THE sight that greeted the Police Constable Albert Moore so horrific, so depraved, that he was off work sick for weeks. It was two days before Christmas 1959 and he was called to a YWCA in Birmingham. There had been a report a woman had been hit in the head with a rock by intruder.

A colleague was inspecting the grounds and saw an open bedroom window - and a pair of legs parallel to the bed.

Constable Moore burst open the door - and came across the murder scene that would dominate the news for months afterwards.

Stephanie Bird, a 29-year-old typist at the YWCA, lay butchered on the floor, her body mutilated and sexually assaulted, and her head cut off and put on the bed.

A former Warrington CID officer said: "The police photos were worse than awful. She had been literally torn to shreds."

The national manhunt for the killer had just begun - and it would lead all the way to a quiet street off Battersby Lane.

Det Sgt Graham Henry Wellborn of Warrington CID was a uniquely memorable policeman. Around 6ft 2ins tall, around 17 stone and with a strong Geordie accent, he could be intimidating presence and occasionally abrupt with colleagues.

He was famed for the meticulous way he went about the job. A former CID colleague said: "He was so thorough he was a menace. He was a tiger."

When he bought a new car, he of course checked the chassis details - and found out it was stolen.

A former policeman said: "He was the most meticulous man you ever met. If he was typing and he made an error, it was wang', out of the typewriter and onto the floor. He had to get it perfect."

He was also humorous - often unintentionally.

The former CID colleague said: "He was full of sayings. I was a young officer interviewing a man for bicycle theft when suddenly Det Sgt Welborn walked in through the side door and asked what the man was charged with.

"He growled to the man Stand Up! Don't you realise the bicycle is the working mans Rolls Royce?' He was quite a character."

It was fortunate for Birmingham police that Det Sgt Wellborn was around. The murder case would come down to his interviewing skills - and in that field, he had few equals.

THE murder was a national sensation. Birmingham CID set up a special headquarters in Speedwell police station. Enquiries were into the few clues available - a bloody footprint on a bus, another footprint outside the YWCA, and the rock used to attack the second woman.

A note had also been left on the victim's bedroom table. It said: "This is a thing I thought would never happen."

The ferocity of the attack convinced police the culprit had butchery skills or medical training but all the suspects checked out, and more than 20,000 men were interviewed in total.

The suspects description was circulated - around 5ft 8ins tall, aged 25 to 27, with a reddish face, fair hair, and a square chin.

Chf Supt Haughton, the man in charge of the case became a minor national celebrity through his repeated appeals on TV and in the newspapers.

His cheerful disposition meant he was referred to as Sunny Jim' by his colleagues and The Smiling Assassin' by the criminal fraternity - but all the appeals were to no avail.

The police knew they had to do things the hard way.

They drew up a list of every single man who had stayed within a one mile radius of the YWCA hostel - which could have been up to half a million.

Questionnaire leaflets and lists of names were circulated to police forces around the country. Checking them out would need methodical and accurate work.

So it was fitting the names of four or five people to be checked from Warrington landed on the desk of Det Sgt George Henry Welborn.

It would have just been another day for Det Sgt Welborn as he cycled to Warrington police station from his home in a police cottage in Chorley Lane, Orford.

There was no reason to suspect the man behind the most brutal killing of the decade was living so nearby.

That man was Patrick Joseph Byrne, a 27-year-old builders labourer from Dublin who lived with his mum at 80 Birchall Street, off Battersby Lane, a long terraced street that used to run between Lythgoes Lane and Battersby Lane and was replaced by St Peter's Way.

MEMORIES have faded. The surviving officers from Warrington Borough Police have different opinions about how many times Det Sgt Welborn questioned Byrne. Some say he was called in once, others say he was called in twice because Det Sgt Welborn flaws in his statement.

A CID officer said Byrne seemed unremarkable as he waited to be questioned: "He was just a little bit nervous. But anybody who comes into a police station is a little bit nervous."

