The Bridgewater Four are four men who were tried and found guilty of killing 13-year-old paperboy Carl Bridgewater, who was shot in the head at close range near

Stourbridge Stourbridge is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley in the West Midlands, England, situated on the River Stour. Historically in Worcestershire, it was the centre of British glass making during the Industrial Revolution. The ...

, England, in 1978. In February 1997, after almost two decades of imprisonment, their convictions were overturned and the three surviving defendants were released; the fourth defendant had died in prison two years into his sentence. Bridgewater's murder remains unsolved. The investigations were carried out by the

West Midlands Serious Crime Squad The West Midlands Serious Crime Squad was a police unit in the English West Midlands which operated from 1974 to 1989. It was disbanded after an investigation into allegations of incompetence and abuse of power on the part of some of the squad' ...

, which was later disbanded after an inquiry into corruption and mismanaged investigations.

Murder

Carl Bridgewater (2 January 1965 – 19 September 1978) was shot dead on 19 September 1978 at Yew Tree Farm near

, West Midlands, while delivering a newspaper to the house. The occupants of the house, elderly cousins Mary Poole and Fred Jones, were not home at the time. Police conjecture that Bridgewater may have disturbed an intruder or burglar, and was subsequently forced into the living room of the house where he was shot once in the head at close range with a shotgun.

Conviction and sentencing

The Bridgewater Four were Patrick Molloy, James Robinson and cousins Michael and Vincent Hickey. They came to the attention of police working on the murder investigation following further serious crimes later in 1978. On 24 November, Robinson, Hickey and an unidentified third man carried out an armed robbery at a

Tesco Tesco plc () is a British Multinational corporation, multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. In 2011 it was the third-largest retailer in the world measured by gross revenues an ...

supermarket on the Castle Vale estate in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

. Hickey and Robinson raided the safe while the third man held several terrified shoppers at bay with a gun. When the manager tried to intervene, a shot was fired over his head. Six days later, Robinson and the Hickey cousins robbed an elderly couple at Chapel Farm, Romsley, near

Halesowen Halesowen ( ) is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley, in the county of West Midlands, England. Historically an exclave of Shropshire and, from 1844, in Worcestershire, the town is around from Birmingham city centre, and fro ...

. Vincent stayed in the car while Robinson and Michael charged into the house wearing balaclavas, brandishing a shotgun and shouting for money. The victims of this robbery displayed great courage but the robbers got away with £200. Robinson took the lead, hitting one of the victims with the gun but not firing it. Molloy was the first to be arrested. During questioning which also covered Bridgewater's murder, Molloy told police that he had been in an upstairs bedroom at Yew Tree Farm while robbing the house when he heard a gunshot downstairs. Shortly afterwards, the other three men were arrested. All denied committing murder, but three of them were convicted of murder at

Stafford Stafford () is a market town and the county town of Staffordshire, in the West Midlands region of England. It lies about north of Wolverhampton, south of Stoke-on-Trent and northwest of Birmingham. The town had a population of 70,145 in ...

Crown Court The Crown Court is the court of first instance of England and Wales responsible for hearing all indictable offences, some either way offences and appeals lied to it by the magistrates' courts. It is one of three Senior Courts of England and Wale ...

on 9 November 1979. The fourth, Molloy, was found guilty of

manslaughter Manslaughter is a common law legal term for homicide considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is sometimes said to have first been made by the ancient Athenian lawmaker Draco in the 7th ...

. They were sentenced on 12 November. James Robinson (aged 45) and Vincent Hickey (aged 25) were both sentenced to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted people are to remain in prison for the rest of their natural lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or otherwise commuted to a fixed te ...

with a recommended minimum term of 25 years, which would have kept them behind bars until at least 2004 and the ages of 70 and 50 respectively. Michael Hickey (aged 18) was sentenced to be detained indefinitely at Her Majesty's pleasure, though it was anticipated he would serve a shorter sentence than the two others convicted of murder due to his age. Patrick Molloy (aged 51) received a 12-year prison sentence on the manslaughter charge, but he died of a

heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which m ...

in prison, two years later.

