The Wimbledon Kidnapping (2021) - full transcript

[Surf crashing]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-Nine, four, six,
two, six, five, six.

[Beep]

-♪ Round

♪ Like a circle in a spiral

♪ Like a wheel
within a wheel ♪

♪ Never ending or beginning

♪ On an ever spinning reel



♪ Like a snowball
down a mountain ♪

♪ Or a carnival balloon

♪ Like a carousel
that's turning ♪

♪ Running rings
around the moon ♪

♪ Like a clock whose hands
are sweeping ♪

♪ Past the minutes
of it's face ♪

♪ And the world is like
an apple ♪

♪ Whirling silently
in space ♪

♪ Like the circles
that you find ♪

♪ In the windmills
of your mind ♪

♪♪

[Indistinct broadcast]

♪♪

♪♪



-It was a unique case.

The end of 1969.

We'd never had a kidnapping
in Britain.

They just didn't know
what was happening.

We didn't have the scientific
progress we've had today.

I mean, it's horrifying.

-Since she disappeared early
yesterday evening,

there have been a number
of telephone calls

demanding ransom money.

-I opened the door only to find

things scattered on the floor,

which had come from her handbag.

Telephone was lying
on the floor.

The, uh, chair was...
some disarray.

And then I noticed
this machete.

-Mr. McKay came home last night
expecting to meet his wife,

who should have been indoors.

The doors were open,
wife wasn't there.

We're treating this
as an abduction.

-The police did not know
what to do.

No police force had ever dealt
with a kidnapping case.

Not only was that,
but there was no Mrs. McKay.

There was no evidence
that she was dead or alive.

-This woman is this is
Mrs. McKay.

She was wearing a medium green
knitted suit,

[indistinct]
just below the knee.

Probably wearing
low-heeled shoes.

-To us, a million pounds ransom
is just incredible anyway.

My mother hasn't any enemies.

♪♪

-And I would say this to whoever
has got my mother-in-law:

he's not going
to crack this family.

We've got plenty of...
reserves yet.

-My heart went out to them.

How can you suddenly lose

a mother and a wife
just like that?

[Wind blowing]

[Surf crashing]

♪♪

-We're looking back
to a different time.

-♪ When will you be near me?

♪ Darling,
won't you make it soon? ♪

-My mother, she met my father

when she was still
probably a schoolgirl.

They were engaged at 18
and married at 21,

which is what you did
in those days, I think.

Then I was born when she was 23.

And my mother won
an art scholarship

and somebody must have
dissuaded her from that.

You know, "Oh, you don't want to
do that.

You're not going
to be an artist.

You're going to be a mother,
you know,

and have lots of babies."

♪♪

The Murdochs were from Adelaide,

my father ...
first job in newspapers,

was working for
Rupert Murdoch's father

with South Australian people,

which tend to think
of themselves

as a bit sort of special.
[Laughs]

Not the same
as the other ones.

Nice memories.
We had some lovely times.

-"The Daily Mirror" from London
offered my father a big job,

a directorship,
and it really uprooted us.

I mean, to take away 16 year old

from all their friends.

But my father just took us
all away, that was it.

We were scooped up
and dumped in London.

I would have had
a very different life

had we stayed there.

My father then moved on
to be with Rupert.

-We moved into that house
in 1958.

It was a happy place to be.

It was absolute heaven in the
summer when the tennis was on.

-The first day of Wimbledon
fortnight.

The favorite spot
for the fashion parade

is just outside
the center court.

-Everybody came and parked,
you know, tried.

-...celebrities too ...
there's Mrs. Chris Madden,

the wife
of the number-four seed.

-They were very
Victorian parents.

And they all got married
too young

because it was one acceptable
way of leaving home.

And that's what happened to me.

We had a nice life, but somebody
came along and jumped on that.

♪♪

-It's 1969.

My parents have been
staying with us

for two nights over Christmas.

-♪ It is the night of...

-Then they'd gone back
to London.

My father had work to do.

♪♪

-...with the market
report for farmers.

So until then,

ladies and gentlemen,
goodnight to you all.

Good night.

♪♪

-The phone rang.

That was my father, and he said,
"Your mother's gone."

And we froze, and he said,
"I don't know,

maybe there's been
another burglary."

There had been a burglary
a few months earlier

and she was pretty
freaked out by that.

-I was the night duty CO
of the area.

And when I got there, I saw
damage to the inside porch door.

There were also senior members
of the Fleet Street press

who were friendly
with Mr McKay,

influential men ...

fortunately, some of them who
had access to

Number 10 Downing Street.

-The drama of the entrance hall
with the phone on the floor...

You know, the desk in the hall
with the knife,

the big bell hook,

the string, the twine ...
all that was all there.

-The uniform
chief superintendent

was a little bit skeptical.

He thought that this was
a Fleet Street stunt.

Either that or Mrs. McKay
had gone of her own free will.

-It was horror!
It was a horror scene.

I mean, it was so obvious that
something terrible had happened,

it was just obvious.

And then when the police came
and they started saying,

"Oh, no, your mother,
she's run away with her lover,

she's gone to Aus..."
You don't know my mother!

I'm telling you
my mother is not ...

this is ... something violent
has happened!

And the door was broken ...
come on, you know?

They were ... I'm sorry,
I don't have a lot of respect

for the police.

We expected
some sort of telephone call

because telephone disk,
with the number on it,

had been removed and was gone.

I sat by that phone all night.

♪♪

[Telephone ringing]

♪♪

'Course, we didn't have
anything to record with.

-We were somewhat
unprofessional in those days.

I managed to get the extension

and overheard
the initial contact.

This is a transcript
of the notes I made.

"This is Mafia Group 3.

We are from America.
Mafia M3."

"We tried to get
Rupert Murdoch's wife.

