'Bullets Were Flying Everywhere'

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31236, 7 December 1966, Page 21

'Bullets Were Flying Everywhere '

(N.Z.P.A. -Reuter—Copyright)

LONDON, December 6.

Harry Maurice Roberts, who pleaded guilty in the Old Bailey yesterday to the murder of two of three policemen shot dead near Wormwood Scrubs prison, told a woman after the shooting: “Bullets were flying everywhere.”

This was alleged by the Solicitor-General, Sir Dingle Foot, Q.C., prosecuting at the opening of the trial of Roberts and two other men charged with murdering the three policemen.

Sir Dingle Foot said Roberts had told the woman that if police had searched the van he had been in they would have found guns, and he “could have got 11 years.” Roberts, together with John Duddy and John Edward Witney, went on trial yesterday charged with the triple shooting.

Crime Plan

The three policemen—Detective Constable David Wombwell, Detective Sergeant Christopher Head and Constable Geoffrey Fox—were shot in a street outside Wormwood Scrubs prison, Shep-

herds Bush, London, on August 12.

Roberts, aged 30, a carpenter of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to the murder of Wombwell and Head but not guilty to the murder of Fox. Duddy, aged 37, and Witney, aged 36, pleaded not guilty to the murder of Fox and not guilty as accessories after the fact to the other two.

Sir Dingle Foot told the jury the three men were planning to commit a crime when their van was stopped by a car with three policemen in it. Sir Dingle Foot said Wombwell was questioning the men in the van when “Roberts pulled out a Luger pistol and shot Wombwell through the open window.” Roberts leapt out of the van and shot Detective-Sergeant Head in the back. Duddy ran and shot Police Constable Fox, driver of the police car, through the head, Sir Dingle Foot said.

Sir Dingle Foot said it was probable that Witney did not actually pull a trigger, but

the Crown’s case was that each was equally responsible in law for each of the three murders.

Earlier he warned the jury that they must not let the “feeling of horror at the nature of the crime or the notoriety that this case has attracted” influence them.

The trial was adjourned until today.

Supported Coup.—The former Indonesian Air Force chief, Air Vice-Marshal Omar Dhani, on trial for his life, today admitted supporting the Communist bid to seize power in Indonesia in October last year.—Djakarta, December 6.