A woman murdered 12 years ago was found stabbed in the chest, with a cut throat and burned clothes – but police officers who attended did not believe the death to be suspicious, a court has heard. Prosecutor John Price described these details in the case of 86-year-old Una Crown to jurors at Cambridge Crown Court on Thursday (January 15).
Mrs Crown was found dead at her home on Magazine Lane, Wisbech, in January 2013. David Newton, now aged 70, of Magazine Close in Wisbech, denies murdering her on January 12. Una Crown’s body was found in her hallway the following day by John Payne, husband of her niece Judith Payne, who had driven to collect her for Sunday lunch at their house.
Mr Price said that police officers who attended on January 13 did not initially treat the scene as suspicious, and a murder investigation did not begin until two days later, on January 15. This followed a post-mortem examination on January 15, which recorded the cause of death as “stab wounds to neck and chest”.
He concluded that there was “no doubt that Una Crown was the victim of a crime of murder. The only issue that will arise for your [the jury’s] decision is: who did it?”
Mr Price said a DNA profile found by scientists in 2023 on nail clippings from Mrs Crown’s right hand, which had not been burnt, matched that of David Newton. He said: “The prosecution alleges that it was David Newton who murdered Una Crown and that he did so acting alone. He it was who somehow got into her house that night.
“We say he did so on the Saturday night – that’s to say he killed her on the evening of January 12. Once he was inside of her home, there came a time thereafter when he used a knife to stab her several times and to kill her.
“The fatal assault, we say, most likely happened not long after he got into her house, but probably not immediately. After he had killed her, he set fire to her body, and at some time while he was in the house, he set two other fires.
“Then we say he left, taking with him her key to the front door and using it to lock that door behind him. He will probably have found that either in the keyhole on the inside of the front door or in her possession.”
No signs of forced entry
Mr Price added that there were no signs of forced entry to the house, and no soot was found in Mrs Crown’s lungs – suggesting she was not breathing when her clothing was set on fire. He said that Mrs Crown’s throat had been cut and she had been stabbed four times to the front and left side of the chest.
According to the prosecutor, one of her chest wounds had an entry point at her left side, passed through both of her lungs and her heart, and exited on the right side. The killer also set fire to the clothes she was wearing, he said, alongside a tea towel on a rail in the kitchen and remnants of newspaper on the hall floor just outside the bathroom.
Mr Price continued: “If the purpose of the arsonist in setting fire to the body of Una Crown had been to try and destroy the evidence of what he had done to her, then it was to prove ineffective. Quite what his purpose might have been in setting the other two small fires is perhaps less clear.
“If he had wanted to burn down the house entirely, you might think there were other obviously far more effective ways of trying to do so. So we pose a question – did he just enjoy setting small fires?”
The prosecution believes that Mrs Crown was killed between 7pm and 9pm on Saturday evening. Mr Price said a witness had seen Newton out walking his dog in Magazine Lane on the evening of January 12.
He also commented that the knife used to stab Mrs Crown has never been found, and neither has the front door key. He continued: “Therefore you may conclude that the front door, given it was locked when Mr Payne arrived on the Sunday morning, must have been locked from the outside by the killer when he left using Una Crown’s key to do so.”
The trial, estimated to last four to five weeks, continues.