In spite of a judge rejecting evidence disclosure, Jeremy Bamber’s case now looks more likely to be reviewed by the Criminal Cases Review Commission; new podcast about the case begins Sunday
“If ever there was a case where the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) should be approached to make a decision on what is said to be new evidence, it is this one. This is a massively complex case which has been investigated and re-investigated by more than one police force over some 35 years.”
“The body of material is vast. After so many years, and so much litigation, the CCRC is the body undoubtedly best placed to consider the claimant’s arguments.”
We today urge readers to watch the YouTube video that follows. It examines the sequence of events on the night of 6th to the 7th August 1985 and for those interested in learning more, we also recommend listening to The White House Farm Murders: Is Jeremy Bamber Guilty? podcast by Kaiesha Page. It begins this evening and is available here.
Woman from Wigan wins latest round in the long-running case of ‘walk in a park ruined by exposed tree root’ at the Court of Appeal
Last week, we reported on ‘elf and safety nuts going crackers over Magnum ice cream containing, you’ve guessed it, MILK. Today, we can report the outcome of another ludicrous debacle – that being the case of the woman who fell over a tree root.
Detailed in July 2019 in The Law Society’s Gazette even in an entire article by one Nicholas Dobson devoted to this long-running dispute titled: “What is a highway?,” the story of one Deborah Barlow relates to an incident on the 21st September 2014.
On the date in question, Ms Barlow had visited Abram Park in the Greater Manchester town of Wigan. Whilst walking “along a path” (referenced yesterday by Lord Justice Bean more definitively as “the Path”), she “tripped over an exposed tree root and sustained injury to her shoulder and arm.” Naturally, she plainly subsequently consulted lawyers.
Of what became a saga worthy of Miss Marple’s attentions, Lord Justice Bean continued: “It might be thought that the question of whether she has a valid legal claim against Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council (“Wigan” or “the Council”), the present owners and occupiers of the park, would be a straightforward one. Far from it.”
Subsequently, the matter was put before judges in both the county court and the High Court. Each took different views and whilst at the first Barlow’s claim for damages was dismissed by Judge Platts “since the path in question was not a highway maintainable at public expense” according to Dobson, on appeal Judge Waksman ruled to the contrary.
Yesterday, at the Royal Courts of Justice in London, the matter was considered by Lady Justice Macur, Lord Justice Bean and Lord Justice Singh and the previous judgment was dismissed. Who’d have thought a simple “walk in the park” could have gone from something so innocent to such an almighty mess?
Remember this kids: Beware of those pesky tree roots or you might find yourself, like Deborah Barlow, in a bit of an ‘elf and safety nightmare.
Derbyshire Police yet again show themselves inept at the art of public relations in tweeting about trying to locate a man who kissed a woman on the cheek to thank her for helping him with his lorry
The “busybodies” of Derbyshire Police will forever be remembered as the dunces of the 2020 coronavirus lockdown.
In a post shared on their own website and online via social media also on Friday, the plainly inept manager of communications for this force shared an appeal. Its wording was beyond weak and its content laughable. The text read:
We are appealing for help to identify a man who kissed a woman on the cheek to thank her for helping when his lorry became stuck under a low bridge.
The incident occurred between 12pm and 4pm on Tuesday, 28 April, in Dale Road, Matlock.
The heavy goods vehicle had become stuck and the woman, who is in her 70s, helped the men to ensure the lorry did not hit the bridge.
After the lorry became unstuck one of the men in the lorry left the vehicle, thanked the woman and kissed her on the cheek.
Officers want to speak to anyone who was in the area at time and may be able to help our enquiries into the incident – of particular interest are any drivers who were in the area at the time and may have captured the lorry on dashcam.
Anyone with any information is asked to contact Derbyshire police.
Slammed previously by amongst others Lord Sumption for their “hysteria” during lockdown, Derbyshire Police subsequently were inundated by Twitter users astounded that this ‘matter’ was being shared publicly.
In response, the force’s Twitter manager announced: “This would be classed as a sexual assault as the woman did not want the man to kiss her on the cheek… We’d just like to identify and speak to the man we’ve described at this moment in time.”
Without explaining how a kiss could have lasted from 12pm to 4pm and whether they’d caught the lorry driver who likes to thank with a kiss, Derbyshire Police subsequently deleted their original tweet about the matter. They did not, however, manage to delete the thousands of outraged and mocking responses.
Pictured top: A young man kissing and an older woman. We cannot confirm whether or not the young man in the image committed a crime or not or whether the older of the pair was a willing participant.
