This is the original article I
sent to True Crime Library, a publisher of four true crime magazines in
Britain. I hoped they would publish it as a full article but, instead, it was shortened and included in the letters page of True Crime magazine,
February 2005 issue.
The recent breakthrough in the hunt for Rachel Nickell’s killer would appear to vindicate Colin Stagg, the man who stood trial for Nickell’s murder before the case against him was sensationally thrown out of court. It also raises a serious issue relevant to many criminal trials.
New DNA evidence seems to indicate that a known sex killer, a patient at Broadmoor secure hospital, was the man who brutally sexually assaulted and murdered Rachel Nickell as she walked with her son on Wimbledon Common in 1992. Robert Napper, a violent psychopath, had been a suspect in the crime but was never properly investigated because Stagg had by this time been charged and remanded into custody. Napper was only briefly questioned because he committed a very similar double murder in 1993.
When placing innocent Colin Stagg in the frame the police were effectively wearing blinkers. They were unable to sufficiently examine any other suspect because they were so blinded by their belief Stagg was guilty, which meant that they were unwilling to entertain any other view. “There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact”, the great fictional detective Sherlock Holmes once said and it is true to say that the police deceived themselves by believing it was a fact Stagg was an ‘oddball’ killer.
By allowing Stagg to stand trial for the horrific murder they ended their hunt despite there having been other suspects who were not properly eliminated. How many individuals stand wrongly accused, in court, of serious crimes simply because the police believe they have found the culprit when they have not even spoken to all of the suspects?
Of course, the police are more often than not correct in their view of who committed a crime when charges are brought against a suspect. Therefore in most cases it does not matter that many individuals have not been questioned. However, when a defendant is innocent the true criminal is more likely to evade justice for the simple reason that the police brought their search to an end.
It is becoming increasingly recognised that there are a worryingly large number of miscarriages of justice occurring in this country and one factor in causing this problem is that the police often arrest and charge the first person who meets the criteria they believe describe the criminal they are seeking. The question is, how many others in the list of suspects would, if investigated, be found to match the criteria more strongly? If the police had not charged Colin Stagg then they would have had a far greater chance of finding Nickell’s killer before he struck again and Stagg’s life would not have been destroyed by the ordeal of being publicly accused of a crime he did not commit.
There is a simple solution to the problem; the police should continue to trace, interview and (if there are sufficient grounds) eliminate suspects even when someone is on remand pending their trial unless there is absolute proof that they have caught the right person/people. Whilst this might be a resource consuming process it will reduce the likelihood of innocents facing conviction whilst the real culprits pose a continued danger to society. As Sherlock Holmes so frequently said, “Once you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.” If the police do not eliminate all of the impossible suspects how can they realistically be expected to be sure they have found the truth?
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