James Hanratty no credible alibi for the date in question, but repeated each time that he had nothing to do with the A6 murder. On 11 October, Hanratty was arrested by police in Blackpool, at the Stevonia cafe. On 14 October, Valerie Storie identified Hanratty in an identity parade, after each of the men in the parade had repeated the phrase used by the murderer: "Be quiet, will you? I'm thinking." Hanratty was then charged with the murder of Michael Gregsten. Hanratty's murder trial started at Bedfordshire Assizes on 22 January 1962; it was originally to have been heard at the Old
Murder of Julia Martha Thomas convicted and sentenced to death after a jury of matrons rejected her last-minute attempt to avoid the death penalty by pleading pregnancy. She finally confessed to the murder the night before she was hanged, on 29 July at Wandsworth Prison. The case attracted huge public interest and was widely covered by the press in Great Britain and Ireland. Webster's behaviour after the crime and during the trial further increased the notoriety of the murder. Julia Martha Thomas was a former schoolteacher who had been twice widowed. Since the death of her second husband in 1873, she had lived on her