# CROWN V COLONY — Let Him Have It: How Britain Hanged 19-Year-Old Derek Bentley for a Murder He Didn't Commit

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit.md
Podcast: [Daily Crime and Justice | True Crime, Trial Coverage, and Murder Cases](https://stenobird.com/podcast/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167)
Published: 2026-07-02T07:20:02+00:00
Episode link: https://www.spreaker.com/episode/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit--72681158
Audio file: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/72681158/crime_7_2_uk4.mp3
Processing state: not_requested
JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167/episodes/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit
Duration seconds: 927

## Resource

Day four of CROWN V COLONY, and the story turns. Garret Fisher leaves the killers behind for a young man who killed no one at all. On a Croydon rooftop in November 1952, 19-year-old Derek Bentley — illiterate, epileptic, with a reading age assessed at around four and a half — was already restrained by police when his 16-year-old friend Christopher Craig shot and killed Police Constable Sidney Miles, 42, a husband and father. Craig, as a juvenile, was too young to hang. Bentley was not. On the strength of five disputed words — "Let him have it, Chris," which the defense argued meant hand over the gun, and which serious doubt suggests Bentley may never have said at all — and a trial widely judged unfair, Bentley was convicted under the joint-enterprise law of the time and executed in January 1953, against his own jury's recommendation for mercy. It took 45 years and a fight carried by three generations of his family before the Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in 1998 — and the state finally admitted it had hanged an innocent man. Join our new FB groups page here. Take the poll! Join the Daily Crime & Justice community on social media! We're building a passionate group of true crime enthusiasts who love diving deep into the most shocking cases in America. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram by searching "Daily Crime & Justice" on either platform. You'll get exclusive behind-the-scenes content, breaking news updates on cases we're covering, and early alerts when new episodes drop. Our social media is where Garret Fisher's hottest takes live, including reactions that don't make it into the show. But more importantly, it's where YOU come in. Share your theories, debate the verdicts, and connect with fellow listeners who are just as obsessed with justice as you…

## Actions

- request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167/episodes/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.
- read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/daily-crime-and-justice-celebrity-trials-true-crime-law-and-justice-7323167/crown-v-colony-let-him-have-it-how-britain-hanged-19-year-old-derek-bentley-for-a-murder-he-didn-t-commit.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.

A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed.

## Transcript

Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.