The Six O'Clock Knock: True Crime Experiences Simon Ford

Thomas Parker’s mother doted on her little boy. This spoilt brat grew up to be a workshy, wife-beating drunk. And he repaid his parents by turning a shotgun on them.

Parker’s father survived with slight injuries. But his mother lingered for weeks with a festering head wound.

The year was 1864. Elizabeth Parker fell into a coma and died in April. Four months later, her son also met his maker — at the end of a rope in front of 10,000 citizens.

Thomas Parker was the last person to be hanged in public at Nottingham. This is his story.

With contributions from Emmaline Severn, a distant relative of Elizabeth Parker, and Paul Mann QC.

The traditional folk songs in this episode are performed by Catherine Earnshaw and Keith Clouston.

“The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood” is a traditional tune with lyrics by Richard and Mimi Fariña.

“Blue Bleezin’ Blind Drunk” also traditional with the last verse written by Linda Thompson.

“False, False” is a traditional Scottish song collected in 1962 by Ewan McColl and Peggy Seeger.

More on Keith Clouston here: www.storywheelmusic.co.uk

More on Catherine Earnshaw here https://www.catherineearnshawmusic.com/

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Michael Benneman Sams was one of life’s losers, a little man with big, bad ideas. He snatched his victims and held them to ransom locked in a wheelie bin. Birmingham estate agent Stephanie Slater walked free when her employers paid £50,000. Julie Dart, a teenager from Leeds, wasn’t so lucky. She escaped from the wheelie bin, triggering Sams’s silent alarm. He murdered her before she could break out of his workshop in Newark, Nottinghamshire, and dumped her body in a field in Lincolnshire. But the police caught up with Sams. His ex-wife and son had long memories. When they recognized him on BBC Crimewatch they were quick to turn him in. Sams, now 79, will die in prison.

This podcast features an exclusive interview with Senior Investigating Officer, Detective Chief Superintendent (retired) Bob Taylor of West Yorkshire Police.

In the late nineteenth century, a series of murders, some unsolved, between London and Brighton shocked Victorian Britain. We take a deep dive into these strange cases and examine some of the curious characters and suspects involved in Murder on the Brighton Line.

We have a small favour to ask. The Six O'clock Knock is self-funded and we're all volunteers. We'd like to say a massive 'thank you' to our patrons who've helped us keep going over the last year. We couldn't make podcasts to the high standard you've come to expect without your contributions.

If you'd like to chip in you can find us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/sixknock. For the price of coffee and a sticky bun you get access to bonus content, and the satisfaction of knowing you're helping us to keep digging and turning over those stones!

TRANSCRIPT

[Music] this podcast contains descriptions of death and violence that some listeners may find upsetting [Music] hello and welcome to the six o'clock knock the true crime podcast that takes a fresh look at murder i'm jack morrell i served as a police officer from 1985 to 2015. my last 12 years in the job was spent exclusively dealing with homicides as a detective sergeant and i'm simon ford a journalist and writer i have years of experience in radio and broadcasting i still have a nose for a good story and jack is still keen to apply his copper's brain to cases whether solved or not that's right and this episode will focus on murder on the railway of course we touched on the railways a few episodes back didn't we the frederick deming case serial swindler and bigamist with a parshan for murdering his wives yes indeed he used the opportunity to travel that steam trains and steamships gave 19th century society he traveled extensively and he used a different name in every town the victorian era meant that travel was so much easier and quicker the railways had revolutionized transport replacing those horse-drawn stage coaches that up to then were the quickest way to get from one town to another right mass travel had arrived passengers were less conspicuous traveling in greater numbers the commute had arrived and with it the travelling criminal yeah we're looking at this subject after someone suggested a particular case known as the murder on the brighton line but when we started digging we found two others on the same stretch of railway line between london and brighton well as your fellow journalist the late sir harry evans said keep digging the truth is down there somewhere wow it's not often i mentioned in the same breath as the late great harry evans so um thanks for that mate and in terms of the truth yes it certainly is so we're going to dig into all those grisly crimes and trust me they are grisly jack did you ever deal with any railway cases well not really because railways in the uk have their own police the british transport police or btp we occasionally asked them for information or made inquiries relating to people moving through railway premises but to be honest we really saw btp officers at our police stations well the british transport police force has its roots very early in the history of british policing the earliest record of railway police predates the formation of the metropolitan police usually recognized as the first modern police force in england and wales by at least four years no one knows just how many individual railway dock and canal police forces existed in the 19th century but they probably numbered over a hundred largely unsung and in many cases unremembered i suppose a modern equivalent would be private security firms in the united states safeguarding the interests and assets of corporations these early forces combined to form the modern btp we looked at the recent crime figures for the btp there was a significant rise in all crimes of 12 percent in 2019 adrian hanstock the deputy chief...

This episode is dedicated to the memory of Gordon Henry.

Donald Neilson, the so-called 'Black Panther', was tried at Oxford Crown Court in the summer of 1976. He was charged with four murders, as well as kidnapping, attempted murder, GBH, robbery and firearms offences. Prosecutors were unable to charge him with the murder of Gerald Smith because the security guard survived longer than a year and a day after Neilson shot him.

Defending Neilson, Gilbert Gray QC, contended that Lesley Whittle, the Black Panther's teenage hostage, died as the result of an accident in captivity. Nevertheless, a jury found Neilson guilty of her abduction and murder, for which he was given a life sentence. Three weeks later he was convicted of the murders of two postmasters and the husband of a postmistress.

Between September 1967 and November 1974, a series of raids on sub-post offices in the English Midlands were linked by a common modus operandi, or MO Striking between three and four o’clock in the morning. Boring a hole in a window frame just big enough for him to reach the catch.
Increasing levels of violence, would see this burglar become a killer and then an abductor of a young woman that he thought was the heir to a fortune. His name was Donald Neilson: 'The Black Panther'.

In this episode, we take a look back at the first 12 months of the Six O'Clock Knock, and the first 12 episodes of our series, from Victorian bigamists to fetish murderers, our first year has had the lot!