Could Someone other than Jeremy or Sheila have comitted the murders at WHF?

[haughton]

this farmhouse is very large, so perhaps a third suspect could have been still in there when the EP broke in. I'm not suggesting Priest Holes!, but did the EP search every corner?

[ceedeells]

It all hinges uopn Jeremy's word that his father telephoned him. If we believe this to be true then this in itself rules out a "hitman". To my mind I have considered this at depth and thought it extremely unlikely.

Not quite, Grahame. 

What 'if', a hitman where involved (not for a minute do I believe Jeremy hired him), but what if....and the hitman wanted JB dead too.

He needed Jeremy to come over, so got his father to phone him.  Now, 'what if'....the father's first call was to the Police.  Eg:  The hitman has told Neville to phone Jeremy,  Neville picks up the phone and start to dial.  During this Neville has a gun to his head/neck, which is where we get the marks from on Nevilles' neck.   The hitman thinks Neville is phoning Jeremy, however, the phone numbers are so similar, that Neville is in fact, phoning the POLICE...NOT Jeremy.   This also answers the question as to why Neville never called 999.

After a beating...Neville then phones Jeremy.

Clever and interesting scenario.  Not a very pleasant one.  There's something horrific about the concept that the killings are premeditiated by a third party, as opposed to frenzied psychotic rage on the part of Sheila.  We are getting in to Law1 territory here.

p.s. Is law1 the alter ego of jailman?

Sorry Grahame, missed that.

Then we ask, well, how did Sheila get from downstairs to upstairs...for we know for certain she was still alive.


Imagine, things from Sheila's point of view.  Girl with severe mental illness who has, in the past, spoken of wanting to kill herself and her own sons etc.  Suddenly, she comes round after the first shot, and takes everything in that she is the sole surviver in a family massacre.  After all she has endured at the hands of this killer, her whole family destroyed she would be in a complete state of panic and fear and utter bewilderment.

She realises the police are also in the house.  She has seconds to take this all in......'what is she going to do?  Who is going to believe her that she is innocent?  Also, everyone else is dead....what has she to live for?' 

Her mind caves in, the medication she is on only adds to her irrational thinking. 

She faces the rest of her life being locked up in a mental asylum or prison and is branded as a child killer.   

How many options has she?

I think Sheila took what she thought was the best option at the time.......she saw no future and took her own life.

Those actions then resulted in a Police cover up.........

This scenario would leave both Jeremy and Sheila innocent of all charges and victims.

I have never liked the idea of people branding Sheila a 'nutter' or portraying her as a 'murderer'.  What if, along with Neville, she did all she could to protect her family.......and lost her own life in the end.

I apologise in advance if somebody else has already posted such an idea......the forum is so big one cannot read all of it in such a short space of time.

[curiousessex]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.
(iv) Nevill, according to Jeremy's witness statement details 'Sheila' with a/ the gun.
(v) Jeremy's telephone call to the police reports Sheila with the gun.
(vi) IF Nevill rang the police, according to the claims of the defence, Nevill would be detailing Sheila with a gun.
(vii) If Nevill is in the kitchen before sustaining any injuries he would have easy access to numerous objects to defend himself, possibly even other guns located in White House Farm together with easy aces to ammunition that is spread out over the sideboard by the telephone which he has allegedly been using.

[clifford]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.
(iv) Nevill, according to Jeremy's witness statement details 'Sheila' with a/ the gun.
(v) Jeremy's telephone call to the police reports Sheila with the gun.
(vi) IF Nevill rang the police, according to the claims of the defence, Nevill would be detailing Sheila with a gun.
(vii) If Nevill is in the kitchen before sustaining any injuries he would have easy access to numerous objects to defend himself, possibly even other guns located in White House Farm together with easy aces to ammunition that is spread out over the sideboard by the telephone which he has allegedly been using.

I agree with you curious,
I thought for a long time a third party was involved, but I was trying to take jeremy out of the frame.
I think the original thought that Sheila was the shooter are correct.
I have for the past couple of days been looking at the statements the family made.
The inconsistantcies from all are mind boggling.
For instance Ann said she unloaded the guns from WHF, and put them in a safe place,
DB said he unloaded the guns, and left them with Ann, and did not know what happened to them.
This is the same DB that was concerned about marks on the silencer.
This silencer was handed over to Jones by Peter Eaton.
Ann said she opened the cupboard in the den and took out a shotgun.
David said HE opened the cupboard, and went on to explain what he found.
The moderator that was supposidly found and taken to Anns house had a grey hair on it.
The moderator was put in a plastic bag that Ann was standing on. Pretty good chance that it had hair on it then.
In Anns statements she mentions that Jones spent some time at her house drinking whiskey.
Later on she says that a number of officers drank a bottle of Whiskey between themselves, but were not drunk when they left.
This is unhealthy in regards to the closeness to the family.
Bear in mind that Ann said to JB that WHF would be his and Julies soon, and JB replied that they preferred Vaulty farm. Alarm bells ringing.
To my mind Stan Jones was corrupt, and if if was'nt for the demise of Taff Jones Jeremy would not have been convicted. Still trawling.

[nugnug]

there were certanly others who had a motive to do it.

[andrea]

the police and the family were too close, did they recieve gifts from the family after jbs conviction?

[grahameb]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.

The call could have been made "before" he received those injuries. Why do people assume that he could never have spoken because of his facial injuries. The would obviously be a sequence of events which would not be the sequence that we ourselves may think?

