The campaign teams version of events (featuring interview w/ the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign)

In today's episode, we're going to hear from two representatives of the campaign team, as we start to discuss the contentious 'evidence' in this case.

Alongside today's second episode, which covers the prosecutions version of the case.

Topics included:

• New theories around Sheila's two wounds
• More detail on the second call log
• Frustrations with the media

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Further reading - the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign.

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Transcript

Today’s episode marks a change in direction because from here on in we are going to start discussing the evidence in the case, but before we do that, it’s worth having an overview of the defence’s case, both at the time and now. 

At the time of the trial in 1985, the Jeremy’s defence was actually pretty simple – Sheila did it and his barrister argued that much of the alleged ‘evidence’ of guilt could be entirely explained. 

The blood in the moderator was suspect. Sheila’s gun use could only be implied but they believed there was enough evidence to suggest she did now what she was doing. That the lack of blood on her person was due to a process called ‘ritual cleansing’. 

But in the years since the case has become much more complex and confusing. 

There was of course only one group of people whom I could turn to for this information, the campaign team, or the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Team as they tend to be known on social media. 

They were group that had undoubtedly been the source of my previous understanding of the case, and it was their information that had previously galvanised my attention. And so, when they replied to my email agreeing to an interview, I knew that they – like their website and social channels – would be an excellent source of information.

The aim of today’s episode is to discuss the core concerns that the campaign team have with Jeremy’s conviction to lay the foundations for later discussions over the contentious issues. 

When I recorded this interview with them, I was a huge supporter of Jeremy Bamber’s campaign and sincerely believed in his innocence. But I now see this interview as something different. 

I went back and fore on how to use this audio for months, years even, because now I believe in his guilt.

That said, the campaign team are the loudest, most dedicated, and most outspoken innocence campaign within the United Kingdom. But they also represent a strand of Jeremy’s defence and – to that end – it’s important that they also have their say. Even if we or I might now disagree with them.

Having spoken to a solicitor, I’ve been reassured that having previously obtained permission to use this audio (which was provided upon them having received direct transcripts of the discussion) there are legal grounds for me to continue with its usage. 

It’s safe for me to assume that I will hear from them if they disagree – as they have once before. 

I have edited the audio to allow it to follow better and to remove some of the ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’ as was requested by the campaign team after the interview was first conducted. 

This interview was undertaken a fairly long time ago, and so it’s possible that certain aspects of their narrative have since changed. To that end I would suggest that you follow them on their own social media, or visit their website, for up-to-date information. 

What follows is a slightly edited, rearranged edit of the interview with the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign, with a limited amount of commentary from myself. I’ve tried to keep that to a minimum to ensure that what they say is accurately reflected.

I also want to thank them for participating in this interview with me. 

In the weeks and even months after the interview took place, they were a huge help to my investigation, answering my questions and providing me with further information whenever I needed it. And I owe them a huge thanks for that and the interview itself. 

Unfortunately, since the initial interview with them my opinion on the case has somewhat changed and as the first few episodes of the podcast dropped, so too did their communication. It must have become clear how I was now starting to feel about the case.

And while the initial transcript of the interview was agreed, edited, and accepted, as was agreed between us, there’s been no further communication since. 

Thankfully, they did approve the transcript at the time, agreeing that I could legally use the information included and that nothing prejudicial towards Jeremy’s case was included within the scripts.

The nature of this case is still active and with Jeremy Bamber’s recent CCRC submission, I understand there’s a need for the campaign to be careful in all communication that it distributes. 

With their previous reassurances that this episode did not affect the CCRC submission, what follows is my interview with the Jeremy Bamber Innocence campaign. 

Right, enough waffling, let’s get straight into today’s episode. 

Yvonne
Jeremy is the most hardworking person I know, he never stops, he absolutely will work tirelessly day and night to prove his innocence. He's supportive of us, because we get a lot of negative press. It's hard but he's very supportive of us, you know the work we do to get the evidence of his innocence out. And you know, we work directly with his legal team which is appreciative of. And he's just absolutely resilient. He bounces back and back and back from all these push backs and rejections like the recent JR

The evidence of two silences, the evidence Jeremy was innocent, and they didn't look at it. So we asked for the disclosure. And we were all absolutely, I was heartbroken, I was in floods of tears, and Jeremy just said, it's fine. We'll get up, we'll move on. And we'll use that for the next stage. And so he's so absolutely determined, so calm you know but he just gets frustrated at the length of time things take, but he's absolutely determined, as we are to prove he is innocent and we will. We have the evidence. We absolutely have the evidence. So, yeah, but you know, he's kind, he's supportive of people. He helps people in the prison, helps them to learn to read and write so they can answer letters to loved ones and have an education and fight their own cases. Without him helping them to do that He's what you call a model prisoner.

I mean the number of hours that we and he spend together working on the case and yet because he just gets a lot of mail and he still finds that time to, he makes sure every single person that writes to him receives a response, , no matter how busy he is, or what issues are going on at that time.

New

Philipp:
As a person he's also good company, he's got a good sense of humour, he's just a normal person to whom a terrible misfortune has befallen and I think the thing that keeps him going, as Yvonne says, is that he knows that he's innocent. We can surmise, and we've seen all the evidence and we believe he is innocent, but he knows that he's innocent and that I think is an inner strength to cope with what has been a terrible ordeal.

For many, these words are jarring, shocking and even unthinkable but for those who spoke to them, they’re nothing but an utterance of truth. As those interviewed in today’s episode believe, without any shred of doubt that they know Jeremy Bamber best and for them, unlike for most of the population, Jeremy is as far from the presented monster as he could possibly be. 

And yet these are not the traditional, killer groupies that tend to swarm the most notorious serial killers’ cases and nor are they are family of the convicted either. In fact, most of them have never even met the man himself, and while many will disagree with what they have to say, none could doubt the sincerity with which they say it. 

In today’s episode, you’re going to hear from TWO of those who work on the Jeremy Bamber Innocence campaign, an impassioned and controversial organisation that is determined to fight for what they see as justice. Via the actors hired.

Philipp
The first thing people tend to say when you say ‘Oh  Jeremy's innocent’  their first question is well ‘How come he was convicted then?’  because of that intrinsic faith in the system that they just cannot think ‘Well occasionally there are miscarriages of justice’. You can demonstrate that there are miscarriages of justice because I don't know how many appeals there are against serious crimes every year, many thousands. Some of those appeals are successful some are not but where they are successful, by definition, that means one of the decisions either the original conviction or the appeal is wrong so if people think about it they can see that sometimes the system doesn't work and regrettably this is probably the most egregious example of it.

Because unlike most of the public, they believe entirely in Jeremy’s innocence, convinced that he IS the victim of a tragedy beyond compare.
Yvonne: 
I think a lot of the problem is because people don't want to believe that the British system can be so corrupt, that even when you produce the evidence that somebody is in innocent, they still maintain that conviction, because they can't admit to the mistakes that they made, and to the facts, that show somebody is innocent. 

Yvonne: 
How would it work for the whole country if a whole lifetime prisoner Who’s been in jail for 35 years, then them saying, he's innocent, we need to let him out. So this is why  the bar for Jeremy, so incredibly high. , you've got other miscarriage of justice cases, that the Guilford four or the Birmingham six  and it's a single piece of evidence or a missing witness statement And yet Jeremy's case, we have so much compelling evidence, we can undermine the entire prosecution case..

What convinced them of his innocence is personal and likely different for each individual, but one thing was consistent with a number of the people I’ve had discussions with. And that was the fact that Jeremy has consistently refused to admit guilt. Much to the damage of his personal situation. 

Philipp
It's not just a matter of persistence because when he was originally jailed if he'd admitted guilt there was a strong chance at that point that he would have got out earlier. That did change later but there was an incentive for him to admit his guilt and he still didn't which is even more compelling.


Let’s start with a brief introduction to the two individuals, Philipp, and Yvonne, with them, in their own words, telling you how they got into the case and what it is that they do. 

Yvonne:
So for me, that was about 11 years ago, nearly now. I watched a program about Jeremy and I thought this just isn't right. So I did as much research. There wasn't a lot available at that time, there was a few books, it was things on the internet.. But from what I read, I thought well, no, this is and my burning issue was the scratch marks. So I wrote to Jeremy this very complex letter about my opinion of the scratch marks on the aga. And he replied to me, and from there, he was like well have a look at this and what do you think of that? And so we were gradually worked through. So for the past, I think about five, six years now. I've been heavily involved with the campaign 

So I'm now forensic liaison manager for the campaign and joint admin. So when we need a forensic report I have team of scientists who I can approach and say, can you possibly do me a report on this, how much will it costs, when can you have it ready for and you know, establishing good relationships with people like that as well, trying to run the campaign to the point where we can get that interest we need people to know we need as many people as possible to know of Jeremy's innocence. So, yeah, and so recent in the last few years I've worked along with Jeremy and with the legal team are quite happy to talk to me as well. 

