Murder at the Cottage | Sky

Yes, good point. There's that and the fact that she hadn't (yet) bought any presents for the children. She said it was unusual as Sophie always left them pencils or books etc. when she left. So she may have been planning to buy all that stuff on the Monday and leaving on the Tuesday.

You`ve ruled nobody new in or out.

The thing about 'motive' in this case is it seems to come down to a completely spur of the moment thing. I don't believe for a second that a professional hitman would arrive with no weapon and use a stone from a wall and a large block from an unfinished building. That screams fantasyland. If it was a professional trying to make it look like a random attack, why not stage a burglary, break a window or lock, take something valuable from the house? This theory is more like a B-movie plot.

Her ex was verified to be in France and despite a bad break up had been on easy enough terms with Sophie since he had asked for her to loan one of his paintings for an exhibition and she agreed. They broke up a couple of years earlier.

Equally, I think the suggestion that an argument over a gate or drainage or speculation that Sophie reported Alfie for a massive cannabis operation up on the hill, which was not discovered during the extensive searches, are unrealistic. This makes Alfie a highly unlikely suspect to me. Shirley would likely have heard him leaving or coming back in to the house and disposing of clothes etc. I don't find it plausible that she would shield him after seeing first hand what the killer had done to Sophie. If Sophie was disturbed by the suggested drug operation going on a few metres from her house then it seems incredible she mentioned this to no one among her friends and family and brought her young son there.

So to my mind, whatever the motive was, it began and ended at the end of the lane.

Yeah but whatever brought her killer to her house at that ungodly hour must have some connection to the murder, whether or not he [not assuming too much there am I?] intended to do her harm when he set out. I mean it's not like the postman suddenly went postal, as it were...

I am open to the notion that this was a random act of insanity.. But what caused it? What triggered such a brutal response?

There are many possible suspects with better motives than Bailey. I'm not ruling out a French connection either, basically because the husband would have gained from Sophie's death, like avoiding a costly divorce settlement & being the benefactor of a life insurance policy..

One things stands out here.. The sheer brutality of the assault. The many blows to the head with a building block, the doc martin foot print on her neck / face. The violence was so excessive it's relevant.

I believe the murder was not planned by the murderer.. The slab and concrete block were just fortunate to be at the place of the murder.

What threat did Sophie present to her assailant?

We know she was quite vocal when she wanted to be, didn't shy away from confrontation, could fight her own corner if needed..

Based on there being no struggle inside the house, and the assumption that Sophie purposely tied her boots up to go outside, would it not seem logical that she was alerted to something or somebody outside??

So who would be outside on a winters morning? I say morning as all the evidence suggests it was around breakfast time .....

Sophie didn't draw the curtains in her house, she liked the lighthouse beam to enter into her cottage, she would leave the lights on at night before she went to bed.

Is this not a perfect scenario for the local peeping tom??

As daylight is breaking, Sophie notices a unusual shadow outside, or catches the peeping tom near the windows..?? She goes out to confront him, threatens to tell his family and call the Gards, the pervert know's he'll be finished in the community, and has probably been in bother before for similar acts of voyeuristic offences..

He pleads with Sophie to spare him, she refuses and returns to the cottage to phone his Mother and the Gards.. In that instant, the peeping Tom makes a rash decision to silence his accuser forever.. She puts up a fight, scratches him, hurts him, he loses the temper.... And the rest is history.

One random man. One act of random violence. The family wouldn't want it getting out so conspire to protect him.

All pie in the sky I know, but it makes more sense than some of the theory's I've heard..

"You saw her in Spar and she turned you on, walking up the aisle with her tight arse. You went to see what you could get and she was not interested." - Ian Bailey

Rejection across a pub floor or in the queue at Tesco is a very different scenario than a weirdo showing up at your door like a freaky stalker while you're alone in a remote place, in the middle of the night and them possibly stinking of drink.