The ‘kiss’ occurred within a window of a four-hour time period on Dale Road, Matlock, Derbyshire in the vicinity of this bridge allegedly. Derbyshire Police’s appeal was issued on their website (left) and online via Twitter (right) also.In response to mockery and outrage from Twitter users, the force used their own account to attempt to justify their actions. Their strategy was subsequently met with further derision.
Jeremy Bamber’s legal team go to the high court after it emerges that the CPS may have handed crucial evidence – not available to them – to an author involved in the ITV drama ‘White House Farm’
On Friday, at an oral renewal hearing in Leeds, the high court will be asked to “review the refusal of the Crown Prosecution Service to disclose evidence they believe could undermine [the] conviction” of Jeremy Bamber according to the Guardian’sSimon Hattenstone.
“Since proceedings were issued it came to our attention that the author of the book the ITV drama was based upon [Carol Ann Lee] appears to have received material directly from the police [images of which she shared on Instagram and later deleted].”
“It cannot be right that an author has been given material that Mr Bamber’s defence team have not seen, particularly in light of the persistent refusal by the CPS to disclose specific material we have been asking for. It raises the question of whether a work of fiction is more important than justice.”
Illustrating her tellingly selective thoughts on what evidence should be released, to whom and where, in an interview with the East Anglian Daily Times in January this year, Ms Lee – whose son also worked with her on the White House Farm drama – stated:
“My personal opinion is very much that he’s guilty. He’s been in prison for 30 years and the evidence he was convicted on has not been overturned. He’s been appealing ever since he’s been in prison and nothing has come out that has been able to overturn that conviction… And for me the overriding piece of evidence, if you like, was looking at the original crime scene photographs. Without going into detail, it was obvious from one of the photographs in particular, that has never been published and should never be published, that those murders were committed by somebody who was extremely adept with a gun – who knew what they were doing.”
Responding and speaking of news of Friday’s hearing from Wakefield prison to the Guardian, Jeremy Bamber commented:
“It is disgusting that a third party was provided with documents and sensitive photographs when Essex police and the CPS have been unwilling to hand over material to our own forensic experts to prove that two silencers were recovered from the scene.”
“Despite court orders being in place for them to make full disclosure to us, which they deliberately chose to ignore, when Carol Ann Lee requested material she was given it without a second thought. Where is my justice?”
Attacked for just £1,000 in his own home in Parkway, Camden, NW1 on Christmas Day 1995, Derry born police mechanic Alan Holmes was left “tightly tied” to his bed, face down and fully clothed for ten days in a building where he was the last remaining tenant. Discovered only after he failed to show up for work on the 4th January 2006, he survived for one night more and was able to explain the appalling crime perpetrated upon him before dying as a result of “horrendous injuries,” blood clotting and dehydration at University College Hospital, Bloomsbury. In spite of a £20,000 reward and (sadly too grainy to be of much use) CCTV images of individuals using his bank cards being made public, Mr Holmes’ “cold and ruthless” murderers have never been apprehended. Of this generous “quiet soul” and multiple sclerosis sufferer, his sister, Mavis Yule, later remarked: “He was a friendly, gentle person. He loved poetry and should have been a writer. He was very kind and would have given you the shirt off his back. Living in London, he saw people begging and sleeping in doorways. He felt very sorry for these people. He may have given them money for soup or given them a blanket – but he would never have let anybody he did not know into his flat.” In 2016, Richard Osley, the deputy editor of the Camden New Journal, rightly asked: “Who killed Alan Holmes? We have to keep asking… As clichéd and contrived as it may sound, Alan Holmes, the police mechanic who was starved in his own home, is the ghost of NW1’s Christmas past… An appeal might seem like a token gesture, a shot in the dark, but it’d be something.”
Watch ‘Crimewatch’s’ report on the case (aired Thursday 29th February 1996 at 10pm on BBC1), go to 5:20 minutes to start:
The last known photograph of Alan Holmes, enjoying the company of friends on 25th December 1995 (as seen on the BBC’s ‘Crimewatch’).
