Justice for Helen

by Marie McCourt

  That evening, he would have had a clear view of Helen struggling up a deserted Main Street, towards the pub, crossing at the pelican lights.

  The George and Dragon was an unusual building; part of the ground floor had been converted to an independent restaurant called The Stone Barn (which Simms had run before taking over the pub). It also had the first-floor pool room with a bar, and on one side of the building was a bowling green.

  A tall wooden side gate provided access both to the bowling green and a rarely used private door, which led to a staircase (referred to as ‘Staircase A’ in the trial) and the pub’s living quarters upstairs. In seconds, Simms could have slipped down those stairs, opened the gate onto Main Street and called my daughter over.

  As I testified, and told police, Helen would not have voluntarily called at the pub. But if he’d called her name, urgently gestured her over, she might well have gone out of politeness. The gate could have clicked shut behind her as he encouraged her up to the side door out of the howling wind and gritty air.

  Just come up here for a second. I need to ask you something . . .

  What could he have wanted? To discuss the incident in the pub two nights earlier? Or was there another, more sinister, reason?

  The police investigation established that Simms was a lothario who boasted about his sexual prowess. While his wife and two young children lived just 500 yards away in the family home with his mother, Simms claimed he needed to sleep on the premises to prevent break-ins. He didn’t sleep alone, however. Since the summer of 1987, his young mistress Tracey Hornby, who was twenty at the time of the trial, had virtually moved into the flat with him. Even that didn’t stop his womanising. One of the advantages of being a pub landlord, he’d boasted, was being able to ‘have’ any woman who came through his door. His many conquests among young female customers, even while Tracey was sleeping in the main bedroom, were the ‘perks of being a licensee’.

  Simms admitted in the witness box that as recently as the week before Helen disappeared, he and Tracey had rowed in a club when she’d caught him ‘all over’ a girl.

  As witnesses gave evidence, I learned that Helen had confided in a number of friends that Simms had made advances, was ‘trying to get her into bed’ and told her he’d ‘fantasised’ about her, but she had ‘knocked him back’ and wasn’t interested. The police had no doubt there was a ‘sexual attraction’ to Helen on Simms’ part.

  After the incident in the toilets, Simms was heard by three separate witnesses saying he hated Helen. Was it because she’d rebuffed him? A few months earlier, he’d accused her of gossiping about his lock-ins and extra-marital affair and temporarily barred her. She’d assured him she’d done no such thing and it was all smoothed over – but was it?

  We already knew that Simms had a temper . . . and he admitted he was ‘steaming’ that day with his manager who hadn’t notified him when a rep from Labatt beer had called at the pub. Was he quietly fuming upstairs? Did he see Helen out of the window and decide to tackle her about the incident in the pub two nights earlier?

  At 5.25pm, a villager returning home from work got off his bus in Billinge and walked up what we call ‘the steps’ or ‘the cobbles’– a steep footpath on Main Street, about 100 yards away from the George and Dragon pub. This path leads to a high point which overlooks the village – and pub.

  Just as he reached the top, Mr Leveson said, the villager had ‘heard a sharp, fairly high-pitched, screaming call which stopped dead. He looked where he believed the noise had come from – down Main Street towards the George and Dragon public house – but saw nothing.’

  Assuming it was children playing, he’d carried on home. But, on hearing his evidence, a chill went down my spine. That man had heard Helen’s last scream as she was pulled into the pub. I knew she wouldn’t have gone in willingly.

  Between 5.45pm and 6pm, the manageress of The Stone Barn restaurant was in the bar serving area when she heard loud ‘dragging’ noises coming from upstairs. Directly above her was the back bedroom of the pub.

  The ceiling was low – with a height of just 7ft 1½in – and the gap between the ceiling and the floorboards above was just 5½in. As Mr Leveson pointed out, ‘every sound made in the back bedroom can be heard in the servery’.

  The jury would have discovered that for themselves when they visited the premises early in the trial.

  The sounds were similar to those made when the previous owner had been packing up furniture to move out, ‘as though something was being moved around,’ she said.

