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I am still out of the country so am posting some shorter podcasts to keep the podcast ticking over. This one concerns a case from 1963 going on to 1967. The podcast is recorded in a studio that is soundproofed but visited by various cats and dogs and sometimes other creatures.

This podcast is set in Soho, Central London an area where I used to work and knew quite well back in the late 1980s.

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This is a short podcast just to post something while I am away. Daisy / Dorothy Wallis started a business in High Holborn, central London. She lived a quiet home life with her parents, one wonders who would have wished her harm ?

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Chloe and Josh Bashford lived at Newhaven with their four children. Their lives were ended by a family friend who killed them for no understandable reason and then claimed diminished responsibility.  The killer will be sentenced on 6 November 2025.

This podcast was recorded in one take with no editing with animals in the room.

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This podcast has been produced while I am away, recorded with a borrowed microphone and on a MacBook laptop with which I can't seem to upload any background music. Recorded in one take without editing this is the story off the BBC's first live broadcast from a haunted house. Dene/Dean manor, Meopham, Kent on 10 March 1936. 

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John Kealty travelled to Mexico to write a travel guide in the style of a Lonely Planet guide twenty years before they were a thing. It did not end well.

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This case is in living memory. Going back to 1974. Egon Von Bulow's parents came from South America, had him while in the UK, then left him when they went back home. Not an ideal start for him. He grew up  anti authoritarian. He shot three policemen and committed other crimes after seemingly losing control during July 1974. He could be living near you today.

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This case happened in Egypt in 1950, so just about in Living memory. It was a difficult time for British-Egyptian relations. When three soldiers were involved in a murder and tried by a British Court Martial, all politicians tried not to get involved as it was easier for all involved to bury an awkward problem. 

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Two recent tragic killings from West Sussex. Both preventable, both the result partly of council cuts. These stories are told in one take in lo-fi. Here are the end stories of Stephanie Marie and Nimroy Hendricks, their lives ending just as they were beginning.

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The story of Reverend Davidson, the vicar of Stiffkey dominated the newspapers in the early 1930s. This is the story.

The Lion and Albert, By  Stanley Holloway was a comic monologue inspired by actual events they had heard about  in 1932. The events in this podcast happened in 1937. Nevertheless, I have put the lyrics here for anyone unfamiliar with the verse.

There's a famous seaside place called Blackpool
That's noted for fresh air and fun
And Mr. and Mrs. Ramsbottom
Went there with young Albert, their son
A grand little lad were young Albert
All dressed in his best, quite a swell
With a stick with an horse's head handle
The finest that Woolworth's could sell
They didn't think much to the ocean
The waves they were piddlin' and small
There was no wrecks and nobody drowneded
'Fact, nothin' to laugh at at all!
So, seeking for further amusement
They paid, and went into the zoo
Where they'd lions and tigers and camels
And old ale and sandwiches, too
There were one great big lion called Wallace
His nose was all covered with scars
He lay in a somnolent posture
With the side of 'is face on the bars
Now Albert had heard about lions
How they was ferocious and wild
To see Wallace lyin' so peaceful
Well it didn't seem right to the child
So straightway the brave little feller
Not showin' a morsel of fear
Took 'is stick with the horse's head handle
And shoved it in Wallace's ear
You could see that the lion didn't like it
For givin' a kind of a roll
He pulled Albert inside the cage with him
And swallowed the little lad whole!
Then Pa, who had seen the occurrence
And didn't know what to do next
Said "Mother, yon lion's ate Albert!"
And Mother said "Ee, I am vexed"
Then Mr. and Mrs. Ramsbottom, quite rightly
When all is said and done
Complained to the animal keeper
That the lion had eaten their son
The keeper was quite nice about it
He said "What a nasty mishap
Are you sure that it's your boy he's eaten?"
Pa said, "Am I sure? There's his cap!"
The manager had to be sent for
He came and he said "What's to-do?"
Pa said "Yon lion's ate Albert
And him in his Sunday clothes, too!"
Then Mother said "Right's right, young feller-
I think it's a shame and a sin
For a lion to go and eat Albert
And after we paid to come in"
The manager wanted no trouble
He took out his purse right away
Sayin' "How much to settle the matter?"
Pa says "What do you usually pay?"
But Mother had turned a bit awkward
When she thought where her Albert had gone
She said "No, someone's got to be summonsed!"
So that was decided upon
Then off they went to the police station
In front of the Magistrate chap
They told him what happened to Albert
And proved it by showing his cap
The Magistrate gave his opinion
That no one was really to blame
And he said that he hoped the Ramsbottoms
Would have further sons to their name
At that Mother got proper blazin'
"And thank you, sir, kindly, " said she-
"What, waste all our lives raisin' children
To feed ruddy lions? Not me!"