Cold case experts are set to launch a fresh probe into the case of teenager Pamela Hastie in an attempt to discover who raped and murdered her more than 41 years ago. The 16-year-old was strangled as she walked home from school in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, in 1981 in a crime that shocked Scotland.
Local man Raymond Gilmour, then 19, was tried and convicted of the crime in 1982 but his conviction was quashed on appeal after he served 20 years in jail. A meticulous re-examination of her case was ordered by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC, who is understood to be determined to make unsolved murders of women a priority while she is Scotland’s senior prosecutor.
A review of the case revealed that her body could still yield evidence not gathered at the time and it is understood detectives are considering exhuming her body. A source close to the case said: “This has been under discussion for a while and is being driven by the Crown Office, with the Lord Advocate determined to push at any door that might lead to a solution.
“If there is evidence from the body, the answer will never emerge if it is not re-examined through the eyes of forensic scientists using the latest advances they have in 2023. No one would underestimate how harrowing this will be for Pamela’s loved ones, and it will be demanding for all concerned, but if it cleared up the murder of a young girl it would be worth all of that.”
It is understood that Pamela’s family have been informed and that her grave at Abbey Cemetery in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, has been assessed by experts to identify if exhumation is possible. The case was one of Scotland’s biggest miscarriages of justice, with Gilmour convicted despite retracting confessions he made while being questioned by police.
Appeal judges accepted expert evidence that he had been bullied into confessing to stop a barrage of hostile questions and intimidation. Pamela and Gilmour both lived close to the woods where she was attacked and murdered.
And Gilmour admitted he had flashed at women in those woods and taken pornographic magazines there to masturbate on occasion. He was released in 2002 after serving 21 years in prison, but his conviction was not quashed until August 2007 by three appeal judges.
In the judgement, Lord Gill criticised non-disclosure of evidence of police violence against Gilmour. Police pathologists were also criticised for concealing evidence that Pamela had defensive knife wounds to her hands when Gilmour’s confessions made no mention of using a knife.
Among the fatal flaws in his confession was that he said he had used Pamela’s belt or tie to strangle her, when she had been strangled by twine found in the woods where she was killed. Superintendent James Brown, who led the initial investigation, never believed Gilmour was guilty.
He told the procurator fiscal in 1982 that he suspected two fellow officers had used violence to compel Gilmour to confess. The appeal court ruled that had that been known at Gilmour’s trial, it would have been a “significant matter for the jury”.
By the time of the appeal, Gilmour was back in prison serving a 30-month sentence for flashing offences committed after his release from his life term. It is believed that cold case investigators do not have a specific suspect in mind.
Since doubts arose about the safety of Gilmour’s conviction, there has been speculation linking all of Scotland’s most notorious contemporary serial killers – Robert Black, Angus Sinclair and Peter Tobin – with Pamela’s murder. A source said: “If there is male DNA among Pamela’s remains, it would obviously be compared with the national database.
“If she was killed by someone who killed or raped at other times, they’ll be on that database. This unprecedented action might also clear matters up for Raymond Gilmour.”
Scottish police forces have been involved in two high-profile exhumations in recent years in efforts to solve historic murders. In 1996, the body of John Irvine McInnes was exhumed from a cemetery in Stonehouse, 16 years after he died by suicide aged 41, in an attempt to link him through DNA to the murder of Helen Puttock in Glasgow in 1969.
The murder of mum-of-two Helen, 29, was the third in 20 months of the three cases that have been attributed to a serial killer dubbed Bible John. Forensic tests in 1996 were unable to match McInnes’ DNA to Helen.
Ten years ago, a family lair at Old Monkland Cemetery, Coatbridge, was exhumed in an attempt to find the body of Coatbridge schoolgirl, Moira Anderson, 11, who went missing in February 1957.
The grave was exhumed after revelations that the late Alexander Gartshore, the convicted paedophile believed to have killed her, referred to being helped by a death in the family who owned the lair around the time Moira vanished.
Her body was not recovered and the 66th anniversary of Moira’s disappearance passed last month, making it one of Scotland’s longest unsolved cases.
A spokesperson for the Crown Office confirmed Pamela’s murder remained under review, adding: “As with any unresolved homicide we will continue to work with Police Scotland to explore any new evidential developments.”
Detective Chief Inspector Brian Geddes, of Police Scotland’s cold case unit, said: “The murder of Pamela Hastie remains unresolved, it is subject to review and any new information about her death will be investigated. Police Scotland never considers such cases closed and the passage of time is no barrier to the investigation of unresolved homicide cases.”
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