Thomas Harding is a journalist who has written some investigative history books about events in the life of his family – see my reviews here and here. As I enjoyed these I picked up Blood on the Page in a charity shop at some now forgotten time and place. This book is true crime and it is the story of a murder which took place in 2006 in London near Hampstead Heath in the area in which the author grew up, although he didn’t know any of the protagonists.
Allan Chappelow was a writer who lived alone in an inherited, large house which was in some disrepair. Police were alerted by his bank about suspect transactions from his account and asked to conduct a welfare check. They broke into his house and found him dead and buried under four feet of paper in one of the rooms. He had been murdered. They traced his bank cards to a Chinese immigrant called Wang Yam who was eventually convicted of identity theft and murder.
The author traces the life story of Allan Chappelow. He was portrayed as a recluse by the police but the author discovered that he had recently travelled to America (he was 86 years old) and that he had an active social life locally, possibly including the gay community who made contacts on the Heath. The author then looks at the life of Wang Yam, with whom he had an extensive correspondence, from his time in China to his life in Britain as a refugee. He was a man for whom the truth didn’t come easily and he had been involved in theft and misrepresentation before. He almost certainly stole Allan Chappelow’s cards and money. The question that the author asks is whether he also committed murder.
The final section of the book traces the three criminal court cases which there have been about this case. The author argues that there was never sufficient evidence to convict Wang Yam and that the police had not fully examined alternative solutions to the mystery. This is further complicated by the fact that part of the evidence for the defence was given in a closed session and journalists, including this writer, were prohibited from reporting anything about this and even from speculating on what that evidence might be and why it could not be disclosed publicly. This makes the author’s analysis of the case rather frustrating to read as we are not privy to everything that the jury heard.
I thought that this book was interesting. The author makes a good case for the murderer not to be Wang Yam, although an Appeal Court did not agree. It is fascinating to read about how these two men lived and how they connected.
I have a small, but growing, collection of true crime books and I shall shelve this one with my others.
Anne Is Reading 