JOHN MICHAEL AND SHIRLEY ELIZABETH REED
The elusive motive
One of the fundamental principles of English criminal law is to be found in the classic definition of the concept of intent. Juries are invariably directed to bear in mind the clear distinction between, on the one hand, motive, and, on the other hand, intent. The example I used to adopt in this situation when I was sitting was to say to the jury, ‘Suppose that you saw a man point a loaded gun at his victim’s head at close range and pull the trigger. You may have no idea at all of his motive, but you will have no difficulty at all in deciding his intent.’ The terms of that direction have an uncanny application to the facts in R v Reed (JR) and Reed (SE).
Before I summarize the facts, I want to say this. Obviously, serial murders are in a wholly different category of depravity by virtue of their repetition – if for no other reason. But that said, in the times of which I write, this case is as chilling a story of a brutal death as can be imagined.
John Reed had a long criminal record, with a string of convictions for dishonesty. They included two for robbery with violence. For the latter of those, in 1966, he had been sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment, from which he was released on licence after four years. His wife, Shirley, had no convictions.
At the time of the murder their home was in Oldham, but (importantly) they had for some few months in the past lived in Halifax. The evidence suggested that they were in the habit of using taxis to get around.
Milton Walker was a Halifax man. He worked as a taxi driver from a rank in Bull Green in the town. On 29 March 1972 he was working a night shift. Having been seen in his Ford Cortina taxi on the rank at about 11 p.m., he was never knowingly seen alive again. The evidence was to disclose that the ‘Taxi’ sign on the roof of the car had been removed before the vehicle was finally recovered.
Around 1 a.m. the following morning a car that was almost certainly the taxi in question was seen by a witness close to the place where subsequent discoveries were made. A man and a woman were inside it. There was no taxi sign on the roof.
Within minutes, an explosion was heard. At 2.15 a.m. a man and a woman were seen on foot in the open countryside nearby. Shortly afterwards, the couple turned up, still on foot, at an isolated farmhouse (Doldrums Farm) on the moorland near Halifax. John Reed asked to use the phone, and summoned a taxi to take the pair to Oldham.
The next morning, the burnt-out remains of the Cortina were discovered. That same morning, a walker found the body of Milton Walker in (or close to) a disused quarry at Denshaw, high on Saddleworth Moor, some five miles from Oldham. His wrists and ankles had been bound with washing-line cord. He had been fatally shot through his forehead. Close by lay a spent .410 cartridge.
From the back of the Cortina was recovered a fairly old .410-calibre shotgun of Canadian manufacture. Its barrel had been shortened. Investigations established that the weapon had been bought by John Reed for a trifling sum a week before the murder from a pub acquaintance named Hickling, whose account of the deal was strenuously disputed at the trial but was obviously accepted by the jury. (John Reed had at first denied to the police any knowledge of the shotgun, and later pointed the finger at Hickling.)
At the Reeds’ home was found a hacksaw that had been purchased a short time before by Mrs Reed. Swarf recovered from it by a forensic scientist matched the metal on the barrel of the recovered shotgun. In witness statements to the police made by each of them in May 1972, they firmly denied any involvement in the death of Milton Walker.
So there, in sum, we had the locality, the chronology, the sightings of a man and a woman, their appearance at Doldrums Farm, and the weapon and the hacksaw. Taken together, they presented a formidable case against the two accused.
At the trial, evidence was also given by a fellow remand prisoner who was facing a charge of unlawful possession of a firearm. He said that John Reed had told him that he too was charged with an offence involving a gun, and that he had admitted that in his case he had pulled the trigger.
After the prosecution evidence had been heard, it was submitted on behalf of Shirley Reed that she had no case to answer, or (alternatively) that the evidence implicating her was so tenuous as to make it dangerous to leave the case to the jury. The judge rejected that submission. Both were convicted. Both applied for leave to appeal. In October 1973 John Reed withdrew his application. I believe that he then made a statement to the police acknowledging his guilt, but seeking to exculpate his wife.
I say ‘I believe’ because although that is my information, I never saw the statement. Tellingly, after the Appeal Court granted Shirley Reed leave to appeal and heard her full appeal, no such statement was referred to by her counsel before the court. Giving the judgement, Lord Justice Megaw said that the court was satisfied that on the totality of the evidence more than one person must have been involved in the murder. Concluding that the trial judge was correct to reject the submission that he should stop the case against Shirley Reed, they dismissed the appeal.
So much for a précis of the facts. Now I must return to the beginning of this account. There can be no doubt at all that if it was proved that John Reed shot Milton Walker through the head and was abetted in that action by his wife, then both intended to kill him. It was akin to an execution. Both were thus undoubtedly guilty of his murder. But what was the motive for that dreadful act? Although motive is irrelevant in proof of guilt, this case is one of the very few – if not perhaps the only one in my own experience – where motive remains highly elusive. That there was a motive cannot be in doubt, and it must have been a powerful one. This conundrum is in itself sufficient to merit the inclusion of the case in my collection.
The police theory was that on that date the two were set upon committing a serious crime in Halifax, or thereabouts, and that for the purpose, they equipped themselves with the cord and the shotgun. At some stage, they wanted to leave Halifax. They went to the taxi rank and got into Milton Walker’s Cortina. Then something went seriously wrong. The police believed that Walker, in the course of casual conversation, must have told the Reeds that he recognized them. Their nefarious purpose demanded their anonymity. That set in train his trussing, kidnapping and killing.
I have many doubts about this, not least because I remain unaware of any recorded serious crime committed in or near Halifax at the relevant time. It is true that there was some evidence that on the night concerned Reed may have had in his possession a suitcase or package, but this takes us no further. Moreover, I find it difficult to accept that, even if the Reeds were leaving the scene of a crime, they would choose to do so by taxi.
So, there it is. Something we may never determine, but something of real gravity and moment, prompted a fatal reaction in Milton Walker’s last taxi fares on that night. It is impossible, isn’t it, to imagine the sheer terror suffered by that poor man as he was driven, a bound and helpless prisoner in his own car, up to that bleak moorland. Did he know what fate shortly awaited him? That is why I say that this was a case of wickedness unlike almost any other in my encounters with evil.
With that, I shall leave the junior Bar behind me, and move on.
The Courts Act of 1971 abolished the old structure of Quarter Sessions, Assizes and Recorders, and replaced it with Crown Courts. Most Queen’s Bench judges and Circuit judges sit in those courts to try crime. But a large part of the work is undertaken by Recorders – part-time judges in practice at the Bar, and a few solicitors with the relevant experience. I applied to become a Recorder under the new system, and was appointed in 1972.
The office of Recorder is of some antiquity. Until 1971 it was the perquisite of any city to appoint a practising member of the Bar of sufficient seniority to be its Recorder. In that office, he sat for some few weeks a year in the Quarter Sessions, dealing with crimes above magistrates’ level, but excluding High Court work. In the counties, there were similar Quarter Sessions, presided over