The break came on January 11, 1990, when Glover slipped up badly, but it was a further three weeks before the incident reached the ears of the task force. On that January day, Glover called at the Greenwich Hospital for an appointment with its administrator, Mr. Reg Cadman.
Afterwards Glover, dressed in his blue-and-white salesman's jacket and carrying a clipboard, walked into a hospital ward where four very old and very sick women lay in their beds. He approached Mrs. Daisy Roberts who was suffering from advanced cancer, asking if she was losing any body heat, then pulled up her nightie and began to prod her in an indecent manner.
Mrs. Roberts became alarmed and rang the buzzer beside her bed. A sister at the hospital, Pauline Davis answered the call and found Glover in the ward. "Who the hell are you?" she called out and when Glover ran from the ward. She chased him and took down the registration number of his car as he hurriedly drove off.
Sister Davis called the police and later that day two young, uniformed policewomen from the local Chatswood police station arrived to investigate. The hospital staff was able to identify and name Glover as he was well known and popular from previous visits on his pastry round. When the police returned a week later with a photo of John Glover, Sister Davis positively identified him and Mrs Roberts said that it looked "most like him."
At last a breakthrough. But for some unaccountable reason, another three weeks were to pass before anyone reported the incident to the Granny Killer task force.