The fact experts in US claim such is meaningless when experts haven't challenged on behalf of prosecution.
The CCRC couldn't challenge the ballistic evidence, they had no counter-expert to challenge the findings of the US experts. What they did manage to do, was get a photographic counter-experts opinion on the reports of Peter Suthurst. Who believed Suthursts claims were inconclusive. This enabled to CCRC to deny a referral on labyrinthine technicality explained below.
"34. The evidence of Dr Fowler is set out in a more substantial report. That report has been peer?reviewed by Dr Dragovich, who is Chief Medical Examiner in Oakland County, Michigan and Dr Marcella Fierro, who is the retired Chief Medical Examiner to the Commonwealth of Virginia. Both have qualifications as forensic pathologists. In his careful report, Dr Fowler makes clear that he has reviewed the evidence, which was available in relation to the wounds. He concluded that the abrasions found were consistent with those of a rifle without a silencer, that there were no distinctive marks on the body which showed that a silencer had been attached, and the residue was consistent with contact wounds. He refers to further work that needs doing, a matter to which I will return in a moment.
35. The Commission's judgment on this matter, which is set out carefully in its decision, is at paragraphs 360 to 362. First of all, it is said that Dr Fowler did not deal with the fact that there was no residue found in the rifle, but there was the blood flake found in the silencer. Although there is really no answer to the first half of that observation, as regards the second there is the point, on which I was prepared to make an assumption, namely that there may be a problem with the blood flake. I have made that assumption because it seems to me that it is possible to do so by reference to the other reasons given by the Commission. The first is the fact that the evidence of Dr Fowler does not grapple with the evidence of the fight in the kitchen and the paint evidence."
"38.Taking, therefore, the three grounds relied on together, and for this purpose making an assumption again in favour of Mr Bamber on the first point, but doing so on the basis that the second and third points, namely the report of Dr Caruso and the report of Dr Fowler, have been dealt with by the Commission in a way that is not open to challenge", "11. That question again has resolved into a narrow issue as to whether, when the fatal shot was fired in the kitchen at the father, Mr Bamber senior, the rifle used had on it a silencer, it being accepted that if there was a silencer on it at that time the prospects of the sister being the murderer were nil."
They could have denied an application for an appeal. The silencer itself consists of two pillars of evidence
A - The blood on the inside that matches Sheila
B - The Paint on the outside that matches the AGA surround.
Dismantling A is all well and good but then you still have B showing the silencer was still used on the night. The same applies vice versa. For argument sake, If it was proven that the marks on Sheila's neck/chin show silencer abrasions but Jeremy could prove the scratches were put there afterwards, it does not overcome the evidence against him.
Suthurst's evidence was undermined Andy Laws claiming it was "inconclusive"
The logic applied by the CCRC makes sense, But it is raising the bar extremely high.
If it can be proven 100% that the scratches were made after the murders then they would probably have to grant an appeal.
the COA have already made a judgment back in 2002 on the relevant issue
"The sound moderator had on any view been attached to the rifle during the fight with Nevill Bamber in the kitchen. But if Sheila Caffell had committed suicide it must have been removed before she shot herself
Had the appellant's sister murdered the other members of her family with the moderator attached to the gun and then discovered she could not reach the trigger to kill herself, the moderator would have been found next to her body. There would have been no reason for her to have removed it and returned it to the gun cupboard before going back upstairs to commit suicide in her parents' room."
This brings us back the 2012 Judgment
"That question again has resolved into a narrow issue as to whether, when the fatal shot was fired in the kitchen at the father, Mr Bamber senior, the rifle used had on it a silencer, it being accepted that if there was a silencer on it at that time the prospects of the sister being the murderer were nil."
This is why the appeal was denied and the court sided with the CCRC.