We couldn't get her
so we took yours instead."

"You will need a million pounds
by Wednesday."

-And it was pretty horrific.

And I said, "That man has
the accent of a foreigner.

He has an accent
of the Caribbean, I think."

♪♪

[Police radio chatter]

♪♪

-It was really
a very extraordinary case.

Which became
a major issue publicly.

And it was a case
which had an impact

on the relationship
of West Indians in London

to other people as well.

Some people saw it
as a deliberate attempt

to frame West Indians

for the kidnapping
of an Australian white woman.

[Horn bellowing]

[Upbeat surfer rock]

[Passengers cheering]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-Already their coming has
caused a national controversy.

But one point must always
be borne in mind:

Whatever our feelings,
we cannot deny them entry,

for all our British citizens

are entitled to
the identical rights

of any member of the Empire.

-We will fight you back
with every bone, every nerve,

every feeling, every ounce of
blood we've got!

We will have our country back!

[Spectators applauding]

♪♪

[Protestors chanting
indistinctly]

-I don't think
any Black person

who was prepared
for what they found in Britain.

Many of us had been invited,

actively recruited,
to come to work here.

-They're nothing but a scourge,

I would deport them tomorrow
if I had my way.

-♪ We're gonna send the Blacks
back, fa-la-la-la ♪

-I didn't expect us to be seen
as an alien force

that was unwanted in Britain.

[Man speaking English]

[Piano playing
"Windmills of Your Mind"]

♪♪

♪♪

[Hosein]

♪♪

♪♪

-I was amazed
they were brothers,

they were so different.

Arthur did what Arthur
wanted to do,

and he felt that things
revolved round him.

And I had that instinct

that there was something
peculiar going on here.

Was a most unusual man ...
black mustache, glaring eyes.

Arthur, to my mind, was like
a panther ready to pounce.

Nizamodeen was a very retiring
young man ...

pale, not very strong.

He'd only been in Britain
for a few months.

He was totally dependent
on his brother, Arthur.

[Nizamodeen Hosein]

♪♪

♪♪

-It was ... it was lovely
on the farm.

We had cows,
things like that; chickens.

It was nice.

It was big.

It's really nice.

Nizam ... he's my Uncle Nizam ...
I love him.

I just love him, and brings back
so good memories again,

just hearing his name.

He was lovely.

He played with us,
made me laugh.

[Nizamodeen]

-[Emotional sigh]

Nizam, he was lovely.

He's a normal 21 year old guy.

How can he do
anything like that?

There are questions
all over this case.

♪♪

♪♪

[Nizamodeen]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[Sixties rock playing]

♪♪

♪♪

-By 1968, his newspaper empire
was flourishing

and Rupert Murdoch had emerged
as a powerful press baron

now keen to seek new titles
in the old world.

♪♪

After a ferocious
takeover battle,

the News of the World
was his,

and before long, London began to
notice Rupert Murdoch.

-Rupert Murdoch on his way
to his office by Rolls-Royce.

He's chubby cheeked
and open face,

but underneath,
say those who know him,

he's a man of steel.

If he succeeds in gathering
the News of the Worldreins

into his hands,
it's likely they'll be in

for some pretty
aggressive management.

-Was buying into
the News of the World

your own idea, or was it
suggested from someone else?

-Entirely my own idea.
-And what is your motive?

-To expand
my own newspaper chain.

♪♪

[Nizamodeen]

-Of course one enjoys
the feeling of power,

although...

[Nizamodeen]

[Woman]

[Nizamodeen]

[Woman]

[Birdsong]

-Rooks Farm,
it was frightening for me

because Arthur was so vicious.

We are to go under the table

and, um,

watch him ... him
beat up my mother.

[Projector whirring]

Very lovable,
and then,

all of a sudden,
he would change into a monster,

and she would get beaten up.

When I was nine years old...

Yeah, that was life at home.

[Clicks tongue ruefully]

[Tearful sigh]

♪♪

♪♪

-My mum was in a hairdresser
shop in Hackney,

and they met because he was
working in the basement

as a tailor.

So consequently,
they got together

and she left my dad,

and went with this guy

who we knew nothing about.

And that was it ... didn't see
mum for a long time.

-...get your blindfolds on
immediately, if you will,

panel, because this will give
you some idea...

[Broadcast continues
indistinctly]

-As soon as we heard
a car come up,

we knew he's coming back again,
and we were all scared.

Nizam, he was scared.

He was really scared.

[Woman]

[Dogs barking]

-I got a phone call at 5:30
in the morning,

and tell me to get out of bed

and get down to Arthur Road
in Wimbledon.

And very quickly they built up
a sort of Fleet Street

sort of siege of people.

-Should have seen the press ...
we had vans,

we had television
from all over the world.

-The first thing you do when you
get involved in this is

find out
where the police drink.

Because journalists
and police lives

revolved around the pub,
largely.

Over the months there.
I mean, I really got to know

some of them really quite well.

And every evening I'd be in
there talking to police.

It emerged quite early on that

when Murdoch had gone off
to Australia,

he'd left his car
and his chauffeur

for Alick McKay to use.

So we put two and two together
and got four quite quickly.

-Well, he was using
Rupert's car

because Rupert said to him,

"I'm going to Australia,
look after the shop" ...

that's how it was,
it was that casual.

-The police are the first
to admit

it's one of the most
baffling mysteries

they've ever experienced...

-...disappeared early
yesterday evening

there have been a number
of telephone calls

demanding ransom money.

-...more than 150 police are
involved in the investigation.

But their night and day
efforts have produced nothing.

-They'd never heard
anything like that.

They kept saying,
"This is not an English crime."

I mean,
they suspected my father.

It was so ridiculous.

♪♪

-There was some amazing
competition in Fleet Street

in the '60s,

and news stories ...

especially stories about crime,
stories about sex ...

were the great currency
of the time.