  At 5.45pm, Simms was seen moving his VW Passat dark blue car from its usual position in front of the restaurant and reversing to the tall gate which led to the pub’s private door. After stopping, he opened the boot.

  It was no accident the car was moved to this position, Mr Leveson told the court ‘ . . . for in that way the body of Helen McCourt could be removed from the flat essentially out of sight and away from observant passers-by.’

  Back to Simms’ affair. Every evening at 7pm, Tracey would arrive at the pub to spend the night with him. However, her grandmother became upset at overhearing gossip about a young woman having an affair with ‘that rat at the pub’.

  To keep the peace, Tracey agreed to no longer sleep at the pub but return home each night after seeing Simms. She wept as she told the court, ‘I love him and still do.’ She was going to start returning home on Tuesday, 9 February . . . the day that Helen went missing.

  That very evening, Simms phoned her at 6.10pm, asking her not to come to the pub until 8.30pm – an hour and a half later than her usual arrival time. When asked why, he’d whispered ‘Nadine.’ His wife’s name. She presumed Nadine was in the background.

  At 5.55pm, a dark blue car pulled out from the pub car park without warning, causing a driver to perform an emergency stop and exclaim ‘Silly idiot!’ The blue car continued through the traffic lights towards St Helens.

  Simms visited the family home between 6.30 and 6.45pm, said his wife, but he only stayed briefly before returning to the pub – again, reversing his car to the gate – at 7pm. He must then have spent the next hour upstairs – on his own – before coming downstairs at 8pm and telling staff he was ‘nipping out for half an hour’. He was gone for two hours.

  Between 8pm and 8.15pm, John rang the pub and asked if Helen was there. An announcement was made over the tannoy. ‘Sorry, she’s not here,’ a new barmaid said. At 8.45pm, Tracey arrived at the pub and, as usual, headed upstairs to the flat via the main set of stairs (called ‘Staircase B’ in court). These stairs led to both the pool room on the first floor – and the locked front door to Simms’ living quarters.

  Tracey slid her key in the lock but it wouldn’t turn. Downstairs, she fumed for a while before remembering there was a key to the other set of stairs, via the side gate, in the cleaning cupboard. She let herself in that way, but found the flat empty. There was no sign of Simms. Puzzled as to why she hadn’t been able to unlock the front door, she’d checked it and discovered the ‘snip’ was on.

  Someone had deliberately locked the door from the inside – preventing anyone from coming in.

  It also meant, said the prosecution, that Simms could not have left the flat through that door because the snip could only be applied from the inside.

  This had never happened before, Tracey agreed. Upset that Simms wasn’t there, and suspecting he’d taken Nadine out for her birthday, which was later that week, she’d sat in the main bedroom watching TV, waiting for him to come home.

  Finally, at 10pm, Simms returned to the flat. Popping his head around the bedroom door (keeping his body out of sight), he told a still-miffed Tracey that Nadine had ‘gone berserk’ after finding out about the affair. ‘Look what she’s done,’ he said, pointing to two long scratches on his Adam’s apple.

  He then asked her to go downstairs and see if the new barmaid needed a hand while he had a bath. Tracey was surprised – she’d never been asked to help before and was only gone a few minutes a
s the barmaid was fine. Back upstairs, she watched TV until Simms emerged from the bathroom with a towel around his waist and wet hair.

  After dressing, he’d popped briefly to the bar, where a customer alerted him to the pub sign swinging precariously in the gale force wind. Simms had looked out of the window and said he’d deal with it.

  Simms returned to the flat ‘subdued and not his normal self’. But not so subdued that it interfered with his sex life. I still vividly remember recoiling as Tracey told the court how they’d got into bed and made love. The word ‘wonderful’ was used.

  Afterwards, she’d set her alarm for 1am and gone home, leaving him in bed. Alone in the pub . . .

  Just after 5am, an air stewardess driving to work for an early shift spotted a car matching the description of Simms’ Passat being driven at speed near Warrington, thirteen miles away.

  At 5.30am, a local delivery driver to Billinge noticed lights blazing in the usually dark pub. There was no sign of Simms’ car. It was still absent at 8.30am.

