Edith Alice Morrell (20 June 1869 – 13 November 1950) was a resident of Eastbourne, East Sussex, England, and patient of Dr John Bodkin Adams. Although Adams was acquitted in 1957 of her murder, the question of Adams' role in Morrell's death excited considerable interest at the time and continues to do so. This is partly because of negative pre-trial publicity which remains in the public record, partly because of the several dramatic incidents in the trial and partly as Adams declined to give evidence in his own defence. The trial featured in headlines around the worldNot Guilty, Time, 22 April 1957. and was described at the time as "one of the greatest murder trials of all time" and "murder trial of the century".Times, 11 June 1985, p. 10 It was also described by the trial judge as unique because "the act of murder" had "to be proved by expert evidence." The trial also established the legal doctrine of double effect, where a doctor giving treatment with the aim of relieving pain may, as an unintentional result, shorten life.Devlin, pp. 171–2
Background Origin of the enquiry Edith Alice Morrell was a wealthy widow who suffered a brain thrombosis (a stroke) on 24 June 1948 while visiting her son in Cheshire. She was partially paralysed and was admitted to a hospital in Neston, Cheshire the following day. After returning to Eastbourne, she was under the care of Dr John Bodkin Adams for two years and four months from July 1948 until her death on 13 November 1950: as she had been attended by a doctor throughout her last illness and as the death was apparently not sudden, violent or unnatural, there was no requirement for an inquest and none was held.Cullen, p. 94 Adams, as her medical attendant, certified the cause of death as a "stroke" following a coma that had lasted two hours. Cullen records that, on the day of Mrs Morrell's death, Adams arranged for her cremation and that her ashes were scattered over the English Channel. However, Mrs Morrell had made various wills, and it was her son, Claude, as her sole executor who was obliged to carry out her wishes for her funeral arrangements, not Adams.Devlin, pp. 176–7, 179. Adams did complete the medical certificate required for the cremation form, answering "no" to the form's printed question "Have you, so far as you aware, any pecuniary interest in the death of the deceased?", which avoided the necessity of a post-mortem. As Adams was not a beneficiary of Mrs Morrell's final will, as amended by a codicil of 13 September 1950,Devlin, pp. 96–7. this answer was in fact correct, although he may have believed he was a beneficiary, as he later told the police.
The Eastbourne police had received an anonymous call, later discovered to be from the music hall performer Leslie Henson who had been working in Dublin at the time,Robins, p. 55. about the unexpected death of his friend Gertrude Hullett on 23 July 1956, while being treated by Adams.Cullen, pp. 15–17 Mrs Hullet had been depressed since the death of her husband four months earlier and had been prescribed sodium barbitone and also sodium phenobarbitone to help her to sleep.Cullen, p. 158 In the months immediately after her husband's death in March 1956, Mrs Hullett had told Adams of her wish to commit suicide. Her daughter, a close friend (who was also her executor) and her two servants later told the police that they believed that she had taken her own life, and the friend added that he had found the letters in which she had contemplated suicide in April 1956, calling her death a "planned suicide".Robins, p.56.Devlin, p. 12.
No information about Mrs Hullett's possible suicidal intentions had reached Adams' colleague, Dr Harris, who was called after Mrs Hullett was found comatose. He diagnosed a cerebral haemorrhage as most likely cause of her death on hearing that she had complained of a headache and giddiness the previous evening.Cullen, pp. 156–9Devlin, p. 13. As the death was unexpected, an inquest was held into Mrs Hullett's death, which ended on 21 August. The inquest concluded that Mrs Hullett had committed suicide, but the coroner questioned Adams' treatment and said in his summing up that it was "extraordinary that the doctor, knowing the past history of the patient" did not "at once suspect barbiturate poisoning".Cullen, p. 185
Police involvement Two features of Adams' way of practicing medicine had attracted attention among doctors, nurses and others in Eastbourne: his lavish use of the opiate drugs, heroin and morphia, and his asking wealthy patients for legacies. It was rumoured that the two were not unconnected, and that someone whose duty it was to keep his patients alive should not have a pecuniary interest in their deaths.Devlin, pp. 10–11. The circumstances surrounding Mrs Hullett's death, in particular his apparent attempt to disguise that its cause was barbiturate poisoning and his wish to clear a substantial cheque she had given him shortly before her death as rapidly as possible together with these rumours, prompted the Eastbourne police to involve the Metropolitan Police in the investigation.Devlin, pp. 180–1.
