The trial of Daniel Weaver took place in April nineteen-eighty-four. He did go in the box and give evidence. And I’ve got the next bits from the newspaper articles covering the trial.” He paused before continuing. “He admitted to the affair and to the argument with Lucy in which she had scratched his face. He said they were caused while trying to reason with her and she had pulled away from him. He admitted making a number of statements during his interviews but he flatly denied making the one where he admitted to strangling her and burying her body up on Langsett Moor. And he accused the police of planting the handbag. After a three week trial, he was found guilty of Lucy’s murder and given life. His defence submitted an appeal but it was turned down on the grounds that the trial was conducted fairly, and that without fresh evidence the conviction was deemed to be safe.”
Hunter glanced up from his jottings. “To be honest, on my first reading of the file I thought everything was cut and dried. That was until we found that statement in Jeffery Howson’s safe. Last night I re-examined the case file. All the interviews in it were written and recorded on the appropriate forms and witnessed by the defendant, Weaver. With the exception of the last set of notes in which he made his confession. On those, where he should have signed, the words ‘refused to sign’ have been penned.”
“Sorry to steal your thunder Hunter,” said Dawn, “If I can come in there now?” She again tapped her Biro against the sides of the incident board, where reduced digital images of the paperwork recovered from Jeffery Howson’s safe were affixed in the top right hand corner.
“This find could change everything about the trial and conviction of Daniel Weaver. The originals of these are currently on their way to Forensics for chemical dating analysis and for fingerprint identification, but at the moment everything about them screams they are the genuine article. What we have here, team, is a set of recorded interview notes conducted with Weaver during the time he was in police custody on twenty-ninth August, nineteen-eighty-three. As we have heard, the interviewers were Jeffery Howson and Alan Darbyshire, and going by the handwriting, which matches that on the envelope they were found in, looks as though they have been completed by our murder victim Jeffery Howson. Prior to the introduction of PACE and taped recorded interviewing all interviews conducted in a police station had to be handwritten. The notes take the form of a question and answer session between the police officers and the defendant, known as contemporaneous notes, and had to be read and witnessed by the defendant. The paperwork found in the envelope, for the attention of Barry, has been witnessed by Daniel Weaver and bears no resemblance to any of the interviews on the original prosecution file. In fact they are a clear denial in the involvement of Lucy’s disappearance and there is certainly no admission to her murder, in fact, quite the opposite. Daniel Weaver states that he last saw Lucy after their argument in the market place at about nine-thirty pm on the Friday evening. He says she told him she was going home; that her husband had found out about their relationship and was holding onto their daughter Jessica, threatening Lucy that she would never see her again. She told Daniel that she couldn’t leave her daughter behind, so was calling it off. He did his best to make her change her mind and at one stage grabbed hold of her. And that’s how he got his face scratched when she pulled away. He goes on to say that he went straight home to his flat, drank a few whiskies and watched some TV, and then went to bed where he remained until the next day when he went to his parents’ house about eleven am, where his Mother made him some breakfast. When he was asked about the handbag being found hidden under sacking in his shed he stated and I quote ‘someone must have
Hunter glanced up from his jottings. “To be honest, on my first reading of the file I thought everything was cut and dried. That was until we found that statement in Jeffery Howson’s safe. Last night I re-examined the case file. All the interviews in it were written and recorded on the appropriate forms and witnessed by the defendant, Weaver. With the exception of the last set of notes in which he made his confession. On those, where he should have signed, the words ‘refused to sign’ have been penned.”
“Sorry to steal your thunder Hunter,” said Dawn, “If I can come in there now?” She again tapped her Biro against the sides of the incident board, where reduced digital images of the paperwork recovered from Jeffery Howson’s safe were affixed in the top right hand corner.
“This find could change everything about the trial and conviction of Daniel Weaver. The originals of these are currently on their way to Forensics for chemical dating analysis and for fingerprint identification, but at the moment everything about them screams they are the genuine article. What we have here, team, is a set of recorded interview notes conducted with Weaver during the time he was in police custody on twenty-ninth August, nineteen-eighty-three. As we have heard, the interviewers were Jeffery Howson and Alan Darbyshire, and going by the handwriting, which matches that on the envelope they were found in, looks as though they have been completed by our murder victim Jeffery Howson. Prior to the introduction of PACE and taped recorded interviewing all interviews conducted in a police station had to be handwritten. The notes take the form of a question and answer session between the police officers and the defendant, known as contemporaneous notes, and had to be read and witnessed by the defendant. The paperwork found in the envelope, for the attention of Barry, has been witnessed by Daniel Weaver and bears no resemblance to any of the interviews on the original prosecution file. In fact they are a clear denial in the involvement of Lucy’s disappearance and there is certainly no admission to her murder, in fact, quite the opposite. Daniel Weaver states that he last saw Lucy after their argument in the market place at about nine-thirty pm on the Friday evening. He says she told him she was going home; that her husband had found out about their relationship and was holding onto their daughter Jessica, threatening Lucy that she would never see her again. She told Daniel that she couldn’t leave her daughter behind, so was calling it off. He did his best to make her change her mind and at one stage grabbed hold of her. And that’s how he got his face scratched when she pulled away. He goes on to say that he went straight home to his flat, drank a few whiskies and watched some TV, and then went to bed where he remained until the next day when he went to his parents’ house about eleven am, where his Mother made him some breakfast. When he was asked about the handbag being found hidden under sacking in his shed he stated and I quote ‘someone must have
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