Fifty-eight-year-old husband and father of one Edmund Simpson was described as a kindly gentleman, a man who would help anyone in need without hesitation. For thirty-six years, he had worked at Burns’ bookstore at the corner of Victoria Street and Fennel Street near Manchester Cathedral in England. Although the owners of the shop had been planning to close the business, Edmund was afraid that he would be thrown on the unemployment “scrap heap,” so the co-founder brothers—Eric and Dennis Burns—agreed to keep it open so Edmund could continue working there.
The owners admitted that there had been rare problems with customers before, such as drunks being obnoxious or people generally behaving strangely.
Edmund normally had no problem ejecting troublemakers, though; despite his relatively small size, he was tough and brooked no nonsense.
But in 1980, a man brandished a razor at Edmund and stole money from the till. Although Edmund wasn’t injured in that instance, two years later he wouldn’t be so lucky.
Monday, August 9th, 1982, seemed like a regular day. Shortly after lunch, Edmund had a couple of customers in the shop, making purchases of only £5 each. But sometime between one-forty and two-forty p.m., a man entered the store with much more violent thoughts on his mind.
Co-owner Eric Burns entered the store a short time later and found Edmund Simpson unconscious on the floor, having been beaten repeatedly in the head with a blunt object. The victim was immediately rushed to the hospital but succumbed to his injuries two days later.
A sum of £65 had been taken from the till. Witnesses reported seeing a distressed-looking man fleeing from the shop at around the time of the murder, describing him as standing between five-foot-nine and six feet tall with dark hair. He was believed to be in his late twenties to early thirties and was wearing jeans.
Sadly, the investigation bore no fruit in 1982, and the case languished in limbo for decades. The homicide was taken up by a cold case unit in 2015, which made new pleas for information in the media and sought to reexamine DNA evidence from the scene in light of improved technology.
However, as of this writing in September of 2024, the savage murder of Edmund Simpson is still unsolved.
Crime Immemorial 