Frank's clothing
On the night the murder was alleged to have been committed, it was claimed that Frank was wearing the
following:
- Green army-style work trousers
- Green army-style work shirt
- Green army-style work jumper
- Green army-style work body-warmer
- Blue army-style work woolly hat
- Brown calf-length jump boots
As the forensic report for the Defence pointed out, considering the manner and violence of the death of Alan
Raffle, blood would have been expected to have been widely splashed. A large amount of clothing was taken
from Frank's house and examined, including all the items listed above. No blood staining was found
anywhere on Frank's clothing, boots included. It is of course possible that washing could have removed the
blood staining, but washing only removes surface or visible blood stains and not blood which has impregnated
the fibres. Certainly it is virtually impossible to remove all traces of blood from boots, stitching,
lace holes and so on. The report found the lack of any bloodstaining, especially on the boots, convincing
evidence that this murder could not have been committed while wearing these clothes.
The gloves
Amongst a goodly collection of gloves were found a pair of blue fingerless gloves and a pair of brown woollen
work gloves. Fibres from these gloves matched in some respects those fibres found on the hammer, the tools
found in the Ford Sierra and odd fibres found on the dead man's clothing.
The presence of fibres from Frank's gloves on the body clothing could have indicated that the gloves had
touched the body. However, for that to be established there would have to be fibres travelling the other way
- from body clothing to the gloves. There was no evidence of such fibre transference, and the Crown itself
told the jury that the presence of these fibres was more consistent with secondary transfer rather than any
other agent. Considering the fact that there was regular contact between Frank and Raffle, both socially and
through working together, it was no great surprise that fibres from the clothing of one should be found on
the other.
The court heard testimony from the manager of a large textile mill in Yorkshire where the material of these
gloves had been produced. Together with the forensic report for the Defence, this evidence pointed out that
the fibres could have come from a great number of sources other than Frank's gloves, the fibres being found
in socks, gloves, trousers, duffel-coats, scarves, hats and thermal clothing of all sorts.
The body warmer
A green body-warmer was also taken from Frank's house, in the pocket of which was found a single pine needle
from a Sitka Spruce, the same type of tree as is found in Kielder Forest. Again, a great deal of importance
was attached to this fact until the following facts were established:
- It was not long after Christmas and Frank and the family always had a real Christmas tree (a Sitka
Spruce) in the house
- Frank's stepson gave evidence in court that the body-warmer belonged to him and had never been worn
by Frank, as Frank had one of his own which was exactly the same. Frank went on to try the body-warmer on
for the benefit of the jury and demonstrated that the garment was far too small for him.
Frank's car
During a forensic examination of Frank's car, bloodstaining was found in the boot. Subsequent tests found it
to have come from a bird - substantiating Frank's claims to be a regular and successful poacher!
This was the extent of the forensic evidence against Frank. As the forensic report for the Defence pointed
out, providing Frank had been in contact with Raffle that day, or had used the hammer in connection with his
work, any fibres found on the hammer or on the clothing of the dead man can be considered as entirely
innocent.