I don't need to giantize Bamber's faults. He stole money from the family business, sold cannabis on the side, killed five members of his adopted family, laughed about it behind closed doors, refused to allow devout June to be buried as she would have wished, attempted to sell lewd photographs of his dead sister and a whole load of other family heirlooms, shoved the twins' possessions into a binbag for Colin to collect and went on foreign jaunts with the blood money.
He is a thoroughly evil human being.
Are you sure about all these?
(i). He did steal money from the family business. You are right about that. But he did it once and you did say we should ignore things that people do once, so let us be consistent and call it a - what was that phrase you were using earlier? - 'spur-of-the-moment' 'white collar crime spree'. Let's also remember that, when confronted about it, he admitted it. He didn't have to come clean. He could have just remained silent or even brazened it out and put them to proof. Since he is supposed to be guilty, what would he have had to lose? Where I do agree with guilters about this is that the whole excuse he gave at the time, and maintains now, that he was checking security arrangements is just spurious. Clearly he robbed the site for the money. We know he did it for that motive, because he promptly spent the money.
(ii). He did sell cannabis on the side. Not necessarily the worst crime and lots of young men of similar character engage in that kind of minor offending. What is bad about the drugs side of things is that he also trafficked drugs into the country for resale, which tells me he was on his way to getting himself into serious trouble at some point anyway.
(iii). You are correct that he was convicted of killing five members of his family. This whole forum is about whether he actually did it, but at this point in time he stands convicted.
(iv). Jeremy denies laughing about the shootings behind closed doors, but even if he did laugh, it's not a crime and it doesn't mean he committed the killings. People even laugh and joke at funerals sometimes. I'm not sure what we can deduce from it, and it's dangerous to make deductions about odd, erratic or eccentric behaviour because we may be stringing together isolated facts that have no particular significance. Jeremy was somewhat immature. That doesn't mean he was a murderer. He played around with Julie in the back of the car [Q. What does that say about Julie? Nobody asks that], but that may have been a way of relieving tension and/or a reaction to grief. It's not often that your parents' funeral is filmed live in front of the world's media.
(v). Jeremy disputes what you say about June's funeral arrangements. He says that, as June was murdered, it was appropriate that she should be cremated and this was in line with June's Christian beliefs.
(vi). The allegation that he attempted to sell lewd photographs of his sister is disputed by Jeremy and relies on the word of a particularly scummy tabloid journalist who was well-known for telling lies, making things up and exaggerating, and is now deceased. I see no reason to believe the journalist. It may also be that there is no reason to believe Jeremy, but the two cancel each other out. I can't remember what Brett Collins, who was supposed to be there, has to say about it all, but I'm equally reluctant to believe a word he says - which probably explains why I've forgotten. If Brett Collins told me the time of day, I'd have to ring up the Greenwich Meridian to double-check. There are also one or two chronological holes in the story. For instance, it's said that Jeremy would have had nothing to sell, as the negatives had been taken by Colin. Colin may contradict this, but then, Colin has every reason to be biased. Moreover, Colin wrote a book about how robins solve murders and Betty Shine revealed his destiny, so I'm not sure what credence can be put on things he says.
(vii). Jeremy sold family heirlooms because that is what he was entitled to do, and supposed to do. Unless you're suggesting that he should have maintained The White House as it was, as if his parents were still living there? Like a museum? That is rather ridiculous. Maybe he did act with some insensitivity, but he was adopted, so would not have had the same emotional connection to the heirlooms as a blood son would have had. I suppose you blame him for that too? He would also have had bills to pay and, if he is innocent, he would have been grieving amidst it all. I also find it doubtful that he murdered five people just so that he could sell some antiques.
(viii). If it is true that Jeremy cleared out the twins' possessions and put them in bin bags, that was insensitive, but I'm not sure what can be read into it. People can be insensitive. Jeremy was an arrogant young man - that is not disputed by most people. I feel sorry for Colin in that situation because he must have felt that he had suffered loss upon loss and that he had lost a tangible connection with his sons that he wanted to say Goodbye to, in one final poignant moment. That's horrible, but it doesn't make Jeremy 'evil' or a murderer.
(ix). Jeremy went on holiday. People go on holiday. You call that 'foreign jaunts with the blood money'. Are you saying when a relative dies, there is a fixed period during which somebody should not go on holiday or take any sort of restful break? When do you suggest he should have stopped publicly grieving? And from memory, didn't Colin go on holiday and also buy himself a new car during this period? Or am I mistaken? Not that this, even if true, would excuse Jeremy if he was unpardonably insensitive, but why are you insisting on precise adherence to careful, neo-Victorian social mores from Jeremy and not others? Did the Eatons go on holiday that year? Maybe we should check with everybody? What if Stan and Taff went off on a lads' drinking blag to Ibiza? How would that look?
This may be an opportune moment to mention again what happened immediately after the trial:
1. The entire CID capacity of Essex Police repaired to a nearby hotel for an orgiastic, sweaty, mayhemic bender in which, to the man, they got themselves snozzled on cheap acidic ale, in the company of one Kelvin MacKenzie, and quite possibly, a certain David Boutflour. Not only that, one member of this Forum who claimed to be in know - and I stress, as matters stand, this claim is unproven - told us that this Kelvin MacKenzie told the following to anybody who could hear him above the deafening music: "We know the little sh*t is innocent".
2. A certain student teacher by the name Julie Mugford was posing for racy snaps in her lingerie for a scummy two-bit tabloid newspaper. Not just any scummy two-bit tabloid newspaper, but the worst of the worst of the worst. The very scum that decades later hacked the phones of the families of murder victims.
Think on that. Think on.
