The Babes in the Woods by Paul Cheston

Author:Paul Cheston [Paul Cheston]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781789461299
Publisher: John Blake Publishing
Published: 2019-11-16T16:00:00+00:00

On 4 December, Bishop entered the witness box to answer questions for the first time in public.

The first question Thwaites asked was: “Did you abduct the girl, strangle her half to death, strip her naked and sexually assault her, as the prosecution alleges?”

Bishop answered, “No, sir, I did not.”

He went on to deny all the forensic links to the girl and the tracksuit bottoms, which he said he had never owned. How did his DNA get on them? Simple. He had sex with Jennie Johnson the night before and placed two used condoms in a bin by the bedside. When the police raided his home they took his semen.

The rest was all down to the police stitching him up, he insisted when they came to arrest him, DI Bacon had said, “Come on, Russ, we have got you bang to rights this time, own up.”

Even the police sitting in court smiled at that claim, which sounded more like dialogue from some 1950s black-and-white Ealing comedy of the.

His car’s tyre tracks at Devil’s Dyke? DI Bacon must have driven the car up there to plant them, said Bishop.

Thwaites showed the court a leaflet from the Fellows poster campaign, headed: RUSSELL BISHOP THIS MAN IS A CHILD KILLER.

Turning to the Babes in the Wood case, Thwaites asked, “Did you commit those murders?”

Bishop: “No, sir.”

Thwaites: “Can you help the jury understand why the police and scientists may have thought you guilty?”

Bishop: “With leaflets like that what can you expect.”

There were tears in his eyes. An usher passed him a paper hankie.

The layout of the court places the press box next to and underneath the witness box. I could look up into Bishop’s face just a few feet away with a view as close as the judge’s and far closer than counsel or any member of the pubic gallery.

I have seen many murderers, rapists and clever fraudsters fake tears in the witness box over the years, but Bishop’s seemed genuine. Was it possible that he genuinely believed he had not killed the little girls?

Was that how he survived so many hours of police interrogation, had the brass neck to campaign for the real killer to be found and convince so many people that he must be innocent?

Is his genuine belief that he didn’t kill them because he has simply has no memory of it? Has he blacked out any memory because it was so horrific? If he has no memory of doing it then obviously, in his mind, he could not have done it.

Interestingly, the Fellows and Hadaways sitting in the gallery upstairs believe he was faking. They may be far closer to the truth than I was.

But perhaps Mr Justice Nolan, from his seat equally close to the witness, saw the same thing as me and, perhaps, that is why, when he came to sentence Bishop, that he was to speak the way he did.

That moment was still ten days away. Back in the room, Bishop recovered his composure and claimed that since acquittal he had been stopped by the police a dozen times.

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