Murder at the Cottage | Sky

Polly701

Wow.. That is some list! I know a lot about this case and have read this thread fully and I honestly couldn't say which on this list did it.

FishOnABike

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117919804#Comment_117919804

and at least one more, who is reported to have been staying in the area at the time, left shortly after but their presence aparently being omited from being mentioned to investigating gardaí at the time. This person would also have been consistent with Marie Farrell's original account of seeing someone in the vicinity of Kealfadda Bridge, walking towards Goleen but not mentioning seeing them when she and her mystrey driver were on the way back having turned around in Toormore.

There's a lot of potential suspects with no real evidence to tie any of them to the crime. Just enough information for gossip and speculation.

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117919468#Comment_117919468

This makes sense from a "picking of the location" kind of view. If the killing was planned, the location was right, plus it must have been known to anybody planning this in France that the Police in Ireland are not the most competent when it comes to investigating.

If the murder would have taken place in France, the Gendarmerie would have come up with more solid results and this more quickly. I also don't think that the body would have been out in the open for so long also the pathologist would have been there sooner.

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117919804#Comment_117919804

Regarding the suspects, I'd say if Alfie Lyons was murdered, he'd be part of the drug gang, rather than anything else. I wouldn't see any other motive for Alfie to do it.

The odd Frenchman, who left not long after, was probably that French fisherman from Marseille?

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117920259#Comment_117920259

"The odd Frenchman, who left not long after, was probably that French fisherman from Marseille?"

Probably this lad;

From; Indymedia Ireland,

I can't post a link, probably not secure

"A new and previously overlooked suspect has emerged.

sophie du plantier was murdered on a remote lane near her West Cork home in Christmas 1996. Initially a local peeping-tom whose fingerprints were found all over the windows of her home and whose alibi did not check out was brought in for questioning. He was later released. Then a couple of weeks later a young "hippy" and his wife were reported as "prime suspects". The theory was that the young man who had worked for Ms du plantier previously and who had been doing fencing near her home at the time of her murder had been sexually involved with her and that he or his wife had killed her in a subsequent falling out.

Some seven weeks after the killing a much disliked part-time journalist of English origin who had been very critical of the local Garda bungling of the investigation became the "prime suspect".In a flurry of hysteria and fear the insular local population were quick to agree with Gardai that Mr Bailey was "guilty", although no evidence existed to condemn him. Rumour upon rumour was circulated until, like Tony Blair with the weapons of mass destruction lies about Iraq, everyone "knew" Mr Bailey was guilty. They just "knew". Some locals who had themselves been previously ostracised by the herd came forward to say how Mr Bailey had "confessed to them". This solved their problems and eased their way in the community and with Gardai.

After Mr Baileys libel case last Christmas it emerged that a local man had not been interviewed, let alone suspected, was present in the immediate location of the murder on the night i question . A local Garda who was involved in the investigation "from the beginning" admitted he had never even heard of this man. He had visited the home of the mans family but did not know he existed!

This young man, a fluent French speaker who had been educated in private schools in France and Ireland was staying with his family a very short walk from the murder scene on the night of the murder. Why did Gardai not investigate him? Why did his family not mention his presence in the locality that night in December 1996? The man quickly left the area on a date unknown and now resides with his new wife in Britain.

Gardai are split over this case with the local gardai who bungled the initial investigation at odds with senior detectives from Dublin who are now investigating the previously overlooked man. One could suspect that local and regional Gardai who have for years built careers, promotions and houses on the commodity of Mr Baileys alleged guilt would look very stupid or worse for allowing the real killer to escape. They have been convincing Ms du Plantiers family for years of Mr Baileys guilt and that it is only a matter of the lack of some forensic evidence that is stopping them arresting him. So they have solved the case - almost! We should just keep repeating the mantra "Bailey is guilty" and everthing will be fine.

As for local gangs of vigilantes who have been hounding Mr Bailey for their personal pleasure and to ingratiate themselves with local Gardai, well, they are what they are. Such gangs emerge from time to time, especially in remote areas and I suppose Mr Bailey and those who dare to point out there is in fact no evidence against him should be glad this is not Nazi Germany or Salem Massachusetts during the witch trials."

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117918075#Comment_117918075

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117918164#Comment_117918164

I don't know about Sophie being pregnant,

My post was about Daniel's girlfriend at the time; Milita Nikolic.

saabsaab

Hadn't heard of the 'young French man' or the 'hippy couple' before. Could he have been the man in the car at the petrol station?

Was the young French man coming to stay for Christmas? Might he have met Sophie on the flight and she gave him a lift to Schull?

but this doesn’t really tie in with the witness sighting of Sophie in Skibbereen when the man in the car with her paid through the window with petrol.

the sighting of Sophie in Skibbereen with a male passenger ties in so perfectly with the subsequent sighting of her in Ballydehob that it’s breathtaking how little this was looked into.

