“We would like to thank DCS Steve Wilkins, his team and all the officers over the years. The family of Peter and Gwenda, anyone else touched by John Cooper’s violence and all the people of South West Wales owe a debt of gratitude to these officers. Because of their tenacity, dedication and hard work their communities will be that much safer after today. We now begin the task of getting on with the rest of our lives. Today’s verdict gives us justice, but there is no sentence the courts could impose that could ever give us recompense for what we have lost and the impact the loss of Peter and Gwenda will have on the rest of our lives. We therefore ask the media to respect our privacy. There will be no further statements from any member of the Dixon family after today.”
It was now my turn and there was one message I wanted to give. “Whilst attending court on remand John William Cooper shouted to the community not to judge until after the trial. Over the last nine weeks, twelve ordinary people from the same community have listened to all of the evidence in this case and have found him unanimously guilty of all charges; I believe that is the right decision.”
The press and TV were satisfied. They had got their interviews and were now busy filing copy and broadcasting the news of Cooper’s conviction. I just wanted to go home and be with my family. I slowly walked back to my car and sat in the driver’s seat for fifteen minutes just trying to take it all in. We had done it, we had convicted the most notorious killer in Welsh history and it felt fantastic. My phone started to ping like a demented microwave as message after message came in, but one stood out, an email from someone I had never met. It simply said, “Thank you. I have not walked the coastal path since the terrible murders. This weekend I will walk it again for the first time in over twenty years. God bless team OTTAWA.” As I drove home the words of the Judge, Cooper and of the Dixon family were ringing in my ears. It was the end of a long and difficult journey but it was one that I would never, ever forget.
The Scoveston Park Murders
IN THE DYING DAYS of 1985, Pembrokeshire would witness a crime that triggered the extraordinary events that came to dominate my career and the lives of dozens of people who were drawn into this chilling case. The chain of events probably began with the striking of a single match.
It was a cold, wet, and windy night as Anna McEwan and Lorraine Brown drove home chatting about their plans for Christmas. At 11 p.m. they passed through Steynton on the outskirts of Milford Haven and approached an area known locally as Scoveston Park. Heavy smoke was drifting across the fields and over the carriageway, adding to the gloom. It rolled across the hedgerows from a small wooded area, set back from the main road. Local knowledge told them it was coming from the direction of Scoveston Park Farm, the home of brother and sister, Richard and Helen Thomas.
The pair were so concerned that they turned off the main road and drove down the narrow lane towards the farm buildings. It soon became clear that the Georgian farmhouse was well alight. The flames were already extending through the three-storey building and into the roof space. They could do little except raise the alarm. Minutes later the area was illuminated by blue flashing lights. It was obvious to the emergency crews that nobody could have survived such a ferocious fire. Through the charred timbers fire officers could see a body on the first floor half landing and their priority now was to recover it. At ten past midnight on 23 December, the body of a man believed to be that of Richard James Skeel Thomas was brought out and taken to the mortuary. A suspicious wound was evident on the right hand side of his lower abdomen. One of the senior officers at the scene, Chief Inspector Chris James, requested an x-ray of the body. It was discovered that the wound contained lead shot. This changed everything. DCI James quickly informed the Head of CID, Detective Chief Superintendent David Davies and then spoke to Superintendent Don Evans at the scene. Richard had been shot and every effort had to be made to preserve evidence.
Having brought the inferno under control members of the fire service began to search the debris for a second body, that of Helen Thomas. The fire had caused extensive damage and the wooden floors had burnt through, collapsing onto the ground floor. Sure enough, while searching there a second body was found. It was very badly burnt and in a poor condition but it was indeed the body of Helen Thomas. Fire officers at the scene also noticed a strong smell of paraffin or other accelerant in the house. Had the fire been set deliberately?
The body of Helen Thomas was recovered and the scene preserved. Again x-ray examinations confirmed that she too had been shot; lead particles were discovered in the base of what remained of her skull. The discussion between DCI James and DCS Davies was simple: preserve the scene, inform the coroner and contact the Home Office Pathologist. He needed to know what had been found and get to the scene as soon as possible. He arrived at 8 a.m. the following morning. Dr O.G. Williams was well known to the officers and a highly respected pathologist. His initial assessment was that of a murder and suicide with the fire being set to finish the job. The likelihood of a gang of dangerous criminals attacking Richard and Helen Thomas was totally out of context with the area and was not the kind of crime that happened locally. An examination of the bodies and a search of the scene were likely to provide the clues to what had gone on between the brother and sister on that fateful night.
Richard and Helen Thomas were regarded locally as the ‘landed gentry’, and owned a considerable amount of land and property in addition to Scoveston Park Farm. Richard also owned property at nearby Norton Farm and Scoveston Grove. He actively worked the land at Norton Farm, but the house to the farm was unoccupied. Richard was a quiet and reserved person who had followed in his late father’s farming footsteps. His sister, Helen Thomas was also quiet and reserved and took over the responsibilities of the house following their mother’s death in 1975. She also owned two farms at Great Harmeston and Beaconing, and their combined wealth was estimated to be in excess of £700,000. Even in the early stage of the investigation there were rumours of a rift between them. It was believed that Helen wished to spend money on improving their properties, whilst Richard was more cautious and intent on farming the land. Indeed the outward view of Scoveston Park was of an impressive country mansion; in fact most of the property was in a poor state of repair, adding to the rumour and speculation.