Case quashed

An appeal in March 1989 was rejected, but on 21 February 1997, the latest in a number of appeals finally saw the men's convictions overturned, after the Court of Appeal ruled that the trial had been unfair, due to certain areas of evidence fabricated by police in order to persuade the now-deceased Molloy to make a confession. However, the Appeal Judges noted that in the light of Vincent Hickey's confessions to being present at the farm where Bridgewater was shot dead "we consider that there remains evidence on which a reasonable jury properly directed could convict."David Graves, "Bridgewater Four convictions quashed", ''Daily Telegraph'' 31 July 1997.
Archived
web.archive.com) Despite this, in the light of the judgment, the

Crown Prosecution Service The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is the principal public agency for conducting criminal prosecutions in England and Wales. It is headed by the Director of Public Prosecutions. The main responsibilities of the CPS are to provide legal ad ...

had decided not to apply for a retrial involving Vincent Hickey in the public interest nor proceed with an outstanding armed robbery charge against him. Hickey said, "My conviction has been quashed, so I am absolved and as far as I'm concerned that's the end of it." The campaign to free and absolve the four men was led by Michael Hickey's mother, Ann Whelan, and campaigning journalist

Paul Foot Paul Foot may refer to: * Paul Foot (comedian) (born 1973), English comedian * Paul Foot (journalist) (1937–2004), British investigative journalist, political campaigner and author See also * Paul Foot Award The Paul Foot Award is an award give ...

. Preparations were made for a case against four police officers in the Staffordshire force on charges of fabricating evidence, but the case was dropped in December 1998. The Court of Appeal agreed with a Home Office-appointed assessor that the Hickey cousins should lose a quarter of loss-of-earnings compensation for their free food and accommodation inside prison. This has set a precedent which is still being used by the Home Office. Robinson died on 30 August 2007 of

lung cancer Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma (since about 98–99% of all lung cancers are carcinomas), is a malignant lung tumor characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. Lung carcinomas derive from transformed, malign ...

at the age of 73.

Bert Spencer

Over the years, convicted murderer Bert Spencer (born 1940) has been mentioned in the media as a possible suspect for the murder. Spencer, a uniformed ambulance driver who worked at Corbett Hospital in

lived in Wordsley and was a neighbour of Bridgewater, living five houses away. He was investigated by police in the immediate aftermath of the murder, not least because he drove a blue Vauxhall Viva - the same type of car which had been seen at the farm on the afternoon of the murder. Witnesses also said that the driver of the car was a uniformed man. Spencer had a shotgun licence and was regularly allowed to shoot at Yew Tree Farm. However, he was eliminated from police inquiries within a few months after the arrest of the four other suspects. Shortly afterwards, Spencer shot dead 70-year-old Hubert Wilkes at neighbouring Holloway Farm. Like Carl, Hubert Wilkes had been shot while sitting on a sofa. Spencer was imprisoned for life in 1980 and served 15 years before being paroled in 1995. Spencer is featured in a book, ''Scapegoat for Murder: The Truth About the Killing of Carl Bridgewater'' (D&B Publishing), written by true crime author, Simon W. Golding. The author invited

criminologist Criminology (from Latin , "accusation", and Ancient Greek , ''-logia'', from λόγος ''logos'' meaning: "word, reason") is the study of crime and deviant behaviour. Criminology is an interdisciplinary field in both the behavioural and s ...

David Wilson to interview Spencer, and in June 2016,

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

screened a television documentary, ''Interview with a Murderer''. In the course of the "interview of the year", Spencer's daughter revealed that she felt that her father was at Yew Tree Farm on the day of Bridgwater's killing "and possibly saw something". An ambulance station secretary (who was also a friend) who had provided the "cast iron" alibi that he had been "at work all day", admitted that she could not be sure that Spencer had not left at some point. Prof. Wilson, in his final meeting with Spencer, told him that he saw through Spencer's "kindly old grandfather schtick", adding that a P-scan test indicated Spencer was a manipulative and callous psychopath. The documentary concluded with Wilson interviewing Spencer's former wife, who had not spoken publicly before. She said that the day after Bridgewater's murder, Spencer told her he was disposing of his shotgun. She added that, Spencer having chosen to revive the issue to protest his innocence, it seemed likely that the police would reopen the case.The Times - Monday June 2016, "Times 2"page 10

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