A Shackleton Award winning campaigner who “fights miscarriages of justice and demands reform,” practicing solicitor Emily Bolton is married to Reprieve founder and one of “Britain’s most powerful civil rights lawyers,” Clive Stafford Smith. This Dorset born stonemason’s daughter, herself, founded the Centre for Criminal Appeals in the UK in 2011 after previously representing wrongfully convicted prisoners in the United States through the George Soros funded Innocence Project in New Orleans. She is a graduate of the University of Melbourne and Tulane University and her work trying to highlight the flaws in the 2011 convictions of the ‘Freshwater Five’ fisherman is clearly illustrative of her tenacity and dedication. Bolton’s sterling efforts in this regard were quite correctly highlighted in an April 2020 in-depth analysis of this most likely bungled case in the Guardian and in 2017, she tellingly commented: “Human beings make mistakes, and no system has more human parts than the criminal justice system. If it can’t identify and rectify its mistakes, it is doomed to repeat them.”
ITV’s ‘Quiz’ has definitely left the public questioning the conviction of the ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’ £1 million cheat Major Charles Ingram in 2003, but what the programme did not reveal is actually more fascinating
“After all that, can we be sure the Ingrams were guilty?” asked The Telegraph’s Chris Bennion in his review of the final episode of the three-part hit, Quiz, and indeed the ending has achieved the inevitable and will likely reignite interest in a story that dates back to 2001.
For the few that may not remember what occurred, a Major Charles Ingram won the maximum prize of £1 million on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? on the 10th September 2001, the day before the 9/11 attacks on America. Ingram’s wife and her brother, Adrian Pollock, had previously each won £32,000.
Immediately after the jackpot was scooped, the programme’s production company, Celador, suspecting Ingram had cheated suspended payment of the winnings. The police were called in and ultimately, after a four week trial in March and April 2003 at Southwark Crown Court, the Ingrams and another contestant, a lecturer and their alleged accomplice, Tecwen Whittock, were convicted of “procuring the execution of a valuable security by deception.” All three were given prison sentences suspended for two years, fined £15,000 each and ordered to pay £10,000 towards prosecution costs. These sums were later reduced on appeal.
Whilst many will know that Ingram was then forced to resign his commission as a major after 17 years and that he and his wife appeared on countless television shows including The Weakest Link, sadly Quiz did not delve into other bizarre twists in this “eccentric” pair’s life in the time since their “fifteen minutes of coughing fame/shame.”
Aside from being bankrupted four times in the intervening years (most recently in 2019), the former army officer chopped three of his toes off in a freak lawnmower accident in September 2010. Ironically, the “cheat” and then resident of Easterton, Wiltshire did the injury when he “slipped on a rotten apple.” Of the incident, Ingram recalled “lying on the grass” and thinking: “Oh dear… I certainly won’t be mowing any lawns again soon.”
Earlier, yet not long after his Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? conviction in November 2003, Ingram was convicted of an entirely unrelated insurance fraud. Found guilty of obtaining pecuniary advantage by deception and of deception by trying to claim on that policy after an alleged burglary, the already disgraced son of a retired RAF wing commander added a two-year conditional discharge to his burgeoning rap sheet.
The Ingrams, now, but not revealed in the show either, are based in Maiden Bradley, Warminster and run a non-registered for UK VAT company that trades as ‘Diana Ingram.’ It sells Murano glass jewellery for prices ranging from £15 to £75 and of her wares, Mrs Ingram states: “Most products listed can be altered for shape, colour, length, etc., though prices may vary. I ship worldwide and nothing is too much trouble – I regularly offer personalised wrapping and buy and write birthday cards too!” No mention is made as to whether any kind of cheat sheets can be enclosed if requested sadly.
Charles Ingram, meanwhile, has kept himself busy on Twitter since September 2013 using the handle @gallantfive. He describes himself as: “English, Irish, European, Family, Labour, LUFC and proud remainer wanting a fairer world” and has over 7,100 followers. Whilst describing Quiz as “simply brilliant” and “terrifyingly accurate,” his family have plainly had a few visits from the media as a result of the show. Now represented by one Skye Redman at 89up, a firm that somewhat immodestly has self-appointed itself as “Europe’s biggest communications agency for great causes,” the ex-major this week tweeted:
“Media: Please #StayHomeSaveLives. In any event I assure you that doorstepping is wasting your time. My solicitor, Rhona Friedman, is available for comment via phone or video conferencing. For interviews please contact Skye Redman at 89up.”
After the conclusion of Quiz, Friedman told the Guardian: “I just know that they did not do it… I just feel very sorry for them.” She intends to file paperwork associated with the case in the summer “with hopes for a hearing at the end of the year,” and given the reaction of the public after the ending of this week’s dramatisation, one thing’s for sure: We’ve not seen the last of ‘The Coughing Major’ and his ever-so-earnest wife just yet.
As he plays ‘Strike It Lucky’ on Instagram during the coronavirus lockdown, we ask: “Is there nothing that Michael Barrymore won’t do to seek a return to fame?”
