Court video: Police never believed a word of postmistress alibi

The day after Diana Garbutt was found dead on her bed, reporters, photographers and TV cameras were summoned to the Scotch Corner Hotel, on the nearby A1, where North Yorkshire Police put on a news conference.

Senior officers outlined the story Garbutt had told them - that a masked man carrying a gun came into his shop and said: “We’ve got your wife, don’t do anything stupid,”

He then allegedly demanded cash from the safe and left with a substantial amount of money.

But, even as senior officers outlined the series of events as described to them by Garbutt and explained how businesses in the area had been warned to be on their guard, many in the room suspected the detectives knew they were not looking for a fugitive.

Asked if the victim’s husband would make a tearful appeal for help to find the raider he confronted, one officer just returned a withering look.

Another thought long and hard before detailing what measures they were taking to protect other isolated businesses from the dangerous criminal they said was at large.

It was clear to everyone at the packed press conference that Garbutt’s story did not add up.

Why did no one in the busy village centre see anything unusual - including the 60 customers served that morning?

Why did a robber intent on stealing cash bother to go upstairs and murder a sleeping woman?

Why did a raider clearly capable of murder leave Garbutt without a scratch?

A year later, at Garbutt’s trial, prosecutors revealed the scientific evidence that proved his story was pure fabrication.

Experts who examined how Mrs Garbutt had digested the fish and chip supper she ate at 8.30pm the night before her husband raised the alarm said she died six to eight hours after this meal. This was four to six hours earlier than the time Garbutt raised the alarm.

Prosecutor David Hatton QC told the jury: “One of the questions you will have to consider, if you accept this evidence, is the likelihood of a robber or robbers being prepared to violently kill a female sleeping in her own bed - at all - but then, having done so, to wait for four to six hours before going downstairs to rob the post office.

“And then, it has to be said, having been prepared to bludgeon the lady to death upstairs and wait for that length of time, to leave the defendant himself unharmed and unrestrained to raise the alarm.”

When paramedics arrived to treat Mrs Garbutt they found rigor mortis had set in, and they detected hypostasis - blood pooling in tissue after the heart has stopped.

One of the first police officers at the scene of Mrs Garbutt’s murder said her husband “would sob occasionally”. But the officer said: “There didn’t seem to be any tears.”