Oscar Slater

In 1909, Oscar Slater, a German Jew, was convicted and sentenced to death for the brutal murder of Marion Gilchrist, an elderly Glasweigan spinster. His trial is now known to have been one of the most scandalous miscarriages of justice in the annals of legal history. This book is a masterful and highly readable unravelling of this infamous case. Tommy Toughill includes material which has only recently come to light, including the correspondence of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (who waged a long campaign to get Slater released) and the once and future Prime Minister, Ramsey Macdonald, who stated 'the Scottish legal authorities and the police strove for Slater's conviction by influencing witnesses and with-holding evidence.' Oscar Slater was finally released from prison in 1927 after years of intense public pressure, led by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and William Roughead, the great criminologist. In the author's quest to clear Oscar Slater's name, and to lay bare the deep corruption both within the police force and a