South Wales Police have apologised to the family of a man who was wrongfully executed for a murder he did not commit 70 years ago. Mahmood Mattan, a British Somali and former seaman living in Cardiff, was hanged in 1952 after he was convicted of killing shopkeeper Lily Volpert in her store in Cardiff.
Ms Volpert, an established Cardiff shopkeeper and unofficial money lender, had her throat slashed with a razor and bled to the death in the very shop she had spent more than two decades running on March 6, 1952. Despite having alibis backed by numerous witnesses and no forensic evidence Mr Mattan was arrested and charged within hours of the murder by Cardiff City police, which is part of the now South Wales Police force.
Mr Mattan, originally from Somalia, denied the help of an interpreter at his trial. This, alongside feelings of prejudice from an all-white jury and unhelpful comments from his own barrister who described his client as “half child of nature, half semi-civilised savage”, saw Mr Mattan found guilty of the murder despite much of the prosecution evidence being ruled as inadmissible.
