Edinburgh's World's End murders investigation into Angus Sinclair to be centre of new documentary

Episode five of Murder by the Sea will be broadcast on Tuesday, October 22, and explores the murders of Christine Eadie and Helen Scott by Angus Sinclair in October 1977.

Dubbed the ‘World’s End Murders’ due to the girls, who were both 17, having been last seen alive leaving the World’s End pub on the Royal Mile, the case is a crime which shook not just Edinburgh but the entire country.

It wouldn’t be until 37 years after Helen’s and Christine’s bodies were discovered, that Sinclair would be convicted of his crimes, following major advances in DNA profiling.

The killer stood trial in 2007 but was acquitted and, due to the law of double jeopardy, he could not be tried again for the same crime.

TSPL

But DNA advances and a discovery which linked Sinclair directly to the girls’ bodies brought about a change in that law and a landmark moment in the Scottish justice system.

Sinclair was finally convicted in 2014 and was sentenced to 37 years in prison - the same amount of time both families had had to painfully wait for news about who killed their loved ones.

Sinclair, who is believed to have killed multiple women in Scotland between 1961 and 1978, died at HM Prison Glenochil in 2019.

Renowned specialist in bloodstain pattern analysis Jo Millington appears in the series as an expert and says that the crime has lived long in the minds of the people of Edinburgh in part due to the tragic nature of the case, but also because of the advancements in DNA technology.

She said: “Not only did it change the law, but it also used really cutting edge technology, at the beginning of DNA technology.”

She added: “It's an absolutely tragic case. I think there's that kind of element that it could happen to anybody. And I think when you've got a case like that, it really does capture the imagination, and almost there's that fear factor around it. Growing up in the 70s, I know that whenever young women went missing, it was always front page news.” 

DNA analysis played a huge role in the eventual apprehension of Sinclair, however forensic science was in a very different place when the crime was committed. 

“Forensic science was in a place where we were very reliant on traditional forensics, so kind of the physical evidence of contact tracers, whereas now we obviously use DNA in pretty much every investigation that we deal with,” Jo explains. “So when you've got a crime against the person or persons, as we did in this case, then nowadays, the first thing that would happen is that we would employ DNA technology, and it would have the potential to essentially generate the name of a suspect.”

Whilst Jo says that the case would have been regularly reviewed, however it took confidence in the potential for technology to advance to ensure that DNA was kept as a consideration.

“I think the thing that is absolutely astonishing in this case is that the scientist Lester Knibb and the team back in the 70s is that they had this forethought to know that we can't do it now, but we will be able to do it in the future,” she said.

“Imagine having that kind of confidence in science to know that in a few years time, we won't be scrabbling around requiring the stain the size of a 50 pence piece, we'll be able to detect, meaningful information from stains that are much less than that, and where the DNA technology is going to come on board and help us to investigate. So I think that it's absolutely life affirming” 

Jo started her career in the mid-1990s with Lothian and Borders Police and worked closely with some of those who continued to investigate the case - including Knibb, who was head of biology with the police force.

“He was a big mentor for me. I mean, he laid down a lot of the philosophies and the ideas and the processes that I've put in place today,” she said.

Murder by the Sea airs on True Crime on Tuesday at 10.00pm. All episodes will be available on Watch Free UK after linear broadcast.