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117919022#Comment_117919022

This is in French,

so put on subtitles, and change to English ( very poor translation).

From 23:20 to 24:00 Leo speaks about this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxZQTOaqwXk

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117920650#Comment_117920650

"only a short walk from the murder scene" If it's not Alfie and Shirley's house, than it can only be the other house in the neighbourhood? I always this house was lived in by a visually impaired resident, who heard a car outside during the night of the murder?

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921117#Comment_117921117

"only a short walk from the murder scene" 

"Only a short walk" is actually about an hours walk from Sophie's to down past Ballyrisode beach.

FishOnABike

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921117#Comment_117921117

I believe the third house at the end of the cul de sac was a holiday home and unoccupied at the time. AFAIK the blind 'neighbour' lived about a mile away on the Dunmanus to Kealfadda road, not in the cul de sac.

OwlsZat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921090#Comment_117921090

This is exactly it. We've just had a list of 10 plausible suspects and we know virtually noting about them. I doubt a team of detectives can be that negligent. One person maybe, a team I don't think so. When MF went off name dropping the shadow man. The deceive willingly went off on the wild goose chase. Why the double standards when none of this suspects weren't investigated? Some have evidence against them some failed alibis. Makes zero sense. Which is why the dead detective is top of my list.

tinytobe

Ballyrisode beach is too far away from Sophie's house for the blind neighbour to have heard anything relevant to the murder. If Alfie and Shirley didn't hear anything then somebody in Ballyrisode beach would certainly not have heard anything. Even a car going by or not, wouldn't be relevant, it's too far away from Sophie's house.

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921947#Comment_117921947

I don't know anything about the blind neighbour, except someone said he heard a car that night,

I don't know where he lives.

Ballyrisode beach is the direction the in which the young man mentioned in the Indymedia article above lived.(post 6218)

lintdrummer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921947#Comment_117921947

I think you're confusing two houses. The blind woman lived about a mile from Sophie's house. Somewhere on the road you would turn off to go up the lane to Sophie's and Alfie's houses.

The person living near Ballyrisode beach is a young man who spoke french and who left the area shortly after. He was never questioned by Gardaí.

chooseusername

Sorry, Tinytobe, we are at cross purposes.

As Lintdrummer said this is about a different person.

The Suspect that the Gardai "didn't know existed"

this is a follow-up post to the one above;

"Why should the suspect be interviewed?

 by Hilaal

 Mon Sep 27, 2004 07:53

 Almost two thousand people were interviewed in this case , some who were up to 75 miles away on the night of the murder were interviewed twice, so why not this man who was only a short walk from the murder scene?

His family obviously covered for him , as gardai didn't even ,"know he existed". All the houses for miles around were canvassed and anyone present on the night was interviewed . So why was this man not known to have been in the area if people did not lie about his presence that night?

Many local men and some women had DNA samples taken even though they had never met Ms Du Plantier. The legion of local peeping toms had hair taken for analysis. A woman like Ms Du Plantier could be assured of many local men taking an interest in what she did at night as rumours had circulated that she often took men to her home.....wink .....wink! Former lovers in France were even interviewed about their wherabouts that night.

Despite claims/lies that Mr Bailey never gave a DNA sample to be compared with samples found under Du Plantiers nails, he in fact did give a sample immediately and without legal order at his first interview. The French press regularly claim that if Ireland had complusory DNA sample taking laws the case would be closed, thus giving the impression Bailey is escaping on this legal technicality. In fact it eventually emerged that no DNA was found under Ms Du Plantiers nails. Just another lie!

Another of the many lies/rumours circulated to paint Bailey as guilty was that he had gone to the scene of the murder before he had received a plone call from Eddie Cassidy of the Star, to do so as a proxy reporter for his paper. In the libel case that Bailey took last winter against newspapers this was proved false although Mr Cassidy then claimed he had never mentioned to Bailey on the phone it was a "murder" case.

Another nonesense is that if Bailey was to have been seen washing his boots at the bridge at Kealfadda where Mrs Marie Farrell said she saw him as she drove back from Goleen to Schull at 3.30am he would have been walking home approvimately four miles on a busy road by many houses whereas he could have walked home directly two miles on a deserted road by only a very few houses.

The Suspect that the Gardai "didn't know existed" lived a very short distance from the bridge at Kealfadda where Mrs Farrell said she saw a man she later claimed was Bailey washing his boots. This would have been on the Suspects direct route home. From there he could have walked to his house in fifteen minutes by road or in about eight minutes over the beach and rocks, thus not passing any houses. Mrs Farrell only seven weeks later identified Mr Bailey as the man on the bridge a mile from the murder scene AFTER the Gardai had settled on him as a "prime suspect". She could say that he was the man she had seen in the dead of a winters night washing his boots down in a river as she sped by on the road above. She claimed she had seen him outside her shop in Schull and walking on the road almost two months later and then went to Gardai ! Incredible!