[mike tesko]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.
(iv) Nevill, according to Jeremy's witness statement details 'Sheila' with a/ the gun.
(v) Jeremy's telephone call to the police reports Sheila with the gun.
(vi) IF Nevill rang the police, according to the claims of the defence, Nevill would be detailing Sheila with a gun.
(vii) If Nevill is in the kitchen before sustaining any injuries he would have easy access to numerous objects to defend himself, possibly even other guns located in White House Farm together with easy aces to ammunition that is spread out over the sideboard by the telephone which he has allegedly been using.

-----------------

Jeremy never told the police that Ralph made the call to him, from the kitchen - everyone just assumes the call had to be made from the kitchen, but there is no direct evidence that it was made from there. It could just so easily have been made from the telephone in the upstairs office? Imagine if Ralph did make the call from upstairs, rather than downstairs, then of course Ralph could not have been wounded at the time he made the call to Jeremy because no blood at all was found anywhere inside the upstairs office or near the office telephone...

How come non of the police officers or SOC make much if any reference at all to the upstairs office or the telephone which was plugged in there at the material time?

Something fishy going on here, I am afraid...

[curiousessex]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.
(iv) Nevill, according to Jeremy's witness statement details 'Sheila' with a/ the gun.
(v) Jeremy's telephone call to the police reports Sheila with the gun.
(vi) IF Nevill rang the police, according to the claims of the defence, Nevill would be detailing Sheila with a gun.
(vii) If Nevill is in the kitchen before sustaining any injuries he would have easy access to numerous objects to defend himself, possibly even other guns located in White House Farm together with easy aces to ammunition that is spread out over the sideboard by the telephone which he has allegedly been using.

-----------------

Jeremy never told the police that Ralph made the call to him, from the kitchen - everyone just assumes the call had to be made from the kitchen, but there is no direct evidence that it was made from there. It could just so easily have been made from the telephone in the upstairs office? Imagine if Ralph did make the call from upstairs, rather than downstairs, then of course Ralph could not have been wounded at the time he made the call to Jeremy because no blood at all was found anywhere inside the upstairs office or near the office telephone...

How come non of the police officers or SOC make much if any reference at all to the upstairs office or the telephone which was plugged in there at the material time?

Something fishy going on here, I am afraid...

In reply............ How come Nevill did not make the alleged telephone call from the telephone in the bedroom? (I expect you will say because telephone that was normally in the bedroom was plugged in downstairs in the kitchen)

[tyler]

Curiousessex,there is a statement on the forum,(from the man who collected the cordless phone from whf in order to repair) that witnessed the cream dial telephone in situ in the kitchen prior to the murders.

[chochokeira]

In my opinion a third party would be inconsistant with Jeremy's original witness statements given on 7th and 8th August 1985.

Additionally
(i) Nevill clearly put up a fight for his life
(ii) Nevill is placed by both Jeremy's witness statement and Jeremy's call to the police in the kitchen using the telephone.
(iii) It has been detailed the medical reports determined Nevill could not have spoken with the sustained facial injuries / broken jaw.
(iv) Nevill, according to Jeremy's witness statement details 'Sheila' with a/ the gun.
(v) Jeremy's telephone call to the police reports Sheila with the gun.
(vi) IF Nevill rang the police, according to the claims of the defence, Nevill would be detailing Sheila with a gun.
(vii) If Nevill is in the kitchen before sustaining any injuries he would have easy access to numerous objects to defend himself, possibly even other guns located in White House Farm together with easy aces to ammunition that is spread out over the sideboard by the telephone which he has allegedly been using.

-----------------

Good points, Mike! Another +1

Jeremy never told the police that Ralph made the call to him, from the kitchen - everyone just assumes the call had to be made from the kitchen, but there is no direct evidence that it was made from there. It could just so easily have been made from the telephone in the upstairs office? Imagine if Ralph did make the call from upstairs, rather than downstairs, then of course Ralph could not have been wounded at the time he made the call to Jeremy because no blood at all was found anywhere inside the upstairs office or near the office telephone...

How come non of the police officers or SOC make much if any reference at all to the upstairs office or the telephone which was plugged in there at the material time?

Something fishy going on here, I am afraid...

[curiousessex]

Curiousessex,there is a statement on the forum,(from the man who collected the cordless phone from whf in order to repair) that witnessed the cream dial telephone in situ in the kitchen prior to the murders.

Tyler

In my opinion, if Nevill had it in his mind to make a telephone call whilst getting out of bed his normal reaction would be to use the telephone that was normally in the bedroom. Upon realising / remembering the telephone had been moved downstairs it is most likely he would go downstairs to try and use the very same telephone having remembered where the telephone was located.

As Mike pointed out there is no hard evidence, in any event, to detail which telephone Nevill used to make the alleged telephone calls. However, it is the case Jeremy informed the police that he had tried to call Nevill back immediately, a couple of times and all he got was the engaged tone. The police following Jeremy's call confirmed via the GPO that a telephone was off the hook.

When everything unfolded there was indeed a telephone that was 'off the hook' and it was the telephone in the kitchen beside which there was also a box of ammunition with spilled bullets which are accurately detailed in Jeremy's original witness statements.

[Hartley]

In addition to which, the door between the upstairs office and the main house was locked, so unless Ralph managed to lock it after he'd finished, the only access to the upstairs office was to go downstairs, through the kitchen, into the lobby near the back yard door and back upstairs using those stairs.

It would be unlikely in my opinion that he would walk past the phone in the kitchen to use the upstairs office phone.

[tyler]

Curious,I wasnt disagreeing with you,think I may have just got confused at what you was trying to say.

[curiousessex]

Curious,I wasnt disagreeing with you,think I may have just got confused at what you was trying to say.

Sorry to be confusing. I was predicting Mike's response and then providing answers to the predicted response.