Gilbert Gray , QC, who died on April 7 aged 82, was among the Bar’s greatest orators, and was described as an heir “to the great gladiatorial titans vividly characterised by Anthony Trollope”
Photo: HULTON ARCHIVE
A consummate criminal advocate, “Gillie” (as he was known to his friends) was admired for his devastating cross-examinations and rousing closing speeches to the jury. It was Robert Alexander, himself acclaimed by Lord Denning as the finest barrister of his generation, who linked Gray’s name with that of George Carman when he portrayed them as “the modern heirs” to Trollope’s legal titans.
Certainly Gray never shrank from the theatrical courtroom gesture, and would often quote poetry or Shakespeare. “Every line a headline, every phrase a gem,” noted junior prosecuting counsel, as Gray eloquently addressed the jury in his most famous case, that of the defence of Donald Neilson, known as “the Black Panther”.
Neilson, already accused of shooting dead three sub-postmasters, stood trial in 1976 for the kidnap and murder of the 17-year-old coach company heiress Lesley Whittle. She had been found naked and hanged in a drainage shaft at Bathpool Park, Kidsgrove, having been abducted from the family home in Shropshire in January 1975. A £50,000 ransom had been demanded.
Neilson pleaded guilty to kidnap and blackmail, but denied murder, leaving Gray with a Herculean task of advocacy. One of his tactics was to create what one observer called “a tonal doubt”, by introducing an unexpected note of humour:
“You have heard much,” Gray told the jury “about Mr Neilson and the Black Panther; but you may, when you have heard of this man’s pathetic attempts to 'make it big’, think rather of the Pink Panther and Mr Peter Sellers.” Gray even went so far as to portray the former Army lance-corporal as a Walter Mitty character with fantasies of military supremacy.
From his place on the bench, the trial judge’s son, the writer Adam Mars-Jones (just down from Cambridge and serving as his father’s marshal), would later record Neilson fixing Gray with a “stare of rage” at this “enormously unwelcome” line of defence. Gray, he added, appeared “bothered and almost distracted” in the sweltering courtroom, never ceasing to adjust his dress “as if the reasonable doubt of which he seeks to convince the jury were roving as an itch beneath wig and gown”.
He did not satisfy that itch, and Neilson was convicted on all but two of seven counts, receiving five life sentences. The trial had undoubtedly tested Gray to the limit, but he continued to flourish in countless other high-profile murder cases, occasionally reflecting on his early days in court when convicted defendants could be turned over to the hangman. He remembered correcting a young barrister who had arrived for his first capital case clad in his best pinstripe suit: “Always wear black for murder trials my boy, always wear black.”
He was leader of the North-Eastern Circuit from 1984 to 1987, entertaining many robing rooms with his stories. Meanwhile, in the courtroom itself, his colleagues wondered at his verbal dexterity: “He makes you feel as if English is not your first language,” declared one fellow Silk.
A celebrated raconteur and wit, Gray was in great demand as an after-dinner speaker. In one of his favourite jury stories, he related how “12 good men and true” were selected, but asked to wait at the back of the court while another case was concluded. The judge then invited them to “take their rightful place”. To a man, Gray recalled, “they climbed into the dock”.
Gilbert Gray was born on April 25 1928 at Scarborough, the son of a butcher. Educated at Scarborough Boys’ High School, he first encountered the richness of the English language at his local Salvation Army Hall and by listening to Methodist preachers. He would base his courtroom style on the rolling cadences he had heard as a boy.
After National Service in the Army, he went to Leeds University, initially reading Theology before switching to the Law. He was president of the Student Union in his final year and was called to the Bar in 1953.
Gray took Silk in 1971, developing a national and international reputation in civil as well as criminal law. He represented the disgraced Newcastle architect John Poulson at his appeal; appeared in the Spycatcher case in Australia, when the British government tried to block the autobiography of the former MI5 assistant director Peter Wright; and was involved in both the arms-to-Iraq trial involving senior executives of Matrix Churchill, and the Brink’s-Mat bullion robbery trial.
Gray also appeared for the former England football manager Don Revie in his case against a Football Association suspension, and, in 1980, for the family of Jimmy Kelly, a Liverpool labourer who had died in police custody the previous year. He appeared in public inquiries into the Selby coalfield, the Leeds airport expansion and, in 1987, the sinking of the Herald of Free Enterprise ferry at Zeebrugge.
