The Murder of Jean Townsend, (born 11 March 1933) is an unsolved murder case from Ruislip, in the county of Middlesex, England. Townsend was a 21-year-old English woman who was murdered in September 1954. Despite an extensive police investigation, no one has ever been charged with her murder and the case remains unsolved.
Townsend was a theatrical costumier, who was returning to Ruislip from the West End of London. She was found strangulated with her own scarf. The autopsy revealed no signs of sexual assault. There were suspicions that the murder was connected to American servicemen based at the nearby South Ruislip Air Station.
Investigators found possible connections with recent cases of harassment of women and attacks on women in the area, and perceived similarities with unsolved murders of women in West Germany. A possibility that the then-recent murder of another woman in London was connected to Townsend's case has been raised. Townsend's murder was also subsequently connected to an attack on another woman, and with the 1957 murder of a young mother. Both these cases occurred at a distance of a few miles from the location where Townsend was killed. In 1971, an unsolved murder took place near South Ruislip, using the same murder method with Townsend's murder. Press reports of the time pointed out the similarities.
In 2005, a family friend of the Townsends applied for access to the police case files under the Freedom of Information Act. The request was denied, and a decision was made to withhold the files from public inspection until 2031. The request brought new publicity to the cold case. At the time, a new theory was publicized, implicating an expatriate Italian nobleman in the murder. The authorities dismissed this theory due to lack of evidence.
Murder
Jean Mary Townsend lived with her parents at the family home in Bempton Drive, South Ruislip and worked as a theatrical costumier in the West End of London. On the evening of 14 September 1954, she attended a social function in the West End, returning to South Ruislip later that night on the last Central line train. At around 11:45 pm she was seen leaving South Ruislip station and walking alone along Victoria Road. Her body was discovered the following morning on the waste ground to the north side of Victoria Road, near the junction with Angus Drive in the area now occupied by St Gregory the Great Catholic Church (opened in April 1967). The autopsy report stated that she had been strangled with her own scarf and it was reported that – despite various items of her clothing being removed – there were no signs of sexual assault.
Investigation
Local suspicion fell on American servicemen based at the nearby South Ruislip Air Station. The rumours of an American being involved intensified when a resident living near the scene reported hearing a woman cry for help late on the night of the murder followed by two male voices arguing, one of which seemed to have an American accent. Subsequent rumours of alleged reluctance on the part of the United States Air Force authorities to co-operate with the Metropolitan Police in the murder enquiry served to heighten local suspicions. In the wake of the murder, a number of women came forward to report being approached or accosted by strange men in and around the area where Jean's body had been found in the days preceding the murder.
One of the women, Miss Jacqueline Cliff, told reporters how she had been approached repeatedly by a man – aged about 30 with a high forehead – who spoke with an American accent and drove an "American-type" car. Another young woman, Joan Gala, reported being attacked by a man late at night on Victoria Road on the Saturday before the murder. Her description of her attacker included the fact that he had a high forehead. It was reported that several young women had been murdered in West Germany in similar circumstances in the early 1950s, with their bodies left by the side of the German autobahnen. Suggestions that US (or British) servicemen stationed in Germany might have been responsible prompted the Metropolitan Police to liaise with their German counterparts, but the idea of a possible link appears to have been quickly discounted.
Meanwhile, some local residents responded by organising patrols to escort women to and from the station late at night. At the inquest the coroner expressed his surprise that – apart from the obvious symptoms of asphyxiation – there were no signs of a struggle or that Townsend had physically resisted her attacker.