Elderly widow's murder to feature on 24 Hours in Police Custody

A cold case involving a “ferocious” knife attack on an elderly woman in her own home is set to feature in a two-part special of a popular TV show.

24 Hours in Police Custody will follow Detective Superintendent Iain Moor and colleagues in the Major Crime Unit as they re-open the investigation into the 2013 murder of retired postmistress Una Crown.

Family members and a neighbour discovered the widow’s body in her bungalow in Magazine Lane, Wisbech.

Una, 86, died from stab wounds to her neck and chest, and her clothing had been set alight in a bid by the killer to disguise her injuries and destroy evidence.

The two new episodes, entitled, “The Last Roll of The Dice”, follow the case as detectives try to piece together more than a decade of evidence and uncover any new information which might help catch her killer, who they believed could be hiding in plain sight.

They then show how new forensic techniques revealed male DNA under Una’s fingernails, protected under her body and in her clenched fist when she fell to the floor.

The DNA matched a man who still lived a stone’s throw away from her bungalow – David Newton, now in his 70s.

Murder detectives had to rule out all male relatives in Newton’s paternal line, travelling all over the country, and pieced the DNA breakthrough together with new evidence to form a strong prosecution case.

In February last year, Newton was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 21 years, with Judge Justice Neil Garnham telling him he had launched “a ferocious and sustained knife attack on a defenceless old lady in her own home”.

Det Supt Moor said: “For more than a decade David Newton thought he had gotten away with this most horrendous crime. He was hiding in plain sight, but jurors saw through his lies and as this programme highlights, you cannot hide forever.

“Also demonstrated in the two episodes is the police commitment to continually reviewing unsolved cases and seeking new lines of enquiry. No unsolved murder case is ever closed.

“When I joined the Major Crime Unit, the first thing my wife said to me was, ‘you’ve got to solve this murder’.

“I’m immensely proud of bringing Newton to justice after more than a decade, and finally getting justice and closure for Una’s family. Una, by the actions she took on that night, solved her own case as she fought her attacker.”

24 Hours in Police Custody: "The Cold Case Murder", is due be shown at 9pm on Channel 4 on Monday and Tuesday (13 and 14 April).