Tag Archives: Harold Jones

Victim’s son encouraged by new focus on Nude Murders case

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I was surprised and delighted to be contacted recently by Frank Quinn, the son of one of victims in the Hammersmith Nude Murders case.

This was, of course, the unsolved serial-killer investigation from the 1960s that I cover occasionally on this blog, having first written about it in The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper.

Frank is the son of Frances Brown, who was the fifth of six women to be murdered.

The killer, who successfully eluded what was then the biggest police manhunt in history, picked up the women in his car or van, strangled them and left their bodies at public spots around west London. Dubbed Jack the Stripper by newspapers, he removed their clothing and jewellery, and sometimes their teeth, leaving few forensic clues for police.

Paul Quinn, partner of murdered Frances Brown, victim of the serial killer known as ‘Jack the Stripper’, speaking with a friend of Frances’s in Shepherds Bush, November 1964 (Mirrorpix)

‘The case has dominated my life,’ Frank told me. He feels it has been shrouded in mystery for too long, and is encouraged now that ‘things are coming out’.

Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer

The BBC4 documentary, Dark Son, followed up the findings in my book earlier this year. This pointed to convicted child killer Harold Jones as the man who should be considered the number-one suspect.

‘I found it an excellent documentary,’ Frank said when we spoke by phone. ‘It’s something I’ve been waiting for a long time. I never thought in my lifetime I’d ever see it happen.’

Harold Jones served 20 years for the murder of two little girls in Wales

He is hoping the Met will make a serious attempt to reopen the case. In particular, he thinks they should look into Jones’s employment and driving records.

It is thought the killer may have used a grey Hillman Husky and that he worked on the Heron Trading Estate, where the bodies were stored before being dumped.

‘I’m convinced it was Jones,’ says Frank.

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Dark Son on BBC4

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Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer on BBC4
Re-enactment from Dark Son

This intriguing documentary is now scheduled for next Tuesday (12 Feb) at 9pm on BBC4.

Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer is a 90-minute look into one of the most appalling and unsolved serial killer cases in British history.

In 1964-65 a kerb-crawler murdered six women in west London. He left their naked bodies in the River Thames or various outdoor secluded spots. Scotland Yard mounted its biggest ever manhunt but could uncover no strong suspects.

The killer stopped his murder campaign in February 1965. The public and media largely forgot the crimes.

As described elsewhere on this blog, the producers at Monster Films have pulled together a team of experts to reinvestigate the case. Child murderer Harold Jones is the prime suspect the police overlooked, the film argues.

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Dark Son now on BBC iPlayer

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Professor David Wilson and former senior detective Jackie Malton uncover new facts about the unsolved Hammersmith Nude Murders from the 1960s

Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer is now available to view on BBC iPlayer.

I have been talking about this documentary for a while now. It was almost a year ago that I got involved with filming some sequences for this re-examination of the unsolved Hammersmith Nude Murders.

My involvement was sought because of findings in my book The Hunt for the 60s Ripper. This employed some modern policing theories to understand why Scotland Yard’s biggest ever manhunt failed to unmask the killer of six women in London in 1964-65.

I consulted Dr Kim Rossmo, one of the world’s leading geographic profilers. He produced an analysis and map for my book that revealed two areas of west London where the killer was probably based.

Harold Jones lived in the middle of the murder area

It is this data that is used in Dark Son. One of the problems the original investigation had was that it was thinly spread over 24 square miles of London.

The geo-profile would have allowed detectives to focus resources on two hotspots around Hammersmith and Notting Hill. Had they done so they would have crossed paths with Harry Stevens.

Harold Jones was released from prison in 1941

This man, living in Aldensley Road, Hammersmith, never featured in the original investigation. As Dark Son explains brilliantly, Stevens was actually Harold Jones, a murderer of two children in his youth in 1921.

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Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer on BBC

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Here’s the trailer for the documentary I’ve been talking about for several months. Dark Son will go out on BBC Wales on 12 January and on BBC4 on 22 January.

The revelations will be ‘astonishing’, according to Professor David Wilson, the leading criminologist who presents the film.

Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer
BBC trailer for Dark Son

It is remarkable that since I wrote The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper in 2017 this film has been made exploring fresh angles.

Leading criminologists, former detectives, a genealogist and writers have come together to re-investigate this unsolved, grotesque series of crimes. I was delighted to be asked to take part.

Who murdered six women and left their naked bodies in public places in the Swinging London of 1964-65? This was a huge police hunt and media story that eventually faded from the headlines.

Dark Son should refocus everyone’s attention on this mystery – not least that of the Met. A major theme of the film will look at child murderer Harold Jones.

As a 15-year-old he murdered two little girls in 1921. He served 20 years in jail.

However, detectives investigating the Nude Murders were never aware of the fact that he was living amid the crimes in Hammersmith during this time.

What would Scotland Yard’s detectives have discovered about him if they had known he was there?

Guesswork and the release of murderer Harold Jones

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Harold Jones in jail in 1921

Thanks goodness deference to authority largely gets the middle finger today.

This means we can give short shrift to claptrap like this: ‘Sadistic crime is probably more rare in England than in any other country in the world. Curiously enough, even the few known exponents in our English records are apt to bear an alien name.’

So, just to be clear – sadism is a vice of foreign blighters. The English do not stoop to such shameful behaviour.

This view, voiced in 1941, was not that of some loudmouth in a pub after one too many. It was the opinion of the Commissioner of Prisons, Alexander Paterson.