You know, you had
a rampant Daily Express,

a rampant Daily Mirror,

the Daily Sketch ...
long forgotten now;

these popular tabloids

were being taken on

by the Sun ...itself
an aggressive news gatherer.

So the British press galvanized
by the idea that it involved

Rupert Murdoch's deputy,

that it was that close to home.

-You were the intended
target for the kidnapers.

-Yes.

-That must be a nightmare.

-It wasn't so bad for us
as it was for Alick McKay.

But certainly one
has to think about it.

And it colored my time there
in Britain after that happened.

-At the time, the Sun
was literally

in its second month
of being under Rupert Murdoch.

So this was an amazing
turn of events to happen

within two months
of the newspaper starting.

-Mr. Murdoch, sir?

-My father was in constant touch
with Rupert.

Rupert had evidently said,
"I'll be on the next plane,"

and and my father said,

"No, you will not, you will not,
you will not."

Obviously, Rupert Murdoch
was terrified that,

because we thought it was
maybe the IRA or the Mafia,

or that they realizing
they had got the wrong person

would start reaching out to him
where he was,

which is a long way away.

And so he did not come back.

♪♪

-What about the ransom,
the million pounds?

-Somebody doesn't know anything
about money, that's all,

it's just ... it's just a sum,

I would think someone
had their eye on.

-What about the thought
that they might want

to extort it from
from the company,

from the News of the World?

-I don't know that
the News of the World

even got a million pounds ...
it's a lot of money, isn't it?

It was always a million.
It was always a million.

"We want a million pounds."

£15-20 million in today's money.

That's a lot of money.

-Hello?
-Hello?

-Yeah.
-Hello, I don't know
who I'm speaking to.

I don't recognize her voice.
-I'm M3.

Huh?

[Man]

[Dianne]

[Man]

[Dianne]

[Man]

[Dianne]

[Man]

[Dianne]

[Beeping]

-Electric, it was horrific,
the stress,

and I think it actually ...

it destroyed my emotions,
I couldn't feel emotion.

I could never cry.
I never cried.

It just was so awful.

It was beyond awful.

-Nine, four, six,
two, six, five six.

Who's calling?
-Since she disappeared?

There have been a number
of telephone calls

demanding ransom money,
both to her home

and to
the News of the Worldoffices,

where her husband,
Mr, Alick McKay,

is on the board of directors.

-We had a whole van load,
probably thousands of papers ...

this is all
News of the Worldpapers ...

to try and find out
if the press had been

particularly hard on somebody

who was ... who ended up
being a crook

and who might have done
this to us.

You know, who has been offended
by the press?

-I think everybody's trying
to find out from nobody else

what really was going on.

It's a hard world to imagine,

but you have to realize
that the police had no idea,

I think,
how to deal with this crime.

It was such
an extraordinary thing.

-We're treating this
as an abduction.

-What's the difference between
that and kidnapping, in fact?

-Well, abduction is
the correct term to use.

Kidnapping is a slang for it.

-It remained very much
a Wimbledon cop is looking into

what was a huge story.

At times, there was element
of amateur about anything.

The police, they decided
for some reason

that they should have
an observation van in the road,

full of policemen looking at us,
looking at the house,

which was pretty farcical,
I can't imagine.

I do remember going out
and sort of banging on the door

and laughing
and thinking ...

I mean, they didn't know
who they were looking for

and there were
no hostage negotiators.

They didn't know whether she was
alive or dead for certainly.

[Ringing]

-I just cannot understand

why those holding Muriel have
not contacted me recently.

I appeal to you to contact me

by telephone, letter,
or telegram.

-Should never have gone
to the press,

is all I thought by.

Getting the press
involved and the publicity,

it would make her
too hot to handle

to let her go.

-Bill Smith, who was a good cop
that was going places,

but they were out
of their depth.

This is still a time of
the Wild West in Fleet Street,

and reporters trespassed,
they bugged, they...

they did all sorts of things

that would later
become to be outlawed.

-We had the house phone,
which was the original number

which we had to keep open
for the criminals,

'cause they had that number.

But unfortunately,
everyone else in the world

had that number, too,
after about 24 hours.

-It would not have been
a strange thing to have done

at the time,
and I'm sure that the Sun

were outraged that
the Daily Mirror did it

for two reasons ... one, because
it was an intrusion into privacy

of their man, but secondly,

because they hadn't
done it themselves.

That they had been beaten,
as it were.

[Telephone ringing]

-Nine, four,
six, two, six, five six.

[Man]

[Man]

[Beeps]

-We've got one day to contact,
another telephone call,

then nothing at all
for almost a fortnight ...

no doubt due to the publicity

that was given to the case
in every paper

and every television
news broadcast.

And I think this delayed the
kidnapers from coming forward

on probably delayed
this case up to 14 days.

-Information was coming out,
it was coming from the police.

The police leaked
like a sieve.

-Some some people would drink

quite a lot
of my father's whiskey.

The police were
very good at that.

I can remember my father
going to fetch another crate

of Black Label ... not a bottle,
but another crate,

from where he kept them all.

-Nine four six two six five six.

[Woman, man]

[Woman]

[Man]

[Woman]

-Yes.

[Woman]

-And the family trying to trace
the missing woman

have been turning to other
methods, including spiritualism.

Mrs. McKay's son-in-law,
Mr. David Dyer, explained.

-We have a very open mind ...
if we get something

that says that it's just
something that you say,

well, maybe.

-We were not a family
of spiritualist at all,

but suddenly we thought,

"Well, maybe there's
something in that.

Maybe someone can help us,

because they're not
helping us ...

the police aren't
doing anything."

I mean, I remember one man
and he came

and he actually said,
"I keep getting this name,

this name,"
and he'd say, "Elsa, Elsa."

