Edwin Albert Arthur Bush (1940 – 6 July 1961) was the first criminal in Britain to be caught through the use of the
Identikit facial composite system, the second to last
executed in
London and the last to be hanged at
Pentonville Prison.
Early life
Bush was born to an English woman and an Asian father and was taken into care at age 12 after his living conditions were deemed to be being horrific. He later embarked on a life of crime and ended up in
Borstal, before the age of 18. By 20, he was living in the slums of
Honor Oak, in
South East London.
Murder
On March 3, 1961 Elsie May Batten, a 59-year-old assistant in an
antique shop in
Cecil Court off
Charing Cross Road
Charing Cross Road is a street in central London running immediately north of St Martin-in-the-Fields to St Giles Circus (the intersection with Oxford Street) and then becomes Tottenham Court Road. It leads from the north in the direction of ...
in London was found stabbed to death with an antique
dagger and an ornamental dress sword had been stolen. Her body was discovered by the shop owner Louis Meier who helped Detectives' try new technology, Identikit that used a standardised set of facial features to help a witness build a picture of a suspect. During Meiers' interview, an image of a suspicious man who had gone into the shop two days before Elsie's killing to admire the sword was constructed. Another witness, who had seen a man and his blond girlfriend try to sell a sword the same day as the murder, also used Identikit, so both facial likenesses from the two independent witnesses were printed in local newspapers and distributed to local police officers.
Arrest
On March 16 Bush and his 17-year-old blond girlfriend Janet, were in Central London, having recently sold the ornamental dress sword. As they walked up
Old Compton Street PC Arthur Cole, spotted the couple looking in a shop window and recognised Bush from the Identikit images. Bush was arrested and interviewed by police, he claimed innocence but his palm print was found on the dagger his
fingerprints on the sword and a
shoeprint
Footprints are the impressions or images left behind by a person walking or running. Hoofprints and pawprints are those left by animals with hooves or paws rather than feet, while "shoeprints" is the specific term for prints made by shoes. ...
at the scene of the murder matched the shoes he was wearing. He was then picked out in an identity parade by a man he had attempted to sell the sword to. Bush wrote a full statement admitting the murder and insisting his girlfriend had nothing to do with it. He said in his statement ''"I am sorry I done it I don't know what came over me. Speaking personally the world is better off without me."''
Trial and execution
Bush stood trial at the
Old Bailey
The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, commonly referred to as the Old Bailey after the street on which it stands, is a criminal court building in central London, one of several that house the Crown Court of England and Wales. The s ...
in May 1961 in a case that lasted just two days. He claimed his attack on Elsie was motivated solely by her making racial slurs as they haggled over the price. Bush was sentenced to death on 12 May 1961 by
Mr Justice Stevenson, under section 5 of the
Homicide Act 1957, charged with “murder in the course or furtherance of theft”, and hanged at Pentonville on 6 July 1961 by
Harry Allen.
Edwin Bush at British Executions.co.uk
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References
External links
Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast #7 - The Identikit Killing at the Curiosity Shop
* Location
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bush, Edwin
1940 births
1961 deaths
20th-century executions by England and Wales
20th-century executions of British people
British people convicted of murder
Executed British people
People executed for murder
1961 murders in the United Kingdom
1960s murders in London