24 Hours in Police Custody to return with notorious Cambridgeshire cold case

Una Crown was found dead in her bungalow after a ‘ferocious’ knife attack, but her death was not initially treated as a murder

A popular Channel 4 show is set to feature a Cambridgeshire cold case involving a ‘ferocious’ knife attack on an elderly woman. Two episodes of 24 Hours in Police Custody follow Detective Superintendent Iain Moor and his colleagues at the Major Crime Unit after they re-opened the case of the 2013 murder of Una Crown.

The body of the retired postmistress was discovered by family members and a neighbour in her bungalow in Magazine Lane, Wisbech. Una, 86, had died from stab wounds to her neck and chest.

Her clothing had been set alight by the killer to hide her injuries and destroy the evidence. The two-parter called “The Last Roll of The Dice” follows the detectives as they try to piece together more than a decade’s worth of evidence and uncover new information to catch her killer.

They show how new forensic techniques revealed male DNA under Una’s fingernails, protected under her body, and in her clenched fist when she fell to the floor. The DNA matched a man, David Newton, who was now in his 70s and still lived close to her bungalow.

Detectives had to rule out other male relatives in Newton’s paternal line by travelling over the country and piecing together the DNA breakthrough with new evidence to form a strong prosecution case. Newton was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 21 years in February last year.

Judge Justice Neil Garnham said Newton had launched “a ferocious and sustained knife attack on a defenceless old lady in her own home”. The two episodes of 24 Hours in Police Custody: “The Last Roll of The Dice” will be shown on Channel 4 on Monday and Tuesday (April 13 and 14).

Det Supt Moor said: “For more than a decade David Newton thought he had gotten away with this most horrendous crime. He was hiding in plain sight, but jurors saw through his lies and as this programme highlights, you cannot hide forever.

“Also demonstrated in the two episodes is the police commitment to continually reviewing unsolved cases and seeking new lines of enquiry. No unsolved murder case is ever closed.

“When I joined the Major Crime Unit, the first thing my wife said to me was, ‘you’ve got to solve this murder’. I’m immensely proud of bringing Newton to justice after more than a decade, and finally getting justice and closure for Una’s family. Una, by the actions she took on that night, solved her own case as she fought her attacker.”