  Fifteen miles away, Gordon Bannister, a local butcher, was taking his Alsatian dog for a 7.30am walk on Hollins Green waste land between the Manchester Ship Canal and the A57. He noticed a dark blue VW hatchback backed right up to the canal’s edge. One big gust of wind and they’ll be in the water, he remembered thinking. But his attention was taken by his dog running excitedly off along a dirt track. About 200 yards along the path, he found it sniffing at a blood-stained towel. As a butcher, he recognised human blood when he saw it.

  Two feet away from the towel were a pair of muddy men’s boots plus a pair of men’s jeans, ‘concertina-ed on the ground as though someone had just stepped out of them’. Nearby was a blue sweatshirt, inside out and crumpled up, ‘as though it had been thrown off’, a pair of underpants and one solitary sock – all heavily mud-stained. There was also another towel and a dishcloth.

  Intrigued, Bannister put his hand over the crotch of the jeans. Despite the extensive mud on the legs, the clothes were ‘bone dry’.

  They’d only just been taken off.

  Mr Bannister told the court he was so alarmed at the bloodstains, he’d looked around for a body before turning back. The car was now gone. After confiding in his wife, he rang Cheshire Police and led them to the site at 10am.

  There isn’t a day goes by when I don’t thank Gordon Bannister for acting so diligently. His evidence would prove crucial to the case.

  Back in Billinge, Simms was seen at a local garage at 8am, putting air into his car’s rear offside tyre.

  At 8.45am, the pub cleaner, Mrs Mary Smith, and her husband arrived at the pub for her morning shift. They were stunned when Simms answered the door immediately. Usually, it took five to ten minutes to rouse him from bed.

  Although Simms was wearing clean clothes, his hands and face were dirty ‘as if he had been working in the garden and then wiped his face with grubby hands’.

  Yet, he’d only had a bath at 10pm the night before.

  Inside, the pub seemed unusually clean. Brand new black bin bags, which had not been ordered by Mrs Smith, were strewn in the cleaning cupboard. And the usual roll of bin bags looked noticeably slimmer. While cleaning the toilets, she heard ‘vigorous brushing’ and was astonished to find Simms scrubbing the wooden floor at the bottom of the private staircase with bleach and a stiff brush. He said he was cleaning up dog dirt – a job he never normally did. The dog often messed there but Simms usually left the cleaning up to them.

  At about 9.45am Simms announced he was going to Makro – a wholesalers at Kirkby – even though he’d only visited the day before to buy cleaning equipment. He had never gone twice in one week before. He told the police, in interviews, that he wanted paint and floor tiles to ‘improve’ his home. (But was he planning to decorate the pub to hide evidence?) Paint was actually delivered on the Thursday while police were speaking to him in the pub. I was told later that one officer actually commented, ‘Someone’s going to be busy.’ (although this was not said in court). The police report also said that Simms brought in a vacuum cleaner from home as the pub one was being repaired and used it on the carpets. Again, this was out of the ordinary.

  Leaving via the side door which led to the bowling green gate, carrying two black bin bags, Simms had locked the staff inside until the pub manager Ken Booth arrived later that morning. This was definitely out of character. Simms didn’t trust anyone. He would remove the handle of the back bedroom, where he stored bottles of spirits, so no one could gain access.

  At 12.30pm, Simms returned to the pub to meet Tracey for lunch. When she commented on a mark on his lip, he said he’d cut himself shaving.

  Helen’s disappearance was now all over the news. By that evening, police had established that she had reached Billinge before vanishing. DCS Eddie Alldred announced police would be searching every building Helen would have had to pass on her way home from the bus stop.

  At that point, my loyal brothers had already embarked on some detective work of their own. While everyone had gathered at my house, frantic with worry, three of them had slipped out and visited the George and Dragon to mingle in the hope of overhearing something about Helen’s disappearance.

  Once inside, Tez had asked the pub manager, Ken Booth, if the landlord was in and if they could speak to him.

  ‘What’s it about?’ the manager asked.

  Our Tez wasn’t in the mood for a chat. ‘It’s a private conversation,’ he’d replied, coolly.