This is really spine
chilling stuff.

♪♪

[Men speaking Dutch]

-He first wants to see
if the woman was alive or dead.

[Croiset speaking Dutch]

-Uh, "through my opinion,
she is still alive."

-You'll try anything.

And he was fascinating.

♪♪

He described the farmhouse
and the pond.

So what do you make of that?

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[Beeping]

-Nine, four,
six, two, six, five, six.

[Man]

Good morning.

[Man, Ian]

-You know who's speaking,
don't ya?

[Ian, man]

[Woman]

-M3, M3

[Rewinding tape]

-Nine, four, six ...
[Beeping]

Nine, four, six, two, six,
five, six.

-Uh...

-Just one sec.
-Hello?

-Hello?

[Man]

[Alick]

[Man]

[Alick]

[Man]

[Alick]

[Beep]

♪♪

-My father, you know,
was a complete mess.

Um...

♪♪

-One morning,
he was rather depressed,

so low, so low,

just very depressing,
had to get this over to him.

I said, "Now, one must expect it
to be published,

and assume it will again.

Can you sort of accept this?"

And he ... he cried.
He did.

Eventually cried, so,
to see a man cry,

it's a terrible thing...

A man of his stature.

And in order to ...

pretty sure he said, now,

he didn't think so,
but he couldn't accept this.

He had to keep hoping,
keep his hopes raised,

and I said, well,
hope for the best,

but one must expect the worst.

[Faint music from radio]

[Nizamodeen]

[Man]

-Okay, I will ...
[Rapid beeping]

[Line cuts]

♪♪

[Projector whirring]

-For me, as a child,
Arthur was a monster,

and I don't like calling him dad

because he never was a dad
to me in my eyes.

I can imagine he's ... he's, uh,

capable of doing bad things.

Yeah. I mean, seeing the way
he was treating my mum...

[Man]

-Is that the M3?
-Yeah, yes.

Well, I'm ... I'm now
on my way to a meeting.

This is being handled by ...

-That does sound like him.

It does sound like him,
like Arthur.

-You know [indistinct]
this morning.

And, uh...
-Just don't know what to say.

-My part, the instructions
I gave you,

they were all
carried out fully.

-That's Arthur.

That's Arthur.

'Cause he always used to ...

to talk and catch breath ...

[Imitates labored breathing]

Yeah.
As a kid, I still remember this.

♪♪

-I went to Arthur's home,

met his wife
and met the children.

He had done fairly well
as a tailor.

He got a decent house
near Bishop's Stortford

in south Hertfordshire,
had a wife and children.

He seemed to be managing
as a tailor,

and he felt he could now
be a kind of English squire.

[Blowing bugle]

[Nizamodeen]

-It's a very rare ambition,
right?

We don't have many Black ...
Black farmers in Britain.

[Band playing]

The ambition that Arthur had
to join the local hunt

showed that he had the very
poor understanding of Britain.

He ... he was, you know,
massively naive to think

that he had a place
amongst those people.

♪♪

-In the past six days, police
have had only one positive lead:

the letter posted from
North London

at 6:45 last Tuesday evening,

which arrived here at the family
house on Wednesday morning.

-I remember being taken to give
a television interview.

Please just let my mother
come back.

And she heard that,
because she wrote that letter

and she said,
"I heard you on the television."

Sick, isn't it?
Really sick.

"Darling, Alick,

I'm deteriorating in health
and spirit.

Please cooperate.

I'm blindfolded and cold."

The earlier you get the money,
the quicker I may come home."

It was so horrible to receive
those letters,

where your mother's saying,
"It's so cold,

please tell Daddy to cooperate,
the M..."

Oh, it's so horrible.
It was so painful.

[Telephone ringing]

-All the letters, I think,
were written at one stage,

and they're all written
about the same time

because one letter came
telling us

to keep the police out of this.

And you'll know
who these people are

because they'll use
the term "M3."

Now, we'd been using the bloody
term M3 for weeks!

She wouldn't have sent that.

I mean, that was obviously
one of the first ones

we should have said,
"Well, they sent them

out of order."

[Leaves rustling in wind]

-There is the point
when something occurred,

which seemed to be
very much a milestone.

My memory says it was around
the middle of the day,

at lunchtime,

and a call came through,

and it was a woman's
shrieking hysterically,

saying,
"She's dead, she's dead!

Mrs. McKay is dead."

And there was noise
in the background.

It was as though
it was Sunday lunchtime

and there were people
in the pub, you know?

And there was a telephone
on the wall,

which is what happened
in those days.

It sounded as though somebody
really had to

say something
to get it off their chest,

and it was just terrible.

I don't know who it was,

but we fancied that
it was perhaps the girlfriend

and perhaps somebody
who was associated.

And we really believed
that she had died at that time.

Sorry, it's hard to talk about.

♪♪

[Line beeping]

-This M3,
did you receive the letter?

-Yes, we have.
Yesterday morning, first thing,

but there's no proof
in the letter

that she is alive and well.

There's noth...

[Man]

-Well, look, quite frankly,
this letter could have been

written weeks ago ...
we want to know she's alive.

We've got the money ...

Well, why the hell
should we give you money

unless we know she's alive?

[Man]

-Yes, of course we recognized
her writing, but ...

but we don't know, she might
have written that

three weeks ago;
she might be dead now.

We don't know ...
where was nothing to say that ...

that gave us any indication
that she's still alive.

That could have been
written weeks ago,

and you may have killed her,
we don't know.

We can't part with
a lot of money ...

[Man]

-There was a lot of play
acting on these telephone calls,

but this was very necessary,
we were out to ...

to catch these ...
these people.

[Man]

[McKay representative]

["M3"]

[McKay representative]

♪♪

-They're slightly weird,
those calls, aren't they?

