The Story of Real Life Police Murders.: (1945-2010)

By Nigel Wier

This book is about the murders of police officers in the United Kingdom since the end of the Second World War till the modern day. You will see that all the murders are horrific and and without any justification against the people will ask to police our streets. You will see that most of the officers are unarmed and all our brave. The murderer does not distinguish between the ranks of the police officers as you will see in this book, it appears that he kills with malice with no thought for anyone apart from himself. I hope the book gives you a little insight into the world of a policeman and what they have to face each and every day.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Sep 2, 2011
• ISBN: 9781456779597

Nigel Wier

Nigel Wier is qualified to write this book as it is his memoirs of thirty years with the West Midlands Police The author states that he is an avid reader of all real life crime thrillers. He is a married man and lives with his wife in Sutton Colfield.

Book preview

Contents

Prologue

Acknowledgements

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty One

Chapter Twenty Two

Chapter Twenty Three

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Five

Epilogue

For Angie of course

For my son, Alex

For my parents, Albert and Maisie

For Martha and in memory of Harry

Prologue

The murder of a British police officer at any time always spreads revulsion and anger throughout the country, because even today in 2011 most British police officers are not routinely armed and in most cases the officers who are murdered were not carrying firearms at the time of their murder, there will of course always be an exception to the rule.

Since 1900 there has been 165 British police officers (not including Northern Ireland police) who have been murdered in the line of duty, so for readers who enjoy statistics that’s nearly two a year.

The author worked for the West Midlands Police from 1975 until 2005 and in his time as a police officer a total of 64 British police officers were murdered in the execution of their duty including five from the authors own force.

Why have I decided to write this book about police murders well, I want to show the readers that police officers do a dangerous job in difficult circumstances and the following police murders that I have outlined in this book, will show you the variance of how police officers have been killed in the line of their duty.

Also when a police officer is murdered the same argument raises its head every time, should we bring back death by hanging or should we at least bring back some sort of capital punishment for the murder of a police officer.

In 1964 the new Prime Minister Mr Harold Wilson made it quite clear that it was his intention to abolish death by hanging in Great Britain, and in 1965 a labour MP Mr Sydney Silverman introduced a private members bill to suspend the death penalty, this was passed on a free vote in the House of Commons by 200 votes to 98, the bill was subsequently passed by the House of Lords by 204 votes to 104.

The Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act 1965 suspended the death penalty in England, Wales and Scotland but not Northern Ireland for five years. However in 1969 the then Home Secretary Mr James Callaghan MP proposed a motion to make the act permanent, this was carried out in the House of Commons on 16th December 1969 and the House of Lords on 18th December 1969, Northern Ireland followed suit on 25th July 1973.

Incidentally the last death by hanging in England was on 13th August 1964 when two men were executed simultaneously, Peter Anthony Allen was hanged at Walton Prison, Liverpool and Gwynne Owen Evans (real name of John Walby) was hanged at Strangeways Prison, Manchester; both men had been convicted of the murder of John West whilst robbing him.

On 15th August 1964 the last man to be executed by hanging in Scotland was Henry Burnett who was hanged at Craiginches Prison, Aberdeen for the murder of a seaman Thomas Guyan.

On 5th November 1959 Guenther Fritz Erwin Podola was the last person in England to be executed by hanging for the murder of police officer.

Any view about hanging in this book is purely the view of the author and I will demonstrate in this book why I think death by hanging or any form of capital punishment will never be seen in this country ever again. Whether that is right or not, I cannot say as I have no control over it and I think that can be said for all of us. It is my view that it will never happen in this country again so all we can hope for is that the courts give the murderer once convicted, the right and proper sentence and that means any life sentence should mean life and not just for a few years.

Of note, in November 2009 a television survey showed that 70% favoured reinstating the death penalty for certain crime and of course included in that was for the murder of police officers, but the authors view is that it will never be reinstated.

Now how did I choose the police murders to write about I did say there had been sixty four during my service and I have chosen only thirty six in this book. I chose them on the basis that every murder was different and every murderer was different and of course all will shock.

It will hopefully also show the readers what police face in their day to day duties and how they have been murdered without reason sometimes in simple situations but all in a day’s work for a police officer.

I did decide not to write about every murder of a police officer and by that I am not being disrespectful to the others that I have not mentioned because you never know if this book is successful then I may write a second book.

The book will also show you that murder is not particular to any rank within the police force, I have shown in this book that Police Constables up to a Superintendent have been murdered and what it does prove is that all police officers of any rank, wherever they are in the country are built the same, they are all without exception fearless and brave and we the public thank god that they are.

I begin my book after the conclusion of the Second World War in 1945, and it will start with the first police officer killed in this country after the end of the war, now I will apologise to readers that more information is available about some of the murders than others of course, some may have made more of an impact on people at the time rather than others may have done, and of course some will be remembered by the readers more than others, but I felt that the time for my book to begin was when the Second World War had ended.

At the end of the Second World War, the country of course was in a desperate state with most people poor and without money and of course very little chance of employment.

So what provokes people into killing police officers, greed, money, desperation, fear, the need to escape, utter contempt for law and order or do they just hate the police that much that they just want to kill them, it is probably a mixture of all of those reasons, anyway perhaps this book will give us a few answers.

I know there will be some omissions and I apologise for that in advance and there may be some errors but they are honest errors made without malice.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Birmingham Central Library Archives Department, they must have really got fed up of my weekly visits there and the asking of my questions no doubt silly questions, but they were always helpful and without them I could not have completed the book.

Many other people have helped me put this book together and some of you as you know must remain without name, but you will know who I mean.

Colleagues, friends and many people have also provided me with the inspiration to complete this book because writing does not come easy to me.

Such as we are made of, such we be

William Shakesphere

Chapter One

Police Constable Brindley Booth

Police Constable Booth was the first police officer as far as is known to be murdered in mainland United Kingdom since the end of the Second World War in 1945. PC Booth was a member of the Staffordshire Police and regularly patrolled a small town called Burton on Trent in Staffordshire.

On 29th May 1946 the officer was on foot patrol in Moor Street, in the centre of Burton when he saw a male figure in the distance acting suspiciously, he was pushing what appeared to be a child’s push chair and in the push chair is what seemed to the officer a metal safe or box or something similar. The officer started to follow the man who by now realised he was being followed by the police, so he decided to run around a corner at the end of Moor Street and he waited for the police officer to approach.

As PC Booth reached the corner, this man stepped out from the dark shadows and struck the officer across the head with something hard, possible with a metal bar or a jemmy or something similar, the officer