Best job in the world, especially when you found evidence like yesterday.

And you have other days where you can't sleep and you have other days where you chew your nails off, and you're in tears and you know, so it's very emotional.

Philipp:
My involvement follows a pretty similar pat to be honest.  I remember years ago reading the Roger Wilkes book, back in the 90s, which put a question mark over the whole prosecution case and I recall thinking at the time there's something a bit dodgy about all this but I didn't particularly follow it after that but about four years ago I read, I can't remember the exact nature of the article, but I read something that again questioned aspects of the case so I again, like Yvonne, did a bit more reading and in fact read Carol Ann Lee's 'definitive account' of the case and decided that I didn't quite come to the same conclusions that she did and then just wrote to Jeremy and offered to help if I could and it went from there. In terms of what I do I run the communications side of things and help out on the forensics side when required and there is lots to keep us busy.

For those who have all but given their life for their cause – the release of Jeremy Bamber – he’s nothing more than a victim and as they protested to me. So convinced are they in their evidence and interpretation of the case, that they told me that even if Jeremy turned around one day admitted guilt, they’d still have doubts over his conviction. 

Over the course of their involvement, Philipp and Yvonne have climbed the rungs of the organisation, working hard, and contributing greatly to what they believe in. From fundraising to networking. Some of you might have even met them at the very first Crime Con Uk even, as I personally spotted the pair walking around the event. They were networking, and I know of at least 5 experts who were approached by them, asking them for their thoughts on Bamber’s case. 

Much in the same way that others amongst us have campaigned for our own passions. For me, my want to change things was expressed through a particular political party, but for them, it’s Jeremy Bamber’s conviction.

Over the course of their history with this case, they have worked on numerous of his court cases and have accessed millions of documents as part of this process. 

As a result, it could be argued that the potentially know more about the case than anyone else and so having spent hours reading through their website, I knew that they were a key source for me to speak to. 

While the American justice system seems to be dominated by notable and famed innocence campaigns, it’s a trend that is mostly absent from that of the UK’s system. And while there are some obvious examples of cases that tend to raise numerous questions, there aren’t many that are as notorious as this. 

In fact, off the top of my head I can only really name two other examples of cases where advocates have continued to laud it a miscarriage. Those who support Luke Mitchell in Scotland and those who supported the late Dai Morris here in Wales. But I can’t name you any other case where a campaign group seems to have prevalence as that of Jeremy Bamber’s.

The campaign has been around for years, with those involved and fronting it changing over the duration of its existence. And while their tactics are sometimes seen as questionable and provocative, their research is thorough, and their social media strategy is constant and consistent. 

There’s a tendency to ‘other’ those who would choose to be involved with such a campaign and for various reasons, the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign has not been free from criticism. And while it’s fine to doubt their message or disagree with them on what they believe, there’s one important point that I want to make from the outset. 

During my many emails and the one recorded conversation with the campaign, not once did I doubt their sincerity. And those I spoke to were involved because they are truly impassioned and engaged with the case. 

There’s undoubtedly a passionate belief within the support they have for Jeremy Bamber, and they outright believe in his innocence. There are no ulterior motives and it’s important to remember that they are doing what they do because they believe in his innocence. 

They’re loyal and determined, entirely admirable qualities, and they find themselves at the forefront of the campaign because of the sense of duty that they feel. They believe that there’s been a miscarriage of justice and feeling that sense of devastation, they fight for what it is they believe. 

And that is, quite simply, that Sheila Caffell was the cause of the tragedy, and that Jeremy Bamber is innocent. 

Yvonne: 
The case itself as we always say, is simple? Do I say that I should have the police have made it complicated?

This is the first of several comments about which I now disagree as to my mind, there really is only one cause of the confusion in this case. And that is the campaign team, they continuous changing of narrative with layer after layer now being added to the story. At the heart of it, their version of events is simple, that Sheila is responsible. But it’s the innumerable details that have been added to the story that make it what it is now – a tangled web of questions. 

That Sheila was alive while the police were there. That one of the twins was shot an extra time. That Nevill was never injured upstairs. That the blood could be animal. 

What results is a situation where nothing seems straightforward. 

And here in lies the issue with the Bamber campaign because every few weeks a new theory emerges. A new strand of supposed evidence is alleged. And the result is an unnecessarily complicated and difficult narrative. A narrative that becomes far fetched and cloudy, with the conspiracy far out stripping the issue that lays at its heart. With even supporters of Bamber confiding in me that they doubt much of what the campaign puts out. 

The defences issue lies in the evidence of guilt and they sense that they have to counteract all of if. And so, what emerges is a complex and hard to rationalise version of event.

If Jeremy is innocent, then that alone should be more than enough. But the conflated and now overly complex protestations of innocent only serve to make the case seem increasingly far-fetched. 

Which begs the question - why.

For every aspect of the now suggested stories, there’s a huge conspiracy that has to have fallen alongside it, meaning there has to be tens upon tens of people involved in the cover-up. And again, that begs the question, why?

After all, Jeremy Bamber was nothing special. He had no public profile and there was no reason to fit him. And after all, police burials and publicly stated it was Sheila. Hardly ideal for a conspiracy.

And so, I’m left to wonder, if sometimes the truth real is stranger than fiction and if perhaps the defences version is true? 

Or if this is a situation in which oxams razor should apply, meaning the simplest reasoning is probably accurate. 

Perhaps the reason the defence’s case is so far detached and hard to believe is because the truth is, that Jeremy Bamber is guilty and that in order to overcome all evidence of guilt, far-fetched is the only answer.

I’ll leave you to make your own mind up via the contents of this episode. 

One of the huge issues with this case is the suggestion that ‘new’ evidence is constantly being uncovered, when it appears to be little more than new interpretations. 

Yvonne:
And you'd think at this stage, people would say, well, thirty-five years, you're still finding evidence, that's ridiculous. But we were  disclosed a huge amount of material in 2011. And we've got to systematically go through that material. And you might read a document six months ago that you think interesting, but nothing I can really go with at the moment. And then like yesterday, that what you've read six months ago, suddenly filled that gap. And you think, ah, so that's what happened. And it's the missing piece. And that happens so many times. But it only happens by keeping reviewing the evidence, going over it, reading it again, cross referencing other paperwork.  We have our material given to us off former legal representatives, of Jeremy's and that and so think now in total, we're getting close to about half a million documents. But we know there are 4 million. So there's still a whole lot of material that isn't disclosed. We know what it is. Because it's referenced, but they won't give it to us. 

Philipp: 
The thing that you've got to remember it is not just the original prosecution case. There have been two other full enquiries afterwards, The City of London police in 1991 and the enquiry by the Met police in 2002. So they were huge enquiries in themselves and cross-referencing all this material to see discrepancies where people have changed their accounts between the original prosecution statement with the statement they later gave to the other enquiries that have shown up the holes in the prosecution case.

While I started this series because I was unable to find an outlet that seemed to fairly and equally consider both sides of the Jeremy Bamber case, the campaign team often feels as if things are unduly biased against them. With a point being made about a documentary that had, at the time of the interview, recently featured about the case on Channel 4. 

Yvonne
Just to emphasize how biased things are. There was channel five program on last week, on Wednesday evening, and they're not repeating it, and then not putting it on the catch-up channel. You know, so it's like, you have one chance seeing that and that is it. And yet, all the guilty programs are like shown again and again and again. 

If you’re interested in this case in any way shape or form, then you’ve probably already seen the drama and if you haven’t, I can almost bet that you will have at least seen some of the Innocence Campaign’s online content. 
Much in the same way that they feel bias in how the media deals with their campaign, they also feel frustrated at what they see as a consistent sense of negativity from traditional outlets. 

Yvonne
And even the negative, like the drama was horrendous. And, you know, we were like, we hijack the hashtag, we were tweeting the truth as that program was on, and, but even the negativity of that encourage people to seek out the truth and look at the website, look at the videos, we've put together, look at the evidence and the facts of the case. Because every single thing we state is from police documents that they've disclosed to us. The evidence is there in black and white, what's taking the time is piecing every piece together, pulling the right threads, pulling it, sometimes it leads to nothing. And yet other times you just feel Oh, my goodness, where do I go first? You know, but we've now got the glue to bind all that evidence together. And so we're still finding things. And Phillip will tell you, found things just yesterday, and it's like, it's even more glue, so that it makes our case watertight.

