BBC ALBA INVESTIGATES THE STORY OF ‘COP TURNED KILLER’ HOWARD WILSON
COP TURNED KILLER - SGEULACHD HOWARD WILSON
BBC ALBA – Wednesday 23rd March at 9pm
The latest in the compelling BBC ALBA series Scottish Killers looks back at Glasgow murders that shocked 1960s Scotland – and led to calls for the death penalty to be reinstated.
The victims were serving police officers, shot dead by a man who had previously worked alongside them. The explosive incident one December afternoon in 1969 shattered a number of families - and made Howard Wilson forever known as Scotland’s “cop turned killer.”
Nine years after he was paroled, the drama documentary charts Wilson’s breathtaking crimes – from leaving the force to armed robbery, and eventually the cold-blooded shooting of three former colleagues – two of whom lost their lives.
In 1969, Glasgow was the focus of UK headlines as the sinister, so-called ‘Bible John killings’ appalled the public, frustrating detectives in their failure to catch the killer. But the Glasgow police force itself was to play centre stage to brutal murder, just as the year drew to a close. As former BBC reporter David Scott recalls in the programme, “it was almost unbelievable.”
Howard Wilson, an ambitious young policeman, had left the force when he was passed over for promotion. He set up a shop, but the enterprise failed dismally. Having obtained a handgun and accompanied by two friends on a similar downturn of fortune, Wilson orchestrated a robbery at the British Linen Bank in Giffnock in the south side of Glasgow. The three men made away with £21,000 – an enormous sum at the time.
Some months later, arrogant after their success, the same trio raided the Clydesdale Bank in Linwood. This time they terrorised customers including a woman with a baby, threatening them with guns and knives. Having fled with £14,000, they headed straight for Wilson’s home in Govan – near the local police station. Spotted by officers long suspicious of Wilson’s activities, they were followed into his tenement flat. What happened next ruined lives, and left a bitter legacy.
In detailed dramatic reconstruction and with exclusive interviews with surviving relatives of the victims, the story of Howard Wilson is told in full in this powerful BBC ALBA documentary.
It was 30 December, 1969. As Glasgow busied itself with New Year preparations, Wilson snapped when confronted. Young officer on the scene, Angus Mackenzie was shot dead, with two bullets. His colleague Edward Barnett was also fired upon, and survived just a matter of days following the horrific attack. Inspector Andrew Hyslop, who had led the team to the flat, was left badly debilitated for life after Wilson shot him in the face. In the programme, Wilson’s two sons describe the dreadful aftermath and enduring effects of that day, on all their lives.
Only the intervention of other brave officers prevented further bloodshed. As news of the shootings spread, there was a public outcry. Families of the officers petitioned for the return of hanging, abolished in the UK just a few weeks before. In a deeply moving interview, the brother of the late Angus Mackenzie talks of being inconsolable with grief for his murdered sibling.
Presented by John Morrison, the programme examines what may have made a man once sworn to uphold the law, commit society’s most heinous crime - with little apparent motive, and no remorse.
Howard Wilson was sentenced to life. But far from disappearing from the public eye, he went on to be involved in the infamous Porterfield riots along with Jimmy Boyle – fellow criminal he had once staked out as a policeman. Wilson also became a best-selling crime fiction author, before being released from prison in 2002, amid further furore.
Produced by STV, “Cop Turned Killer – Sgeulachd Howard Wilson” can be seen on BBC ALBA on Wednesday 23rd March at 9pm, and repeated on Thursday 24th at 10pm.