Arlene Fraser trial: Case is fused into the Scottish public’s psyche

The decision by the Supreme Court in London last year that Nat Fraser’s original trial in 2003 had been unfair was met with deep hostility by First Minister Alex Salmond and justice secretary Kenny MacAskill.

Their criticism of, as they saw it, unwarranted interference in Scots law by a court south of the Border was such that Fraser’s lawyers argued he could not possibly receive a fair trial the second time around because so much prejudice had been created against him.

Everyone would take from the comments by the politicians that Fraser was guilty, it was said.

The plea fell on deaf ears, however, and the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh sanctioned a retrial.

Much of the evidence remained the same, although it took great effort to tease some of it from dimming memories. Here, people were being asked about events from 1998, and they could be forgiven for struggling to recall what had been said by whom, where and when.

Fraser’s lawyers recognised from the off that it would be pointless to try to conceal from the second jury the fact that there had been a previous trial.

The details might have been sketchy, but the intense media coverage at the time of the disappearance of Arlene Fraser in 1998, her husband’s conviction in 2003, and the political fall-out in the wake of the Supreme Court’s judgment in 2011 meant this was a case fused into the psyche of the Scottish public.

The defence team was quick to bring out into the open that in 2003, Fraser had sat in the dock initially with two other men, Hector Dick and Glenn Lucas, now deceased, charged with murdering Fraser’s estranged wife. During the trial, the charge was dropped against the others and they were freed. Dick became a crucial witness for the prosecution against Fraser, who was duly convicted.

The full story of what happened thereafter was not spelled out, but enough was said for the jury to understand that Fraser had pursued an appeal, that it was to do with his wife’s rings, and the upshot had been the current, second trial.

The jury had heard that Mrs Fraser, 33, and her husband, then 39, separated about a month before she disappeared from her home in Smith Street, New Elgin, Moray, on 28 April, 1998.

By late evening, the couple who shared after-school childminding duties with Mrs Fraser were sufficiently alarmed by her absence to call the police and report her missing. One of the first things found at the house was a poignant note left by her son, Jamie, after he had returned to an empty house.

“I was home at 7.30. You not in. I am over at Marc’s. Where are U!” Otherwise, the house appeared normal. The vacuum cleaner was still plugged in, as was Mrs Fraser’s hair-drier. There was no sign of a struggle and no forensic evidence to suggest a crime had been committed.

Police suspected Fraser was somehow involved. He had a cast-iron alibi, however. That day, as the police confirmed, he had been making deliveries for his wholesale fruit and vegetable business.

Unfortunately for Fraser, the alibi smacked of having been set up. Part of it involved phoning a woman he had met a couple of weeks earlier. He had called her every weekday, at about the same time each morning, but during the call on the Monday, the day before the murder, he had given a time for his call the next day. He had never specified a time, and after that call on the Tuesday, he never called again.

Detectives learned that Fraser, described by one witness as “green-eyed jealous”, had feared the cost of a divorce and the idea of his wife starting a new life with another man, who would help bring up his children.

A friend of Mrs Fraser, Marion Taylor, said Arlene had told her Fraser had warned: “If you’re not going to live with me, you’ll not be living with anybody.”

Other witnesses noted that Fraser had reacted with nonchalant disinterest to his wife’s disappearance. He had even joked with her family, pointing to a toy moustache and suggesting that’s what she might have worn as a disguise when she vanished.

Mrs Fraser’s father, Hector McInnes, recalled Fraser saying, in the days after she had disappeared: “The bairns will soon forget their mother.”

In 2003, evidence suggesting Fraser had planted his wife’s rings back in the house in an attempt to bolster his claim that she had left him became a cornerstone of the Crown case. The engagement, wedding and eternity rings were found by Mrs Fraser’s stepmother, Catherine McInnes, on a peg in the bathroom nine days after she vanished.

It was this evidence that led the Supreme Court to rule that the original conviction was unsafe, after hearing evidence suggesting the rings had been in the house on the day Mrs Fraser went missing was not disclosed to the defence. This time, the rings evidence was led and all perspectives on it were heard.

The police discovered that, on the eve of the murder, Fraser had acquired a cheap car through his friend Hector Dick, specifying that it needed to have a boot, and that it was returned to Mr Dick a few days later. He suspected it had been involved in the murder and he burned the car and took the wreckage to a scrapyard.

It took Mr Dick many months to admit any knowledge of the car, and he was jailed for a year for attempting to pervert the course of justice.

In 2003, Mr Dick sat in the dock with Fraser and a third man, Glenn Lucas, now deceased, charged with Mrs Fraser’s murder. A few days into the trial, the Crown dropped the charge against Mr Dick and Mr Lucas and they were freed. Mr Dick became a prosecution witness.

He testified again during the second trial, claiming Fraser had confided in him that he had paid a hitman £15,000 to strangle his wife, and that Fraser had burned the body and then ground and scattered the remains so no trace of her would ever be found.

Fraser’s lawyers mounted an all-out attack on Mr Dick’s credibility, and Lord Bracadale directed the jury that, if they chose to dismiss Mr Dick’s evidence “out of hand”, there was still enough circumstantial evidence to allow a guilty verdict. That verdict was delivered yesterday.