Britain's Murder Map: The Timothy Evans case
A look back at the trial and execution of Timothy Evans, and how the British justice system got it so wrong.
Image: Timothy Evans was hanged for the murder of his wife and baby daughter, but he was officially pardoned more than a decade later | Public Domain / Background: Shutterstock.com
Picture a narrow London terrace with thin walls, a shared yard and a washhouse that, in the winter of 1949, became the hiding place for two bodies.
At Sky HISTORY we’re here to unpack the story of Timothy Evans, a 25-year-old Welshman who was hanged in March 1950 for the murder of his baby daughter, Geraldine… and who would later be officially pardoned, after the truth about his downstairs neighbour bubbled to the surface.
Evans’ story is featured in greater detail on Sky HISTORY’s new series, Britain’s Murder Map, starting Tuesday 7 April at 9pm. Join husband and wife, Vicky McClure and Jonny Owen, as they explore locations where some of history’s darkest acts took place.
Rillington Place
Evans and his wife Beryl lived at 10 Rillington Place in Notting Hill when their baby daughter was born. They were already under strain, both financially and because of Evans’ heavy drinking. In December 1949, Beryl and 13-month-old Geraldine were found bundled together, concealed in the washhouse. Both had been strangled to death.
What happened next is the part that Britain keeps returning to: the investigation didn’t just go wrong. It locked onto the wrong man and ultimately saw him executed at a London prison for his supposed crime.
A confession that wouldn’t sit still
Evans was questioned by police and produced not one neat, coherent account, but a shifting set of statements. In the version that first gained traction, the death was connected to an attempted abortion. In another, Evans pointed to his downstairs neighbour, John Christie. In a later confession he described killing Beryl himself in a rage.
That wobble was likely Evans’ downfall because once you’ve got a confession (even a messy one), it can start to do a lot of heavy lifting in a courtroom. Evans later repudiated his confession at trial but the damage was done. Critics would argue, for years, that he was suggestible, vulnerable and talked into “agreeing” with what investigators already believed.
It’s not the only British case where a shaky evidential picture spiralled into something final. Sky HISTORY’s look back at the A6 Murder asks the same question about “reasonable doubt” and what happens when the courts get it wrong.
And there was another problem: parts of Evans’ confession didn’t line up with practical reality. In Parliament, the case was picked apart in forensic detail, including evidence suggesting the washhouse had been accessed and even cleaned during the key period Evans claimed the bodies were there. There were also timeline issues around when timber used to conceal the bodies was actually delivered. The argument, bluntly, was that crucial details of the confession were demonstrably false, and that material which could have helped the defence wasn’t properly aired.
Why the jury believed he did it
Evans was tried for Geraldine’s murder (not Beryl’s), convicted and executed on 9th March 1950.
So why did a jury land there?
Because Evans did look suspicious on the surface. He’d lied, his story changed and the police were presenting a narrative that made him the obvious answer. But the most poisonous twist was this: John Christie, the man Evans accused in one of his statements, was treated as a steady and respectable witness. He actually gave evidence and helped shape the story the jury heard.
When the house gave up its secrets
Three years later, the real story started to emerge.
In 1953, after Christie had moved out, bodies were discovered hidden inside his former flat and in the garden. All women. Reports even revealed he’d used the thigh bone of one victim to prop up his garden fence. Turns out John Christie was one of London’s worst serial killers, up there with the likes of Jack the Ripper. The discovery detonated the idea that the Evans case was a straightforward domestic crime.
Christie was arrested, tried, and executed in July 1953. He admitted to multiple murders when he was tried, including that of Beryl Evans. He did not reliably confess to killing Geraldine, which is why the Evans case stayed stuck in that maddening zone of proof, probability and institutional reluctance.
The pardon (and the bitter logic of 'more probable than not')
After Christie’s crimes were exposed, an inquiry still concluded there had been no miscarriage of justice. Public anger simmered for years and in 1965 another inquiry was carried out, largely thanks to a campaign by Evans' sister and an exposé by crime journalist Ludovic Kennedy.
Finally, in 1966, Home Secretary Roy Jenkins addressed Parliament with the conclusion of the inquiry: it was impossible to establish the truth beyond doubt but it was more probable than not that Evans did not kill Geraldine. Jenkins recommended a royal pardon, which was granted.
It’s one of the bleakest sentences in modern British justice.
Why this case still hits hard
Evans’ story sits at the crossroads of everything that can go wrong in a murder investigation. It has a vulnerable suspect, tunnel-vision policing, over-reliance on confession and the catastrophic consequences of being “sure enough” in a system that still had the death penalty on the table.
It’s exactly the kind of case that Britain’s Murder Map digs into. The series sees Vicky McClure and Jonny Owen travel to notorious crime scenes across the UK, exploring the enduring impact of shocking crimes on local communities.
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