Innocents. Jonathan Rose

       it negated much of the investigation which had taken place as to the movement of vehicles in the lay-by, by dramatically altering the possible times at which the child could have been brought to the lay-by.

      In the event, the girls, naturally, were re-interviewed and they completely retracted their previous statements. Cooper said that she thought she had seen a girl with Bay City Rollers socks, but knew it was not Lesley. Jones admitted the story was totally false, but neither she nor Cooper would ever say why they had invented their story. The phenomenon of children making up false accounts with no apparent motive save, perhaps, to involve themselves in the ‘excitement’ is further illustrated by three young boys, Philip Hinchcliffe, Mark Kirkham and Andrew Fletcher, who said that they had spoken to Lesley near to the Spar shop at 2.30 p.m., and that she had put her tongue out at them. The boys later admitted that they had made this story up.

      The false and inaccurate reports were not restricted to the estate or to the Sunday. The incident room received a number of calls from the Greater Manchester and Yorkshire areas, with callers’ memories having been triggered by photographs of Lesley released to and published by the media. There were sightings of Lesley, or at least lone little girls fitting Lesley’s description, in vehicles, taxis or on the street accompanied by men, and these sightings were believed (usually genuinely) by the callers to be suspicious. Reports were even received of sightings of Lesley up until the Tuesday night. The fact that Lesley wore the distinctive Bay City Rollers socks became more of a hindrance than a help, since the group was one of the most popular of 1975, and was adored, in particular, by girls in the 10 to 15 age group. The socks featured in many of the calls. Each sighting had to be investigated: it was simply not possible, not safe, to overlook any call, and so Dibb was obliged to place officers on each call, to check and, where possible, eliminate the sightings. This increased the burden on police resources and enabled the ‘trail’ from the genuine sightings and the body of Lesley, to the true killer, to go cold.

      Another approach taken by the police in their interviews was to ask whether the interviewee had any suspicions as to family members, neighbours, relatives, friends or acquaintances. Any such suspicions would be pursued with total confidentiality as to the source of the information. Dibb’s need to glean information about any suspicious event in the area on or around 5 October made this an appropriate approach. He was particularly concerned where there were incidents of drivers of vehicles accosting women or children or attempting to entice them into cars, or where there had been minor sexual offences which had not been reported to the police, and he was particularly interested in any such case where a knife had been brandished. Results were forthcoming. In scenes reminiscent of Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia, people did ‘inform’ on individuals with whom they were acquainted, simply because of suspicions concerning their behaviour, lifestyle, or previous sexual behaviour. The number of these reports was such as to make the investigating officers wonder how so many incidents could take place in so small a geographical area.

      There were numerous reports of men in vehicles following children and lone women. A yellow van, a bronze Cortina, a light-coloured Vauxhall Viva and a light blue-green GPO-type van figured prominently in these reports. The first two vehicles were traced and eliminated (elimination being achieved by forensic examination of the vehicles) but the Viva and the GPO-type van were never traced. None of these reports, however, involved the driver attempting to force the person accosted into the van, they merely involved offers of lifts. There were reports of an indecent exposure by a driver, and even of a man masturbating, but in each case some element of the report enabled elimination to take place.

      Local schoolteachers reported to the police a man who had been disturbed on several occasions taking photographs of children in school playgrounds. When confronted he spoke English with a foreign accent, and purported to be a Canadian on holiday. He was 35 to 40 years old, six foot two, slim build with collar-length sandy hair. It is not believed that he was ever traced.

      Thus the enquiry team was supplied with a steady stream of suspects. Just as any purported sighting of Lesley had to be investigated, just as any suspicious incidents had to be compared to what was then known, just as in all these cases there were mistakes, errors and complete fabrications, so too did the police have to investigate and eliminate any individual at whom the finger of suspicion had been pointed. In some cases this was difficult, when individuals were unable to provide information as to their movements that could be corroborated: how could a single man, living alone, ‘prove’ that he had spent Sunday, 5 October alone at home? In many cases, arrests were necessary to enable clothing and vehicles to be subjected to forensic examination, and this was particularly so where the index of suspicion was raised by previous convictions, type of vehicle or current unusual behaviour.

      Professor Gee, having considered the results of his findings more carefully, contacted Dibb and Holland with information which was to open up a further avenue of investigation. He had come to the conclusion that the killer could have cut his own hand in the attack. The knife had struck underlying bones with force, and this might have caused his hand to slide off the handle on to the blade. Thus the enquiry team carried out checks with local hospitals, for men attending for treatment for any such injury. Professor Gee also thought that the killer’s clothing might have been stained with either his or Lesley’s blood. Dibb therefore circulated surrounding police forces requesting enquiries be made of dry cleaners, a method which at one time was frequently utilised in murder enquiries.

      Ronald Outteridge was also keeping the police abreast of his investigations, although, as yet, he had little to offer by way of assistance. He had found no traces of foreign blood on Lesley’s clothing and the semen staining was of insufficient quantity to enable blood grouping to take place. He had, however, found traces of white powder on the clothing, and this was found to contain maize starch, which is an ingredient of wallpaper paste. The investigating team had been informed that workmen employed on local housing renovation were associating with and befriending local schoolgirls, who would visit the redevelopment site. All of these men were therefore interviewed, as were the employees of a local firm connected with painting and decorating.

      As it was believed that the killer could have committed sexual offences previously, it was necessary for police records in surrounding areas to be searched for ‘MO Suspects’, that is persons who had committed offences with a modus operandi similar to that in the instant case. A similar search went on where the police held records of unsolved sexual offences or violence against children. Local mental hospitals and psychiatric units were checked for absconders and people on weekend release. ‘Normal people would not do this’ is such a common expression in the face of the killing of a child, that somehow great comfort is taken from the assertion that the killer must be mentally ill. It is an untrue proposition, and, like many propositions in the Molseed case, was to prove unhelpful. All that the sweeps and searches and enquiries achieved was an increase in the number of persons to be eliminated and in extra work for the police.

      The senior officers held private meetings on a regular basis to assess progress and evaluate the direction being taken and what new lines were developing. From these private debates emerged the view that the killer, whether as a result of being injured in the attack or disturbed by the realisation of what he had done, had stayed off work, not attended school or college, or even moved away from his home temporarily, perhaps even moved out of the area. They also considered that local traders, ice-cream men, milkmen or a person who had worked at or near Lesley’s home could have befriended Lesley, as could taxi and minibus drivers who were involved in taking Lesley and her school friends to their special school.

      More interviews, more eliminations, more overstretched resources subjected to further strain, but nothing was discovered. For all the manhours invested in the case, for all Dibb’s wish that no one be eliminated from the enquiry until the last piece of information had been drained from them and for all his intention to trace everyone who had seen Lesley on her last errand, Jack Dibb failed in his objectives. He was never able to trace a single witness who saw the abduction of Lesley that October day.

      At the same time as the net of enquiry was swept across large sections of the community, those responsible for the investigation also turned their attentions to the central figures, Lesley Molseed’s family. Lesley may have been known to many as a happy and friendly child, who would