Michael Barrymore is a coward and a scumbag. That is a fact. He has failed to face Terry Lubbock – the father of an innocent young man murdered in 2001 in his swimming pool by one of seven other people present that fateful night – on television, yet he happily took £60,000 to lackadaisically chit-chat to Piers Morgan about this most serious matter in a totally disgraceful fashion.
Self-absorbed Barrymore, who recently took to Instagram to claim Channel 4 were “parasites” for daring to air Barrymore: The Body in the Pool – a carefully researched documentary about the case of the death of Stuart Lubbock – yesterday again illustrated his vanity by returning to the medium to attempt to revive his deservedly failed career.
In two posts and a live feed, the disgraced former entertainer – best known for rolling around on the floor smashed off his skull with the convicted bigot Marie-Claire, Baroness von Alvensleben – played ‘Strike It Lucky’ with his 19,500 followers. He used the hashtag #stayathome and shamelessly posed smiling as if nothing at all was wrong.
We once again say: A pox on your house Michael Barrymore for not coming clean about what you know about the events at 4 Beaumont Park Drive in Roydon, Harlow on 31st March 2001. Now, Mr Barrymore, finally do the decent thing: Stop playing silly games and start telling the truth.
To watch ‘Barrymore: The Body in the Pool,’ click here.
A list of people present on the 31st March 2001 who are still alive – It’s time the lot of them told the truth
Michael Barrymore (born Michael Parker).
Kelly Campbell.
James Futters (sometimes incorrectly spelt ‘Futers’).
Claire Jones.
Jonathan Kenney.
Justin Merritt.
Kylie Merritt.
Simon Shaw.
Some of Michael Barrymore’s ludicrously telling remarks about the murder that occurred at his home
Admitting he partook in ‘sex orgies’ on other occasions – “There was no orgy I was aware of… Some of the papers wrote ‘sex orgy’ … There was no sex orgy. I don’t know what to say. There was no sex orgy that night.”
The word ‘another’ is most important – “I just hope they [the public] understand it was another night that went terribly wrong.”
Excusing himself – “It isn’t what happens in life, it’s how you deal with it.”
Just another day in the life of the not so often speechless Michael Barrymore – “I looked down at effectively the deep end and Stuart was there… It was like some really bad film, some unhappy ending. It was my house, my party, I don’t know what to say.”
Michael Barrymore rolling around on the floor drunk as a skunk with the equally pissed convicted racist Marie-Claire, von Alvensleben in April 2000 – just under a year prior to the death of Stuart Lubbock at a drunken, drug fuelled orgy at his home (left). The scene of the murder of Stuart Lubbock – Michael Barrymore’s then home: 4 Beaumont Park Drive, Roydon, Harlow, Essex, CM19 4HB.Essex Police recently launched a new appeal with the hashtag #justice4stuart. The eight people still alive who were present at 4 Beaumont Park Drive on the 31st March 2001 should now jolly well respond to this.
This “sweet, matronly looking woman” killed her partner John Price, skinned him, boiled his head in a pot and served up his body parts to his children with baked potatoes and gravy in February 2000. Katherine Knight – a woman who proudly kept knives above her bed so that they “would always be handy if [she] needed them” – was the first Australian to be sentenced to life imprisonment without parole in October 2001.
A mother of four and an enthusiastic “cutter up of offal” at her local abattoir, Knight was described as having a “screw loose somewhere” by her own mother and even tried to strangle her husband on their wedding night. She unsuccessfully attempted to appeal her sentence in 2006, continues to show no signs of remorse and will rot in jail for the rest of her life.
Whilst elements of the media seized on one conviction being thrown out, His Honour Judge Brown, Lord Justice Treacy and Mrs Justice McGowan found that “nothing arises which could impugn the safety of [the remaining] convictions.” They specifically noted:
“Stepping back and looking at the totality of the evidence of Counts 2 to 12, including the bad character evidence, we find nothing that causes us to doubt the safety of those convictions… The primary evidence… remained intact, as did the body of bad character evidence.”
Elsewhere, one of the paedophile child abuser Harris’ unhinged supporters, Lizzie Cornish, wrote to The Steeple Times. In a series of rants on our comments pages – which we will not be publishing due to the fact that they would offend genuine victims – crackpot Miss Cornish commented:
“Your putrid words about me make me sick! … [The] case STANK from the very start…and people like you believed it! People like me, Steeples, stood up against them and had to endure the likes of YOU!”
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