Moorgate tube crash: Horror moment son realises own dad was killed in deadly disaster When the phone rang at 9am, journalist Laurence Marks was at home in his council flat in north London’s Finsbury Park.
Subsequent interviews with survivors, London Transport engineers, forensic pathologist, Professor Keith Simpson, and toxicologist Dr Anne Robinson produced evidence questioning the condition of the brakes and the train’s speed - which, at 40mph was three times the limit, according to Laurence.
If my stepmother was right – she and Dad had only been married four months – he’d boarded the train at Drayton Park, having left his car in the station car park,” continues Laurence.
Finding the entire transcript of the inquest, including everyone’s name, address and telephone number - some 900 pages in all - he says: “I popped it into a Sainsbury's carrier bag, caught a cab to the Sunday Times offices in Gray’s Inn Road and got it photocopied, before catching a cab back to the mortuary, sneaking up the fire escape and returning the transcript to the safe.”.
“Could I go there straightaway and find out what was going on,” Laurence - now better known as the co-writer of hit TV sitcoms including Shine on Harvey Moon, The New Statesman, Love Hurts and Birds of a Feather – tells The Mirror, ahead of the 50th anniversary of the disaster.
