Murder, Mystery and My Family

The British justice system

ranks amongst the best in the world.

But in the past, mistakes have been made.

Between the year 1900 and the year 1964,

approximately 800 people were hanged in the United Kingdom.

Many of those desperately protested their innocence.

Some of these long standing convictions

could be a miscarriage of justice.

She's been assaulted with a weapon

and there's been more than one blow.

In this series,

a living relative will attempt to clear their family name.

- Quite angry really. - Yeah.

That they could do that to a young boy.

Searching for new evidence.

We have a blood stained knife.

I simply don't understand the logic.

With help from two

of the UK's leading barristers, one for the defense.

Did the prosecution get it fundamentally wrong

from the outset?

And one for the prosecution.

The marriage was a very troubled one

so as far as motive is concerned,

she had every reason to be rid of him.

They're on a mission to solve the mystery,

submitting their findings to a senior Crown Court judge.

That must render this conviction for murder unsafe.

Yes, thank you.

I shall reflect and let you know what my judgment

on the matter is.

Can this modern investigation rewrite history?

In Oxfordshire, the sleepy hamlet of Gallowstree Common

was shaken by the violent murder of a 55-year-old woman.

On Saturday the 4th of March, 1922,

the body of Sarah Ann Blake,

the landlady of the Crown and Anchor Inn was discovered.

She had suffered over 60 wounds across her head,

neck and hands and her throat had been cut.

The motive was thought to be robbery

but hundreds of pounds were left untouched.

More than a month in to the investigation,

a local 15-year-old boy, Jack Hewitt,

was charged with the widows murder.

Hewitt lived just 180 yards from the crime scene

and was the last person to report seeing Mrs. Blake alive

on the evening of Friday the 3rd of March, 1922.

He was questioned repeatedly and eventually signed

a statement confessing to the murder.

Despite retracting this confession at trial,

Jack was found guilty at the Oxford assizes

and detained at His Majesty's pleasure.

He only escaped the death penalty as he was a child.

I've only got a few Jo,

I don't know how many you got.

Well why don't you have some of mine?

Jack served 10 years in prison

before being released early for good behavior

in May, 1932.

There's me and there's me Uncle Jack.

John is Jack Hewitt's nephew

and knew him from childhood.

Every birthday, Uncle Jack would always come up

and always had lovely presents.

I had a toy tank that used to puff smoke out

and they were brilliant, brilliant toys.

My mum is Uncle Johns sister,

so Jack Hewitt is my great uncle.

Jack kept his painful past a secret

from the younger generations of his family.

I first found out when I looked at a Sunday Supplement

and it had Berkshire murders in there.

Came and found me dad and said "Is this here Uncle Jack?"

and he said "Oh, yeah, yeah."

- That's-- - Uncle Jack, yeah,

in the army, wasn't he?

John and Joanne have a number of concerns

about the conviction.

If you knew me Uncle Jack, he was so quiet and unassuming,

I find it very hard to believe

that he could of committed a murder,

he was just nice to be around.

- Grandad. - Yeah.

- That's Uncle Jack? - Yeah, yeah.

Now I would like to prove his innocence,

that would mean the world for everybody,

icing on the cake.

Yeah.

In London, John and Joanne are meeting

the barristers who will reexamine this case.

Criminal defense barrister Jeremy Dein

will be looking for new evidence to show

that Jack Hewitt's conviction may have been unsafe.

Sasha Wass QC, will review this case

from the prosecutions point of view.

But first, they want to meet with John and Joanne

to learn about Jack Hewitt as they remember him.

Had you met Jack?

Yes.

And was this something that was ever spoken about?

Never spoken.

- Never spoken? - Never.

Even after you found out?

Yes, even after we found dad said it was in the past

so best let these things be forgotten.

My role in connection with Jack's case

is to look at the evidence very thoroughly

with a view to persuading a judge

that Jack's conviction was unsafe.

I'm looking at this from the prospective

of the prosecution but if there are features of the case

which concern me, I will put those before the judge

and draw them to his attention.

The other matter, just imagine, if you would,

that we come across which conclusively demonstrates

that Jack Hewitt was guilty,

how would you feel about that?

My mum said "Do this for grandad."

because they just thought he didn't do it.

And he was so young.

Jack Hewitt was convicted

of the murder of Sarah Blake and served 10 years in prison.

The suggested motive for the crime was robbery

as Mrs. Blake ran a public house in the village

of Gallowstree Common.

This case involves the death of Sarah Blake.

On the morning of Saturday the 4th of March, 1922,

her lifeless was found face down in a pool of blood

and she had sustained a horrific attack.

The previous night, Jack Hewitt, aged 15,

was in the Crown and Anchor public house

and the police believed that he was the last person

to see Sarah Blake alive.

Now, 10 days later, a knife was found and on that knife

was human blood and hair which was consistent

with the hair of the victim in our case, Sarah Blake.

Jack Hewitt's boss indicated that that knife

belonged to Jack so police questioned Jack Hewitt

and Jack eventually confessed to this crime.

Jack Hewitt was a mere 15 years of age,

he hadn't been in trouble before and he had no motive

for inflicting violence on Sarah Blake.

The prosecution case against him depended on

hotly disputed confessions and that really worries me

because you and I both know that the criminal justice system

has come an awful long way since the days when

that kind of confessional evidence was deemed good enough.

I think a good starting point will be to look at the terms

of the confession and to see whether there is any

independent support which suggests that what he's said

in the confession was true.

Jack Hewitt was born in Henley in 1907,

the eldest of five sons.

The family lived in a small village

about six miles north of Reading called Gallowstree Common.

In 1922, this South Oxfordshire village

had two public houses, The Reformation

and the Crown and Anchor

and a just single village shop at Smith's Corner.

In Gallowstree Common, John and Joanne are visiting

the house which was once the Crown and Anchor pub.

They're meeting crime writer, Diane Janes,

who will share her knowledge of Jack's case.

The Crown and Anchor had actually been run

since about 1915 by Henry and Sarah Blake.

Henry Blake died in December, 1921.

After her husband died,

she wasn't really making people particularly welcome.

She served everyone their beer in the passageway,

which as you'll see when we go in,

would of not been a particularly hospitable way

of dealing with things.

Early on the morning

of Saturday the 4th of March,

Mrs. Blake's next door neighbor called

but found the front door locked.

Opening the back door,

Ellen Payne discovered the brutally battered body

of Mrs. Blake lying dead on the kitchen floor.

Her head was down here towards the window

and her feet were almost out in the passage.

One of the puzzling elements

that the police faced in investigating this horrific murder

was trying to identify a motive.

The first police officer at the scene

was Constable Buzzwell and he found the deceased

in the position on the kitchen floor

with her blood stained knife near her body

but a search of the house revealed a locked box

which contained about 400 pounds,

a huge amount of money in those days.

If he didn't do it for money, why did he do it?

Why would Jack Hewitt have done this?

Part of the assault appeared

to have taken place in the passageway of the pub

where Mrs. Blake served her customers.

There was also blood in the hall here

and the lamp had been smashed and broken,

so there was lamp glass all over the floor.

There was some blood inside the cellar,