He had been coached,
if you like,

by the police
to do it in a certain way.

And it ...
and that was what he was...

He was supposed to get angry
with them, I think,

and it ... I don't think it
necessarily worked very well.

-Well, the reason for repeating
myself was that we believe

that M3 was using a script,
and we were using a script,

and both of us were trying
to keep to our script.

And therefore, I was trying
to get some points over,

and this point
I was trying to get over,

was always this point
of proof ... we wanted proof.

Obviously, if you're going
to leave a large amount

of ransom money,
you must have proof.

And it was important
that we kept up this...

this willingness to pay,
and that we shouldn't be

too willing to pay
or we might possibly lose them.

♪♪

[Telephone ringing]

♪♪

[Ringing continues]

♪♪

[Ian]

["M3"]

[Ian]

["M3"]

[Ian]

["M3"]

-The kidnapers asked that
Ian McKay delivered the ransom.

But rather than put him
in danger,

senior investigating officer
told me

that I was to be Ian McKay

and to go off in the Rolls-Royce

with a suitcase
purporting to contain

£1 million
in used £5 notes.

-They asked for
£5 and 10 notes.

What they didn't realize was

you couldn't have
a million pounds

in two suitcases, for instance.

The weight was enormous.

-They told us that we were to go
to particular telephone boxes

and wait for the phone to ring,

and then tell us to go
to another telephone box

where there would be a message.

A government laboratory
specifically made

a tracking device to put on
the case with the money

and on the car.

Never worked.

It never worked ... the thing
was absolutely useless.

-The contact I had told me that
it's one of the biggest farces

that he'd heard of ...
they were being followed

by something like
63 different cars.

They're also being pursued by
three Hells Angels on motorbikes

who are actually policemen
pretending to be Hells Angels.

-The note that we found
in one of the telephone kiosks

told us to go
to a very rural location

where there would be some
white flowers on a bank

where we were to put
the money and go.

Which we did.

♪♪

But it wasn't sophisticated.

♪♪

The money was dropped
and, um...

nobody approached,

nobody came across land,
nobody went past in a vehicle.

The money was there for hours.

Well, we were all
very disappointed.

-And I can remember standing
in the windows upstairs,

waiting to see, um...

Rupert Murdoch's car
come back

with Bill Smith in it,

and wondering
who else was in it.

-And we'd all be hopeful,
and we'd be at home thinking,

"Oh, my God, this is the one,
this is the one," you know?

You can imagine pinning
all your ...

pin all your emotional hopes
on that one evening,

and came to nothing ...
nothing.

[Telephone ringing]

♪♪

[Ringing continues]

-Nine, four, six,
two, six, five six.

["M3," Ian]

["M3"]

[Ian]

["M3"]

♪♪

♪♪

[Beeping]

-Nine, four, six, two,
six, five, six.

-Hello.
-Hello.

[Man, Dianne]

-Yeah?
-Yeah.

[Man]

[Dianne]

[Alick, man]

[Alick]

["M3"]

[Alick]

["M3"]

-she wasn't allowed to go.

And so I said, well, if you
won't let her go, I'll go.

"No, no, no, you can't go,
and it's got to be a policeman."

♪♪

-The apparel included
a pair of ladies boots,

high length,
knee length boots.

I won ... won the job,

because I was the only one who
could get my feet

into the boots.

-♪ Then mama spent every last
penny we had ♪

♪ To buy me a dancing dress

-And I can clearly remember
my sister and I in the kitchen,

sitting perched on stools
with makeup

and a towel around his neck
trying to make him ...

and I'm, you know,
regardless of how tragic

and how terrible
the whole thing is,

we were laughing ...
it was ...it was ... it was ...

it was a moment
of clowning, you know?

["M3"]

-It was hilarious,
I have to say.

I mean, I feel guilty
about the laughter,

but it was hilarious.

And of course, he didn't,
in the end ...

they sent a police woman.

-I had a coat, because my mother
would recognize that coat.

And it was a sort of pink
mohair coat.

And I mean, I thought,

well, she'll realize
that we're trying to help her.

["M3"]

[Man]

["M3"]

-♪ Round, like a circle
in a spiral ♪

♪ Like a wheel
within a wheel ♪

♪ Never ending
or beginning ♪

♪ On an ever-spinning reel

♪ Like a snowball
down a mountain ♪

♪ Or a carnival balloon

♪ Like a carousel
that's turning ♪

♪ Running rings
around the moon ♪

♪ Like a clock
whose hands are sweeping ♪

♪ Past the minutes
of its face ♪

♪ And the world is like
an apple ♪

♪ Whirling silently
in space ♪

♪ Like the circles
that you find ♪

♪ In the windmills
of your mind ♪

♪♪

♪♪

-This only happens in England.

They put the suitcases there,

and the police all hidden round,

and then a local well-wisher
saw the two suitcases ...

a local resident ...
said, "Oh, gosh,

this is a time when bombs go off
and so forth ...

I better get
the local police in,"

and our police force
hiding all round the place

threw up their hands in despair

that their best laid plans
went awry.

But they did capture
the registration of the Volvo

because it was going
round and round,

and that led them
to Arthur and his farm.

That's the only thing that led
them to Arthur and his farm,

despite four weeks of efforts
of trying to find the truth.

["Windmills of Your Mind"
playing]

♪♪

♪♪

[Foreboding music playing]

♪♪

-There's now little doubt that
the police,

after weeks of frustration in
their search for Mrs. McKay,

are searching
in the right place.

Rooks End farm
at [indistinct].

-Sleepy hollow
was woken up

early on this
bitterly cold morning

by a full scale police invasion.

[Nizamodeen]

[Barking]

[Helicopter blades whirring]

♪♪

-I had a phone call to say,
"Is that your mum's farm?"

