Having followed the retrial of Gary Dobson and David Norris for the murder of Stephen Lawrence, and their subsequent conviction, Sussex Police commissioned an internal forensics review of the Bishop exhibits to see whether, with all the developments and renewed sensitivity of DNA profiling, there was the chance of discovering any new and compelling evidence. They remained quietly optimistic but only too aware that they had gone through the same motions over the years but to no avail.
The team responsible for the retrial of the Stephen Lawrence killers had employed LGC – now Eurofins – Forensics, the leading cold case scientists, to use their cutting-edge expertise and facilities to prove Dobson’s and Norris’ guilt, so Sussex Police turned to them.
DCI Adam Hibbert knew there had been some false starts around 2005 and 2006, when scientists found new fibre links between the Pinto top and Bishop’s home, but this had proved insufficient to launch a double jeopardy investigation. He needed to be sure that not only was he sending the right exhibits for testing but also of the strengths and, crucially, the weaknesses of any findings.
He pulled in Principal SOCO Nick Craggs to discuss a way forward. Nick had nearly thirty years of crime scene experience and despite his placid manner was no yes-man. I had worked closely with him and he was the type to tell you if you were talking nonsense, however senior you were. Later to be supported by Senior SOCO Stuart Leonard who was cut from the same cloth, Nick audited all the exhibits that were seized during the original investigation and made attempts to locate them. The items that would be sent to LGC were prioritized, with a brief as to what needed to happen to them.
The first item was the Pinto sweatshirt.
Roy Green, LGC’s senior scientific advisor who had helped solve the Lawrence case, had also worked on the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and the mysterious death of government scientist Dr David Kelly. Coincidentally he also had a link to Moulsecoomb. He had lived there at the time of the murders while studying at the nearby University of Sussex. He also worked as an assistant to Dr David Northcutt, the forensic scientist who had helped convict Bishop for his attack on Claire.
He knew the Babes in the Woods murders to a certain degree and was only too willing to put his steely objective skills to good use, whatever the outcome.
Roy cuts the figure of a humble man, quietly confident in his own expertise. You’d pass this fifty-something, bespectacled chap with his mop of grey hair and matching suit in the street, oblivious to his razor-sharp intellect and his knack for translating his eye-wateringly complex specialism into simple layman’s terms.
Having received a lengthy briefing from the review team, Roy Green invited them to his laboratory in rural Oxfordshire to mull over what could and could not be done. Drawing on his recent Stephen Lawrence experience, Roy was clear that any scientific tests must be aimed at discovering evidence that was new and compelling. It would not do to rehash the 1986 tests or to find links that could have been found back then. The bar was high and Roy was committed to seeing if he could help Sussex Police reach it.
DNA profiling was not available in 1986 but was by 1990, as Bishop found out to his peril. However, since then, the science had improved exponentially, meaning that by 2012 it was possible to extract a profile from a minute trace of even badly degraded DNA. The possibilities this opened up for reviewing historical cases were boundless. This was the most exciting development in forensics since 1892 when the first conviction using fingerprint identification was achieved.
Roy Green suggested he examine parts of the Pinto sweatshirt not previously checked for DNA. One such area was the inside of the cuffs. Roy surmised that, as the cuff was formed of a double layer, it was hypothetically possible that traces of DNA had passed through the weave and were sitting on the inside. If that was the case, the person whose DNA it was could have worn the sweatshirt and be the killer.
The sweatshirt’s history up to the point that Mr Gander picked it off the path was a mystery but, despite what Jenny Johnson had initially said, Bishop had vehemently denied owning or wearing it. So, if it could be linked to him through forensics, he would have a lot of explaining to do.
Adam knew he would have to wait for his answer, so life continued as normal but, in early 2013, things were about to change. Roy had been his usual diligent self in picking the sweatshirt apart and, having swabbed the inside of the cuff, he sent it for DNA testing against samples retained from Bishop’s 1990 conviction.
The result was everything Adam had hoped for but dared not expect.
Testing that tiny area, a part of the sweatshirt no one else would think of checking, had returned a one in a billion DNA match to Russell Bishop. This was the missing link. Generations of police officers already knew that the sweatshirt was worn by the killer at the time of the murders but, after Jenny had changed her mind, only circumstantial evidence had linked it to Bishop.
Despite probably, at the time, never having heard of DNA, Bishop had shed enough of his on that sweatshirt for it to come back to haunt him twenty-seven years later. All of a sudden, Adam’s ducks were lining up.