UK Alan Leppard April 1991 and Brenda Long December 1991, Kent UK

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davidt said:
Apologies if I have this wrong but I thought Brenda went to the door first time and by the time she got there they had gone. 40 minutes later they returned and that time Akan answered. One thing I found odd that as described is that it seems Alan went out the back door and around the side of the house. Why didn't he just open the front door? Was Alan being cautious or suspicious of something and trying to sneak a look to see who it was? Did he have something to be worried about ?
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Is that from the Crimewatch reconstruction? I need to watch it again...
For some reason I thought it was much less than 40 minutes before they returned.
 
tes1984 said:
Is that from the Crimewatch reconstruction? I need to watch it again...
For some reason I thought it was much less than 40 minutes before they returned.
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No it's from the last podcast I linked. And a couple of others as well. I think it was around 10pm and then 10.40 when they returned. I haven't rewatched the Crimewatch one to see if they have it differently.

Edit: just had a watch and Crimewatch says the same. Reconstruction doesn't show which door Alan opened but it does like he walked around from the back of the house. It's quite hard to watch seeing Brenda taking part knowing she too would be murdered a few months later.
 
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davidt said:
No it's from the last podcast I linked. And a couple of others as well. I think it was around 10pm and then 10.40 when they returned. I haven't rewatched the Crimewatch one to see if they have it differently.

Edit: just had a watch and Crimewatch says the same. Reconstruction doesn't show which door Alan opened but it does like he walked around from the back of the house. It's quite hard to watch seeing Brenda taking part knowing she too would be murdered a few months later.
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You're right and it was a 40 minute gap (going by the reconstruction and local press). At 10pm Brenda and Alan are watching television in bed, when someone knocks on the door. Brenda peeps through the first floor curtains and sees two men outside. She goes downstairs and opens the door, but the men have gone.
At 10.40pm they knock at the door again. Brenda peeps through the curtains and tells Alan he had better go down and check what they want.

I can't find anything much about Alan using the side door.

It seems a bit strange to me that the first time the men knock on the door, it's Brenda, rather than Alan, who goes downstairs to answer.
 
tes1984 said:
You're right and it was a 40 minute gap (going by the reconstruction and local press). At 10pm Brenda and Alan are watching television in bed, when someone knocks on the door. Brenda peeps through the first floor curtains and sees two men outside. She goes downstairs and opens the door, but the men have gone.
At 10.40pm they knock at the door again. Brenda peeps through the curtains and tells Alan he had better go down and check what they want.

I can't find anything much about Alan using the side door.

It seems a bit strange to me that the first time the men knock on the door, it's Brenda, rather than Alan, who goes downstairs to answer.
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Apparently Alan had fallen asleep but was awake the second time.
 
Mrs Marple said:

The Crime Watch reconstruction of Alan's murder begins at 1hour 11 minutes. Brenda features in this.

I find it really hard to believe that Alan's murder isn't solvable when they were driving around in a large American style car. Hardly discrete is it o_O
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Never heard of this case before, interesting watch!

Nothing to add except the guy who came into the pub to ask after Alan Leppard looks the spitting image of John Palmer!

Then we have Nick Biddiss leading the case, just over five years later he was leading the manhunt for Kenneth Noye who got himself into a little bit of bother again....

Kent was pretty dodgy in the early 90s it is fair to say....

Perhaps different times but can't say I'd be too found of opening the door after half 10. Would what the response would've been if they'd just knocked on the bedroom window to alert the individuals they were in?!
 
tes1984 said:
I don't understand what you mean by this...
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Well would the individuals outside have quickly driven off on being noticed from upstairs, shot at the window or shouted for Alan to come down?

They quickly disappeared the first time when the landing light was switched on and Brenda was coming down to open the door although I don't know how visible the hallway would be from outside at night?

Or maybe it was just a knock to indicate we know where you are and are coming for you so be ready in about 40 minutes?
 
