson and Jeremy Thomas of Stocken & co, the solicitors acting for Nichols on his appeal. Boorer says the prosecution and defence counsel, and the presiding judge, at his trial on 28/4/1975 at Chichester Crown Court were parties to a deal that brought Boorer -- a man with a lengthy and varied criminal record -- a reduction in charges from burglary to handling stolen property, and a light prison sentence of twelve months, in return for evidence he would give in the Nichols case and other cases. Boorer had been expecting a sentence of as much as seven years imprisonment. His co-defendant, John Ashton, who was facing lesser charges and had a much less serious record, got thirty months. Boorer further states that that the prosecution and defence counsel in Nichols' case were aware of the deal that had been made ; this suggests that they may also have known of the material which police had suppressed. There is evidence [ in the statements of Boorer 17/6/1975, Nichols 27/10/75, and Ida Nichols 27/10/75 to Stocken & co ] that police officers had mingled with jury members during Nichols' trial at Lewes Crown Court, and that various attempts at jury tampering had been made.

There are also certain problems with the defence counsel. According to Hugh Wright, the clerk at Nichols' solicitors, Patricia Coles [who had, by the time of the Nichols case, sat as a recorder] may well have sat in judgement on Boorer and so known his record ; while Mr Norman had been a police inspector before taking to the bar, and also -- according to Nichols -- knew both John Boorer and D.I. Harrison. Hardly a recommendation for the defence barrister! What's more, it appears he had a certain nostalgia for his old profession. An unidentified shopkeeper and his wife were questioned about Nichols and Heath, by Harrison and by someone he introduced to them as a fellow police officer. When they attended the last two days of the trial, they readily identifies this ''police officer'' as Dennis Norman. [statement of (name withheld) on 3/12/1979, Nichols own archives].

On 1/1/1975, Nichols wrote a letter from HMP Wormwood Scrubs to his then solicitor, David Tysdall, which [he says] criticised the conduct of his defence lawyers and declared his intention to appeal against conviction, despite counsel's advice there were no grounds. Of course, there were very good grounds : there was firm evidence that Gladys Heath had died of natural causes and, if this were so, then the entire police case must be a fabrication . There was also the evidence of Det.Supt. Finley and PC Coleman on filming, and numerous witnesses contradicting Boorer's prison evidence. Nichols finally got leave to appeal, represented by Stocken & co, was granted, and took place before Orr LJ and Chapman JJ and Davies JJ on 7/7/1977 at the Royal Courts of Justice on the Strand. Prosecuting once more was Denny QC with R. Seabrook, and defence was Robert Harman QC with P. Hunt. The Judgement given by Lord Justice Orr was uncritical of Denny's claim that, although Boorer's evidence is unreliable, the circumstantial evidence against Nichols was overwhelming. Robert Harris described it in a Sunday Times article entitled Our Blind Judges Stand Accused [17/3/1991] as ''...unquestioning acceptance of the official version, the sheer failure of the imagination to comprehend what [really] happened.''

And there the matter, uneasily, rests. The prosecution case reads like something out of Dario Fo. Nichols got early retirement, not to a quiet home, but to rot away most of his remaining years in south coast prisons.

This article was first issued, (C) Bill Thompson at Reading University [Dept of Sociology, White Knights, Reading]. I circulated it in my local area in March 1993. Nick is currently at HMP Kingston in Portsmouth, which is a closed prison but fairly easy-going which has a large proportion of pensioners on life sentences. I visited Nick during 1995, but it is difficult for me to travel to the south coast. For more recent developments go back to main page. 

                                        Dave <XEMU>, March 1996