Woman's Murder Solved 39 Years Later

The murder of a young mother in 1970 remained unsolved until 2009. It was only when a written confession detailing the killing was found amongst the belongings of a man who died that the police could finally close the case.

At 8am on Wednesday 2nd September that year binmen found the body of nineteen year old Lorraine Jacobs in an alley off Rodney Street. Lorraine's knickers had been removed and by her side were three rain sodden bags of chips. As her back was dry, police concluded she had died prior to the rain starting at 3am. A pathologist later put the time of death as around midnight.

Lorraine had been on her way to her home in Russell Street where she lived with her mum, fourteen month old daughter and baby son. Enquiries established she had last been seen alive in Pilgrim Street at 11pm and bought the chips in Great George Street. Earlier in the evening she had been drinking in Yates' Wine Lodge in Great Charlotte Street.

Detectives interviewed 900 people who lived, worked or had been in the area on the night of the killing and handed out 3,500 questionnaires. However the trail went cold and the murder remained unsolved until a dramatic discovery by decorators in 2008. Whilst cleaning out the house of 78 year old Harvey Richardson, who had recently died of bowel cancer, they found an envelope marked 'private and confidential'. Inside was a nine page confession to the murder, written on yellowing paper, as well as a pair of blue knickers.

The discovery led to Merseyside Police being called in and tests dated the paper to around the time of the murder. The confession contained information never previously in the public domain, detailing how Richardson, who had never been a suspect, had rowed with Lorraine over a camera she had taken from his Huskisson Street flat a couple of months earlier. This had happened as she was unhappy about him taking photographs of her children with it, although there was no reason to believe there was anything sinister about that. The letter said Richardson had been drinking all day after finding out he had failed his exams to become a librarian, then gone to Upper Duke Street looking for prostitutes. After coming across Lorraine, he strangled her then headed to Greenheys Gardens, where he had recently moved after being evicted from Huskisson Street.

Despite the length of time since the murder, detectives were able to corroborate 90% of the letters contents and there were DNA matches to both Lorraine and Richardson on the knickers. The Crown Prosecution Service confirmed that if Richardson were still alive, then he would be charged with the killing. This led to the police closing the case and Detective Superintendent Ian Kemble stating 'It means a lot to me to close this case for the Jacob family, I can not appreciate the suffering they have been through all these years and hope this outcome will bring them some comfort.'