  Five, then ten minutes went by, with no sign of Simms. After another prompt to the manager, Simms finally appeared – swaggering across to where they were waiting.

  ‘What’s up?’ he’d asked over-casually.

  All three had stared at him. Simms looked as though he’d just got out of a long soak in a red-hot bath. He was wearing a thick cream Aran sweater but his face and hands were red and literally gleaming. He made a point of trying, and failing, to look at ease – stretching out his arms dramatically, slowly scratching his neck and yawning, while he considered, then answered, their questions.

  Tez had chosen his words carefully: ‘When’s the last time you saw Helen McCourt?’ he asked.

  Simms’ demeanour instantly changed. His swagger evaporated. For the briefest of moments, a look of panic appeared in his eyes and his voice became hesitant and higher-pitched.

  ‘She comes in here, sometimes,’ he stammered. Then he quickly added, ‘But I haven’t seen her.’

  Tez eyed him levelly. ‘What do you mean, “you haven’t seen her”?’ he asked. ‘I didn’t ask that.’

  Then David spoke: ‘So how often did she come in?’

  Simms’ eyes darted about. ‘Er, rarely,’ he stammered.

  ‘Did Helen ever stay behind for lock-ins?’ David continued.

  Simms shook his head quickly. ‘No, never,’ he said.

  David stared at him. He knew for a fact Simms was lying – he’d asked Helen himself to stop having stay-behinds as it was upsetting me.

  ‘Right, I’d better be off,’ said Simms. ‘Have a drink before you go – on the house,’ he added, before sauntering off.

  The brothers headed outside to the front of the pub and spoke quietly.

  ‘He’s lying,’ said Tez.

  David nodded. ‘I know for a fact he’s lying because Helen did have stay-behinds.’

  Tez frowned. ‘And what sort of landlord offers free drinks to strangers? There’s something not right.’

  Together, they’d gone to the police incident room to report their concerns before slipping back to my house – I hadn’t even noticed they’d left.

  The prosecution asked for just one sibling to testify. Senior Investigating Officer Paul Acres put Tez forward: ‘I think you’ll agree he’s the strongest witness,’ he said.

  ‘No!’ I said firmly. ‘It has to be our David.’

  Paul blinked – he probably wasn’t used to having his brilliant mind questioned. ‘He was the only one who knew about Helen having stay-behinds and he was the
one who asked Simms about it,’ I continued. ‘The barristers will accept it from him. But if it comes from our Tez, it’s just hearsay.’

  I’ve no idea where that word ‘hearsay’ came from. I’d never even heard it before. Yet, suddenly, I was spouting legal jargon with the best of them – I’m sure it was down to St Martha.

  And so it was my youngest brother, David, who took the witness stand. Sitting beside Mum, I shook with nerves. David had developed epilepsy as a teenager and, although it was controlled with medication, I was terrified that the stress would bring on a seizure. Thankfully, he remained calm and in control as he testified.

  ‘When Tez told Simms we were Helen’s uncles, he asked: “Helen who?”’ David told the court.

  Helen had been a regular in the pub for years – she’d worked there, for heaven’s sake. Everyone knew her.

  ‘Helen who?’ indeed.

  Next morning at 11am, perhaps before this information had even filtered through, police arrived at the George and Dragon.

  DCS Eddie Alldred explained in later documentaries how they knew something had happened between the bus stop and Helen’s home so decided to search every building she would have passed. Simms wasn’t there but Ken, the manager who had been sending drinks to Helen, allowed them to start a cursory search of the premises. The judge reminded the jury that, at that point, the George was just one of the places they were visiting – the searches weren’t in detail.

  At 12.30pm, Simms arrived. Initially, he was helpful – offering to make tea and fetching a ladder so they could search the attic, outhouses and bowling green area. He told them he lived alone at the premises but was forced to confess to an extra-marital affair when police found Tracey’s belongings in the main bedroom.

  As the pub grew busier with lunchtime customers, police decided to take Ken’s statement at St Helens police station. Aware that it would leave the pub short-staffed, Detective Inspector George Durno, flanked by Superintendent Tom Davies, asked Simms if there was anyone else who could help him behind the bar.