Don Hale – författare

‘An Extraordinary story of innocence and persecution, determination and grit … it had me rattling through the pages’ SOPHIE DRAPER A gripping true crime investigation into the longest miscarriage of justice in British legal history.In September 1973, Stephen Downing was convicted and indefinitely sentenced for the murder of Wendy Sewell, a young legal secretary in the town of Bakewell in the Peak District. Wendy was attacked in broad daylight in Bakewell Cemetery. Stephen Downing, the 17-year-old groundskeeper with learning difficulties and a reading age of 11, was the primary suspect. He was immediately arrested, questioned for nine hours, without a solicitor present, and pressured into signing a confession full of words he did not understand.21 years later, local newspaper editor Don Hale was thrust into the case. Determined to take it to appeal, as he investigated the details, he found himself inextricably linked to the narrative. He faced obstacles at every turn, and suffered several attempts on his life. All of this merely strengthened his resolve: why should anyone threaten him if Downing had committed the crime?In 2002, Stephen Downing was finally acquitted, having served 27 years in prison.Immerse yourself in this masterful account of Hale’s long, dedicated and often dangerous campaign to rescue a long-forgotten victim of the British legal system; the longest miscarriage of justice in British history.

Just over eighty years ago on the East Coast main line, the streamlined A4 Pacific locomotive Mallard reached a top speed of 126mph – a world record for steam locomotives that still stands. Since then, millions have seen this famous locomotive, resplendent in her blue livery, on display at the National Railway Museum in York. Here, Don Hale tells the full story of how the record was broken: from the nineteenth-century London–Scotland speed race and, surprisingly, traces Mallard’s futuristic design back to the Bugatti car and the influence of Germany’s nascent Third Reich, which propelled the train into an instrument of national prestige. He also celebrates Mallard’s designer, Sir Nigel Gresley, one of Britain’s most gifted engineers. Mallard is a wonderful tribute to one of British technology’s finest hours.

Lionel ‘Buster’ Crabb was a drinker, a gambler, a womaniser and a lover of fast cars and gadgets. On top of all that, he was a spy, an acquaintance of Ian Fleming and the inspiration for James Bond.A British naval frogman and bomb disposal expert, Crabb worked directly under Fleming during the Second World War at Naval Intelligence and went on to conduct covert operations for both SIS and MI5. Elements from Crabb’s dangerous missions and eccentric lifestyle were later incorporated into Fleming’s novels. His inventions sparked the role of Q; Miss Moneypenny was based on Crabb’s aunt, Kitty Jarvis; and his underwater battle with enemy divers became a crucial scene in Thunderball. During a secret drive beneath a Russian warship in 1957, Crabb disappeared without a trace. One year later, a decapitated and handless body was found, sparking a major row between the government, the secret services and the Admiralty that still smoulders today.