South Wales Police issued a photofit image of a bloodstained, white male seen in the vicinity at the time of the murder but were unable to trace the man.

Gafoor received a shorter minimum tariff (the length of time before a prisoner may be considered for parole) than had been given to the wrongfully convicted men, due to the reduction for a guilty plea, highlighting a controversial feature of the sentencing guidelines.

[13][16] When White disappeared, the police began actively searching for her, and a judge issued a warrant for her arrest to ensure that she attended the first trial, which was listed to commence at Cardiff Crown Court on 15 February 1988.

[17] Earlier in February 1988, another prostitute, Leanne Vilday, had loaned White the keys to the flat in James Street, where she was later murdered, for the purpose of taking clients there for sex.

[18] After White disappeared, Vilday was unable to get into the flat herself without the keys and on the evening of 14 February she asked taxi driver Eddie Dimond, who knew both women, to take her to the address.

[22] The subsequent murder inquiry was led by Detective Chief Superintendent (DCS) John Williams, the head of South Wales Police's Criminal Investigation Department (CID).

[23] Appeals for information led to several potential witnesses independently describing a white male, approximately 5'8"–5'10", aged in his mid-30s, with dark hair and a "dishevelled" appearance.

[24][25] An E-FIT of the suspect was compiled and on 17 March 1988 DCS Williams appeared on the BBC television programme Crimewatch UK, where he stated that the police believed this man was responsible for White's murder.

These were dirty and unwashed – the police even joked with Miller during his initial interview that he should sit in the opposite corner of the room due to the smell of his clothing – but there were no traces of blood found on them.

One of the men, whose identity has never been publicly revealed and was referred to only as 'Mr X', was a convicted sex offender and paedophile who lived around twenty minutes driving distance from James Street, was known to use prostitutes, and was a frequent visitor to Cardiff.

[40] Although he did not realise this at the time, his common-law wife Jackie Harris was having an affair with Geoff Smith, a South Wales police officer attached to the Vice Squad.

[41] Williams began passing information to the police in March 1988, much of it unreliable, including a claim that White had been stabbed in the Casablanca club in Butetown before being moved to the flat in James Street.

On 10 November 1988, the day after Mr. X was cleared of any involvement, Perriam gave a statement to the police that she had been driving home from the club and had passed 7 James Street at around 1.30 am on the night that White was murdered.

Perriam's statement was the "breakthrough" needed by the police and her allegation that she saw John Actie and others "at or near the scene of the murder" allowed the investigation to take a new direction after it had reached an impasse following the elimination of Mr.

[47][48][49] Armed with Perriam's statement placing the group of black men outside the flat at the time of the murder, the police questioned Psaila on 17 November 1988 and insisted that she was somehow connected with the crime.

Vilday then gave a new statement on the same day, naming Stephen Miller, Ronnie and John Actie, Abdullahi and Paris as the killers, and saying that she and Psaila had both been forced to cut one of White's wrists to ensure their complicity and silence.

[56][57] The trial commenced at Swansea Crown Court on 5 October 1989, but was interrupted on 26 February 1990 – after 82 days of evidence – by the sudden death of the judge, Mr Justice McNeill, from a heart attack.

[65] Evidence concerning the unreliability of the taped police confession of Stephen Miller was given by Icelandic-British academic, forensic psychologist and former detective Gísli Guðjónsson.

[68] Satish Sekar, an investigative journalist specialising in crime and justice issues, had tracked down two witnesses not called at the trial who could provide an alibi for Miller's whereabouts at the time of the murder.

[69] A public campaign to overturn the convictions, started by families and friends of the three men, began to receive high-profile support, including that of American community leader Al Sharpton, and Gerry Conlon, a recently exonerated member of the "Guildford Four".

Mansfield argued that the trial judge "was wrong to admit the evidence of Mr Miller's police interviews contained on the tapes because it was tainted by the officers' 'oppressive' conduct."

"[72] In his judgement, Lord Taylor said that the police had "bullied and hectored" Miller during a "travesty of an interview" and that "short of physical violence, it is hard to conceive of a more hostile and intimidating approach by officers to a suspect."

[24] Yusef Abdullahi was treated for posttraumatic stress disorder after his release from prison and campaigned on behalf of other victims of miscarriages of justice and for the reopening of the investigation into White's murder.

In January 2002, after the development of the Second Generation Multiplex Plus (SGM+) test, forensic scientists, led by Professor Angela Gallop, were finally able to obtain a reliable crime scene DNA profile.

[80] Hopes were also raised of solving the case when in the same year South Wales Police were able to positively identify a historical Port Talbot serial killer, Joe Kappen, using the pioneering approach of familial DNA searching.

On 4 July 2003, at Cardiff Crown Court, he pleaded guilty to White's murder and the judge, Mr Justice Royce, sentenced him to life imprisonment, with a minimum tariff of twelve years and eight months.

[35] In December 2008, three of the accused – Angela Psaila, Leanne Vilday and Mark Grommek – were found guilty of committing perjury and each sentenced to 18 months imprisonment.

[91] In July 2011 the trial (R v Mouncher and Others)—the largest police corruption trial in British criminal history—of Chief Inspectors Graham Mouncher and Richard Powell, Inspector Thomas Page, Detectives Michael Daniels, Paul Jennings, Paul Stephen, Peter Greenwood and John Seaford, and Violet Perriam and Ian Massey, commenced at Swansea Crown Court.

[105] In February 2015, then Home Secretary Theresa May announced that an investigation into the collapse of the police corruption trial would be carried out, led by Richard Horwell QC.

[106] May, who rejected calls for a full public inquiry, said: "There are still unresolved questions surrounding the reasons why no-one was found responsible for this appalling miscarriage of justice.