Gray also sat as a crown court Recorder between 1972 and 1998, often at the Old Bailey, and was proud to have spent 40 years as a Silk without retiring. He was head of York Chambers at his death.
Away from the courtroom, Gray stood unsuccessfully for Parliament for the Liberals in 1955 and 1959. He was an accomplished artist, and appeared as a panellist on Radio 4’s Any Questions.
An enthusiastic amateur sailor, he taught his children how to navigate back into Scarborough harbour by aiming for the painted white gable of their grandmother’s home. He never forgave Scarborough council for not renewing its contract with Max Jaffa, the musician whose concerts with the Palm Court Orchestra were broadcast from the resort by the BBC for 25 years. He was a keen supporter of the RNLI both at Scarborough, where he was station president, and nationally, becoming an honorary life vice-president.
Gilbert Gray married, in 1954, Dilys Thomas, who survives him with their two sons and two daughters. His ashes are to be scattered from the Scarborough lifeboat over the South Bay.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/law-obituaries/8472650/Gilbert-Gray.html
He did not satisfy that itch, and Neilson was convicted on all but two of seven counts, receiving five life sentences. The trial had undoubtedly tested Gray to the limit, but he continued to flourish in countless other high-profile murder cases, occasionally reflecting on his early days in court when convicted defendants could be turned over to the hangman. He remembered correcting a young barrister who had arrived for his first capital case clad in his best pinstripe suit: “Always wear black for murder trials my boy, always wear black.”
He was leader of the North-Eastern Circuit from 1984 to 1987, entertaining many robing rooms with his stories. Meanwhile, in the courtroom itself, his colleagues wondered at his verbal dexterity: “He makes you feel as if English is not your first language,” declared one fellow Silk.
A celebrated raconteur and wit, Gray was in great demand as an after-dinner speaker. In one of his favourite jury stories, he related how “12 good men and true” were selected, but asked to wait at the back of the court while another case was concluded. The judge then invited them to “take their rightful place”. To a man, Gray recalled, “they climbed into the dock”.
Gilbert Gray was born on April 25 1928 at Scarborough, the son of a butcher. Educated at Scarborough Boys’ High School, he first encountered the richness of the English language at his local Salvation Army Hall and by listening to Methodist preachers. He would base his courtroom style on the rolling cadences he had heard as a boy.
After National Service in the Army, he went to Leeds University, initially reading Theology before switching to the Law. He was president of the Student Union in his final year and was called to the Bar in 1953.
Gray took Silk in 1971, developing a national and international reputation in civil as well as criminal law. He represented the disgraced Newcastle architect John Poulson at his appeal; appeared in the Spycatcher case in Australia, when the British government tried to block the autobiography of the former MI5 assistant director Peter Wright; and was involved in both the arms-to-Iraq trial involving senior executives of Matrix Churchill, and the Brink’s-Mat bullion robbery trial.
Gray also appeared for the former England football manager Don Revie in his case against a Football Association suspension, and, in 1980, for the family of Jimmy Kelly, a Liverpool labourer who had died in police custody the previous year. He appeared in public inquiries into the Selby coalfield, the Leeds airport expansion and, in 1987, the sinking of the Herald of Free Enterprise ferry at Zeebrugge.
Gray also sat as a crown court Recorder between 1972 and 1998, often at the Old Bailey, and was proud to have spent 40 years as a Silk without retiring. He was head of York Chambers at his death.
Away from the courtroom, Gray stood unsuccessfully for Parliament for the Liberals in 1955 and 1959. He was an accomplished artist, and appeared as a panellist on Radio 4’s Any Questions.
An enthusiastic amateur sailor, he taught his children how to navigate back into Scarborough harbour by aiming for the painted white gable of their grandmother’s home. He never forgave Scarborough council for not renewing its contract with Max Jaffa, the musician whose concerts with the Palm Court Orchestra were broadcast from the resort by the BBC for 25 years. He was a keen supporter of the RNLI both at Scarborough, where he was station president, and nationally, becoming an honorary life vice-president.
Gilbert Gray married, in 1954, Dilys Thomas, who survives him with their two sons and two daughters. His ashes are to be scattered from the Scarborough lifeboat over the South Bay.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/law-obituaries/8472650/Gilbert-Gray.html
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