Case of Winifred Hogg

Whitehall 1212. For the first time in history, Scotland Yard opened its official files to bring you the true story of some of its most baffling cases.

Research for Whitehall 1212 is from Percy Hoskins of the London Daily Express. The stories for radio are written and directed by Willis Cooper. You will now hear the voice of Chief Superintendent John Davidson, who is custodian of the famous Black Museum of Scotland Yard.

Many of the objects on exhibit here in the Black Museum, as you undoubtedly know, are weapons of murder. They're not always knives, bludgeon, guns. Murder is done with a great variety of instruments, never intended for that unpleasant task. These wrinkled sheets of what appears to be black blotting paper have been responsible for a great many deaths. In fact, they were manufactured

for that purpose. And sold openly years ago, it's true that most of the deaths these papers caused were perfectly legal, in fact to be desired, but these particular ones figured in a case of most revolting murder. You see, these are old-fashioned fly papers. Once they were impregnated with arsenic. Soaked in water and left standing about in a saucer, they furnished

a working-sudution of pure arsenic. The flies who sipped it found their way at once through the pearly gates, so that any unwary pets who sampled it and some careless people. On the 20th of September, 1911, a rather shabby fat man called on Inspector Oliver Peters at his office in New Scotland Yard.

My name is Pete von Halitz, Inspector. I live in Finsbury Park. Finsbury Park, let me think. That's New Holloway Prison. It's just beyond Holloway Road, yes, sir. Yes. Well, what brings you here, sir? Sir, I, to put it quite plainly, my aunt is dead.