Cracking cold cases

35 years after he brutally attacked a women on Wells Road, rapist Stephen McCafferty has been sentenced to more than four years in prison.

The cold case unit at Avon & Somerset Police have some 70 crimes, including a murder dating back to the 1940s, which they are constantly re-evaluating in the light of scientific advances.

Here the team explain what it takes to finally bring a criminal to justice.

TV dramas like Unforgotten and Waking the Dead have shone a new light on the work of cold case teams seeking justice for crimes which remain unsolved.

The Major Crime Review Team (MCRT) started out as a cold case unit ten years ago, and was set-up to see if advancements in DNA techniques and a fresh set of eyes could solve some of the force’s unsolved cases.

Based at police headquarters in Portishead, the team now focuses on re-investigating up to 40 unsolved rape cases dating back to the 1970s and almost 30 murder enquiries from the 1940s onwards.

The BBC award-winning drama Waking the Dead focuses on the work of the Met’s Cold Case Unit (Photo credit BBC)

The oldest unsolved case the team are still working on is the murder of Robert Parrington Jackson who was the manager of the Odeon on Union Street. The 32-year-old was shot in the head in his office on the 29 May 1946 – the case is still active with officers regularly reviewing the evidence for new leads.

However, Detective Sergeant Pete Frake explains that the unit is not just about solving cold cases: “We influence policies on how cases should be reviewed, we review standards of crime investigations and we examine current cases of rape, murder and homicide where there isn’t a suspect within a set time period, to see if we can come up with new leads.

“The main bulk of our work though is reviewing unsolved rape cases. We started off with around 70 cases but through the input of forensic experts and a crime scene manager, we’ve identified up to 40 cases where there’s a realistic prospect of taking the inquiry forward.

“We have to be realistic and our focus is generally on cases from the late 1970s onwards, as we have a better chance of identifying people involved in the original investigations, locating either victims or their families and of tracing an offender.”

DS Frake said advancements in DNA techniques are a ‘game-changer’ in terms of solving old cases.

“There’s recently been a jump in terms of DNA techniques and these advancements are developing all the time,” he said.

“Early investigations relied heavily on blood grouping, where the distance a drop of blood travelled down a piece of specialised paper would determine a person’s blood group.

Detective Sergeant Pete Frake says they never forget about a case

“We’re now much more advanced and up until July 2014 we were using a process called SGM+ to examine DNA, but now we’ve moved onto DNA 17, which is significantly better in obtaining profiles from very small deposits of DNA or from degraded exhibits.

“But it’s not just forensic evidence which can progress a case. Over time people can put names forward, in some cases prisoners want to give details of crimes themselves or repeat things they’ve heard and we’re also able to use modern policing methods to check and test alibis given by people of interest at the time.

“It’s about looking at things afresh – can we now place people back into an investigation who’d previously been discounted? Loyalties can change over time and consciences re-examined. We still do house-to-house enquiries and chase up people not spoken to at the time.”

Student Melanie Road was murdered in Bath in 1984

DS Zoe Niccolls, who has been on the MCRT for the past three years, explained how the team’s role in unsolved murder enquiries differs – with the case handed over to the Major Crime Investigation Team to progress when a strong suspect or DNA profile has been identified.

The team recently helped progress Operation Rhodium – the murder of 17-year-old Melanie Road in Bath in 1984. Following mass DNA testing 63-year-old Christopher Hampton from Staple Hill was arrested and charged with her murder. At a hearing at Bristol Crown Court last year he denied the charge and his trial is due to begin in May.

“We can’t get deeply involved in a job requiring intensive resourcing as we have to keep the review process momentum going,” DS Niccolls said.

“One of the main problems around cold case murder investigations is trying to locate all the exhibits and gather the evidence back in, as over the years they’ve been retained elsewhere.”

62-year-old Stephen McCafferty pleaded guilty to raping a 22-year-old woman on Wells Road, Knowle, in 1981

The conviction of Stephen McCafferty for the rape of a woman in Bristol in 1981 is a significant success for the unit.

DS Frake added: “It’s euphoric when you get a result. Not only have you solved something which hasn’t been solved before, but you’ve lived the job and know the victim as if you’ve met them.

“This isn’t a dusty old case file which no-one is interested in; it’s a crime which has affected a family (in the McCafferty case) for 35 years.

25-year-old Melanie Hall was last seen alive at a nightclub in Bath in 1996

One of the most high-profile cases the team are still working on is the murder of Melanie Hall.

Melanie disappeared from a nightclub in Bath in 1996. Her remains were found by the side of the M5 in 2009. She died from severe head injuries.

Meanie’s father Steve has urged people to help the police solve her murder: “People out there have been protecting someone they suspect was responsible for a missing person. Now they are protecting someone responsible for a particularly callous murder.

“It is time those people found the moral fibre to come forward and give some assistance to the police and bring this case to a close.”

Meanie’s case is one of 40 unsolved murder cases that the team are currently working on.

DS Franke says they will never give up the search: “We have the son of a murder victim who died in the 1940s still asking questions and showing an interest in the case. That is all the motivation you need.”

Article reproduced with kind permission of Avon and Somerset Police. The original version of the article can be found here.