One February 9, 1960, he was taken into the small interview room at the station in Arpley Street, sat down on one of the wooden chairs, and question about the killing.

There were no tape recorders and usually no solicitors, just a detective and his suspect.

And this detective made sure the Birmingham police's questionnaire was boosted by his own growling presence and improvisations.

A former Warrington CID man said: "Det Sgt Welborn asked about finger prints - it was his own idea, it wasn't on the questionnaire, and Byrne started shaking."

Byrne's conscience could take the pressure no longer.

He told Welborn: "I want to tell you about the YWCA. I had something to do with thatit has been on my mind."

The admission was sensational - but could it be the work of fantasist?

Det Sgt Welborn called Birmingham police. He was told to ask questions that only the killer could answer - and Byrne could.

"As a result of that there were cars hurtling up the M6," said a former CID man.

Byrne was questioned again by Det Supt James Haughton, and taken back to Birmingham at 1.05am - to face trial for murder.

THE fall out from the arrest was dramatic as the eyes of the nation turned to Warrington. A former policeman said: "The national press mafia besieged the mother's home.

"They camped out on the doorstep of this poor woman and were chanting Come out Mrs Byrne'." The behaviour came as a complete shock."

Byrne had been working with Osborne and Co builders of Thelwall New Road, Latchford, carrying out shop alterations at Rigby and Co in Rylands Street.

Arthur Osborne, a company director, said: "He was very good, conscientious workman, friendly and quiet. Everybody considered him a good lad. We couldn't believe when we heard he had been arrested."

Neighbours said he was well-dressed but quiet' and that he was believed to worship at St Benedict's in Rhodes Street, Orford and St Albans in Bewsey Road.

A Byrne's first court appearance on Thursday, February 11 he was quite and pale, but at his next wept silently as the first details of his statement were revealed to the court.

THE facts were given in full at the trial in March - and they were horrible. Byrne was a long-time peeping tom who had been out on a drinking session with four other men on the night of the murder - but on this occasion, he felt he would be capable of committing rape.

He saw Stephanie Baird going into the hostel, got in through a window, and found her room. He asked for a kiss. She refused but he kissed her anyway.

His statement said: "She screamed and I put my hands round her neck. She went backwards inside the room with me squeezing her throat.

"I was lying on top of her kissing and squeezing her at the same time. I heard a couple of small noises from her throat but kept on kissing her."

Byrne used a bread knife to mutilate the body in such a fashion the details cannot be reported in a family newspaper, and was so forceful the knife broke. He also sexually assaulted the victim after her death.

He left the room and attacked the second woman at the hostel with a stone.

"She attracted me and I felt I only wanted to kill beautiful women," said his statement. "The urge to killer her was tremendously strong."

He went back to his lodgings and write a note to the landlord saying he had two personalities, one very bad, the other real me', but tore it up.

He looked at himself in the mirror for the signs of a madman' and slept in his cousin's bed that night because he was afraid to be alone.

An expert said Byrne was a sexual psychopath with immature sexual development, who sexual emotions had overpowered him, fuelled by alcohol.

The defence said he should be found guilty of manslaughter only on the grounds of insanity.

But he was convicted of murder and jailed for life. The judge concluded the case by thanking the police for their immense amount of work' and added: "Society owes them a great debt of gratitude."

Det Sgt Welborn's role in the case was small but absolutely vital. His son, Graham Welborn, a borough councillor, said: "He was very proud of his role in it." He retired more than ten years after the case and went on to work as head of security at Tetley's brewery, which has been replaced by Tescos.

He died a few years later and his funeral was held in St Wilfred's Church in Grappenhall.

But there was one thing Det Sgt Welborn did on the case that never hit the headlines.

He was known for being compassionate and for helping the victims of crime, and this case was no exception.

And after helping jail her son for life, he helped the forgotten victim, the completely distraught Mrs Byrne resettle back home in Ireland.