But if you think there is no need to interview the "Suspect" then perhaps you are right. Sure, begorrah his family are "fine people" and we all know that "fine people" never do things like this. Well, there was Malcome McArthur..............

Of course to entertain the prospect the Gardai got it wrong would not only be embarassing to them but would also leave Bailey claiming hundreds of thousands in Libel damages against the very papers who tried so hard last winter, in cohoots with the Gardai to build a case against him out of rumour and oft repeated and exaggerated rumour ."

And another post on that site;

"It was when the mans name was given to the Garda that it emerged they, "did not even know he existed". Strange enough, since the Guard in question had been to his family home to have a confidential talk regarding the spouse of his first cousin with his mother ! Strange enough since the Guard in question was one of the first to the scene of the crime!

However it may be pointless now, so many years later trying to interview this man as he lives in Britain and presumably would have little or nothing to say except that the family lawyer would be in touch."

Polly701

Has this young French man ever been interviewed? Ballyrisode is a relatively short walk from Kealfadda Bridge. It seems crazy that he was in the area on the night in question and that he hasn't been definitively ruled out.

chooseusername

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117922594#Comment_117922594

He wasn't French,

he was a local lad who went to school in France and spoke fluent French.

And anyone care to hint what his connections might have been... to a local politician, to a guard?

lintdrummer

It is intriguing that this young man may have gone completely unnoticed by the Gardaí. Do we have any real evidence of this though, or is it all hearsay from internet forums?

You would imagine it would be of huge interest to the Gardaí to interview this man if what we have heard is true. He was in the area on the night. Left some time shortly afterwards. His family were interviewed and nobody bothered to mention him. He had a "French connection" so there is a tenuous thread of motive there which needs to be explored.

Is there any possibility that this is the same man "living in Europe" who was of interest recently after the revelation that a local had been confided in about the washing of bloody clothes? Surely that wasn't Jules, she has separated from Bailey now and if she had felt inclined at one point to spill some critical info like that to a local, surely she would by now have made a statement to the Gardaí or gone public with it...

Edit to expand on that point... With the majority of locals seemingly convinced that Bailey is the perpetrator, it is also hard to imagine that if this kind of revelation about washing clothes came from Jules that it wouldn't have spread like wildfire amongst the local community and to the press. It would have been a cross to crucify Bailey on, which many people are looking for.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923100#Comment_117923100

the revelation that a local had been confided in about the washing of bloody clothes? Surely that wasn't Jules

I'm afraid it was, or that's the claim

https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/ian-baileys-ex-partner-hits-24733887

mamboozle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117921098#Comment_117921098

Alfie didn't hear a peep on the night of the murder, not a "human voice". He remembers how he had told Ian of Sophie's imminent arrival, how he had his back to him, when he introduced them Ian "shook hands with her and...that was it." Come on Alfie, this is Ian loudmouth Bailey, surely you must have noticed he was dumbstruck.

Curious_Case

Ian Bailey should probably now set up a dedicated means of contact, such as a simple website (maybe he already has one), and publicly invite anyone with information, to provide it directly to him.

There would be two elements to this, the collating of any information relating to the crime itself, but also, the collating of any information pointing to the existence of any campaigns conducted against him.

He seems no longer to be the sole focus of attention.

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923282#Comment_117923282

I'd say that, if Alfie was involved, it was most likely drug related.

Alfie didn't "hear anything" because he was either himself involved, or he did it himself.

Thus he denied that he heard anything that night.

lintdrummer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923177#Comment_117923177

Okay but there's nothing to back up the claim in the article that the man who gave the interview was talking about Jules. The man himself hasn't stated that publicly, neither have the Gardaí, who incidentally haven't even spoken to Jules about it. Wouldn't you expect that a revelation like this would lead the Gardaí directly to Jules' doors to question her about it?

Perhaps Jules is just assuming the man is implicating her because Bailey has been the only suspect for 25 years?

Curious_Case

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923498#Comment_117923498

We can't assume there was sufficient noise to have reached inside Alfie's place.

Double glazed windows? poor hearing? fast asleep? radio or TV on? intoxicated? weather?

Curious_Case

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923606#Comment_117923606

That is how I read it too.

If the first 9 handfuls of mud were aimed at you, you'd feel reasonably confident that the 10th was coming your way too.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923606#Comment_117923606

Well he hasn't denied he was talking about Bailey and Jules after Bailey directly claimed he was. If he was talking about someone else isn't it likely he would have come out and clarified that (without necessarily identifying that person specifically) to refute Bailey's claim of besmirching his name?

mamboozle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117923815#Comment_117923815

I wonder how the phonecall to Jules went ; "Hello Jules Irish Mirror 'newspaper' here, the paper which Ian Bailey won damages against. We have a story that a man, never mind who he is, went to the gardai, never mind where, saying blah blah blah about you. Tell us your thoughts and we'll print them verbatim and if we don't you can take us to court hahahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaa!!!!"