At this stage in the episode and before we get into the interview itself, it’s worth briefly pointing out a handful of important points. 

The first is to say that while most of the public tend to favour Jeremy being guilty, there is a growing number of people who don’t. 

And many of these people are often those that have found the campaign website, have perhaps read some of the discussive articles that tend to pop up in the media every few weeks or perhaps from their increasing social presence. 

And full disclosure, that’s certainly the category that I fall into it. Because my history with this case undoubtedly started with the campaign itself. 

It was the evidence regarding the call logs and the moderator that inevitably led me to researching this case further. And I previously found the information on their website compelling at least and convincing at best. 

The website is a hub of information, and no one can fault the sheer volume of information that is provided. If you’re looking to read up on the case further, I’d suggest looking at that following this episode. 

But it hasn’t come without its own criticism, with the campaign itself having even been raised in parliamentary debates due to criticism over the campaign and the morality of its existence. 

Because while there are a handful of other cases where the subject protests their innocence, it’s borderline impossible to pinpoint one that has such an active campaigning body. For some, there are obvious moral questions over this, namely regarding the influence Jeremy Bamber has and the extent to which he – as a prisoner – should be able to communicate with the public, which he arguably does via his campaign team.

After all, while the campaign will argue his innocence – as they have a right to do – he is technically a convicted killer and, in the law, he has been proven to have taken the lives of 5 people – 2 of whom were young children. 

The morality and boundaries under which such groups should operate is a rare and often unheard debate, because so few and small are their presence within the media. It’s not visible and so it’s one of those issues that seems needless to address. If there isn’t a visible problem, then there isn’t the need for a solution. But nonetheless, it does beg the question. How far should you go in the pursuit of an alleged miscarriage of justice?

I say this because there are so many questions over what they can what they should do. With even a question having been raised in Parliament on a previous date over the blog that Jeremy’s supporters use and whether or not it was legal for prisoners to communicate to the public via a blog. 

Then there has been all of the public controversies too. 

Just a few years ago, one of Bamber’s supporters attended the grave of his parents, reading a letter that Jeremy had written to them. If he’s guilty, the entire event is chilling, particularly because he spends the entire time talking about himself. 

Earlier, in 2015, the campaign hosted what was undoubtedly their most questionable awareness event, encouraging supporters of Bamber’s to bake in support of the convicted killer. The caveat being that some of the ‘family’ recipes provided, were also those of Jeremy’s mother. Just one of the five people he is accused of killing. 

The event caused outrage within the UK, with many expert charities speaking out to condemn the move, reminding the public that where there is a victim, there is a family to. And that campaigning aside, events like this tended to regurgitate previous pain. 

In order for this episode to follow some kind of structure, I thought it was best to approach each aspect within its own bracket. Starting with perhaps one of the most common theories in this case. The suggestion that Sheila was still alive when the police entered the farmhouse.

The campaign team have long since argued that the timeline is off and that instead, Sheila Caffell died after the police had arrived. While Jeremy Bamber was outside with police, and hence had an alibi. The reasoning behind this is complex and convoluted. But I’d suggest you take a look at their website where there is much more information. 

The next part of the interview is particularly relevant for next week’s episode, they go back to two key incidents that they say demonstrates that the police were aware of life within the farm, while officers were outside. 

The first is the allegation that Bews and the other attending officers saw movement in the upper window and that it was this which prompted PC Bews to call for firearm support. I talked to him about this in great length and that will be featured in an upcoming episode. 

They also allege that two notes contained with the incident log also add weight to this suggestion and only strengthen their allegations that Sheila was knowingly alive during the stand-off. 

One is that a 999 call was made from within the property, something I also discussed with Chris Bews, and that police were in contact with someone within the farm. 

One of these will be revisited briefly by Yvonne a bit later and both will be discussed in their allocated episode. 

Yvonne:
But I mean, there's not, it's not just that evidence. I mean, we know, we now know a lot more of all the #SheilaAlive things. So, you know, we know, not only was movement seen in the window by PS Bews, but we've got that there was a rifle seen in the window by two trained firearms officers, who then said they've been told it was a pipe for a vacuum cleaner.

Yvonne: 
I'm sorry, a trained firearms officer and a firearms instructor know the difference between the pipe for a vacuum cleaner and a rifle, you know, not telling me that they don't. And we've got two bodies were seen in the kitchen. You know, we've got the doctor being requested out to the scene to confirm the deaths of two people before the firearms team went upstairs and discovered another three bodies. Now we know Sheila was found upstairs. We know photographs show her upstairs when she was first seen she was in the kitchen with Nevill, she wasn't injured at that time now.

Yvonne: 
They know Sheila was the last to die, because they know she committed suicide after they entered the house. They heard of running upstairs. She was challenged. Sheila Bamber make your whereabouts known.

Yvonne: 
You know, the police officer said, PC Hall said, I heard movement in, said Sheila Bamber make your whereabouts known. He was later told that was an officer who was in an upstairs office at the opposite side of the house. No officers were upstairs at that time. 

Philipp: 
They came out because of him so it was directly his situation report that led to them coming out so.  

Philipp: 
Yeah, quite. Did he say ‘There is a really dangerous trick of the light out here, you had better get yourselves down here quick’.  

Next week, you’ll actually hear from former PS Chris Bews for yourselves and in that episode, he’ll explain exactly what happened. 

To me, this makes absolutely no sense. The suggestion that the police knowingly covered or staged the crime scene is wrong on so many different levels. But most of all, because they believed it was a murder-suicide from the beginning. 

If they ‘knew’ Sheila had died last, or that she’d died while they were present, what possible reason would they have for covering it up? All that would have done, is support their initial theory. 

It’s impossible for us to ever know the true order of those who died, the police can offer theories and opinions. But none of them ever knew for certain. 

I am all about criticising the police for having done a shoddy job were appropriate. But, in this instance, it feels completely and utterly false to suggest there was cover up. It makes no sense and isn’t supported by a shred of evidence. 

That moves us nicely on to the criticism of the police and specific concerns that the campaign have over how this was handled. 

Yvonne: 
And some people might argue that some of the firearms team gave evidence that Sheila had two gunshot wounds. But those statements from the firearms teams, they were not made until September 1985. They were made by being shown photographs of the scene so they weren't made on the day. This is Sheila, how you saw her at the scene, three of those firearms officers, the three of the very first firearms officers in the house out of the party of six, who initially entered three of them, who went in the bedroom, all said, Sheila's not how I remember her. Her head isn't in the same position. You know, they disputed, the evidence that was on the photographs. And that was ignored.
Yes, you heard that correctly. 

The newest of all the theories is that of the two gunshot wounds and the suggestion that Sheila was actually only shot once, with the second injury having been inflicted on accident by one of the many officers at the scene. 

As with all of the work they do, the campaign team also suggest that this is confidently supported by the evidence and that there are reams of statements and documents to support this theory. 

Philipp: 
Yes, because I mean this is obviously something that was quite, well very prejudicial to Jeremy at the trial because suicides involving more than one shot are certainly not unknown but they're relatively rare. I think about 3% to 4% of gunshot cases fall into that category so by definition that is far less likely to happen but what Yvonne has now,  by going through all the statements of the people who initially saw Sheila before 9.15 in the morning, what emerged was that all of those six people saw her when she only had one gunshot wound and they are all very specific about that. There is not any equivocation. She was shot under her chin  obviously the fatal shot that she inflicted on herself. So we've sort of worked out or Yvonne has worked out that what happened as far as the second shot is concerned is that we think when they were arranging for the photographic evidence to be taken somebody lifted the rifle up and there was  still a bullet in the breach and it went off accidentally and you can see from the second shot from the angle, which is 80 degrees, that it  was delivered from above her and it would have been virtually impossible for her to hold the rifle back , because then it would have been too heavy because you would have been holding it by the barrel and trying to reach for the trigger that it was done by somebody standing over her. That, as I say, was extremely prejudicial to Jeremy at the trial because that would have put a doubt in the back of the jury's mind. Sorry just to  finish the point it goes beyond  that because the way that the prosecution presented their case it was like an inverted pyramid and everything in that pyramid rested on the apex which was a Malcolm Fletcher, the ballistics expert’s opinion, that the moderator has been on the gun throughout the incident and  he placed that on that second shot. Now, if what we're saying is  true that the second shot was done by the police accidentally there  is no question that it was delivered without the moderator because from the very first time they saw the gun on her body there wasn't a moderator so that's not in dispute. That shows that  Malcolm Fletcher's expertise in this area is totally worthless if he couldn't see that that had been delivered without a moderator then everything he said about the other shots falls away  because he got that wrong, completely wrong. So there are various elements to it and we're convinced and we got six different statements that say she was seen with one shot before 9.15.
  
