Her hands were unmarked. There were no defence wounds.3 She had not had time, or had not been able to defend herself. Or she had been attacked from behind.
When the professor examined the child internally, the twelve stab wounds could be traced on their path into the body. Each had penetrated to different depths, and some had caused damage to bones and to internal organs, most notably the heart and lungs.
The hair was cut from Lesley’s head to enable examination of the scalp, but there was no evidence of injury or blood-staining. It was then passed to PS Godfrey, along with a vaginal swab, a mouth swab, a blood sample and the stomach contents (which would show that Lesley had not eaten since leaving her home). The internal organs each yield further samples to be taken for further examination. They are taken to exclude any suggestion of death by natural causes.
From 2.30 p.m. until 6 p.m. Professor Gee went about his work, slowly, cautiously, meticulously and without regard to the silent staring of the police officers – including ACC Craig – who lined the walls of the mortuary, observing proceedings anxiously.
The result of the post-mortem revealed that Lesley had died of bleeding from the twelve stab wounds, the heart, aorta and left lung having been penetrated. The wounds were caused by a knife, with a thin blade no more than half an inch broad and not less than two and a half inches long, with one edge sharp and the other rounded. Bruising adjacent to two of the wounds at the back of the left shoulder suggested that those blows had involved the knife being driven in with substantial force, the hilt or the attacker’s hand having made forceful contact with the body. The wounds to the back of the body had been inflicted as the child lay in the position in which she had been found.
Whilst it was impossible to be certain as to the time of death, Professor Gee was of the opinion that Lesley had been dead more than twenty-four hours before she was found, and that she had possibly died up to three days earlier, namely on Sunday, 5 October 1975. There was a silent hope that his longest estimate was most accurate, so that the child had not had to endure days of captivity (and what else?) before her final, brutal death.
The inquest into the child’s death which opened on 14 October 1975 would disclose only that Lesley had died from multiple stab wounds. There was no need to say more.
Her body has been mutilated, and the post-mortem necessarily adds to that defilement, but Mr Seward again applies his skills, and the body may now be prepared for burial.
But her clothes are neither discarded nor returned to her parents. In murder cases the victim’s silence is compensated for: for her body speaks for her, and her clothes speak for her, and for Lesley Molseed her clothes shout loud.
DS Godfrey amasses his collection from the search team which has, throughout the day, continued to scour the moors and lay-by. He receives twenty-six items, including seven bottles, a Polaroid camera cartridge wrapped in silver foil, part of a plastic bag, a small tablet still in its foil (would that be the killer’s medication?) and four photograph negatives. Had one of these items been discarded by the murderer and, if so, would even one yield up his fingerprint?
A pair of socks, a handkerchief, a packet of cigarettes and a high heel from a lady’s shoe.
And, from the lay-by, a broken knife …
For nearly thirty-six hours PS Godfrey has collected exhibits, numerous and diverse. The collected materials are brought together, and then they are removed from Halifax to the laboratory at Harrogate, where they are handed to Ronald Outteridge, the principal scientific officer in the case and a highly respected member of the Home Office Forensic Science Service.
For now, the scientific material is mute, or, if not mute, it speaks in half-sentences only. It directs the scientists to look carefully, and note what they might find, but it can say no more until the time comes for comparisons. Until fibres from two sources lie alongside each other under a microscope, or two semen samples are observed together, the scientific material can tell only a fragment of the story. It will say that Lesley had been in contact with a cloth which shed fibres, but it cannot yet say from where that cloth came. It will certainly tell the investigators that, whilst the child had not been interfered with, the killer appeared to have derived some sexual pleasure from being with her. But it cannot, now, say who the murderer was. Or was not.
Each single item is removed from its shielding plastic bag and is examined closely. It is a critical and crucial examination, and it yields results. Peter Guise, a forensic scientist and Batchelor of Technology examines the clothing: each garment, as ever, on its own to prevent any contamination, lying on a sheet of brown paper to collect any matter which may fall away in the course of the examination. He looks for blood or fluid staining, and he notes the dimensions and directions of the cuts. He runs Sellotape over the garments to collect loose fabrics which might adhere.
Of the blood-stains, he finds no evidence of ‘run down’, supporting the already-held theory that the child had not been standing up when the principal injuries were inflicted. From the jumper, the vest, the skirt and a sock, tiny fibres of a certain hue, a certain type, a certain constituency. And a single blue fibre from the back of Lesley’s neck. From the underwear, what appear to be semen stains. He makes up microscopic slides from these stains and looks further: his initial belief is confirmed. He can see sperm heads. He applies the test then in use to record the amount of heads: +H is the lowest, ++++H the highest. He writes ‘+H’ in his notes. There is a low sperm count given the large area of seminal staining.
Outteridge was soon to provide an initial report, confirming Professor Gee’s findings that Lesley had been murdered where she was found, and indicating Outteridge’s belief that the murder had a sexual motive, based on the finding of semen on the lower garments. He has identified Lesley’s blood as being group B,4 but he wishes to continue to examine blood-staining on the clothing in the hope of finding blood of a different group, perhaps belonging to the murderer. Outteridge would therefore advise Dibb and Holland that any suspects should have blood specimens taken from them, and that their clothing should be seized for forensic examination. Any suspect vehicles should also be examined, for matching fibres, but also because Lesley’s purse bore a sequined pattern, and the sequins appeared to be falling away. The appearance of any such sequins in a suspect’s vehicle would be a matter of great interest.
Finally, Outteridge informs Dibb and Holland that the knife found in the lay-by is not, in his opinion, the murder weapon.
The work of Gee and Outteridge was, of course, limited to the materials already gathered from the scene of the crime and from Lesley herself. Clearly there was a great deal of available information which had to be obtained, and to this end Dibb, who had been appointed head of the enquiry, and Holland, his deputy, set in motion information ‘seeks’ on the Turf Hill Estate and the A672 near to the lay-by, searching for the elusive clues as to the identity of the killer.
High up on the moors officers were combing the grasses and shrubs around the site where the body was found, using metal detectors and electronic probes to try to find the small knife which had so cruelly slashed the child, and police scenes of crime officers took photographs of the still-untrampled area. At the direction of the supervising officers, other uniformed officers set up blocks at the Junction 22 exit of the M62 to ask questions of every motorist leaving the motorway at that point. Similar questions were asked of motorists passing the lay-by. Had they driven that route the preceding Sunday? Had they passed by the site? Had they seen a girl, a parked car, a man – alone or with a child – anything? A list of questions designed to squeeze information from people who might have seen something, yet not paid close attention or even noticed that they had seen something. A car parked up on the moors is not so rare a sight that it would be regarded as noteworthy, but if later asked perhaps the question will cause the brain to yield up that sighting, stored somewhere in the subconscious.
Professor