♪♪

And, um, sure enough,
I rang her and it was.

[Sirens blaring,
clock ticking rapidly]

-At first light this morning,

120 policemen
from this special mobile unit

begin an inch by inch search of
the property.

-First of all, she thought it
was all a big mistake,

absolutely massive mistake.

-Then firemen began draining
three ponds and a well.

-And obviously,
mum was just beside herself.

She didn't really know
what was going on.

Mum went to Germany
for Christmas with the children.

She came back in January,

and that's when
everything happened.

-More than 100 men from the
Metropolitan Police

special squads
and the Essex Constabulary

were soon at work searching the
3.5-acre...

-...and tomorrow, more than
100 policemen will be drafted in

to begin an even more intense
search of the farm buildings

and surrounding fields.

-We've had reports
there are fingerprints found

in the farmhouse, which you've
connected to Mrs. McKay.

Is there anything in this,
detective?

-No, I'm not able
to comment on this.

-There was a report too that
a shallow grave had been found.

Can you comment on that?

-No shallow grave
has been found.

-Do the police still feel that
Mrs. McKay is still alive?

-Well, we're hoping so, yeah.

-Have you any evidence that
suggests she ...

-We have no evidence otherwise,
no evidence at all.

[Siren blaring]

-I was in my room
and I stayed upstairs

because I was a bit frightened.

There were so many.

Taking fingerprints everywhere.

♪♪

All I remember is mum
running around,

hosting all the people.

But I cannot remember
seeing Arthur or Nizam.

-They arrived here about
a quarter to seven this evening.

In the first car,
the elder brother was

crouched on the floor
of the back seat.

And in the second car,
the younger Hosein was sitting

between two detectives
in the back seat

with a coat over his head.

-I think what surprised us

when we saw the brothers
and spoke to them,

they were unusual.

It became evident
that they were not ...

certainly not ...
professional criminals.

-The two men have stayed here

at Kingston police headquarters
since 6:30 yesterday evening,

according to the police,

and their questioning
has been surrounded

by an aura of unusual secrecy.

So far, I understand those
inquiries have not been

very productive, and apart from
giving their names

and some personal
background details,

the two men have not been
able to help very much.

-Well, Bill Smith did
the interrogation himself

with Joe Minus.

It's totally...

Unimaginable.

I wouldn't give it
any credence whatsoever.

-I used to say, "Let me get
to them," when they had them.

"I'll make them tell
where my mother is."

"Oh, we do everything,"
they'd say, "we do everything,

but nothing that shows."

That's what the police
would say, Smith and Minus.

-What did they say?

-"We do," otherwise they were
saying, "Yes, we torture them,

but mustn't show."

"Get them by the balls,"
I said,

"You let ... I'll do it."

I mean, I really said that
to them!

And they would say, "We do;
we we've done everything,

but they won't speak."

[Nizamodeen]

-I spent a lot of time
with the brothers.

I took them back and forth
to court from Brixton Prison,

more than probably anybody else.

The van stopped in ...
in the yard

at Brixton Prison.

♪♪

The only time I'd seen
any of them snap.

And Nizam went for
me and Arthur.

I think Nizamodeen was against
Arthur as much as anything else.

♪♪

♪♪

-The two men were charged
after being in company

with the police
and Kingston police headquarters

for about 72 hours.

Charge was that,
between the 29th of December

and the 6th of January,

they murdered Mrs. Muriel McKay,

and further charged

that they demanded by menaces
£1 million from Mr. Alick McKay

for the return of his wife.

-The common view
in the community,

as I knew it, was,

people thought it was ...
it was utterly incredible,

and that it was more than likely
that other people,

white seasoned criminals,
might have been involved,

and those two were
taking the rap for that.

So it seemed to me
such a kamikaze thing.

And the idea that you could
pull off something ...

a heist as massive as that ...

seemed to us to be
totally airy-fairy, really.

-When the brothers
were arrested,

a lot of thinking was,

"Well, they must be
more than them."

And they were members of the
family living in London ...

of the Hosein brothers.

One of them was a brother

who was really investigated

for some time.

Adam Hosein.

But, um,
his alibi stood up.

♪♪

-I went down there,

it was really
a very extraordinary meeting,

extraordinary situation,

because the police could get
nothing out of the two men,

and Smith said to me,

it's as if they pulled shutters
down on their mind.

And I decided to act for
the younger brother, Nizamodeen.

-Mum said that she looked even
where police hadn't looked.

She was looking.

Hollow tree
underneath the dog's bed,

but there was nothing, nothing
at all that gave her any inkling

that they had
actually killed her.

-100 police officers searched
and searched and found nothing.

Mrs. McKay could not be found.

-I had just read
a trashy American whodunit

in which the murder victim
was fed to the pigs.

So I said to one
of the policemen there

about this story, et cetera.

So the next day and there were
people sifting with sticks,

whatever, through the pile
of slurry.

And, "Had she been fed
to the pigs?" started.

And just a throwaway remark
for me

has sort of
went down in history.

-What happened with the body,
we don't know.

-M3... [Indistinct]
M3.

-This is M3 speaking again.

-This is the M3, we've contacted
you last week.

-Hey, who am I talking to?

-I wanted to get to the truth;
I wanted to hear the tapes,

and they were happy
to play the tapes to me.

I'm just trying
to find the truth.

-Nine, four, six, two, six,
five, six?

["M3," Ian]

["M3"]

[Ian]

["M3"]

[Beeping]

[Ian]

♪♪

[Siren dies]

♪♪

-You are aware, as a popular
newspaper editor and journalist,

of what the audience thinks
and wants, and its prejudices.

You play to them,
but not always consciously,

very often unconsciously.

Their views are your views.

You would know that the fact
that two Caribbean men

have been responsible for
kidnapping and murdering

a white woman ...

you'd know exactly

the likely response
from your audience.

