Furious detective 'pinned expert against wall' after evidence in trial that saw paedophile freed
Life on Mars-style incident occurred during 1987 trial that saw Russell Bishop acquitted of the murders of Karen Hadaway and Nicola Fellows, Old Bailey hears
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A senior detective was so infuriated by a forensic scientist’s evidence in the trial of a paedophile accused of murdering two girls that he grabbed the expert as soon as he left the courtroom and pinned him against the wall, a jury was told.
The Life on Mars-style incident occurred after Dr Anthony Peabody gave evidence at the 1987 trial of Russell Bishop, who had been accused of sexually assaulting and murdering nine-year-olds Karen Hadaway and Nicola Fellows in a Brighton park, the Old Bailey heard on Tuesday.
Dr Peabody had been called to give evidence for the prosecution at the 1987 Lewes Crown Court trial, which ended with Bishop being acquitted.
Dr Peabody has now given evidence for the prosecution at the 2018 Old Bailey hearing, which is taking place after new DNA evidence allowed Bishop to be tried a second time for the 1986 murders of Karen and Nicola.
Bishop, 52, again denies murder.
Joel Bennathan QC, defending Bishop, began his cross-examination of Dr Peabody by asking him: “Is it not the case that as you left the witness box in 1987 you were pinned against the wall by a senior officer?”
Dr Peabody, now retired, replied: “As it happens, yes.”
Mr Bennathan asked: “He was unhappy about the way your evidence came out?”
“There had been a great deal of work done,” replied Dr Peabody, who in 1987 had been a senior member of the Home Office Forensic Science Laboratory (HOFSL). “At this time, emotions naturally ran high.”
The Old Bailey jury then listened to a series of tetchy exchanges as Mr Bennathan suggested that evidence examined by Dr Peabody might have been contaminated, in particular a Pinto sweatshirt that is a key part of the prosecution case.
The prosecution alleges Bishop was wearing the blue Pinto sweatshirt when he sexually assaulted and strangled the girls in an ivy-covered natural ‘den’ in Wild Park, Brighton.
The Old Bailey jury has been told that fibre, hair and plant evidence link the sweatshirt to the den, to the girls and to Bishop.
Mr Bennathan, however, suggested three times to Dr Peabody that he had worked using Sellotape to collect fibre samples from clothing despite knowing the edges might be contaminated by matter that stuck to the exposed sides. On the third occasion, he asked: “Is it really a question you are unable to answer: you were using Sellotape you knew might be contaminated?”
Dr Peabody stuck to his view that he was using “good scientific practice”, explaining he disregarded any fibres that were on the edge of the tape, precisely because he was aware of the contamination risk suggested by Mr Bennathan.
“We are not just willy nilly using Sellotape that had been contaminated,” he shot back at Mr Bennathan. “That would be terrible. We don’t do that. I am shocked that you are suggesting we do.”
At times referring to transcripts of Dr Peabody’s 1987 cross-examination and a 1981 academic paper the scientist himself had written about how to avoid contaminating fibre evidence, the QC continued to challenge the witness over the sweatshirt.
Mr Bennathan took Dr Peabody back to evidence at the 1987 trial in which it emerged that the Pinto was photographed on arrival at the lab at 10.30am on October 31 1986 in a bag with a piece of white cardboard also inside.
The piece of white card, both trials heard, was not mentioned in Dr Peabody’s notes of the examination he conducted at 7pm the same day.
Dr Bennathan read from the transcript of the 1987 Lewes Crown Court trial in which Dr Peabody had answered “presumably” to the question, “So in the nine hours it has changed from that [with the white card] to what you received?”
At the 2018 Old Bailey trial Dr Bennathan asked Dr Peabody: “How significant a failing would it be if someone examined an exhibit and didn’t make a record of having done so?”
Dr Peabody’s initial response was to say: “I fear there is a follow-up statement that I would rather hear.”
Mr Bennathan replied, “Can you just answer the question, I am so sorry.”
Dr Peabody then answered: Yes, it would be something that would at least be regrettable.”
The lawyer also asked Dr Peabody why he had not followed up on a white fibre taken from the Pinto sweatshirt similar in appearance to the material from a police forensics suit.
"Are you not interested in possible signs of contamination?” Mr Bennathan asked the expert witness. “You should be, shouldn't you, because even if something comes to you properly sealed, if you found something that might suggest contamination before it gets to you it would be proper to make a note of that and explore it.”
Dr Peabody said it was not certain the white fibre was from a police suit and he did not feel the need for further examination.
He said that his laboratory did scour trademark databases to see how many people in Brighton might have owned Pinto sweatshirts at the time of the murders, but admitted under cross-examination that the search had “drawn a blank”
The Old Bailey jury has been told that three years after being acquitted of the murders of Karen and Nicola, Bishop grabbed a seven-year-old girl off the street, bundled her into the boot of a stolen car, and strangled and sexually assaulted her before leaving her for dead at Devil’s Dyke in Sussex.
The girl, however, survived and was able to give evidence that led to Bishop being convicted for the 1990 attack.
Now a convicted sex offender, Bishop is being retried on two counts of murder after the Court of Appeal quashed his 1987 acquittal in respect of the deaths of Karen and Nicola.
The Old Bailey trial continues.