However, nothing further has come from this angle. This lead police to consider the per son responsible for the murders was most likely related to the man charged with the minor crime. In 2004, a DNA sample taken from a minor crime scene came back as an 80% match to the sample obtained from Bible John’s murders. It’s not clear why he was considered a suspect, and although the test didn’t prove anything, it was deemed there was not enough other evidence to pin the murders on McInnes. In 1996, his body was exhumed so DNA testing could be carried out, but this came back as inconclusive. He had served with the Scots Guards and committed suicide in 1980. One suspect the police considered later was John Irvine McInnes. He was described as looking disheveled and it seemed he had scratch marks on his face. There was a sigh ting of a man matching Jean’s description as he got off a bus at Gray Street around 1:30 am that morning. She denied being drunk during the taxi ride, and stood by her description of the man she believed attacked and killed her sister. The police were inclined to believe the description given by the bouncers because Jean had been intoxicated at the time.
There was also a human bite mark on one of her legs. She had grass stains on her feet, which showed she most likely tried to get away from her killer. This time her handbag had been upended nearby, the contents scattered, but the bag itself was missing. Helen had been raped and strangled, just like the others. Jean was dropped off at her home in Knightswood and the taxi headed for the direction of Helen’s home in Scotstoun.
According to Jean, the man was very well-spoken and liked to quote from the Bible, which is why the killer ended up being called ‘Bible John’. When they left the ballroom, John went off to catch a bus, and the other man joined Helen and Jean in getting a taxi. The other man didn’t disclose who he was or where he was from. They had met two men there, one of who was called John who said he was from Castlemilk. Like the others, she had also attended the Barrowland Ballroom on the night she was killed, along with her sister Jean. The third known victim was Helen Puttock, 29, who was found in her own back garden on October 31, 1969. Witnesses came forward saying they had seen Jemima leaving the Barrowland around midnight that Friday with a young man who was slim, tall, and had red hair.įurther investigations uncovered a witness who claimed she had heard screaming coming from the old building the night Jemima was killed, but she was unable to say what time she had heard it, so the police didn’t consider it important. Her autopsy showed she had been raped, beaten and strangled. Inside the building she found the fully clothed body of her sister Jemima. The next day, her sister Margaret had heard children talking about a body they had seen in an old building, but at first she didn’t pay too much attention.īy Monday, and with no sign of her si ster, Margaret decided to investigate the rumors she had heard from the children. Jemima McDonald was a 32-year-old mother of three children, who had gone to the Barrowland Ballroom on Friday, August 15, 1969. How the next victim’s body was found is truly t ragic.