Somerton’s clothes were of a high quality and all labels had been removed. His hands showed no signs of manual labour and he was wearing a jacket over a pullover, despite it having been a very warm night. He was clean-shaven, had no ID and his dental records and fingerprints did not match anyone on their database.

The autopsy report said Somerton had died at 2:00am. His heart and brain were normal but there was congestion in the pharynx, stomach, kidneys and liver and his spleen was three times the normal size. His last meal had been a pasty, so at least he went out in style I guess. It looked like a poison case to the pathologist, but not a trace could be found and there was no sign of puke or convulsion which is the normal reaction with poison cases.

The body couldn’t be identified and therefore couldn’t be burned or immediately buried, so the police took the unprecedented step of embalming it for future reference.

The newspapers all ran with the story of course, everyone loves a murder, especially a mysterious and unsolved one. The Advertiser ran with the story that the body was E.C. Johnson, then a few days later, Mr Johnson showed up at the police station, so it wasn’t him. A further three people recognised the guy as Robert Walsh until it became clear that an obvious scar on Walsh’s body wasn’t present. Scrub him off the list.

☛ Next: Dumb And Disturbing Deaths