41 Facts About Timothy Evans

Timothy John Evans was a Welsh lorry driver who was wrongfully accused of murdering his wife Beryl and infant daughter Geraldine at their residence in Notting Hill, London.

In January 1950, Evans was tried and convicted of the murder of his daughter, and on 9 March he was executed by hanging.

Timothy Evans was a native of Merthyr Tydfil in Glamorgan, Wales.

Timothy Evans had an older sister, Eileen, born in 1921 and a younger half-sister, Maureen, who was born in September 1929.

Timothy Evans liked boxing and football, supporting Queens Park Rangers, as did Christie.

Timothy Evans was prone to inventing stories about himself to boost his self-esteem, a trait that continued into adulthood and interfered with his efforts to establish credibility when dealing with the police and courts.

In 1935, his mother and her second husband moved to London, and Timothy Evans worked as a painter and decorator while attending school.

Timothy Evans returned to Merthyr Tydfil in 1937 and briefly worked in the coal mines but had to resign because of continuing problems with his foot.

Timothy Evans was fined 60 shillings at West London Magistrates' Court on 25 April 1946 for stealing a car, and driving without insurance or a licence.

On 20 September 1947, Timothy Evans married Beryl Susanna Thorley, whom he had met in January 1947 on a blind date.

Timothy Evans's and Beryl's daughter Geraldine was born on 10 October 1948.

Several weeks later, on 30 November 1949, Timothy Evans informed police at Merthyr Tydfil that his wife had died in unusual circumstances.

Timothy Evans told the police that after arranging for Geraldine to be looked after, he had gone to Wales.

When re-questioned, Timothy Evans changed his story and said that Christie had offered to perform an abortion on Beryl.

Timothy Evans stated that he had left Christie out of his first statement in order to protect him.

Timothy Evans said that Evans should leave London for the meantime.

When Timothy Evans was shown the clothing taken from the bodies of his wife and child, he was informed that both had been strangled.

Timothy Evans was asked whether he was responsible for their deaths.

Timothy Evans was kept in solitary confinement for two days before being handed over to the London police.

Timothy Evans did not know what was happening other than his wife's body had not been found in the drain as expected.

Timothy Evans was put on trial for the murder of his daughter on 11 January 1950 before Mr Justice Lewis and a jury.

Beryl's murder, with which Timothy Evans was still formally charged, was not formally before the court, though evidence that he had murdered Beryl was used with the aim of establishing Timothy Evans's guilt of the murder of Geraldine.

Timothy Evans, who was represented by Malcolm Morris, withdrew his confession during consultations with his solicitor and alleged that Christie was responsible for the murders in accordance with his second statement given to the police at Merthyr Tydfil.

Unlike Christie, Timothy Evans had no previous convictions for violence, though he had been fined for theft and motoring offences.

The safety of Timothy Evans's conviction was severely criticised when Christie's murders were discovered three years later.

Timothy Evans instead claimed to have strangled her while being intimate with her, or that she had wanted to commit suicide and he helped her do so.

Indeed, the police re-interviewed the workmen and forced them to change their evidence to fit the preconceived idea that Timothy Evans was the sole murderer.

Brown found the bodies of three women hidden in a papered-over kitchen pantry, a recess immediately next to the wash-house where Beryl and Geraldine Timothy Evans had been found.

Timothy Evans confessed to murdering Fuerst and Eady, saying he had stored their bodies in the wash-room before burying them in shallow graves in the garden.

The murder of Beryl Timothy Evans was never a primary charge in the trials of either Timothy Evans or Christie.

Hence questions that went to the murder of Mrs Timothy Evans were not those with which the trials were especially concerned.

When Christie was later the subject of the Scott Henderson Inquiry, questions drafted by a solicitor representing Timothy Evans's mother were deemed not relevant and Scott Henderson retained the right of deciding if they could be asked.

The television journalist Ludovic Kennedy's book Ten Rillington Place criticised the police investigation and evidence submitted at the 1950 trial in which Timothy Evans was found guilty.

Brabin found it was "more probable than not" that Timothy Evans murdered his wife and that he did not murder his daughter.

Timothy Evans did not consider the incompetence of the police in their searches of the garden at Rillington Place.

The enquiry did little to settle the many issues which arose from the case, but, by exonerating Timothy Evans of killing his child, was crucial in subsequent events.

Since Timothy Evans had only been convicted of his daughter's murder, Roy Jenkins, Soskice's successor as Home Secretary, recommended a royal pardon for Timothy Evans, which was granted in October 1966.

In 1965, Timothy Evans's remains were exhumed from Pentonville Prison and reburied in St Patrick's Roman Catholic Cemetery in Leytonstone, Greater London.

The outcry over the Timothy Evans case contributed to the suspension and then abolition of capital punishment in the United Kingdom.

Timothy Evans argued that Evans's pardon had not formally expunged his conviction of murdering his daughter, and although the Brabin report had concluded that Evans probably did not kill his daughter, it had not declared him innocent.

The report contained the "devastating" conclusion that Timothy Evans had probably killed his wife.