Philipp: 
One of  the extraordinary things that struck me from 01:18:42 inaudible  pod casts the other day was where she just blithely said the reason Taff Jones thought that it was Sheila was because had  Jeremy told or made out that it was whic  I just found an extraordinary statement because the fact is that Taff Jones had very good reason to think it was Sheila because he knew about  the rifle in the window and that is something that Yvonne mentioned earlier  but that is a really important piece of evidence because if  that rifle was in the window there is no other explanation other than Sheila committed suicide. You can actually make a case for saying that each one of the five people involved shot one or the others. Obviously that's a fantastic idea but  from a pure logic point of view you can make that argument but whatever scenario you come up with it has to end with Sheila committing suicide if that rifle was in the window. Now, as Yvonne, said two trained fire officers saw that and we believe that the rest of them saw it as well but they just haven't released the relevant statements and they saw them a  long time apart as well. The first one saw it just after seven o'clock and the second one saw it just after the raid had begun at about 7.40.  So Taff Jones knew about that so that was one reason why he thought it was Sheila. The other was because he knew that she'd been seen or at least there were signs that she was moving around in the house. They had been talking  to somebody within the farmhouse at 5.25. They'd had the 999 call from within the house and the only sentient beings that could have been alive at that point was Sheila and the dog so assuming it wasn't the dog that was making the 999 call it had to be Sheila.  So his conclusion was based on very sound evidence  it had nothing whatsoever to do with Jeremy and what he said and also the finer point on that is that Taff Jones knew she'd only been shot once because he was told by the firearms people what had happened and he was part of the cover up  which is why he was in a very difficult position when the second inquiry started because he couldn't come out and say ‘Well, look guys,  actually my mate Montgomery’ who was the head of the   firearms team that was there ‘told me they had made a complete cock up and managed to shoot her  accidentally themselves’ which is what he should have done. He should have said ‘ Look, there's been a mistake here and it was actually us that did the  second shot and if he had done that  things would have worked out very differently but for whatever reason he chose not to.   



Yvonne: 
Originally, it was a case against Sheila, it was murder suicide, it was given a specific case reference number. And we know that when Jeremy became the suspect from the seventh of September, the case was given a brand new reference number. There are very, very, very few documents we have got from that original case reference number. We know we've got statements missing, we've got a report made by DCI Kennelly that said, made on the sixth of September that said he was asked to do a review. And he was told what the evidence indicates that she was responsible. We don't have his report, we don't have the evidence that he used. Could one of them pieces of evidence have been the suicide note? That we now know existed that DS Jones admitted to in 2002. You know, there were lots of pieces of paper at the scene and a lot of references to suicide notes in the past. And could this possibly be a suicide note? He was very specific. It was only recently discovered and he said, you know, we treated it as an murder suicide. We didn't go looking for anything else that you know, could have implicated anybody else. Because you don't do that. When you've got a note says I've just killed myself and he didn't say it once, he said it twice. And Essex police and the Metropolitan Police were approached to, you know, see about the credibility of this document And they didn't dispute it.

Yvonne: 
They've got computer indexes of the documents that were generated in the case, and they call it the Holmes 2 computer system, the number of documents that are referenced on there that we've never had is astounding. You know, and two of  them say, a referenced suicide, note - Sheila Caffell. So we don't have that. We don't have that document. We've asked them for it, we said give us Holmes box, x, y, Z And no, you're not having it.

Yvonne: 
No, give it the photographs of the silencers, These are the the Holmes box reference numbers. No, you're not having them. So why not? If they're being honest, if the fy're being honest, and that the evidence that they've got is inconsequential to the case. And it's just like, you know, it's not important, not relevant, you've got what's relevant. If that's not relevant? Let us have it. Let us look at the photographs. You know, let's look at the 77 missing photographs from the scene that were taken that day. Why can't we look at them? No, why not give us the photographs of the silencers? Yvonne: You know, because this one show loads and loads of paint in the end and the other one, we know these physical differences to them. But they don't want us to see them. But we don't need to see them to prove what we're saying is true. 

Yvonne: 
We don't know what happened and why certain things happened when the evidence speaks for itself. And so, you know, admit you've made you've made a mistake, Jeremy was a 10 to 2 to majority verdict. And yet he's on a whole life tariff. So he's got death by sentence, he will never go to jail. Unless we, this evidence, gets him out of jail. So we are absolutely determined that it will. You know, it's there. It speaks for itself. It's in the case material. We've not invented that material. This is police documents they've given us. So it's, it's there your document, you've provided it. So now do the right thing. admit you made mistakes. Admit that you know, you've been confused over this issue. You've confused yourself. We don't we don't care how you do it. Just admit that you've done it wrong. That actually, you know, there were two calls made to the police were two sounds as somebody was alive and active in the house, making 999 calls. When we know that nine minutes past six in the morning, somebody made a 999 emergency telephone call from White House farm.

This is another theory that is doing the rounds at the moment and will be prominent in a alter episode. Sometimes, things are not as black and white as they might seem. 

Yvonne: 
And as a result of that, they called to ambulances to the same one for immediate use, and one from stand by. Now they've been at that same place since before four o'clock. So they can't say to us Oh, but we just thought it was time which we've called a couple of ambulances because we thought we'll break in in about an hour. No, you don't do that. They were told something on that phone that cause them to call the ambulances out. The officer who monitored that 999 call didn't even get ask to make a witness statement. And the first time he was questioned about it was in 2010. And he told the the police officers. You won't find any paperwork about this. So why not? Why not? What are they trying to hide? Be open, give us a disclosure, give us documents we're asking for, give us the photographs we're asking for and prove that you're not hiding anything? Because he absolutely are they've convicted an innocent man. You know, for now, we've just passed the Jeremy has been in jail for 35 years because he did him a year on remand. You know, he's lost, you know, the best years of his life in a jail for a crime he categorically did not commit. The evidence is there, we can prove that. 

Yvonne: 
One other important thing that nobody ever, ever, ever raises is that prosecution never, at any stage disputed that Sheila was the last to die. You know they had no, the doctor didn't take body temperatures. They have no, you know, chain of evidence as far as they were concerned as to what happened in the house, but they never once disputed that Sheila was the last to die. It was accepted as fact. So why would they accept that as fact? Because we don't know. And there's no way anybody could know the order that people were killed in that house. But yet they it was the Essex place and the prosecution have come over said sheila was the last to die. So how if Jeremy was the one that committed these murders, why was sheila the last to die?  Why would she not the first to die? They've never, they've never said that. They've never disputed it. They've never argued it. It's their evidence and they've said, you know, Sheila was the last to die.

Again, I’m not sure that ever has been proven but even if it was, it hardly proves that she committed the murders. 

The idea that Sheila was alive has become a huge staple for the campaign team and so, for them, it’s vital to their theory. 

That moves us swiftly on to the ‘two call’ theory, that part of this case that was probably the most convincing to me all those years ago. 

Again, it’s an issue that we are going to spend a fair bit of time on in future episodes. 

By now, you’ll have already heard about the phone call that Jeremy Bamber made to the police following the call from his dad. But the campaign team allege that they have record of TWO phone calls to police, one which was made by Nevill and one which was made by Jeremy. 

The two documents do record separate information, different addresses, phone numbers and wording with one noting Jeremy’s details and the other noting Nevill’s. The timestamps are also different, with the one record in Nevill’s name noting 3:26am and the second, Jeremy’s, noting 3:36am. 

Curiously, the two documents do look different and clearly not the same type of form and also, both have the same call handlers – West and Bonnet. 

While the defence and campaign allege that this is evidence of Nevill calling the police first, hence verifying Jeremy’s accusations, the prosecution disagree entirely. 

The prosecution attempted to prove at trial, that there has been an error in the recording of the time and that actually, the call was 3:26am. However the campaign argue that this is inconsistent with the evidence they now have and that on the contrary, their new evidence further verifies their version of events. 

It was something I needed to touch on with the campaign, even if it was only brief, but I can assure that it is a string of evidence that I have now explored thoroughly. And so there will inevitably be a much longer episode on this aspect later.  

But anyway, here’s what they had to say.

Yvonne: 
New evidence which was disclosed earlier this year absolutely confirms that Jeremy's call wasn't 3:26. And we've got PC West who took his call, who said that the trial? Oh, Jeremy was on the phone about a minute before I contacted the police officers well. And then he said, Well, a minute is a long time. You know, and they said you couldn't possibly have said all you need say a minute is a long time. And we have one of the police officers at Witham police station, who said they spoke to PC West at 3:37. So a minute difference in terms cause 3:36 so it's unarguable.