The quote is what Bill Fuller testified IB said to him a few days before he was arrested and interrogated, so it couldn't be him regurgitating what the gardai told him. IB denies the conversation ever took place. Bill Fuller testified at the libel case and travelled to France to testify at the trial there, which seems to make it unlikely he was motivated to make it up to help the gardai.

This quote is from Bill Fuller - repeating what Bailey said to him. Rejection CAN be a motivator in the mind of an already disturbed person. And attempted rape often results in the killing of women whether accidental or not.

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Bailey claims? Uh huh, ok. Bailey has a habit of blurting out things which he later changes and finds a convenient excuse for... including his initial alibi "claim".

That's not what's in the Fennelly report. As the report explains, any confession or information obtained using bribes would be inadmissable at trial and would likely cause a mistrial. The report says that Martin Graham mentioned hash but the recording shows he was not offered, promised or given hash.

A detective is not going to give a witness thousands of euro out of their own pocket. That would have to be authorised higher up, which would leave a paper trail as the money would have to come from somewhere. The gardai said Martin Graham came to them and said he wanted thousands of euro for information. The gardai told him to take a hike. They offered him some money for expenses, tobacco and clothes. Both of the detectives involved claimed for small expenses for small amounts.

As the report points out, it seems incredible that a garda who was illegally giving a witness a large amount of illegal drugs would ask a technician to go in the car with them to record the conversation.

I think a more likely story is Martin Graham thought he could enrich himself by playing along with the gardai, try to get them to offer him drugs and then go to the papers with the story.

If you think about it rationally, if a garda is that paranoid about a witness that they get a technician to install a secret recorder and travel with him for the meeting, do you think he would actually go on to give the person a big slab of hash?

I suppose it depends on what you believe is more likely, a man might have a dark sense of humour or a man gotten away with a disgusting murder is now going around confessing to it and telling random locals that he did it.

Same with the washing bloody clothes theory, are we really to believe the same person who committed a brutal crime and left no trace is going to locals and asking them to wash clothes covered in blood.

Again comes down to what you believe is more likely, I struggle to believe that Martin Graham would out of the blue mention hash if he hadn't already been given some. Quite strange to ask a gardai for an illegal drug, which was much more frowned upon then than is now.

I believe maybe in the Jim Sheridan documentary they say that the reason a wire was placed on Martin was because Gardai were aware he was being a double agent.

Graham has also stated that the night he told Ian Bailey he was working with the guards he brought with him hash and two bottles of wine that the guards had given him.

You say that its more realistic that Martin Graham went to the guards to enrich himself, but you'd have to wonder why then he would buy wine and hash out of his own pocket and share it with Bailey regularly if he was as greedy as you say.

As mentioned above, its also on audio record that a guard asked him was a statement going to cost them financially.

Also the point about the guards would have to leave a paper trail if it was higher up, don't make me laugh. As discussed posts back, many pages were torn from an evidence book. A bloodstained gate was disintegrated and a wine bottle missing. Are we really to believe there would be a paper trail if they were giving cash to get Bailey to say something incriminating.

To me the most likely scenario is that the gardai gave him money knowing it was to buy hash. Martin Graham's account is that he told the gardai he didn't know where to get hash himself so they would have to supply it. That sounds extremely unlikely that a known drug user would tell the gardai they were the only ones who could get him drugs. The gardai do seem to have a soft approach to cannabis in the area, if you are to believe the DPP report they knew people that were supplying small amounts of hash and were letting it go.

Whether or not there was a paper trail, if it came out under cross examination that a witness was paid large amounts of money to provide statements then it would cost them the trial. If it didn't come out during the trial the gardai would then be leaving themselves exposed to a homeless drug user who could get them sacked. It seems much more likely that they were leading him on in case he did get information that was useful. Personally I think the garda was trying to get Graham to say 'as I said before, I want a big payout for this' so it would be clear he was almost trying to extort money.