Five Blitz criminals
1
In the summer of 1940, John Fulljames, a student at University College Oxford, opened fire with a rifle on fellow students. Tried for murder, Fulljames was described to the jury as having a “split-mind” in the fashion of Dr Jekyll. He was committed to Broadmoor where the authorities rejected the court’s finding of insanity.
2 Killing spree
Future gangster
Seventeen-year-old James Harvey was robbed and killed by a gang of youths in Elephant and Castle – a no-go area due to the blackout and the absence of police. The leader of the gang, 21-year-old
Jimmy Essex, was initially charged with murder. But he was eventually sentenced to just three years in prison for manslaughter, leading to an outcry from furious local residents. Essex went on to become a notorious London gangster.
3
In September 1940, Percy Clark was charged with attempting to murder his wife Irene in their family air raid shelter. Claiming that the bombs had driven him mad, he admitted punching her repeatedly in the head in front of their children. While Irene was recovering, her hospital ward was struck by a bomb and she was killed. Percy received permission to be released from custody to attend her funeral. Shell shock 4 Cowardly convicts Two brothers, Brian and Patrick
Williams, were serving members of the armed forces, who walked into a police station to admit a burglary they had committed before the war. They believed that criminal convictions would secure their release from the army and navy respectively. Brian was successful: he was convicted, sent to borstal for three months and discharged. However, Patrick was merely bound over, and returned to the Royal Navy. 5 Impersonating a pilot Twenty nine-year-old D’Arcy Wilson, a barman from Thornton Heath, was sentenced to two months’ hard labour for impersonating an RAF officer. Having deserted his wife and children, Wilson started wearing the officer’s uniform “to impress women”. He was apprehended after he gave a “sloppy salute” to a flight lieutenant. At the time, he was days away from bigamously marrying an 18-year-old girl who believed him to be a test pilot.