大象传媒

by Alex von Tunzelmann, presenter of The Lucan Obsession for 大象传媒 Radio 4’s The History Podcast.

When I was growing up in the 1980s, it seemed like almost every weekend there was a story in the newspapers about where British aristocrat Lord Lucan had been spotted around the world. He was the world’s most famous missing person. His name became synonymous with mysterious disappearances: he was often the punchline to a joke about something that was hard to find.

Yet the case which made him infamous was very far from being a laughing matter. On 7 November 1974, someone beat Sandra Rivett to death with a length of lead piping in a basement in London’s exclusive Belgravia. She worked as a nanny for the three children of Veronica, Lady Lucan, who was also beaten with the same weapon. Lady Lucan said the perpetrator was her estranged husband John, Lord Lucan. Lord Lucan wrote letters that night claiming he had been passing the house when he saw a stranger attack his wife – though he expected she would blame him. He promptly disappeared and has never been seen again.

Why has this case obsessed so many of us for half a century?

1. A jury did find Lord Lucan guilty – but not in a trial

There was a coroner’s inquest into Sandra Rivett’s murder, during which a jury was directed to name who was responsible. They named Lord Lucan. Because Lord Lucan had disappeared, he wasn’t there to defend himself. This was the last but one case in England where a suspect could be declared guilty by an inquest jury. If Lord Lucan returned now, the verdict would not suffice. He would still have to face a criminal trial to determine his guilt or innocence.

2. The case against Lord Lucan hinged entirely on Lady Lucan – but she couldn’t be interrogated

Lady Lucan was the only available adult witness who had been in the house during the murder and assault, yet the coroner wouldn’t allow her to be questioned outside very narrow rules. For instance, the barrister representing Lord Lucan’s family wasn’t allowed to ask about her history of mental health issues, or her attitude towards her husband.

3. The murdered woman, Sandra Rivett, was quickly forgotten in the press obsession with the Lucans

The glamour of the Lucans themselves, coupled with the British obsession with social class, made this case irresistible to tabloid and broadsheet newspapers alike. Yet the focus was almost always on the Lucans: often characterising Lord Lucan as a handsome playboy, and Lady Lucan as a beautiful, tragic victim. Lady Lucan curated this image, giving interviews to favoured journalists, while sometimes threatening – and allegedly even physically attacking – those she didn’t like. There was little in the coverage about Sandra Rivett. The inquest concluded she had been killed accidentally by Lord Lucan because he mistook her for his wife.

4. Many of the police officers involved had cosy relationships with journalists

In the macho, hard-drinking culture of 1970s London, male police and journalists often socialised with each other and shared information. Standards of ethics and forensics were not what they are today. One of the first things the presiding police officer at the scene of the murder did was telephone a journalist friend and invite him to view the crime scene – where he saw officers trampling through smears of blood that would become crucial evidence.

Police with tracker dogs search Peachaven Gold Course for missing Lord Lucan

5. Police were suspicious of Lord Lucan’s friends, and thought some were hiding something

Lord Lucan spent most of his time gambling at London’s ritzy Clermont Club. The day after he disappeared, the club’s owner John Aspinall gathered Lucan’s friends together for lunch. Aspinall said they were discussing what to do if Lucan returned, but there has been a lot of speculation about whether some associates helped him to escape. The police believed some of Lucan’s friends were withholding information. Aspinall himself claimed in a 大象传媒 interview that he would have done “anything that he wished” for Lord Lucan. “After all,” he said, “to break your friendship is even more serious than to break the law.”

6. We don’t know how common it is for people to create new identities and disappear

The car used by Lord Lucan that night was found abandoned in Newhaven on the Sussex coast. Some police officers thought this could be a deliberately planted red herring. Yet some reporters suggested he might have fled across the English Channel. Members of the public were soon claiming to spot Lord Lucan all over the world – in India, Mexico, South America, southern Africa, and Australia. Most sightings were dead ends, and some were deliberately faked by fame and fortune seekers. Even so, it was easier to disappear and create a new identity in the 1970s, before we had digital footprints – especially if you had wealthy friends with private jets and large estates abroad. The National Crime Agency’s Missing Persons Unit does occasionally find people who have been in hiding for decades. But of course they don’t know how many successfully get away with it, because those people are never found.

7. Plenty of people closely connected to Lord Lucan think he got away

Lord Lucan was declared dead in 1999. A death certificate was issued for him in 2016. If he were still alive today, he would be nearly 90. Some of those close to the case believed Lord Lucan probably took his own life in the days after his disappearance, perhaps by throwing himself into the English Channel near that abandoned car. Yet many of his friends and family, including Lady Lucan, continued to think he was still alive. Lucan’s late brother, Hugh Bingham, is alleged to have told a journalist that he died in Africa in 2004. We may never know the full truth – unless someone out there does.