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Tom Griffiths

Age: unknown

Sex: male

Date: 28 Jun 1991

Place: Cricklewood Broadway, Northwest London

Tom Griffiths was murdered on Friday 28 June 1991 at his home

He had lived with his son and daughter in-law in their ground floor flat near Cricklewood Broadway.

Tom Griffiths suffered from Parkinson’s disease. His wife had died two and a half years earlier after which it was said that he had let himself go and not taken as much care of himself.

On the morning of Friday 28 June 1991 Tom Griffiths he went to St Johns Wood to do some odd jobs for a family friend. It was known that he had left there at about 10.30am, but it was not known how he had spent the rest of the day, although he later arrived home at about 6pm.

It was said that he would often have a few drinks before he went out in the evening and that before he went out he would put the radio on to deter burglars. A while later he went out to his local pub, the Windmill on Cricklewood Broadway opposite Skardu Road and about 300 yards from his home where he met a friend. It was thought that the key to his murder might have lain in what happened there that night.

His friend said that when Tom Griffiths came in, he appeared to have been drinking earlier at home. He said that he got a little loud whilst he was talking but said that he wasn't really a problem.

It was noted that he quite often did a round of the tables in which he would go round and say hello to everyone in the pub, but his friend said that no one seemed to get annoyed with him.  However, the police said that he might have upset someone, and said that they were interested in speaking to anyone that had seen him in the Windmill pub that night.

Tom Griffiths later left the Windmill pub at 11.10pm and a few minutes later his friend also left. The friend said that when he got outside, he saw Tom Griffiths talking to a couple and said that he noticed a man standing in the doorway who he said appeared to be watching them.

About five minutes later, at about 11.15pm, a man who was walking along Cricklewood Broadway with his dog said that he noticed a man, Tom Griffiths, in the road talking to two young girls aged about 16, saying that one of them had her hand out whilst Tom Griffiths appeared to be looking for something in his pockets like money. He said that as he went along, the two young girls ran past him, but he thought that they had got a couple of pounds off of Tom Griffiths and didn't think much more about it. He said that a short distance later he turned the dog around and walked back and said that as he returned, Tom Griffiths was still there, but was then arguing with two men, one black and one white. He said that a moment later he turned round and saw Tom Griffiths spinning round and then fall to the floor with his shoe having fallen off and that the last that he saw of him was him sitting in the gutter, noting that that was at about 11.20pm.

It was said that that was the last that was seen of him and that by an hour later he was dead.

At about 11.25pm, a neighbour in Skardu Road opposite Tom Griffiths's house saw a couple arguing, saying that they stopped outside Tom Griffiths's flat.

Then, about an hour after that, a neighbour in the flat above Tom Griffiths said that she heard him shouting in the shared hallway below. She said that she heard him shouting something like 'Get out of my house' and noted that when she looked at her clock it was about 12.20am.

A short while later his son and daughter-in-law, who had spent the night out, had returned by taxi-cab. Tom Griffiths's son said that when they got near their flat he saw a man walking down their pathway out of the building and then right towards the Broadway, but said that he didn't really take much notice of him, saying that it could have been a friend of the person upstairs. However, he said that when they got in they found Tom Griffiths lying injured in the hallway. He said that he then ran out again and saw a man walking down the street about 20-30 yards away and shouted out to him but said that when the man saw him he started to run off and so he chased him. He said that the man then turned the corner on to Cricklewood Broadway and that when he got there and turned the corner onto the Broadway he almost ran into the man and said that the man then punched him in the face and knocked him over and said, 'Now piss off if you don't want some more'. However, it was later suggested that the man that Tom Griffiths's son had bumped into might not have been Tom Griffiths's murderer, noting that it seemed strange that he would have been so available in that spot and they appealed for that man to come forward.

Tom Griffiths's son said that the man was about 6ft tall, in his late 20's or early 30's with short curly light brown or ginger hair and possibly a moustache.

When Tom Griffiths's son got back to his flat he found that Tom Griffiths had been repeatedly kicked and beaten. Tom Griffiths died a few minutes later.

The police noted that nothing had been stolen from Tom Griffiths and that his flat had not been broken into and they thought that Tom Griffiths might have upset someone in the pub or maybe later after leaving in Cricklewood Broadway.

The police noted that the Windmill pub was frequented by a number of Irish people, some of whom might have returned to Ireland since, and they noted that there were at least about 30 people that they though had been in the pub tat night who had not come forward.

The police further noted that Tom Griffiths might not have gone straight home after he was last seen sitting in the gutter by the man walking his dog at 11.20pm and when he was found dying in the hallway at 12.20am and said that in the past he had gone to late night cafes or dance-halls or drinking clubs. It was also suggested that he might have gone off for a drink with a casual acquaintance. The police said that they were keen to find anyone that could help them trace his movements in that time.

The police said that when they examined the flat, they found a footprint that they believed belonged to the murderer and determined that it came from a size 11 Pony training shoe. A sample of the Pony training shoe was shown on the Television programme Crimewatch, but the police noted that the one that they showed was not necessarily the same colour or style that the murderer had worn, but that the sole print that they found was for that type of shoe.

When the police described the man that they thought had killed Tom Griffiths, they said that he was in his late 20's or early 30's, about 6ft tall, and wearing a dark jacket and size 11 Pony training shoes.


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