ABSTRACT
Somebody is trying to prove something. How is he doing this? First, he should have in mind a clear idea of what is to be proved. Suppose we take a famous murder trial that took place in 1910 – that of Dr Crippen. The prosecution was trying to prove that Crippen had murdered his wife. The story, according to them, was that Crippen had fallen in love with his young secretary, Ethel Le Neve, and had decided to kill his wife so as to leave him free to marry Ethel. One night, therefore, he put poison in a glass of stout – his wife’s regular nightcap. The poison might have been sufficient to kill her, or it might merely have rendered her unconscious. At any rate, by the time Crippen had finished with the body she must have been dead. According to the prosecution, he cut the flesh from the bones and buried it in pieces in the cellar of the house where they lived. He burned the bones, and the head was never found. To explain his wife’s absence, he told friends at first that she was staying with relations. Later, when the police began to make inquiries, he told them that she had left him and that he had been too embarrassed to tell people this. Crippen had not yet been arrested, and shortly after his interview with the police, he hurriedly left the country with Ethel Le Neve. Meanwhile, the police dug up the cellar floor and discovered the human remains that had been buried there. Crippen was followed and brought back to England to stand trial.
