mental age and the fact that he did not fire the fatal shot. Bentley's appeal was heard on 13 January 1953 and was unsuccessful. Decision not to reprieve Bentley When his appeal was turned down, Bentley's life was placed in the hands of the Home Secretary, David Maxwell Fyfe, who had to decide whether to recommend that the Queen exercise the royal prerogative of mercy to commute his death sentence to life imprisonment. Lord Goddard forwarded the jury's recommendation of mercy, but added that he himself "could find no mitigating circumstances". His later statements to author David Yallop, which convinced Yallop that Goddard had wanted a reprieve, appear to have been incorrectly quoted. Maxwell Fyfe's autobiography, published in 1964, refers to the factors which he took into consideration: "the evidence of the trial, medical reports, family or other private circumstances ... and police reports, ... the available precedents, and ... public opinion". He went on to say that Bentley's case also involved the issue of the police force, since it was a police officer who was killed. Maxwell Fyfe then stresses that a reprieve would mean the Home Secretary is "intervening in the due process of the law". Maxwell Fyfe, in the words of the letter sent out, failed to discover any sufficient ground to justify him in advising Her Majesty to interfere in the due course of the law. There was much political pressure to commute Bentley's sentence, including a memorandum signed by over 200 members of Parliament. Despite several attempts, Parliament was given no opportunity to debate the issue until the sentence had been carried out. The Home Office also refused Dr Hill permission to make his report public. At 9am on 28 January 1953, Bentley was hanged at Wandsworth Prison, London, by Albert Pierrepoint, with Harry Allen assisting. There were protests outside the prison and two people were arrested and fined for damage to property. In March 1966, Bentley's remains were removed from Wandsworth and re-interred in Croydon Cemetery. To Encourage the Others In his 1971 book To Encourage the Others (the title is an acknowledged allusion to Voltaire's Candide), David Yallop documented Bentley's psychiatric problems, as well as what he believed were inconsistencies in the police and forensic evidence and the conduct of the trial. Despite Craig's gun being the only one on the roof at the moment that Miles was shot, he proposed the theory