Both post-mortems were carried out at Withybush Hospital Haverfordwest. Richard had a gunshot wound to the right side of his lower abdomen. The wound contained a complete column of a 12-bore cartridge containing an original loading of UK number five shot. The wadding was of compressed wood fibre that experts would identify the shot as coming from an Eley cartridge containing a Grand Prix loading. Although his body was badly burned some of his lower clothing remained intact. One of his brown leather shoes was missing, though his sock was relatively untouched by the intense fire.
Helen’s body had been recovered from the debris on the ground floor room to the right of the entrance hall. She had apparently fallen through the ceiling from the bedroom above as she was found sandwiched between layers of debris. She was also dressed in her day clothes, as a jumper and underwear could be defined. Beneath her body were items of bed linen and part of a foam mattress. Entangled in the body was a length of black-knotted rope. Around her neck was a heavily blood stained shirt with the sleeves knotted tightly. As the examinations continued the murder and suicide scenario became less likely. The rope and shirt suggested that Helen had been tied up, gagged or blindfolded in a bungled robbery.
If a possible murder weapon could be recovered it would provide crucial evidence to add weight to the murder/suicide theory. On Christmas Eve a search of the building for a shotgun had proved negative and the chilling reality of the situation was all too clear to DCS Davies. He was faced with a cold, callous double murder and as the Senior Investigating Officer he was the man who would have to lead the investigation. The crime was totally out of character for the area and he knew it wasn’t going to be easy. As Christmas Day came there was little cheer in the local community or for
the officers who found themselves drafted on to the grisly case.
North Pembrokeshire is dominated by spectacular coastline and countryside and the main source of income is from tourism and farming. The North and South of the county are divided by the Milford Haven Waterway, which also represents a major source of employment. The Dyfed Powys Police area experienced on average two murders a year but they were predominantly domestic in their background. The core work was low level, volume crime and it had one of the lowest crime rates in the UK. Fewer than 1,200 officers police an area covering two-thirds of Wales. It was a safe and idyllic place to live but now the Force faced possibly one of the biggest and most complex investigations in its history.
An incident room was set up at Milford Haven Police Station using a paper-based system. Paper-based incident rooms were dominated by racks of files and rotating card index carousels. Incident room staff, known as indexers, would transfer and cross reference data onto the cards. These cards were then placed in various categories agreed by the incident room staff. As a card was filled, another would be sellotaped to it and so the index would build up. Any large and protracted investigation will generate a mass of statements, reports, information, evidence and intelligence all of which needs to be assessed, recorded and indexed to allow it to be searched for clues. This information will generate actions that require officers to conduct enquiries, in order to verify the information. When completed, the action and associated documents are returned to the incident room where the process starts again.
As a Senior Investigating Officer, or SIO, you always feel the incident room is playing catch-up and it is important that it is properly resourced with a day and night shift in the early stages to try to keep pace with a fast moving investigation. The incident room is only as good as its staff; it is certainly not a place to hide the weak and lazy and requires a good office manager with a strong detective background. DCS Davies knew this and ensured he had a good team for the challenges ahead.
Any investigation requires strong leadership; the SIO is the principle decision maker and sets policy and the direction of the investigation. Because of the intense media coverage the eyes of the nation were on this seemingly sleepy little force and decisions made by the SIO and his team were likely to be closely scrutinised and picked over by the media.
Search teams and scenes of crime officers, together with forensic experts, began the painstaking process of searching the scene and surrounding land and outbuildings. Large metal grilles were set up outside the burnt out house and its contents were shovelled into them and searched by hand. In particular they were looking for a murder weapon and spent cartridges. They were helped in this arduous task by large industrial magnets, but despite a detailed fingertip search only live ammunition was found, and an empty gun cupboard. The killer had taken away any firearms kept in the house together with the spent cartridges and set the building on fire to cover his tracks. This demonstrated a high level of forensic awareness.
On Boxing Day officers were conducting a search of a small outbuilding at the rear of the house when they discovered a pool of blood. Also found were two lead cartridge pellets in plasterboard and one blood stained pellet embedded in the wall. Two cartridge waddings and a button were recovered; the button was later matched to buttons on the shirt Richard Thomas was wearing. Again there were no spent cartridges at this scene. What was puzzling was that Richard’s body had been found inside the house on the stairs lying on top of a blanket with what appeared to be bailing twine entangled in it. Why was there blood in the outbuilding?
Richard’s red Rover car was found in an open garage at the rear of the building. Witnesses had seen him driving it on the day of the murders. The door was open and the keys were missing. Had Richard returned to Scoveston having been away during the day, leaving his sister alone and disturbed the offender? Had a struggle taken place in which Richard was shot? Was it likely that he had been shot outside and then dragged into the main building? On New Year’s Eve the Forensic Science Laboratory initially told the SIO that the blood in the outhouse was not Richard Thomas’. Later they changed their conclusion to confirm it was unlikely to be anyone else’s.