Inspector Evans said:
Well would the individuals outside have quickly driven off on being noticed from upstairs, shot at the window or shouted for Alan to come down?

They quickly disappeared the first time when the landing light was switched on and Brenda was coming down to open the door although I don't know how visible the hallway would be from outside at night?

Or maybe it was just a knock to indicate we know where you are and are coming for you so be ready in about 40 minutes?
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Where are you getting this information from?
 
One thing that could be looked at is US military bases. Where I live we had a few of the big USAF bases, and the one thing they used to do is bring in everything to make them feel like a home from home. They were literally small US towns dumped in to the UK. One of the things a lot of servicemen did was ship their own cars over from the US. Often though they weren't taken with them when they left, and many were sold on in the UK. Was this car bought from a serviceman who left not long before?
 
tes1984 said:
Where are you getting this information from?
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Crimewatch reconstruction....

Never heard of this case until it was mentioned on another thread on WS a few days back so popped over and the reconstruction was my main reference point to understand what the situation was on the night in 1991 compared to just reading endless articles on the case.
 
TheRockingRev said:
One thing that could be looked at is US military bases. Where I live we had a few of the big USAF bases, and the one thing they used to do is bring in everything to make them feel like a home from home. They were literally small US towns dumped in to the UK. One of the things a lot of servicemen did was ship their own cars over from the US. Often though they weren't taken with them when they left, and many were sold on in the UK. Was this car bought from a serviceman who left not long before?
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Interesting idea about the car. A Cadillac (or similar) is such a strange choice for the getaway vehicle in a UK murder.
 
tes1984 said:
Interesting idea about the car. A Cadillac (or similar) is such a strange choice for the getaway vehicle in a UK murder.
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Not only that, theg also slowly drove around the area for an extended period almost as if they wanted to be seen. One of the opening posts on this thread says it almost looks staged. I tend to agree. I did wonder if it was some sort of distraction technique. Everyone seeing and remembering this particular car whilst something else was going on unnoticed?
 
If it's a planned contract killing, then why don't the hitmen finish the job?

Alan is shot in the chest, and is still alive when they flee. There's no second shot to the head to make sure. What if there's an ambulance there within minutes and Alan survives? Do they flee once they realise a woman (and witness) is also in the property?
 
davidt said:
Might her appearance on Crimewatch have triggered her murder?
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Right. They might not have realised she was in the house/ a witness.

If she did use different names as mentioned upthread, perhaps back then it would take a little time to track her down.

Did the police not have any theories about why Alan was targeted? It hardly looks like a random killing.
 
tes1984 said:
Alan is shot in the chest, and is still alive when they flee. There's no second shot to the head to make sure. What if there's an ambulance there within minutes and Alan survives? Do they flee once they realise a woman (and witness) is also in the property?
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It's not the sort of gun you'd expect a contract killer to use, but maybe that's what they could get and they were just not very good, so they shot him, perhaps as you say realised he wasn't there alone (surely not something hard to find out) and made a run for it.

It sounds like perhaps the killer/s did not actually know Alan personally but perhaps were hired by someone with a grudge (he was a serial cheat/family abandoner wasn't he -- even if the person with a grudge wasn't a disgruntled ex, that sort of behaviour does say something about Alan's character so perhaps he got on the wrong side of others in some way). The killer/s agreed to do it, used what they could find, the car was some crazy idea (that seems to have worked) to draw attention to the car rather than them so everyone looking for a white Cadillac that couldn't be found or linked to them.

But because they don't do their research properly, they mess things up rather badly, realise that Alan had a girlfriend or wife at home who might have seen them and shouts her mouth off ( as they see it) on Crimewatch, and so decide to kill her too.

Did the police dig into Alan's background?
 
Alan wouldn't have been hard to track down, and I very much doubt the gunman would have prioritised a LHD vehicle.

Shotguns were also extremely common and available in Kent in the early 90s.
 
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