As I said, this was the most compelling piece evidence for me when I believed in Bamber’s innocence. And given where I stand now, you can imagine what I’ve since discovered. That episode is only a few weeks away.

The conversation that turned to the order of the calls, why Jeremy hadn’t call 999 and why he had called his girlfriend Julie before leaving his cottage. 

Yvonne: 
Nevill had been a magistrate. He knew a lot of the police officers in the local area. And Jeremy also knew just how private his mom and dad were, you know, they were a very, very private family. And if Jeremy would have rung, he was like, you know, what should I do? And for Jeremy to ring 999. Have Police cars screeching to the house, lights on and everything. he wouldn't have done that. Because that would have been embarrassing. Had it turned out that he got there and never were then sat there sitting around the table, having a cup of tea.
As well, Neville had always been the one that could calm Sheila down. When she got previous psychotic episodes. Neville always went to her. I mean Colin would ring Neville Freddie rang Neville was like, you know, he could calm her down. He would stay on the phone with her all night to talk her down. So he was the one person that she would listen to. And also when he rung Jeremy with his concerns, wanting to go and, you know, maybe help calm her down.

Philipp: 
Yes.  Quite, yeah, he didn't say ‘Sheila’s shooting people please get over here’.  Don’t forget Jeremy  didn't really understand the full extent of Sheila’s  illness.He knew that she did have these periodic episodes where life was a struggle for her and she found [00:28:43 inaudible] or whatever. So it was more than signing out of the blue, this  was the type of thing that had happened before so he didn't immediately think ‘Oh, my God, this is a total  crisis’. It was concerning but it wasn't apocalyptic at that point.

Don't forget … sorry just to complete that point, don't forget the police response was to send officers from the local police station. In fact, he achieved what he was trying to achieve, the quickest possible response.

The telephone call is pivotal because without it – Jeremy could only have known about what was unfolding if he was the one who’d done it. 

Philipp: 
Well quite, there is no logic. I mean the phone call … if he had made up the phone call from his father it would have been the equivalent of sticking his hand in the air and saying ‘I did it’ for several reasons. A because at that time they were in the process of digitalising the local telephone exchange and some of the lines in the area did have time recording on them. So  there'd be no way he would know that there wouldn't have been no record of that call which in itself would have been an admission of guilt and there are various other factors along similar lines about time of death, difference between the time death that would have also pointed the finger towards him. So, making up that phone call would have been a very, very stupid thing to have done.

As we’ll see in a future episode, there are huge discussions to be had over whether Nevill Bamber could even have made the infamous call. As it’s possible that the injuries that he sustained upstairs would have made that borderline impossible. If Nevill WAS injured upstairs, it’s almost certain that he wouldn’t have been able to make the call due to the injuries to his larynx. 

It's something the campaign team themselves acknowledged.

Philipp:
It was before he was injured and that was one of the irritating things about the drama that they made the bold statement that he couldn't have made that phone call because he'd been shot in the mouth which if he had been shot in the mouth when he tried to make such a phone call would have been true but they seem to not even consider the possibility that it was made beforehand. What we think happened is that Sheila came down at some point during the night when Neville was still either in the lounge or the kitchen which he had a habit of doing, just staying up late and dosing in the chair. She probably picked up the rifle, started  waving it around and he obviously became concerned about what might or could happen and he called Jeremy to ask for his help in trying to coax her into giving the weapon back and when that didn’t  work things obviously went downhill pretty quick but before he was fully aware of what she had done or was about to do that’s when he rang the police himself for which we have multiple pieces of evidence and if everybody accepts that if he made that call to the police then there is no possibility that Jeremy was involved in any way.   

The problem with this theory is, well, the evidence as we’ll get into in a few weeks’ time. 

Since this interview, a new version of events has started to emerge – and perhaps you now see where the confusion comes form. The new theory – which mostly contradicts all the available evidence – is that Nevill wasn’t injured upstairs at all. 

In a recent podcast episode that they did on the case, they suggest that the ‘evidence’ now proves that Nevill Bamber was not shot upstairs and that instead, he was – as they surmise – downstairs during the entirety of the incident. They do not, however, reveal exactly what that evidence is or how it explains away the number of bullets found in the bedroom. 

After all, there were too many bullets and bullet casings to account for just the injures to Sheila and June. They do suggest in the podcast episode, that both June and Nicholas received more injuries than was previously set out by police and that this accounts for the extra bullets found there. 

They don’t, however, explain where this theory actually comes from, or what ‘evidence’ it’s based on. But they certainly didn’t explaining the gaping questions that such suggestions leave behind. For example, why there were few too casings in the kitchen for all Nevill’s gunshot injuries to have been sustained there. OR on the flip side, why there are too many casings in the bedroom to account for just June’s. 

The police arrival is also a source of contention, with the campaign making it very, very clear that they have serious concerns with PS Bews’ version of events. 

Yvonne: 
They didn't park the police car in the farmyard. Next to the house, he parked the car on the lane, and then walked to the farmhouse, you know, because it probably was always that. Well, it will not antagonize the situation. They didn't know. You know what was going to be the situation when they got there. And so it could have all been nice and calm. You know, unfortunately, it wasn't.

Yvonne: 
Made a situation report at 4.09 and as a result of that situation report. Bews said he saw a reflection of the moon or a trick of the light, that he went back and thought no, it's just a trick of the light. If he's going to run back to the car, immediately get on the radio and request firearms assistance, would they come out for a trick of the light? What did he say to them on the phone during that situation report, did he say, we've got a siege situation? How did he know that if the house was all quiet as he said? 

Yvonne: 
He's even had one where he's said it was the officers who were sat in the car, PC Saxby that PC Saxby saw the movement but he was sat in the car.
 
Yvonne:
But one of the other main things that Mr. Bews always says is Jeremy was driving really slow.

The allegation – presumably – is that Jeremy Bamber WANTED to be seen by the police, whether being that they picked him up – as he asked – or they overtook him on the way there. Those who believe in his guilt now allege that this was all part of his attempt to build an alibi

Yvonne: 
Right. Jeremy was going at the. You know, he just woken up. This is what people don't get. He just been in bed after 12 hour day at the farm. He's, you know, gone home and stayed up until about 11 o'clock. Four hours later, he's woke up with this disturbing telephone call off his dad he's in front the police right, get to the farm and meet the officers there. He's still half asleep. Is the lad you know. So he gets in the car drives to the farm safely. Because he doesn't know what's going on. And he doesn't want to get there before the police get there. He knows they're on the way, doesn't know where they're coming from. They could have been coming from Chelmsford, Whitham, anywhere he didn't know what station was gonna be coming. Now there police cars jumped past himwith his lights on. And Jeremy arrived two minutes after them. They hadn't got out of the car and Jeremy pulled up behind them. Well yet Chris Bews has that that going from here are two minutes after us to 10 minutes after us to 20 minutes after us. Well, you know, Mr. Bews just isnt telling the truth. 

Yvonne: 
I mean, even criticise the fact that Jeremy went to his car to get a jumper, , you know summer nights yourself are cold, you've just been walking up, you feel cold when you've woken up. You're tired. You know, they even thought that was suspicious. Not immediately, but in the time to come. They said Oh, well he went back to his Car and got a jumper, wasting time. You know, it's just invented.
The questions over how Jeremy behaved in the weeks following the murders is something that the campaign team easily justify. Reminding me that it was an extremely traumatic and difficult situation. 

Yvonne: 
Well, that's the time you need support. And I mean, like we showed on television recently, there was like, analysing Jeremy at the funeral and what his bottom lip was. And it's like, oh, my goodness, me. This man was 24 years old. He'd lost every person he loved in the world. He had the wider family, who were then oh, we want that painting or we're having now trying to get all June's engagement, we want your mother's engagement ring. We want her wedding ring. Never left him alone. Peck, peck, peck, peck. You got the police who should have had nowadays, you'd have a family liaison officer who would be there helping you through this and assisting you. Jeremy didn't get any of that. He had a farm where we had workers, and he had to pay the wages. It was the middle of the harvest. He had that responsibility on his shoulders to sort those out those 24 years old. What a massive responsibility. And if you raised a smile once, do you know during the entire police investigation is that not allowed? 
 
Yvonne: 
Jeremy is a very quiet person he's not one for like, you know, public sort of look at me. You know, you've got all the cameras in the country from the BBC News and ITV and all the local media and all these people at the funeral, knowing that they're looking at you. I mean, , I would like to shrink behind my clothes you know, but Jeremy tried to be proud of it, of, you know, representing his family. And yet they have analyzed every single maneuver he made. If you cast a smile, it was like not that he was smiling at these friends across the road, which is what actually happened. But Jeremy was smiling, being all smug because he was going to court, because he committed these horrendous acts. No, he smiled at friends.