On 2 January 1986 pathologist O.G. Williams re-examined the bodies. It was at this point he discovered what he described as a ‘raking shot’ to the left side of Richard’s head. An x-ray revealed that only twenty per cent of the shot remained in the wound, confirming that the blast had only glanced him. The pellets recovered from Richard were of UK No.5 shot, whilst those recovered from Helen were of UK No.4. This would later prove to be significant.
Now that the post-mortem results and initial forensic findings were in, DCS Davies was troubled by the motive for this callous and cold-blooded double murder. Was the killer local or did a team of travelling criminals target the location in the knowledge that Richard Thomas was wealthy? Due to the damage to the house it was impossible to say what, if anything, was missing from the house other than shotguns. Why kill them if they could not recognise their attackers? Many aspects of the crime did not make sense. If it was a robbery that had gone wrong why was Richard found with £75 in his jacket pocket? There was a local rumour that in the past Richard had disturbed intruders on his land and threatened them with a shotgun. He had also told one of his farm labourers that he had set up an early warning system if they returned.
This was by now the largest enquiry in the history of Dyfed-Powys Police. Vast amounts of information came into the incident room, and teams of detectives flooded the area following up actions to trace and eliminate persons of interest and establish the movements of Richard and Helen Thomas leading up to the murders. From these enquiries it was established that Richard had been seen on a number of locations in the area and had certainly visited nearby Norton Farm. Of great interest were a number of sightings of a Land Rover vehicle which appeared to be following Richard’s vehicle. The driver was described as a bearded fat man: was this Richard’s killer stalking him before he attacked? In all, nine witnesses reported seeing the Land Rover on a stretch of road between the Horse and Jockey Public House and Sentry Cross just a short distance from Scoveston Park between 11.30 a.m. and 11.55 p.m. on 22 December.
Another witness who passed the scene mentioned a vehicle parked opposite the entrance to Scoveston Park. They described it as a saloon car, probably a Ford Cortina Mark IV. Efforts were made to trace all Land Rover and Ford Cortina owners in the area, a massive and resource intensive task. All houses and farms were visited and the occupants spoken to. It was important to establish their knowledge of the victims, together with their own movements on the night. Road checks were set up at which all vehicles were stopped and the occupants questioned as to their knowledge of the victims or whether they had ever met them or visited Scoveston Park. A substantial reward of £25,000 was offered for information about the murders; it also included a request for information regarding the blue Ford Cortina and Land Rover together with the ‘fat man’ who was driving it. It all came to nothing.
DCS Davies needed a break and he was about to get it. On 28 January he received a call from the Forensic Science Laboratory informing him that an anal swab taken from Richard Thomas contained semen and it must have been there around the time of his death. Because DNA technology was very much in its infancy, the scientist could give little more detail other than the blood grouping.
This information together with the witness accounts placing Richard’s vehicle in proximity to the Land Rover and description of the ‘fat man’ driver presented a real line of enquiry to the SIO. Did a gay lover, who then tried to cover his tracks by killing Helen and setting fire to the house, murder Richard? Was Richard actually killed at Scoveston Park? One of his shoes was missing and was never found. The ‘fat man’ lead could also fit in with other information that Richard had visited a local cinema to watch pornographic movies in the company of such a man. Extensive enquiries were made in the local gay community in an attempt to secure information about Richard and his priv
ate life. Very little was known about Richard and Helen, though it was clear that neither had a partner. After months of investigation and appeals there was not a shred of evidence that Richard had indeed had a gay lover, or was in fact gay.
The police had acted on dozens of tip-offs, including a suggestion that the killer had been wounded and was hiding in a housing estate in the Swansea area. All appeared to be credible but came to nothing. Ten months into the investigation over 70,000 documents, reports, index cards and statements had been entered into the incident room. More than one hundred people had been traced, interviewed and eliminated. Eight people were actually arrested; of whom six were eliminated. The remaining two men were not eliminated, but there was no evidence to suggest they were connected to the murders.
By the spring of 1986 the team had worked tirelessly for months on end with little reward. DCS Davies did not favour the theory that a gay lover had killed Richard despite some forensic evidence to support this hypothesis. He was more inclined to believe it was a bungled robbery on a lone female by criminals from outside the area who had killed Richard when he had disturbed them; Helen, as witness to this, simply had to die. Whatever the truth, they were no closer to finding the answers.
The Coastal Path Murders
TIM DIXON ARRIVED AT Birmingham airport to pick up his 18 year-old sister Julie, who was returning from a holiday in Cyprus. It was 3 July 1989 and their next stop was to go to Witney in Oxfordshire, the home of their parents Peter and Gwenda. They were looking forward to a family get together as their parents had been on their annual summer holiday to the beautiful coastal village of Little Haven in North Pembrokeshire, a place they loved and had visited for the past fifteen years. To the children’s surprise the house was empty and there was no sign that their parents had returned from Wales. More worrying was the fact that Peter had not gone back to work as expected.
The Pembrokeshire Murders: Catching the Bullseye Killer Page 2