THE COLD CASE SERIAL KILLER
Sinclair guilty of horrific World’s End murders after hunt that lasted 37 years Police fear he has killed EIGHT women as judge brands him a depraved monster
ANGUS Sinclair was yesterday convicted of killing two teenagers in the infamous World’s End murders, as police said he may be responsible for the deaths of six other young women. The 69-year-old was handed the longest jail sentence in Scottish legal history for the murders of Christine Eadie and Helen Scott in 1977.
Sinclair’s conviction was also the first prosecution brought since Scotland’s double jeopardy law was reformed.
Jailing him for life, with no chance of parole for 37 years, trial judge Lord Matthews told Sinclair: ‘You are a dangerous predator, who is capable of sinking to the depths of depravity.’
The jury at the High Court in Livingston heard for the first time yesterday of Sinclair’s appalling catalogue of crimes, including rape, murder and culpable homicide stretching back five decades.
His first victim was a seven-yearold girl, Catherine Reehill, whom he killed when he was 16.
In 1982, he was sentenced to life for a series of child rapes and indecent assaults. Then, in 2001, he received a second life sentence at the High Court in Glasgow after a cold case review led to his convic- tion for the 1978 murder of 17-yearold Mary Gallacher.
However, police now believe that he may be responsible for a string of other murders of young women in the late 1970s, including Frances Barker, Anna Kenny, Agnes Cooney and Hilda McAulay.
After a 24- day trial, Sinclair showed no emotion as he was found guilty by a unanimous verdict of the rape and murder of Christine and Helen, both 17, crimes he committed with his late brother-in-law Gordon Hamilton. The case became known as the World’s End murders after the pub in Edinburgh’s High Street where the girls were last seen alive on the night of October 15, 1977.
Christine’s body was found in the
afternoon of Sunday, October 16, at Gosford Bay, East Lothian. Helen’s body, naked from the waist down, was found as it was getting dark about four miles away in a field near Haddington.
It triggered one of the largest investigations in the history of Scottish policing which spanned four decades.
In 2007, Sinclair was brought before a court charged with the murders but was acquitted by Lord Clarke after the Crown had closed its case without leading crucial evidence relating to his DNA having been found on all five ligatures that bound and strangled Christine and Helen.
His defence counsel on that occasion, Edgar Prais, QC, made a submission of no case to answer, which was accepted by Lord Clarke.
The furore that resulted led directly to the abolition of one of the central tenets of Scottish Criminal Law, that an accused could not be tried twice for the same crime. This time there was to be no mistake. The jurors rejected entirely the account Sinclair gave from the witness box of consensual sex with both girls and not being present when they were killed.
His claims were branded ‘ludicrous’ by prosecutor, Lord Advocate Frank Mulholland, QC.
Sinclair claimed the teenagers had also consented to have sex with his brother-in-
‘The dreams they had turned to nightmares’
law Gordon Hamilton, who was with him that night.
The murderer said that Hamilton had then driven him to East Lothian to go fishing and must have killed the two girls when he was s upposedly t aking them home.
Hamilton died in 1996 and was cremated. The jury had been cautioned by Lord Matthews against the temptation to convict Sinclair simply because his brother-in-law was dead.
After the verdict, Lord Matthews paid tribute to the jurors, recognising they would never be able to forget the images of the girls’ beaten bodies, ‘subjected to an ordeal beyond comprehension and then left like carrion, exposed for all to see, with no dignity, even in death’.
Turning to Sinclair, he told him there had been no reason for Christine and Helen to think October 15, 1977, would be particularly eventful, but he added ‘fate had denied them their futures, the possibility of many such nights with friends and family, including perhaps children and grandchildren.’
The judge said of the two teenage victims: ‘ Whatever dreams they had, they turned into nightmares shortly after they left the World’s End Pub, the name of which has become synonymous with these notorious murders.
‘Little were they to know that they had the misfortune to be in the company of two men for whom the words evil and monster seem inadequate.
‘If they were not resting in peace before today, I hope they are now.’ He added: ‘ You have displayed not one ounce of remorse for these terrible deeds.
‘The evidence in this case as well as your record, details of which have now been revealed, shows that you are a dangerous predator, who is capable of sinking to the depths of depravity. ‘I do not intend to waste many words on you. You are well aware that the only sentence I can pass is one of life imprisonment.’ Ear li e r, the Lord Advocate, who played a key role in changing the law on double jeopardy, said t hat t he guilty verdict was thanks to the dedicated work of ‘ thousands of police officers, ordinary people, forensic scientists and the people of Scotland, who never allowed the case to be forgotten’.
Mr Mulholland took the unusual step in court of naming 11 detectives, some of them now dead, who had worked on the case and said that it was only because of meticulous work to recover and preserve clothes and samples from the crime scene that Sinclair had finally been brought to justice.
He added: ‘ There are no words whatsoever that I can say to the court on behalf of the families of both girls that would do justice to the loss felt by them of their beloved daughters and what happened to them, and the 37 years they have had to wait for justice.
‘On their behalf I would like to thank the ladies and gentlemen of the jury that have patiently listened to the evidence and considered it with such care i n delivering a verdict which is a huge relief to the families who are in court today to hear the verdict.’
The legal change which made yesterday’s verdict possible was hailed yesterday by the families as Christine and Helen’s ‘legacy’.
In a joint statement remembering their loved ones, they said justice had finally been done.
They praised the efforts of the police, prosecutors and forensic scientists who have toiled over many years.
Outside the court, Helen’s father, Morain Scott, 84, expressed his relief that Sinclair had finally been brought to justice and said he hoped the f amilies could now find closure.
But, flanked by his son Kevin, his granddaughter, Aimee, who turns 17 t omorrow, and Christine’s brother Hamilton Craig, he said that closure would never be easy for him.
He added: ‘There will never be closure for me because I saw Helen that night and I will never forget for as long as I live what they had done to my beautiful daughter.’
But he had made a promise to his dying wife always to fight on for justice to the end of his days, and he had kept that promise.