-It was so un-British.

Did they come into the country
to do this?

-The judiciary also thought
it was

an un-British kind of crime,

and certainly the prosecution
made a lot of that too.

The great deal was going
to depend really on

the extent to which matters
were put to the jury

that it was an unusual crime,

as foreign as the people
who committed the crime.

♪♪

♪♪

-I've never been in a court
before in my life.

Nobody said, "This is what it's
going to be like."

So you're suddenly standing
in this daunting place.

You feel quite overwhelmed.

I just burst into tears.

And I could see
the two Hosein brothers there.

They were there.

♪♪

And that is really horrific
moment, really horrific.

The elder brother,
Arthur Hosein,

he had specially tailored
a suit to wear

to conduct his own defense,

and the young one,

all I could do was look
at the young one,

and just think,
"You are the evil."

He, to me, he was the evil.

The other one was mad,

but he was evil.

And I'd always felt that he was
the one that killed my mother

and dispose of her body,
however ... however, he did that.

♪♪

-They plead not guilty.

And so you have to respect that.

Let the prosecution
prove they're guilty.

That's the pattern of our law:
it's the prosecution's job.

But he was very, very difficult
to see,

100 percent evidence
as to guilt or not guilt.

♪♪

-Arthur's fingerprints
was found at the House.

The bill hook, his neighbor
found it missing from his farm

and then identified it.

The twine
that every farmer uses ...

there it was at the farm.

But of course, search went on
for weeks at the farm.

We didn't have the benefit
of what we've got now.

No DNA;
purely on fingerprints.

There was no sign of her
at the farm, never has been.

It was a case of,
"prove your case."

There was nothing other
than the forensic

to prove it.

-The body of evidence
that went to the court

and that the prosecution
put to the jury

was substantial
but inconclusive.

My recollection
within the Black community

was that they were
unable to say categorically

that those two men

had actually murdered
Muriel McKay,

because they had no evidence.

♪♪

-And then...

Nizamodeen, at the Old Bailey,

made certain admissions.

Nizamodeen admitted getting
the details of the Rolls-Royce

that belonged to Rupert Murdoch.

By admitting that,

he'd then involved Arthur.

[Nizamodeen]

♪♪

-He then admitted

his fingerprints
were on the paper flowers

put down for the drop;

said that he'd done that because
Arthur had told him to do that.

So Nizam turned on Arthur.

It was devastating
for both of them.

-Nizam was probably
so frightened,

he was so frightened
that he probably admitted,

when we spoke to him,
and we all spoke to him,

that he was prepared
to admit certain things.

He was aware
of what he was doing.

We wanted to show that he was
pushed into something,

dominated
by somebody else.

And so Nizam made
some admissions ...

when his brother couldn't reach
him or get in touch with him.

-It's a good defense, isn't it?

He was a weak character,

you could see that
by looking at him.

He was a weak character
who would do anything

the elder brother said ...
that's what I felt.

♪♪

♪♪

[Gentle instrumental music,
indistinct broadcast]

♪♪

-I don't think even mum believed
what was going on at the time.

I don't think she believed
that it was possible

that he would do such a thing;

if he'd done it,
she didn't know,

and she was
backwards and forwards

to London going into court.

And she came back one day
and she said to me,

"What would you do
if you found something?"

And I said,
"I don't know, Mum, what ...

what have you found," you know,

"Have you found something
of any importance?"

Said, "No, I just wondered
what you would do?"

♪♪

There was a place where Arthur
used to hide his money

behind the bar,

and there was an inset
in the wall.

-There must have been a box
or something like that.

And she looked in ...
she looked in there...

-And she thought,
"Mm, has he left me any money?"

And she had a look,
and she pulled out some jewelry.

-The police want anyone who's
been offered for sale jewelry

by men of Indian descent
to come forward immediately

and help them with the further
inquiries in this case.

-She said, "And I took her
in to visit Arthur,

and I said to him,
'You are guilty,

because I've got something
in my bag,

and you know what it is,
I found it behind the bar',"

and she said to me,

"That's the first time I've ever
seen a Black person go white."

And she said,
"Arthur, you did do it.

You were involved."

-When mum found the jewels,

she was scared
because I did ask her,

why didn't you give it
to the police?

'Cause she was scared.

I don't know why.

She phoned then Adam,
my other uncle,

and Adam said,

"Right, we're going to the
Thames and throw in the Thames."

That's what mum told me.

-Right, so your dad
is terribly ill.

He would not be able to comply
with the instructions

as so you'll do it in stride.

-Instruction is for one person
to be alone,

one person to be alone now.

All right?
Now, uh...

Your mum wrote a letter
last night,

posted it a few minutes ago.

One is to your dad.

Well, it's one of both.

Other is to...

[Nizamodeen]

-It was very sad that the judge

wouldn't allow voice prints
to be heard.

I think that was a mistake.

It may be law,
but it's not justice.

It's not getting to the bottom
of what has happened

and why it's happened.

All of the evidence,
all the relevant evidence,

should be given,

and the relevant evidence
was not given here.

-So we're having
all the evidence ...

handwriting, fingerprints ...

reassessed by modern
forensic experts.

If we get you to repeat
these recordings ...

-Yeah.
-Do you think that

might help to clear your name?

♪♪

-"I am on my way to a meeting."

-I am now on my way
to a meeting.

-Our business handled
by intellectuals, the heads.

Now is a meeting
of the semi-intellectuals.

-To be passed on to the third
party, the ru...

the ruffians, we call them.

-To be passed on to ruffians,
we call them.

-The mark
on the cigarette packet

is the same as a left thumb.

The mark on the newspaper
is the same as the left palm.

-Whether she should be executed
or at what time?

-And the mark on the letter
is the same as the left palm.