The TV show they are referring to, of course, is Faking It. 

Talking of faking and of telling lies, let’s turn briefly to Jeremy’s girlfriend, Julie Mugford. A lady who’s testimony was absolutely essential. 

Yvonne: 
She said that Jeremy had been plotting this for a year, he thought of all different ways, and fires and poisonings and all sorts of different methods that he could kill his family. And if that would have happened, she would have been absolutely terrified of him. And if that had happened, and he'd have made all these plots and plans and then, , they come to fruition, and it had happened. Well, if he did rang her at 10 o'clock at night and went tonights the night. It's gonna happen tonight. Anybody in there right mind, no matter who that person was, would ring the police. They would ring the family, they would ring Neville, and say, "Oh, my God, Jeremy has lost the plot." You need to get out of that house. something's gonna happen. Somebody but so you know what I mean? 

Yvonne: 
He spoke to Neville about 3:15, spoke to Julie about 3:30 and then rang the police, which again is more supportive evidence that the 3:26 call could not have been Jeremy couldn't have been on a phone call to the police and to Julie at the same time. 

The time of the call to Julie has changed constantly since Jeremy Bamber’s first statement in August of 1985. And for good reason if you ask me. 

The suggestion that Jeremy paused to call Julie – at that time of the morning – before calling the police is somewhat questionable. According, when he did the call police he lost patience with how long they were taking. Yet, he’d not been so panicked when he came off the call to his father? What is it that Julie is alleged to have said to him that escalated the situation in his mind? Never has Jeremy suggested that he consulted on this with Julie. Or at least I’ve never seen any suggestion of that from him – why?

I can’t wrap my head around pausing to call my partner if I knew my family were in such grave danger. You can’t inpatient for a resolution, while also taking the time to consult someone who had little reassurance to offer.

Another thing, if Jeremy’s call was at 3.36am, he was on the phone for a matter of minutes. Is that consistent with someone who felt the police weren’t acting quick enough? Was that enough time for him to have said all that we know was said? 

I am tending to disagree. 

Yvonne: 
What should I do? My dad's just rung this, you know, and something's going on. Sheila's not and Julie's Mugford told him to go back to bed. Julie must have said go back to bed. So, you know, this is where her evidence is so questionable, because, you know, in her original statements, Jeremy had rung her when he got home from work, he had asked her about her day and they had a nice 20 minute conversation. And then later on in the early hours of the morning, Jeremy rang, and saying something's going on at the farm I don't know what to do. She said "go back to bed." And then that changes, you know, and then Jeremy's out "tonight's the night," I mean, really, Jeremy never said that.

Yvonne: 
It did not happen.

Yvonne:
Julie had plans. Julie have plans, Julie wanted to. She wants to go and live in Vaulty Manor, which is one of the properties that Jeremy would have eventually inherited. And she wanted to marry him. He would have been a very successful farmer. She was telling people that they were engaged at the Christmas They weren't, they were never engaged was never a ring it was just, you know, something that was said. And when she found out that Jeremy had been been seeing one of her friends on one occasion and that he did. I mean, it just ended the relationship. It just got too much. I mean, she tried to it. She tried smothering with a pillow. She admitted that if I can't have him nobody's gonna have him. She admitted that to the police. You know, she was she was very demanding of Jeremy. She wasn't very domesticated and would make a meal. They had to go out for a meal. And it was a very, very demanding, but not supportive. And now Jeremy just had enough, you know, she was violent if you spoke to the people and  you know, she thought he had a relationship with Brett Collins, and she thought you had a relationship with this woman and that woman and completely paranoid about Jeremy going off with somebody else. And he finished with her. And it was only when she realised there's nothing that could this isn't. I mean, he helped him move flat. The day before she went to the police, she didn't actually go to the police we've discovered that her and her friend went to an older man's house to like say, oh, what do you think of this? Right? Tell him what you've told me do it. Oh, yeah. Jeremy planned it blah, blah, blah. And it was Malcolm Waters who police and then they went to his house and arrested Jul and Liz took them into the cells and said well, now tell us what the evidence is and that's when everything changed.

Yvonne:
Especially when the offered her immunity from prosecution if she would act as a prosecution witness. I mean, Julie was no angel, the police will have you think Julie was an angel? she'd trying to smother Jeremy, she had propagated drugs, she'd sold drugs at college. She'd smuggle drugs into England, from Canada and from Holland. They said, Jeremy corrupted her. She was doing things before she met Jeremy. So, you know, they can have the theories, but we know the truth.

Eventually, the conversation inevitably turned to Sheila, the other essential suspect in this story. Specifically, her ill-health and her relationship with her brother. 

Yvonne: 
Yeah, Sheila had already had foster care help day foster care. So after Colin left her alone with two babies she needed help. She wasn't able to cope. And social services got involved and she was offered day foster care which she took and was very grateful for and you know, they helped with the upbringing of the boys, but when she moved to Maida Vale after she was divorced from Colin  and she moved [inaudible 23:43] that stopped because she was in a different district to them. And so she struggled. You know, even more. So social services were still involved, but they closed Sheila's case

Yvonne: 
Sheila absolutely love those boys and the fear of when she was hospitalized the second time. Colin then took full responsibility for the children. She only saw them very occasionally and she had so many great delusions of... They frightened, they were scared, she couldn't help how she felt and when she found out that her parents were sat talking about the foster care issue, which by the way, the police said Jeremy is the only source of that information. When we have witness statements from foster carers, and from Colin's mother that said about this, that we just think something snapped and she just couldn't deal with... She was emotional. You know, her medication have been reduced to the incorrect dosage, to the incorrect timeline of having the medication. It went from being fortnightly 200 milligrams to being monthly, at 100 milligram, which just wasn't enough, and couldn't control her state. And she'd been recently she thought that she was going to get back with Colin. At a recent barbecue that we had. She's looking lovely and everything, you know, in the disappointment of it So the fear that she'd never seen them at all. Coupled with the realization she'd never get back with Colin, that she was ill with all these issues going on. You know that we just believe something snapped. She just couldn't cope with medications at the wrong dose. 

Yvonne: 
Sheila was a beautiful, incredible lady who just had problems.

Yvonne:
He loved Sheila. He was very proud.

Yvonne: 
Yeah. I mean, he was so proud of his big sister was beautiful and successful and she involved him I mean, you know she looked after him at school and when they were at junior school and you know, this is my little brother and you better look after him and they absolutely loved each other you can see that on photographs of them. You know, we don't have many photographs because the wider family made sure that Jeremy didn't get he hasn't got photographs, it's been very difficult to get them but the photographs we do have, you can see for yourself they just Absolutely adored each othert hey were very close, they were very close.

Let’s move our attention to the rifle, a huge part of this case and specifically the likelihood of Sheila having used it.

Yvonne: 
She'd lived around guns all her life. They're common on the farm, she used to go as a beater when they used to have shoots regularly. And so she took part in those, she'd been on a shooting holiday with David Boutflour in Scotland and shot, on that occasion was a shotgun. I mean, they're much more difficult because you got to break it and everything where with the gun that was involved in the incident, it was a magazine. So it involved putting like a clip into the rifle and then cocking it and going not having to break, what they call break it. Snap it in half to put the bullets in, which is quite difficult because I've tried myself, and I've tested things. And that is quite hard to do because you've got to force it you know and it's hard for me. And but it had a magazine I mean, you load the magazine. It's not rocket science. You know?

Yvonne: 
Yes, you could. And they said, they did say the police said, oh, she couldn't have loaded it because the tenth bullet was difficult to load into the magazine. And oh, I broke a thumbnail and Sheila's nails intact and perfect and everything. Who knows how many bullets she ever put in the magazine? Did she put 10 in, did she put eight in? We don't know, only Sheila would have been able tell us that we don't know. So only speculation is that she would have put 10 bullets in, we know there was nine in and it was like the Jeremy because one was in breach of the gun. So we know the magazine had nine at that stage. We can't speak for Sheila's actions on how many actual bullets she loaded into the magazine. She may have loaded it twice. She may have loaded it five or six times How can we know? 

Philipp: 
Yeah, she  would have seen people doing that dozens and dozens of times. You just put it in the top and push it down. As Yvonne said, it's not that complicated.

Philipp:
They're not heavy. I shot a 22 rifle years and years ago when I was at school when I was  a young  teenager and they are very light and they and  the calibre is the same.  You’re not talking a huge weight by any stretch of the imagination.

