At the age of two, James Patrick Bulger was assassinated on February 12, 1993. Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, two ten-year-old boys, kidnapped, tortured, and murdered him. Bulger was dragged away from his mother in the New Strand Shopping Centre in Bootle, England's A.R. Tyms butcher shop. Jamie's mother alerted security, and the police were summoned as soon as she realized her kid was missing.
They discovered Thompson and Venables approaching Bulger before grabbing his hand and bringing him out of the shopping centre at 15:42 while analysing the shopping centre’s CCTV footage. Bulger was then led 2.5 miles away to a railway track in Walton, Liverpool, by Thomson and Venables. Witness accounts later supported this, stating that they saw the three boys together and believed they were family. Thomson and Venables flung paint in Bulger's face as they arrived at the railway track, part of which went into his left eye. Stones were thrown at him, and he was kicked and beaten with bricks by the two youths. They then struck him with an iron bar, a slightly rusted railway fishplate measuring 20 inches in length and weighing 22 pounds.
Thomson and Venables put Bulger on the railway lines with rubble over his head before leaving him, hoping that a train would hit him and cause his death to seem accidental. Bulger's corpse was sliced in two by a train after they fled the area. On February 14, 1993, his mangled body was discovered on the railway line.
The first lead in the hunt for James' murders came when a woman phoned the cops after seeing CCTV photographs of the two lads, Thompson and Venables, on national television. She had seen the two youngsters the day James Bulger disappeared and knew they were out of school. After the police responded to the woman's call, the two guys were detained. The prosecution relied heavily on the forensic evidence discovered and presented to the jury.
The blood found on one of the accused's right shoes was one piece of evidence that placed Thomson and Venables at the crime scene. According to Graham Jackson, a home office forensic scientist, there was a one in a billion probability of mistake. The blood detected on the shoe would have been matched to the victims by DNA testing. Forensic DNA testing entails isolating DNA from cells – in this example, blood cells – and then duplicating it using a technique known as "polymerase chain reaction." This procedure repeatedly copies a specific stretch of DNA, making it easier to analyse. The genetic code is separated into different pieces and then analysed to establish a genetic fingerprint. Unlike fingerprints, there's a risk that two persons with the same genetic markers, especially if they're related, might have the same genetic markers. Scientists will analyse many genetic features from a strand of DNA to reduce the likelihood of a mistake. Bulger's blood was also discovered on a few bricks and a 22-pound iron rod.
Dr. Allan Williams, a forensic pathologist, counted 22 wounds on James' head and face and another 20 on his torso. The wounds were so numerous that it was impossible to determine a final death blow. According to Dr. Williams, James would have been dead by the train hit him since he had been trapped at least 30 times and would have only had "a little period of surviving" once the attack began. The deep bruising on James's head and a cut that extended down to his skull, and extensive damage to the back of his head indicated that bricks and an iron bar had been used. Bulger suffered severe head injuries, including bleeding in the brain's centre. According to Dr. Williams, a heavy hit to James's face left a huge bruise and grooved imprint around the right cheek and ear.
Philip Rydeard, a forensic scientist, matched the marks on James' right cheek to a sneaker worn by one of the lads. The shoe had an odd lacing ring configuration and a unique stitching design.
The paint was detected on Thompson and Venables' clothes and James Bulger's body at the crime scene. Solvent testing, gas chromatography, and infrared spectroscopy are all methods for determining a match in paint. Solvent testing entails exposing paint samples to various solvents and observing any changes (i.e., a change in colour). Gas chromatography is a technique for distinguishing between two paintings with the same colour but distinct chemical compositions. The paint sample is heated until it disintegrates, and then separated into its constituents. Infrared spectrometry examines how the paint's various components absorb or reflect infrared light to determine the type of paint.
Thirty-eight witnesses testified that they saw Bulger walking with Thompson and Venables throughout the trial, but none of them could have predicted the events that followed later that day.
Furthermore, they exhibited the 27 bricks, stones, and 22-pound iron rods used as weapons by Thompson and Venables in court to dispel any possibility that the lads were innocent.
The forensic evidence presented at Robert Thompson and Jon Venables' trials was critical to their prosecution. The DNA evidence from traces of blood on their clothing and the shoe mark left on James Bulger's cheek, and the paint discovered on both the victim and the perpetrators' clothing proved that Thompson and Venables were present at the murder scene. This evidence, backed up by CCTV video and witness accounts, led to the indictment of the U.K.'s youngest killers.
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