Sadism and cruelty

The problem he faced was what to do with Harold Jones, who had been convicted of murdering two little girls when he was 15. In 1941 Jones had served 20 years, considered a ‘life’ term at the time.

During his incarceration, the consensus had been that Jones was a sadist who showed no remorse. Senior medical officer W Norwood East reported that for Jones ‘the sexual act reaches its highest gratification when accompanied by cruelty’.

In 1936 the governor of Maidstone prison, B Grew, was damning, ‘Sad as it may seem I can see no hopeful prospects for Jones in the future.’

But by 1941 Paterson was effectively muddying the waters. The medical profession really knows little about sadism, he suggested. 

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Documentary puts Harold Jones on trial for Jack the Stripper crimes

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Criime Scene in Acton where the body of Bridget O'Hara was found earlier today 16th February 1965. Pictured: Policeman standing at spot where body was found, in between fence (on left) and brick hut near embankment. Bridget O'Hara was a confirmed victim of serial killer known as 'Jack the Stripper' who was operating in London 1964-1965 and killed 6-8 women prostitutes & dumped their bodies around london or in the River Thames. The serial killer has never been caught.

Crime Scene in Acton where the body of Bridget O’Hara was found on 16 February 1965. © Mirrorpix

First posted  1 10 17 on robinjarossi.com

Despite the huge difficulties in unmasking the man who got away with the murder of at least six women in 1960s London so long after the event, efforts are still ongoing in 2017 to unravel this chilling mystery.

Since the publication of The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper in July, I’ve been in touch with author Neil Milkins. In his 2011 book Who Was Jack the Stripper? he makes an interesting case for Harold jones, a child sex killer, having been the guilty man.

My own feeling is that the case against Jones is circumstantial. However, in researching my book I did come across one tantalising new connection between Jones and the 1960s investigation.

This has helped to spur Neil into pushing on with more research on the case and assistance in a new documentary,

Harold Jones teenage killer

As a 15 year old, Jones had callously murdered two girls in his home town of Abertillery in the 1920s. He eventually pleaded guilty because he would have turned 16 by the time of his trial and been eligible for hanging.

A ludicrously indulgent prison governor decided to release Jones from prison in 1941, despite his lack of remorse for his crimes. 

Kim Rossmo

Thanks to Neil’s research, it seems Jones turned up in west London, where he married and had a daughter. During the height of the manhunt for the Nude Killer, who murdered six prostitutes in 1964-65 and left their unclothed bodies in locations around west London, Jones was living under the noses of detectives.

For my own book, I was lucky enough to interview Dr Kim Rossmo, a leading geographic profiler. He had created a computer program that can analyse data based on a series of crimes, travel routes and other local information to produce geographic hotspots revealing where a perpetrator lives, works or has some connection.

Geo-profile hotspots in west London

He conducted such an analysis for me in The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper (Mirror Books). This suggests two hotspots in west London where he thinks the killer may have had a base.

A geographic profile by Kim Rossmo revealed this area around Hammersmith where the Nude Murderer may have been based

One is around Hammersmith and the other covers Holland Park/Notting Hill.

The significance of this is that Harold Jones – as Neil Milkins has shown – was living in Aldensley Road. This is right in the middle of the Hammersmith hotspot. But Jones never came under suspicion during what was the biggest manhunt in police history up to that time.

What would detectives have discovered about Jones?

Again, this doesn’t prove Jones was the killer. But it does raise the question… What if detectives had been able to narrow their focus to these hotspots?

Instead of being spread so thinly across 24 square miles of west London, they might have realised they had a cold-blooded psycho right in the murder zone.

They could have interviewed and checked out his movements and lifestyle very closely. So, he may or may not be Jack the Stripper… but on the other hand we know nothing at all about him at this time.

Dark Son promo

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Harold Jones at the time of his trial and imprisonment

An industry promo for Dark Son: The Hunt for a Serial Killer is doing the rounds.

It’s a good insight into the forthcoming BBC documentary. This will be a fascinating investigation into Harold Jones’s child murders in Wales in 1921 and his potential links to the unsolved 1960s Nude Murders in west London.

As the author of The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper, which deals with the case, I have been involved with the filming. I was struck by the new leads and witnesses the producers have uncovered.

Who was Jack the Stripper?

The west London Jack the Stripper killings, as they became known, taunt us today. Between 1964 and 1965 someone murdered six women and left their naked bodies at various locations in the capital.

Because the victims were sex workers, the crimes faded from the headlines after the last murder, that of Bridie O’Hara, in February 1965. However, at the time it was Scotland Yard’s biggest ever investigation.

Suspects included a disgraced detective, underworld figures and almost anyone reported to favour unorthodox sexual practices. Police never charged anyone for the killings.

Criminology and law-enforcement experts

Neil Milkins was the first writer to cite Harold Jones as a suspect. Jones murdered two little girls – Freda Burnell and Florence Little – in Abertillery in 1921. I discovered when writing The Hunt for the 60s’ Ripper that Jones was later living in an area of Hammersmith that would have been of major interest to detectives had they had modern-day profiling techniques available to them.

The makers of Dark Son approached the possibility of Jones’s involvement with an open mind. Enlisting criminology and law-enforcement experts, they have delved into this mystery and made some powerful connections.

Several writers have convictions that they know who did it – some of which are ludicrous. Dark Son will definitely add a wealth of new insights into these infamous crimes.

This post first appeared on robinjarossi.com