A friend of mine compared to driving a car. Before reach the age of 17 and before you have any kind of driving lesson, you’ll have seen hundreds of people driving their cars. You’ll have been inside cars while people were driving, and you might have even paid attention to the driver’s actions. Perhaps because your desperate for the day when you can drive.

Regardless of how much knowledge of driving you have, how much attention you’ve paid or how many vehicles you’ve been in – observing isn’t the same as learning. 

It’s the very reason WHY we have a practical and theoretical test as part of our education. Because putting what you’ve learnt into practice is important. Most of us, couldn’t just turn up to the test centre and pass on the basis of what we’ve seen others doing. We’d need to actually be shown what to do. 

It’s also the reason why learning to drive instructor and learning to drive once you’ve passed and are on your own are regarded as two separate things. Watching someone is drive is just that. Learning to drive with an instructor is an experience in itself. But the first time you take that car out on your own, once you’ve passed, it’s like learning to drive all over again. 

I’ve had no gun experience, not a single shot have I fired. I have no interest in weapons, and I’ve never been around them. But do I think I could watch my grandad use a weapon and then instantly now how to commit a massacre? Not for a second. 

And from that line of thought, comes the moderator. The elephant in the room of White House Farm. The moderator was a vital piece of evidence in the conviction against Jeremy Bamber. 

Why – for several reasons. 

One. It’s suspicious that the moderator isn’t on the weapon anyway, as relatives testified that it was usually put in the cupboard with moderator attached. 

Two. It was found to have the presence of human blood – what was likely to have been Sheila’s – which regardless of who’s it was, suggested that it had been used in the killings. 

Three. That with the moderator attached, it was too long for Sheila. And that she would have had to have taken if off having realised this. Why she’d have gone through the effort of putting it back in the cupboard is anyone’s guess.

Four. There was no blood in the muzzle itself. Since Sheila had two close contact wounds, if the moderator wasn’t used then Sheila’s blood should have been inside the muzzle. There was no blood in the muzzle, but there was blood in the moderator. 

Five. There was paint flecks in the moderator which matched samples from the kitchen, suggesting it was attached when Nevill was attacked 

Yvonne: 
It's the moderator that the judge said to the jury that on the sound moderator evidence alone you can convict so Philip might want to explain that one. You know, how we know there's two. 

Yvonne: 
But no moderator was used in the incident.
 
Yvonne: 
But the scratches, the scratches on the underside of the mantle shelf, they said were caused by a silencer on the end of a rifle during the struggle with Neville and his assailant in the kitchen. Well, that's not true. Because on the crime scene photographs, there's no paint flakes whatsoever on the floor, which you can't scratch an odd surface, there's got 15 layers of paint on it, and not expect any particles at all fall to the floor. So now we're not only able to show there was no paint on the floor that day, we now know when those scratches were made, who made them, and how they make them. I can't say how we know that at the moment, what's from the case material, but that is going into the ccrc with these new submissions. So, you know, if those scratches that weren't made on the day, and we can now categorically show how, when and who made them, and the chain of evidence for those scratch marks happening, which we've been able to establish, then that proves that what they said at the trial did not happen.

Yvonne: 
You know that there was no silencer on the gun they really was not. 

Philipp: 
Yeah,yeah.  What two silencers? This is the central perception that managed to get the prosecution case over the line. The three bits of evidence against him were obviously Julie Monkfords fairy tales. The paint on the moderator and the blood supposedly in the moderator.The reason why two moderators … the fact there were  two moderators found, one on  the day by the police that they announced to the press shortly afterwards and one by the relatives on the 10th so three days later which was given to the police I think on the 12th. The reason that matters is because the test results for the paint that were produced in court came from the first moderator which they gave the reference number SBJ1 to and the blood  that was presented at court came from the second moderator which they gave the reference DB1to and that was the central perception  that they indulged in. They pretended that both those  pieces of evidence came from one single moderator and by sleight of hand, because they didn't show the jury two separate moderators, and they controlled  how the forensic scientists were showing the moderator that they examined, the  jury were given the impression that both the paint  and the blood has come from this one single moderator and that's why the fact that there are two moderators matters. So I know and  I think you've seen the comment that was made during the judicial review where the Crown’s barrister said ‘Well it doesn't matter if there are forty moderators’. That is just wrong. It does matter because there were two and the evidence that was presented as having come from one actually came from two separate items because  we believe that they rightly didn’t think that the jury would accept the  fact that two moderators had been used during the incident. No moderators were used, we know that because we've had detailed  forensic reports from US pathologists  who have extensive experience in gunshot wounds and  who have unanimously said that there was no moderator in the gun and we have  had our own experts here look at it and they  were  of the same  opinion so it is a red herring but because that is the platform they presented,  the evidence they have got the  prosecution from we have obviously have to counter that and that is the reason it matters.

Confused? Yeah, me too.

Here’s what they had to say about the blood.

Yvonne: The jury we're told the blood came from Sheila and Sheila only but we now know that they match it also to Robert Boutflour, exact same blood group as Sheila. Now we're not saying that's Robert Boutflour blood we're not saying he planted it, he did anything we're not saying that. We're saying is the jury were told it was sheila's, only sheila's and therefore, she couldn't have committed suicide because she couldn't have reached to shoot herself with the silencer attached, we're saying no, it wasn't only Sheila's, it could have been, it was the same as Robert's, the same as 8% of the population. And so therefore, how can they say it came from Sheila? How long did, how long had that blood been there? Could have been their Neville was up there since November 1984. It could have been there months. It could have been one of the farm workers we don't know. But it certainly wasn't Sheila's and Sheila's only as they presented at the trial. 
 
Yvonne: Then of course in 2001-2002, for the appeal, and the reason we got the appeal, is because Sheila's DNA was not found in any silencer but an unknown males was. Now we're not saying that Robert, was the unknown male DNA. But of all the people who took DNA samples he didn't gave a sample. So, you know, maybe that's something they should have. They should have checked, but they didn't. But like I say say it could have been somebody, who could be one of the police officers, whose DNA was in it. We don't know, you know, they need to do that elimination.

Philipp: What we  can say I think is that none of the forensic examinations of either moderator before the middle of September found any evidence of paint on the end of either one before that day so it clearly had no relevance to the incident whatsoever.

Philipp: We have no doubt that if it had been presented to the jury they wouldn't have found him guilty because they were already suspicious of the extended family motive but the thing to remember about blood grouping is we are so conditioned now by DNA which can be very specific to one individual but blood grouping  is a process of elimination whereas DNA is a process of identification. So all you can do with blood grouping is eliminate sections of the population that don't have that blood grouping and as Yvonne said 8% of the UK population has the same blood grouping as that  found in the moderator as well as 01:05:26 inaudible names. So how the judge could then turn around and categorically say ‘This is Sheila’s blood and Sheila’s alone’ is either a mistake or a deliberate misdirection of the jury.

I wanted to touch on the exit and entry theory, to ask them their thoughts on the idea that Jeremy was able to enter the house unheard. 

Yvonne: 
None of the neighbours reported hearing the dog's bark. Prior to the police going, you know what I mean? So, I mean the windows issue, windows issues are massive. I mean, They said Jeremy gone in the bathroom window, which is downstairs, sort of shower room. And then made his means of exit through the kitchen window and got on his mom's bike and rode across fields, slightly some amazing Batman type person. Yvonne: But it's like, it's really so inconceivable the kitchen window alone, the Jury was shown a photograph from an angle. So the catch looked like it would not fall to a fully closed position. And another crime scene photo the jury didn't get show the catch was absolutely fully closed, which they could not do from the outside. But as well as that there was a bottom catch on the window, an old fashioned lever catch that went on to little peck on the window sill.

Yvonne: 
That was closed, crime scene photographs show, you can't see very clearly, but you can see it's not sticking up. It's not an angle. And PC Barlow, who did experiments on the window said there's not a chance he could fasten that from the outside. Yet the jury didn't get to hear that so Jeremy could not have got out of that window. 

The only sound coming from the farm being that of the dogs. And that brings me on to another subject that I touched upon briefly with the campaign team. 

For anyone who has previously watched the 2020 drama, which is now on Netflix, you’ll distinctly remember the outrage which from the British public when it was revealed that Jeremy Bamber had, for what the campaign allege was sympathetic reason, had the smaller of the two dogs put down. 

They say that this was because of the dogs age and the fact that it was unlikely to settle with any other family. But I did want to briefly touch on exactly what the situation with the dogs was on the morning of the discovery. 

The farm had two dogs. One of which was kept outside and slept in one of the farm’s barns. While the second one, the little one who caused the outrage, was inside the property.

