James Hanratty James Hanratty James Hanratty (4 October 1936 – 4 April 1962), also known as the A6 Murderer, was a British criminal who was one of the final eight people in the UK to be executed before capital punishment was effectively abolished. He was hanged at Bedford Gaol on 4 April 1962, after being convicted of the murder of scientist Michael Gregsten, aged 36, who was shot dead in a car on the A6 at Deadman's Hill, near Clophill, Bedfordshire in August 1961. Gregsten's mistress, Valerie Storie, was raped, shot five times, and left paralysed. According to Storie, the couple were
Murder of Jacqueline Thomas alibi, because he did not want his wife to know he had been "larking about" with girls. Although he was considered as a suspect, Hall was not charged with the murder as there was no evidence linking him to the crime. At an inquest later that year he was called as one of 53 witnesses to give evidence, asking his solicitor to put him in the witness box: "Though he may not be an angel, he wants the finger of suspicion which has been levelled at him removed". A jury subsequently recorded a verdict of "murder by some person or