CRIMINAL COLD CASES-FUGITIVES FINALLY BROUGHT TO JUSTICE-9-HILDA MURRELL: COL...

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HILDA MURRELL: COLD CONSPIRACY?
THE CASE OF HILDA MURRELL WAS ONE THAT FOR MANY MONTHS OCCUPIED THE BRITISH PRESS, BECAUSE OF THE VARIOUS POLITICAL CONSPIRACY THEORIES THAT AROSE AROUND IT. THE STORY READS LIKE AN AGATHA CHRISTIE THRILLER: MURRELL, A WOMAN IN HER SEVENTIES, LIVED QUIETLY IN THE COUNTRYSIDE, GROWING ROSES AND CAMPAIGNING AGAINST NUCLEAR ENERGY, UNTIL HER SUDDEN, VIOLENT DEATH IN 1984.
The local police took her murder to be the result of a botched robbery, but those in the political world thought that more sinister elements had been at work. Controversy raged, until the case was reviewed almost twenty years later. This time, with the help of DNA profiling, it was finally solved.

Stabbed and left to die
Hilda Murrell was born in 1906, and grew up in Shrewsbury, England. After attending Shrewsbury High School, she went on to study at Newnham College, Cambridge, and later became a renowned rose grower. She also became a conservationist, working to protect the wildlife of her native Shropshire. As part of her aim to protect the natural environment, she campaigned against nuclear energy, fundamentally disagreeing with the British government's strategy to develop and expand its nuclear reactors.

In March 1984, Hilda Murrell's body was found dead in woodland near her home. There were several stab wounds on her body, but a post-mortem revealed that she had actually died from hypothermia. When local police visited her home, they found that an intruder had broken in. Their conclusion was that this was a robbery that had gone wrong. They thought that Murrell, aged seventy-eight, had put up a spirited fight and tried to stop the thief. It appeared that the thief had then forced her into her own car, driven her out to the woodlands, stabbed her, and left her to die.

A photograph of Hilda Murrell relaxing in the countryside – her murder was to spark conspiracy theories at high levels

British intelligence agents
However, after the murder, facts about Murrell's life emerged that made political activists and commentators suspicious. Shortly before her death, Murrell had been due to speak at an enquiry into the Sizewell reactor. Could the British government have been involved in the murder, to silence her and suppress crucial information? Not only this, but Murrell's nephew turned out to be a naval intelligence officer, Commander Robert Green, who had been involved in ordering the sinking of the Belgrano , an Argentinian ship, during the Falklands War in 1982. This had caused a major controversy in Britain at the time; many had opposed the war from the start, and the sinking of this ship, which caused the deaths of over three hundred sailors, caused enormous public protest – especially when it was claimed that the ship had been sailing away from the area of conflict. Could British intelligence agents have been searching her house to obtain sensitive documents belonging to Mr Green about the sinking of the Belgrano, and ended up murdering her as a cover-up?

The main proponent of the latter theory was the Labour MP Tam Dalyell. He was backed by the Liberal MP Paddy Ashdown, who called for a public inquiry into the matter. In response, Murrell's nephew Robert Green, now retired, argued that his aunt's death had been nothing to do with the sinking of the Belgrano. He pointed out that his aunt had been a prominent opponent of nuclear power, and as such would probably have been listed by the government as a subversive. The implication was that if there were any secrets to come out, they would be more likely to emerge from this line of enquiry.

Freemasons and occultists
The police, however, continued to discount these theories, contending that Hilda Murrell had met her death as the result of a straightforward break-in by a vicious burglar. Dalyell countered this by saying that there were inconsistencies in the police records, and that there was evidence at the scene of the crime to show that the intrusion was not a simple break-in but the work of intelligence officers. For example, the phone line was cut in such a way that callers could ring in but not out. (The police denied this, however, saying that the phone had simply been pulled out of the wall.) Undeterred, Dalyell cited a confidential source which had led him to make the allegations.

Dial 'M' for murder: the ripped telephone cord was at the centre of some of the many conspiracy theories surrounding the death of Hilda Murrell

Of course, the claim that Hilda Murrell had been brutally murdered by British intelligence officers, in the course of trying to suppress damaging evidence about the sinking of the Belgrano, electrified the media. If it could be proved, the Conservative government – now at a peak of popularity after winning the Falklands War – would be under serious threat. An avalanche of commentary followed, which included not only newspaper articles and parliamentary debates, but television documentaries, books, and even stage plays. More and more conspiracy theories arose: Murrell was a nuclear expert and was about to report terrible dangers at Sizewell; or that the investigation had been sabotaged by Freemasons in the police force; or even that occultists were to blame.

DNA evidence
None of this could be proved, however, and eventually interest in the case died away. It was not until twenty years later, in 2004, that the truth finally came to light. With advances in DNA profiling, the case was reopened and reviewed, and this time police were able to match up blood samples from the scene of the crime to those of a local labourer, Andrew George. George was charged with the kidnapping and murder of Hilda Murrell, and brought to trial. He was convicted and received a life sentence for the crime he had committed at the age of sixteen. After the trial, the police detective at the head of the investigation commented simply, 'I told you so'. This, therefore, was a case that was allowed to go cold when, if everyone had accepted the obvious explanation in the first place, the culprit could have been brought to justice straight away. And had it not been for the fact that Murrell's murder was turned into a political issue, to suit the agenda of the warring factions of the time, it might have been solved many years earlier.