Yvonne:
There were actually two dogs because there was the farm dog that was kept outside. And the little dog that was inside and neither dog. I mean, the dogs were barking when the police arrived at the scene and we're looking around the house because they see, flashlights, torches, you know, it's like somebody's walking around the farmhouse the dog is going to bark.

The nature of this conversation was pretty straight forward because for me, it’s always seemed likely that the killer ambushed the family while they were in bed. With my personal theory having always been that Nevill and June were in their bed at the time the crime began. 

But the situation with the dog has always been a spanner in the works. After all, little dogs are known to bark and from what I can tell from my research Crispy – the little one – was no different. If there had been an intruder of any kind, surely Crispy would have awoken the family and the scene might have been remarkably different from that which it was.

Unless, of course, the dog knew the person and was comfortable enough with their presence. 

For the campaign team this further supports their theory that Sheila committed the crimes, after all, wouldn’t the dog have been disturbed if Jeremy had broken into the property? And so, it further adds to their suggestion that the only people within the property where those who were supposed to be there. 

Yvonne:
I mean, there is as much fresh evidence that we can't speak about, as is what is public? You know, we have, there's been so much in the last 10 years since, since we have disclosure, the documentation in 2011 there's been so much that ad set is about 50% of its public, the remaining 50%. We can't make public yet. So, you know, the case is absolutely massive. The submission grounds are huge. Now, there's not just one, like I said, previously seen in the cases, there'll be one over there, this is flick of gunshot residue that was in somebody's pocket, but it could come from, you know, something innocent, or there was one witness statement not disclosed. And this says this, we literally have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, you know, with 1000s of documents ever been disclosed, photographs, the key, like I said it's only about half the evidence of Jeremy's innocence in the public domain at the moment, because that's all we are permitted legally to disclose at this time. But once these submissions are made, then we will make that evidence public and people are just going to be absolutely astounded that Essex police still think they can maintain this conviction. And that the crown think that the evidence, Essex police put forward originally, was honest and not corrupt, because we can prove it wasn't, we can prove they are corrupt, that they did misinformed the jury, they deliberately kept evidence from the jury hearing, you know that the trial was not fair.

Yvonne: 
Everybody has a right to fair trial, as you said at the beginning. But when you're not told, you know, when the evidence is manipulated, you're not told there's two silencers. You're not told Sheila was only shot once initially, you're not told there was two telephone calls, or that Jeremy couldn't have got out of that window without leaving a trace. You know, that it was impossible for him to get from Whitehouse farm to goldhanger on a bicycle in 10 minutes. Know what I mean? So it's like the jury just wasn't like that... They weren't told about. Julie crimes only one that she committed check offenses. They weren't told that she would be doing illegal things before she even met Jeremy. You know, they were lied to about the foster care issue, they were lied to about Sheila state of mind. I mean, Jeremy was told that we're not here to prosecute Sheila, we're here to defend you.

Yvonne:
And that's where a lot of it fell down because they weren't able to present the evidence that they had about Sheila's state of mind and how her whole catalogue of roller coaster of things that had happened over the course of a few months and a few weeks, was built up. It was just absolutely shambolic, you know, what I meant?

At this point I asked a question about something that had alluded my research and that is the suggestion from a contemporary newspaper report that someone had actually heard a gunshot on the night of the murders. This ‘anomaly’ is not mentioned anywhere else, so I wanted to know what the campaign team new about it.

Yvonne: 
Yeah. We've got one witness statement from somebody who lived in the farm cottages that said at 10 o'clock at night, he thought he heard a gunshot. Well, we know Neville was still bringing the harvest in at 10 o'clock at night. We know that June and Sheila were on the phone to Pamela, at 10 o'clock at night. It had nothing to do with Whitehouse farm if he heard a gunshot. And we've not had any statements. There's nothing in the disclosed material at all. Say that anybody heard any shots? I think a lot of the problem is on documentaries, or dramas, or sometimes authors that jump to conclusions. So they read something to think about, well, that means that so we don't do that. We don't speculate, we work off cold, hard evidence. And, you know, if something says something, so one document won't do for us. So it's like the one shot. You know, when I've discovered one police officer, I'm like, Yeah, well, okay, that's one, by the time you get to five, who else is saying the same thing. It's like, wait a minute, now there's something not right here. And then you get, I mean, we do have more evidence than what we disclose to the public. But we can't disclose that additional evidence about the one shot yet. And, but we will do it in the submissions. But in total, there were like eight people who know that Sheila was shot once they know, you know, and it's all documented. We don't speculate. So like authors at the end of their book where they go, we'll tell you what happened, you know, will have, and it completely invent what they believe happened, fine if you support that with the evidence, but just to we could speculate, you know, we could say, Oh, this happened, and that happened. And at this time in that time, we can't do that. Because we deal in facts. And it's the facts that will get Jeremy's to the court of appeal, and the facts will win the appeal. Not all saying, oh, but I think, you know, because I think it doesn't count.

A number of years ago, Jeremy Bamber was granted permission to undertake a polygraph test – something that he passed. One of the latter episodes of this series is an interview with that polygraph expert, Terry Mullins, who conducted Bamber’s test. 

Yvonne: 
Well, he fought for 10 years to be able to have the polygraph test, we got permission to have it. And Terry Mullins who conducted the polygraph test is impartial you know he was approached. And he said categorically, Jeremy did not kill his family.

Philipp: 
And the guy who did it also did the lie detector, was it Adrian Prouce? The guy who killed his wife and always claimed he was innocent, he also did a lie detector test on him which Prouce failed accordingly and subsequently confessed. So he is not somebody who was predisposed to believe in Jeremy or was in favour of people who claimed they were innocent.  

Philipp: 
Yeah, they're more than an investigative tool but people are sent to jail in the UK on the basis of lie detector tests because if you're a sex offender you have to go through periodic reviews of your behaviour after release and if you fail a lie detector test as part of that process your licence is revoked and you go back to jail. So people are sent to jail purely on  the basis of lie detector tests in this country.

To end the interview, I asked if there was anything in particular that the campaign team wanted sympathetic listeners to do, any particular action that they wanted taken. 

Philipp: 
Well, the first thing we'd like them to do is to look at the evidence and come to their own conclusion. Don't accept we are  saying or the prosecution is saying.  look at the evidence and if they do come to the same conclusion as we do, which we're sure they would, having looked at all the evidence, then talk to their friends, spread the word that this is a flaw in the system both in Jeremy's case personally and in the wider disclosure area as well and help to make a better justice system that finds the guilty and convicts them and doesn't convict and imprison innocent people.

They say that they now have reems and reems of evidence to support their campaign and that what we, as the public, have seen is just the tip of the iceberg.

Yvonne:
It's such a lot not in the public domain, which Because of the legal cases that are ongoing at the moment, we can't speak about that at this time.

At the time of both the interview and the episode going live, the result of the latest CCRC submission is still unknown but either way, for the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign the fight will continue. 

Yvonne: 
We believe in justice. This is why we do what we do. We do it because this is a huge injustice. You know, this is one man who spent more time in jail than he has as a free man for a crime and he categorically did not commit, we can prove it is not committed. And we will prove that and why? Because we want that man to be able to have some life. He had his family taken from him and he has had his life taken from him, at least hopefully, with our assistance, you know, we can help the legal team get Jeremy to that court, get him out of jail, so he can have some life and enjoyment and the pleasures we take for granted because you know, it's just been years have been stolen from him as far as I'm concerned.

Yvonne: 
Well, I mean, at court, the jury are told if you believe beyond a reasonable doubt, well, there isn't just a reasonable doubt that Jeremy is innocent, this absolutely categorical proof that Jeremy is innocent. You know, there is no doubt at all. So, you know, it's always interested me if the jury could hear the evidence that they didn't get privileged to hear that the court, you know, with this decision, no not a chance.

Yvonne: 
We believe in his innocence, the evidence proves he's innocent and to be honest, we do get negative negativity, especially from the media and from some people. But you know, you fight for what you believe in and you fight for the truth. And we will always fight for the truth because we know the truth is you know, Jeremy knows what the truth is. And so we will fight we will continue to fight until the claws they'll and also see that truth. And let Jeremy home.




Maybe you found the campaign’s narrative compelling, maybe you disagree completely. Or maybe you, like me, are more confused by their version of events than you were before. Fear not, most of this information will be re-considered in a lot more detail. 

I am fully prepared for the likely criticism that this episode will garner and I expect some very, very specific tweets regarding my choice to come out against Bamber. But if you think I’m making sense, maybe you can help counter balance any and all negativity. 

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