The Murder of Jill Dando

It is indeed the last look of Breakfast news, Im not sure how long it was in use..


With the 6pm news I take it I take it Jill only did three days, and even then would disappear to do holiday and crimewatch? Hence we got Moira and Anna ford ?

Praise be to the Wayback Machine. Here are some photos from 1989:



If anybody else wants to do some exploring, here you go:
https://web.archive.org/web/20151222075431/http://www2.tv-ark.org.uk/news/bbcnews/breakfast_1986.html

The only way we'll get to see TV Ark

And here's Jill

If Genome patterns are correct. Jill mostly only presented on Thursday and Friday. Seems to have mostly been;

Monday and Tuesday: Martyn and Moira
Wednesday: Anna and Andrew
Thursday: Anna and Jill
Friday: Martyn and Jill.

Gave her time for other commitments earlier in the week. As we know, Genome isn't entirely correct, but it seems to be the general pattern.

Martyn also only worked three days a week? how every odd, I thought he would have done at least four, I take it wed/thursday was the recording days for that quiz he did?

With some authority, once a loose identity is found immediate effort is made to locate NOK. Usually this is through employers, as they hold these details - you'd send a police officer to an employer to obtain the information, then get someone local to attend the address and give the sympathy message (this is often done under blue light conditions to expedite matters if the person's still alive and close to death, or there's a risk they could find out through an unofficial source - these days social media, back then via the phone?). Once this is done effort is made for an early, formal identification (subject to the person being in a state fit to show relatives, RTCs, fires or persons under trains tend to be done through other means, such as DNA comparison or dental/fingerprint records). This is for the coroner mostly. Again this is generally done within 24 hours, usually a matter of 2-3 hours, once any medical treatment (if any) has been rendered or the body removed from the scene, rarely an at scene identification may take place but this is usually reserved for people being identified by their employers such as emergency service personnel.

Sorry if it's way off topic but worth knowing the speed at which a formal 'death message' is done.

Back in the 1990s the 999 call would've been received at the Met's 'IR' at New Scotland Yard, Broadway, then sent via CAD to the local borough (Hammersmith and Fulham, probably Fulham police station) for dispatch. Someone with a scanner could've listened to the trunked analogue radio network and the source text of the CAD would be read out, given it was a shooting unarmed assets would stand off until a Trojan unit had attended and made the scene safe, this can take at least 10 minutes, on a good day - back in 1999 probably a lot longer as there were less available firearms resources. I don't think the 999 op would've had much chance between calls to leak it, especially given control rooms then, as they are now, tend to be a mobile phone free zone and any calls in or out via landline are recorded. I'd suspect a local radio scanner type probably picked it up ("Units attending XX Gowan Avenue, the informant states the victim is Jill Dando, unknown where the suspects are" or words to that effect).

Again, sorry if it's off topic but might add some background to the previous discussion!

Don't be sorry, really interesting stuff, thanks


It would more likely have been even simpler than that, just by word of mouth. All it needed was for anyone of the neighbours or passers by in the aftermath of the discovery to tell someone else and its out there. The road at the end of Gowan Avenue is a very busy main road, lots of people on it in the middle of the day


I wouldn't be surprised if one of those at the scene or someone who found out about it early on phoned a newspaper.


Incidently presumably Trojan wouldn't have been involved immediately as it was treated initially as a stabbing.

Jill would not present every week. She would quite often be replaced on Thursdays and Fridays with Jennie Bond

Am I correct in saying that Martyn never presented with Anna?

Good documentary, especially the interview with the police guy.

From a presentation point of view really liked the Newsnight set of the time - something different but still appropriate.

Not that I can remember. The Six had an unusual arrangement back then in that one presenter was definitely the 'main' presenter whilst the other person was very much a 'secondary' presenter. The main presenter would always read the opening headlines etc. Martyn and Anna were both considered main presenters so I don't think they ever presented together, to the best of my knowledge, anyway.

I'm not sure about the 90s but certainly today stabbings are treated as SFIs if there's a risk to life, therefore generate a TJ response due to the risks involved with edged weapons, even with readily available resources such as Taser, that being said in the absence of a visible offender/suspect it's more likely an unarmed officer would've attended in the first instance.