The ridge detail on both
the mark and the prints

have been made
by the same donor,

namely Mr. Arthur Hosein,
and by nobody else.

-I'm reasonably sure that
the GLC application,

that Nizam wrote this.

And he admitted writing it.

But in general terms,

the handwriting wasn't
conclusive in either way.

So this is
the cigarette packet note.

And I ... I've said that
it's inconclusive,

I can't tell one way
or the other

whether it was written
by Arthur or not.

Equally, it could have been
written by another person.

With the examples
that I've seen,

I'm more inclined to agree
with the defense's case.

-The data that we have indicate
that we're dealing

with an older individual,

older than Nizam would have been

at the time that the ransom
calls were made.

My strong feeling is that
where we're dealing with

more than one speaker
in the calls.

That means there are
three individuals involved.

So there is, uh, one or more
unknown individuals in the mix,

and therefore it's quite
possible the outcome

of the trial of Nizam Hosein
would have been different

if the jury had been able
to listen to those recordings.

We'll never know.

-Found guilty on all charges,

Arthur was sentenced
to life imprisonment

plus 25 years, plus 14 years
for blackmail,

plus 10 years
for sending threatening letters.

Nizam got the same,
except for 10 years less

on the kidnapping charge.

Inspector Smith and his team

were delighted at their success
in this extraordinary case.

[Nizam]

♪♪

-It's not a triumph,
it's a relief.

But it's not...
[Sighs]

It's not success,

because you haven't brought
my mother back alive.

-Alick made a comment at
the Old Bailey after the trial

that, "I just want to know
where she is

so I can put flowers
where she is."

If they did kill her,

then of course, they were ...
they were evil.

But...

I don't know.

I don't know if Nizamodeen knows
where the body is.

Did Arthur do it on his own?

Nobody knows.

♪♪

-I've never bought the theory
that it was the two of them.

They were probably involved
in the plot.

Were the real killers
ever caught?

I don't think so.

I think they were
either commissioned to do it

or they were the middlemen

who then commissioned
someone to do it.

They could have come clean,

they could have told
what they knew.

Why didn't they try and do that?

And the answer for me
has to be that

there were
other people involved.

Far as Bill Smith
and John Minus cared,

that was
the end of the case,

they'd successfully
got arrests

that led to successful
convictions.

But a lot of the younger police
were very unconvinced

by the whole thing.

♪♪

-The man with the loneliest job
in the world

works only a step
off the streets of London.

He's the night watchman
at Madame Tussaud's Waxwork.

Night plays tricks
on the eyes,

concerning this gallery of the
world's greatest criminals.

-We went to Madame Tussaud's
afterwards.

Arthur and Nizam were there
in Madame Tussaud's,

standing in front
of the pretend prison cells.

That was
quite a shock, actually.

-Looking back on it,

I suppose there was
a certain demonization.

I mean, there was unquestioned
sort of prejudice in Britain,

and we lived in
a very different world.

And the fact that they had ...

that the people who've been
accused of this crime

were not white

probably played an element
in the public's view

that they got the right people,

and probably the police view
they got the right people.

But it never occurred to me
that they got the right people.

♪♪

-I had to go down to Trinidad
for a double murder

that I was investigating
for a British man on death row,

and I wanted to investigate
Adam Hosein,

because he was obviously
deeply involved in

the cartel money laundering that
was behind that double murder.

I wanted to talk to Adam,
and I went to his house

and I met this older woman
at the door

who I took to be his mother,

and she said Adam wasn't around,
but we got into conversation

and somehow we got to talk
about the Muriel McKay murder.

She said that he was
the smart one,

and he was the one who got
his brothers into trouble,

that it was Adam
who was the one behind that

and not the other two boys.

She said Adam did it.

♪♪

I've been involved in
representing people

in over 400 murder cases
over the years,

so I've got to know people's MO
fairly well,

and one of the things
that clever people do

when they're involved
in a murder

is they set themselves up
with an alibi,

a free-willed alibi,
if you will.

And then the other person
goes down for it.

It then becomes way more
difficult for the police to say,

"Oh, but you were still
the mastermind behind it,"

because then they've got to get
someone to snitch on you,

and that's always harder.

I got the impression that there
were a number of people

involved in
the Muriel McKay case,

and that there were
some really bad guys involved

who could have been
involved in London gangs,

who you wouldn't want to cross.

♪♪

-My father, he did deserve it.

Definitely.

Not Nizam.

He didn't do anything,
he had to do these things

for Arthur,

because I know how he treated
him at home.

I know exactly how, so I can
imagine how that went.

We all cried...

Because of Nizam
going in prison for so long ...

20 years, I think.

That's ... no.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-♪ We'll build a home
on a hilltop high ♪

♪ You and I

♪ Shiny and new

♪ A cottage that two

-I do wake up
and think about her.

You know, she is always there.

-♪ And we'll be pleased

-Such a lovely mother
to us all.

-♪ The folks who live
on the hill ♪

-And one of the kindest people
that I've ever known.

And she was just delightful.

-♪ Some day

♪ We may be...

-I looked for my mother.

You know, you sort of catch
sight of someone flashing by,

and say, "Oh, my God, it's her!"

You know,
you just could not have that ...

you could not close the door,

you just could not
close up on it.

Whatever you knew or suspected,
you never knew.

And it's always
that element of hope.

♪♪

-I drove with my sister.

I said, "My mother could be on
the Thames,

she could be quite close."

♪♪

And we drove
all along the river.

And I said,

"This is so hopeless."

That ... the feeling
of hopelessness.

Someone taken from you.

Well, I suppose
you always hope

that somebody might have
some information somewhere.

Maybe something comes out
of somebody's watching this.

And maybe they ... they do know
what happened.

Maybe.

You know, where is she?

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