Murder at the Cottage | Sky

I've just listened to Nick Foster on Neil Prendeville. Nick is like so many people who starts sentences with words like "well the DPP is only....." and then calls into question, cagily enough, the professionalism of this state institution. He tells us about the investigation that he's happy there was no 'systemic corruption'. So that's good that he's happy.

Nick is someone with an obvious agenda in that he needs to sell a book but he is also very apparently convinced of the Garda case against Bailey. There are trolls in many internet forums as there are on this one but it should be remembered by impartial people that the objective of trolls in this case is not to take a side against Bailey but to keep the endless debate going about the merits of the case against Bailey. So you will obviously have people arguing both sides with the same aim. There is an entirely different debate we could be having, something similar to the one the Bailey case against the Guards initiated in many places.

We can be very grateful that we don't have a police/justice system like the one in Belorussia, but that doesn't mean we should take the operation of our system for granted. This is why there is quite a debate at the moment about the kind of legislation that should be enacted to give GSOC real power to investigate Gardai. Without going too deeply in to it, it is obvious that there is a lot of contradiction in how a Guard is expected to go about his job at times. I have no hesitation in saying that we are lucky to have in the main decent people working as Guards. We give them quite a lot of power and it is quite difficult to be certain these are not abused. There are occasions when tacit consent will be given to step over the line as when the killer of Veronica Guerin had to be caught 'whatever it takes'.

As regards the STDP case is concerned there were a lot of witness statements. We had a lot of senior Guards on it who were well used to dealing with some of the hardest criminals/subversives around, and getting information out of them. It is not controversial to state that they would have been terrifying and persuasive to some people who had to deal with them for the first time. The DPP brings cases to trial all the time and a lot of argument around the decision in this case is that somehow the DPP was being very adversarial. That is simply not true, the case being made was very bad and that should have been the spur to encourage a look at other suspects. But for some strange reason that didn't happen. At the very least we should investigate why that was allowed or if there were any circumstances in west Cork at that time which hampered the investigation.

I listened to Foster just now. This new stuff about a guard writing his notes up differently from "police speak" and that giving away a clue that could crack the case was odd. That cannot be in Foster's book so why not just say it out loud? Even though Foster said this wasn't the "silver watch" it still concentrated on the "late morning" and something that happened then that solved the riddle of no prosecution being brought in Ireland.

Was something said about somebody involved that meant they could never face justice?

Late morning?

so sometime between 10:40am. and noon,

Could it be something to do with the identification of the body,

or contamination of the site deliberately or otherwise?

A couple of questions someone might have the answer to. We are aware STDP and Alfie had a chequered past. So with that in mind. Seems logical there will have been a detailed level of investigation into him and his explanations.

1. The hand injury he had directly after the murder. Was it photographed? I believe it was explained as a dog bite from a dog he was minding for a friend. Who was the friend? Were they interviewed? Can they corroborate the story? Did he see a doctor? Assume he did and got a tetanus shot. Was his doctor interviewed and could he corroborate the marks looked like a dog bite?
2. Was Alfie's DNA offered or taken?
3. Was his property searched immediately after the murder?
4. Is it true his wife was let to go straight out through the AGS cordon the morning of the murder? What was the reason for her disappearance so suddenly after the discovery of the body? Was her car searched? Was this in breach of AGS crime scene protocol?
5. Where was Alfie born, what were his past occupations, when did he move to Schull. Had he any history of domestic abuse or did he have any other reports of him in the AGS file?
6. Is it true he spoke Russian and Italian? If so where did he learn them and why?
7. His infamous parties? Who used to go? What did they drink or smoke? Was there any independent witness accounts of these parties?
8. Did STDP and Alfie share the same access gate? Is it true there was a dispute about the gate being left open/closed?

We know pretty much all of the answers to these questions for Ian Bailey, seemingly we should know the same answers for any other suspect?

Can I ask where you got this information? Because some of it I have never been able to find anywhere...

Regarding the "disputes" between Sophie and Alfie. Based on what has been reported and what you say, it would seem Sophie is the one who had reason to be irritated by Alfie and not the other way round.

Also, these things have been depicted by some people as if they are arguments, but just for example, the "dispute" over the shed could be as simple as "I thought I owned the shed". "No, actually I own it."

Regarding the "someone's been in my bath" allegation... I think many people have tried to use this to throw suspicion on Alfie as the killer. I should point out, this incident could only have happened in the Summer of 1993 at the very latest, since Bruno was the one who noticed it. That puts it at least 3 and a half years before the murder. And it only happened the once and never happened again, according to Josie Hellen. So, I think it's highly unlikely that it would be related to the murder.

Also, as I understood it, Josie had no actual reason to finger Alfie as the "phantom bather", it was just her random suspicion. In fact, there may not have been a phantom bather at all. Josie could easily have forgotten to clean it. Or it's possible some animal/insect like a cat, rat, bird or spider could get in and dirty the bath. We have no explanation of why she thought someone had dirtied the bath.

As I recall, the pathologist (Harbison) said in his report that she had abrasions on her upper chest area consistent with the concrete block rolling off her after being dropped on her head. And an impression in the ground under her head indicating she had been lying in that position when the concrete block was dropped on her.

No, she had two sets of abrasions on her back which *may* have been glancing blows from the block. Yes on the second point. The block was found beside her, not moved. All this info is in the books & documentaries, however there are a lot of contradictions and obvious errors. The pathologist report has been reported on many times and most of it is in Michael Sheridan's book.

Was this row anything to do with the fence erected where Sophie parked her car, which by the way was on Richardson's land?

Or was it to do with the fencing and new gate down at the bottom of Sophie's lawn, do you know?

(both of which were removed in later photos of the area)

Yes, you're right. My memory was wrong. The abrasions were on the back

You might have noticed that that isn't something I wish to debate? Can I be clearer?

I'd be inclined to think that it is less likely to have been Ian Bailey than someone else.

Given the intense scrutiny he has been under for most of the last 25 years, I think if there was something it would have been found.

I think it more probable that focusing attention on him early in the investigation diverted the focus away from other lines of investigation which might have been more productive in solving the case.