Forty-four-year-old Patrick Byrne was originally from Ireland, but had traveled to London in 1988 to look for employment as a woodworker. His wife and three children remained in Ireland, but Patrick was diligent about sending them money when he could.
Patrick had only been in London for a few months, and at about five-twenty p.m. on the evening of March 11th, 1989, he left the Bricklayers Arms pub where he’d been drinking and began to walk back toward his mother’s house, where he’d been staying.
Witnesses later reported that a young man wearing jeans, sneakers, and a light brown jacket was obviously following Patrick, and continued to do so when Patrick went into a block of public bathrooms. When the two men came out of the restrooms, they appeared to be arguing and scuffling with one another, and the young man’s jacket was torn.
Patrick walked away from the fracas, but the young man was clearly not finished. He leaped into a nearby garden, picked up a length of wood, and began beating Patrick mercilessly with it.
Once Patrick fell to the ground, screaming under the onslaught, the young man walked on, seemingly without a care in the world, still holding the bloodied two-by-four. Witnesses attempted to follow him, but lost sight of him not long afterward. The same man was allegedly seen about a half-hour later, still carrying the piece of wood and stalking back toward the Bricklayers Arms with an angry expression on his face.
The attacker was described as a swarthy white man in his twenties, about five-foot-seven with a medium build. He had collar-length dark hair, and a thick, dark mustache.
Patrick Byrne was taken to the nearest hospital, but died an hour later from his injuries.
The motive for the broad-daylight assault was a complete mystery, and authorities were at a loss to locate the perpetrator. Years went by, and police thought they finally had a lead when, in December of 1996, a man confessed to the murder and stood trial at the Old Bailey.
Very quickly, though, it became evident that this man was almost certainly not the culprit. He was Scottish, for one thing, when the killer had been described as having a Cockney accent. Further, the confessor claimed that he’d been involved in an altercation at the Builders Arms pub which had spilled out into the street, at which point he had beaten Patrick Byrne to death in the midst of the fight. The Builders Arms was about three miles from the pub where the attack had actually occurred, and the man’s account did not line up with witness statements.
The Scottish man was also discovered to have made false confessions before, even once while drunk telling police he had murdered his wife, a claim which was found to be untrue. The man was further believed to suffer from depression, anxiety, and a number of other mental problems; he was thus acquitted of the murder of Patrick Byrne.
The violent and seemingly random slaying remains unsolved.
Crime Immemorial 