Instead of having to find a suspect for a known crime, the senior Metropolitan Police officer, Detective Superintendent Herbert Hannam, had a known suspect in Adams but wished to link him to more serious crimes than forging prescriptions, making false statements and mishandling drugs. Devlin suggests that Hannam became fixated on the idea that Adams had murdered many elderly patients for legacies, regarding his receiving a legacy as grounds for suspicion, although Adams was generally only a minor beneficiary in his patient's wills.Devlin, p. 181. Hannam's team investigated the wills of 132 of Adams' former patients dating between 1946 and 1956 where he had benefited from a legacy, and prepared a short list with around a dozen names for submission to the prosecuting authorities.Devlin, pp. 18–19. The list included Mrs Morrell, Mrs Hullett and two other cases in which evidence had been taken on oath,Devlin, pp. 24–5. these being among the cases where Hannam considered he had collected enough evidence for a prosecution.Cullen, p. 636 Devlin considered that Mrs Morrell's case, which was chosen by the Attorney-General for prosecution, looked the strongest of Hannam's preferred cases, despite it being six years old, although he noted that some others believed that the Hullet case was stronger.Devlin, pp. 11, 25.
The evidence Context Murder is a criminal offence under the common law of England and Wales, defined as "the unlawful killing of a reasonable person in being under the King or Queen's peace with malice aforethought express or implied", and matters outside this definition are not murder.Blom-Cooper and Morris, pp. 13, 15.Prins, pp. 15, 22. Devlin told the jury that, even if they decided that Mrs Morrell did not die a natural death but was killed, there had also to be the intention of killing.Devlin, pp. 174–5. He pointed out in his account of the Morrell trial that prosecution could only draw inferences about the intention of an accused person, whereas the defence had the advantage that only the accused could say what had really been in his mind.Devlin, p. 142.
The prosecution case, based on the police investigation and outlined in the opening speech of the Attorney-General Sir Reginald Manningham-Buller, was that Adams either administered or instructed others to administer drugs that killed Mrs Morrell with the intention of killing her, and that these drugs were unnecessary as she was not suffering pain and had been semi-comatose for some time before her death. The prosecution added that the likely motive for the killing was he had decided that it was time for Mrs Morrell to die, as he feared her altering her will to his disadvantage.Devlin, pp. 2–5. In strict law, the prosecution did not need to show a motive but, if none were advanced, the offence had to be proved by demonstrating beyond doubt how the killing was carried out.Devlin, pp. 69, 123. Throughout the trial, the prosecution maintained that the motive was a mercenary one, and it did not rely on the possible alternative of euthanasia.Devlin, p. 163.
Not only did the alleged manner in which Mrs Morrell met her death have to be proved by expert evidence, the police evidence offered at the trial depended for its accuracy on two statements made by Adams while not under caution in apparently friendly conversation with Hannam. Adams' first statement, that he had administered almost all the dangerous opiate drugs he prescribed for Mrs Morrell himself and that virtually none were left unused at her death, was critical to the prosecution's case on method, but was later contradicted by other evidence. Devlin considers that this admission was made in response to Hannam searching the doctor's house and surgery on 24 November 1956 and at the same time presenting Adams with a list of drugs prescribed for Mrs Morrell between 8 and 12 November 1950, the latter being the day before she died. Had Adams not said that all the drugs had been used, he could have been accused of illicitly hoarding them.Devlin, p. 22. Adams' second statement that he had inherited certain items under Mrs Morrell's will, the basis for the case on motive, was also incorrect.Devlin, pp. 21–3, 99.
Medical evidence After Mrs Morrell had suffered a stroke and was partly paralysed, she was admitted to a cottage hospital in Neston, Cheshire on 25 June 1948. Cullen, whose account is based on the Scotland Yard case files, stated that Adams was already her doctor, that he arrived in Cheshire on 26 June, and on the following day prescribed morphia for the pain.Cullen, pp. 395, 560 Adams, she claimed, also made special arrangements to take Mrs Morrell back to Eastbourne and gradually increased the dose of morphia and added heroin until she was addicted.Cullen, p. 561 However, it was established during the trial that the morphia injections Mrs Morrell received for the nine days she spent in hospital to ease pain and symptoms of "cerebral irritation" and to help her sleep were prescribed by a Doctor Turner of that hospital, not by Adams.Devlin, pp. 112–3 On her return to Eastbourne, Mrs Morrell was first cared for at the Esperance Nursing Home before returning home.Robins, p.228. The Attorney-General's opening speech also stated that Mrs Morrell was transferred to Eastbourne on 5 July 1948, only then becoming one of Adams' patients, and that he first prescribed morphine on 9 July 1948, adding heroin on 21 July.Devlin, pp. 2–3 Rather than a gradually increasing dose, between July 1949 and the end of October 1950, the regular dose given was a quarter grain of morphia and one-third grain of heroin.