john bible

On 23 February 1968, the body of 25-year-old Patricia Docker was found in a Glasgow doorway. She had been strangled. The previous night she had been out dancing at a nearby club, the Majestic Ballroom in Hope Street, Glasgow.

On 15 August 1969, Jemima McDonald, 32, went for a night out at the Barrowland Ballroom. The next day she was found in an old building, strangled with her own stockings. Witnesses said they had seen her leaving the club at midnight with a tall, slim young man with red hair.

On 31st October 1969, 29-year-old Helen Puttock was found murdered. She had been to the Barrowland Ballroom the night before with her sister Jean and had met two men called John. One said he was from Castlemilk; the other did not disclose where he was from. After being in their company for well over an hour, they left to head home. Castlemilk John headed to George Square to get a bus, while Helen, Jean and the other John got into a taxi. They crossed the city to the Scotstoun area where Jean got out. The taxi then continued to Earl Street in Scotstoun where Helen lived.

This was the last sighting of Helen alive. Her body was found in the early morning by a man walking his dog. The poor woman had been strangled and was menstruating; her handbag was missing.

The suspect was described by Helen's sister Jean as being a well-dressed young man — tall, slim and with redish/fair hair — and described as being polite, well-dressed and well-spoken. She said the stranger had given his name as "John" and that he had frequently quoted from the Bible. He was reported to have said: “I don’t drink at Hogmanay, I pray,” and to have referred to Moses and his father’s belief that dancehalls were “dens of iniquity”.^[1]

The last possible sighting of Bible John was of a well-dressed young man in a disheveled state with possible scratch marks on his face, getting off a bus at Grey Street at Sauchiehall Street around 1.30am. He was last seen heading towards the public ferry to cross over the River Clyde to the south side of the city. He dissapeared into the night, never to be seen again.

The police made a determined effort to hunt for the killer, now nicknamed "Bible John", but although a number of suspects were questioned, no arrests were ever made, and no further victims have been attributed to him. All three victims had been strangled and were menstrating. Their handbags we also missing.

In 1996, police exhumed the body of John Irvine McInnes, the cousin of one of the original suspects, from a Lanarkshire graveyard. McInnes, who had served in the Scots Guards, had committed suicide aged 41 in 1981. Police ran a DNA test and compared it with semen found on Helen Puttock's tights and announced it to be non conclusive.

Lord Mackay, then the Lord Advocate, said there was not enough evidence to link the murders with McInnes.

On 12 December 2004, police announced they were to DNA test a number of men in a further attempt to solve the case. This followed the discovery of an 80% match to a DNA sample taken at the site of a minor crime two years earlier.