Friend of strangled teen tells of f inal night out together
THE best friend of a teenager strangled to death more than 27 years a go yesterday told a trial of their last night out together on the eve of her killing. Lynn McCurdy relived the evening spent at a 50p disco with Elaine Doyle, 16, telling how they walked to a hamburger stall before going their separate ways at around midnight – hours before her body was found.
Mrs McCurdy, 44, told the High Court in Edinburgh Miss Doyle
‘It was just constant laughing’
turned down a lift with another friend’s brother and her last words to her friend before they parted were: ‘OK, I will see you tomorrow.’
By 10am next day, Monday, June 2, 1986, Mrs McCurdy was being questioned by police after Miss Doyle’s naked body was discovered yards from her home in Ardgowan Street, Greenock, Renfrewshire.
The girl’s worried family had earlier phoned to ask if she was with her. A post- mortem examination concluded Miss Doyle had been strangled, the court has been told.
As Mrs McCurdy described the friends’ final weekend together, the court was shown a photo of Miss Doyle, taken in a booth after a Saturday evening spent in a pool hall, where they used to hang out.
That night Miss Doyle stayed at her friend’s home in the town.
On Sunday afternoon, the girls met up again to go to a disco at the Celtic Club in Laird Street.
Mrs McCurdy said that during the evening they each drank two lagers.
Advocate depute John Scullion, prosecuting, asked the witness if she liked to dance. She told him: ‘I did. We always carried on. It was just constant laughing.’
Mrs McCurdy said four of them – including Miss Doyle – were dancing together. She did not remember being chatted up.
‘We were not really into boys as such,’ said Mrs McCurdy. ‘We were just friends with a lot of people.’
She told the trial that Miss Doyle would confide in her and, as far as she knew, she was a virgin.
John Docherty, 49, of Dunoon, Argyll, denies murder and claims that at the time he is alleged to have strangled Miss Doyle, he was at home with his parents, who are no longer alive.
Docherty has also lodged a special defence of incrimination claiming the culprit may be among a list of 41 names from police files.
Mrs McCurdy was questioned about a man, known to the youngsters as ‘Daft Willie’ Campbell who hung around the pool hall. Defence QC Donald Findlay produced a police statement in which she told officers: ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if he [Campbell] turned violent.’
Mrs McCurdy, whose maiden name was Ryan, was also shown a 1986 artist’s impression of a gingerhaired man and said it looked like Francis McCurdy, the man she later married, who has since died.
The trial continues.