THE RED SHOE MURDER - Who Killed Norma Mary Dale - Unsolved for 75 Years

Who Killed Norma Mary Dale - Unsolved for 75 Years

She was last seen by her mother, Francis Dale, who was getting ready to take her into the city, at about 3pm, and was also seen at the same time by the next-door neighbour, Annie Langan, who spoke to her. Norma Dale ran in from play on the Saturday afternoon and took a bun, and then ran out again.
She could hear Norma outside chattering for a few minutes, and she then went out to pick blackberries, but when she returned at about 3pm, Norma Dale was nowhere to be seen.
When Norma went out, she was wearing a pair of bright red dancing shoes and a white dress.

During her search, at about 6pm, her mother Francis, went to a lorry parked on the waste ground, near where Norma was later found, but couldn’t find any sign of Norma being there.
A boy that lived on March Street, who was visiting his grandfather on Rawdon Avenue, was out playing with Norma Dale on the Saturday afternoon , sometime after she was last seen by her mother on the waste land behind Rawdon Avenue, near a beck that ran through there.
Norma and the boy were throwing some stones into the water when a man approached them and told them not to play there because they might drown. The man then told Norma Dale, 'Come along with me, and I will give you some money to get an apple'.
The man and Norma Dale walked off together across the wasteland, in the direction of Milton Street, which ran parallel with Rawdon Avenue.
According to the boy, the man was wearing a brown trilby hat and a brown overcoat.
The boy told this story over and over again and each time, the story remained the same, so it’s quite credible.
Please remember, this was the 40s, right? Kids were playing outside unsupervised all the time. IT wasn’t usually as dangerous as it is nowadays, so Norma being unsupervised and left outside to play was something being practiced in that day and age. She was with other kids outside and the waste land was just behind Rawdon Avenue.
After Norma Dale was noticed to be missing, a search of the area was made and the police were informed. An appeal was then broadcast over the wireless relay system and the police dragged the beck running through the wasteland behind the houses.
Norma Dale's body was later found on the Sunday morning on the waste ground which was within sight of her home and beyond the bottom of a neighbour’s garden, at 93 Rawdon Avenue.
It wasn’t believed her body to be there for very long when it was found. She was wearing a white dress and would have been easily spotted by searchers looking on the previous Saturday evening or the following Sunday morning.
She was lying about five feet from a lorry there and three or four feet from the garden fence of 93 Rawdon Avenue.
Norma Dale's grandmother searched the field where her body was found on the Sunday morning at about 8am but Norma Dale's body was not there at that time. She also questioned two men who were in a nearby brick yard.
Her body was found by 11-year-old Michael Duffy, a local schoolboy, at around 10am. He was also in the field with Norma Dale's grandmother at 8am searching for Norma Dale and said her body was not there at 8 am.
Norma’s father, Cyril Dale, left home at around 2 or 2:30 pm on Saturday, to watch with his friend, the Heworth Rugby team playing, for whom he was a trainer. They both had tea after the match and Cyril got back home at about 6.30pm, but there was no one in the house. He saw his wife out in the street with other people who told him Norma Dale was missing and they then searched the waste ground until midnight.

If there is anyone who holds fresh information or evidence that has the potential to identify and ultimately convict the person responsible, please come forward.
You can contact Detective Superintendent Dai Malyn, head of North Yorkshire Police’s Major Crime Unit .

#unsolvedmurder #unsolvedcase #truecrime #ladyandthemannequintruecrime #latmtruecrime

SOURCES:

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2047429/norma-dale-red-shoe-murder/
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/725554/uk-england-norma-dale-murder-1946-case-reopened
https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/14748701.norma-dale-murder-70-years-on-the-mystery-endures/
http://www.unsolved-murders.co.uk/murder-content.php?key=1680&termRef=Norma%20Mary%20Dale