The murder of 14 year-old schoolgirl Jodi Jones near Edinburgh on 30 June 2003

[nugnug]

The pathologist said the similarities were superficial at best.

alarming that a proscuter can staray so far from what the patholgist actully said.

[nugnug]

ive neer had one.

[John]

One of the most enduring mysteries in this case is why Shane Mitchell failed to corroborate his younger brothers alibi when he was facing a murder charge, certainly Sandra Lean has never been able to explain it and mother Corrine has always avoided the question like the plague.  This is what seperates guilt from innocence in many cases, an inability to answer that one really simple but sticky question.

Bumped for Sandra Lean, won't hold my breath though. 

[mike tesko]

I do not believe that JJ died at 5.15pm, I strongly suspect her death to have occurred at around 8pm. If I am right, then the alibi Shane Mitchell did not provide for his younger brother, has no significance. What time did Luke Mitchell say he left home after having his tea with his mother? Is there a time line of his known movements from say 5.30pm, onward, that same evening?

[nugnug]

i think she did lardgely becouse there were no sightings of her after that i meean if she was still alive were was she.

[sandra L]

Called Jodi's landline from his mobile 5.32 and 5.40. Seen sitting on a wall at the end of his street 5 - 10 minutes later by three schoolboys who knew him Potentially seen in the same vicinity by the witnesses who later claimed they'd seen him at the entrance to the path (original claims were that they saw him "at the entrance to the Abbey" which is opposite the end of his street.)

Hung around waiting for Jodi - sighting of a youth at the entrance to Barrondale cottages (a little way up the Newbattle Road in the direction he would have expected Jodi to approach from) - I don't remember the exact time of this sighting - after 6pm, from memory.

Met up with some friends in the grounds of Newbattle Abbey around 7pm, played on a tarzan swing with them (after calling his mother and telling her to tell Jodi to come to the abbey if she turned up at the house) until 9.30, returned home, took the dog out around 10.30, received the text from Judith at 10.38pm.

Clothing described by the first youths who saw him matched descriptions of clothing given by youths he met around 7pm.

[marty]

what time was it that jodi was ungrounded

[sandra L]

Depending on which version of events you accept, she was ungrounded wto weeks previously, or at least by Saturday 28th June, when she left Luke's home in a taxi just before 10pm.

If you accept the "ungrounded on the afternoon of June 30th" version, the ungrounding happened a few minutes before 4.34pm - that was the time of her first text to Luke which, it was claimed, was made "immediately" she was ungrounded.

In one statement, Judith said she was sitting on the settee and Jodi was "trying to" talk to her (Judith). the statement says, "I was telling her to be quiet shoo and go out." Later, she said that was her way of telling Jodi she was ungrounded, so it seems, even from judith's own statements, she did not claim that she told Jodi directly that she was "ungrounded" - perhaps because, according to all of the other statements from Judith, Alice and Janine, Jodi's grounding had "petered" out and things had returned to normal two weeks before June 30th. Janine was able to give the exact date of the start of the grounding because it happened on the day of one of her exams. All of them agreed that the grounding ended within 4 weeks, which meant it was over two weeks prior to the murder.

[mike tesko]

i think she did lardgely becouse there were no sightings of her after that i meean if she was still alive were was she.

Being abused by her killer...

[marty]

Depending on which version of events you accept, she was ungrounded wto weeks previously, or at least by Saturday 28th June, when she left Luke's home in a taxi just before 10pm.

If you accept the "ungrounded on the afternoon of June 30th" version, the ungrounding happened a few minutes before 4.34pm - that was the time of her first text to Luke which, it was claimed, was made "immediately" she was ungrounded.

In one statement, Judith said she was sitting on the settee and Jodi was "trying to" talk to her (Judith). the statement says, "I was telling her to be quiet shoo and go out." Later, she said that was her way of telling Jodi she was ungrounded, so it seems, even from judith's own statements, she did not claim that she told Jodi directly that she was "ungrounded" - perhaps because, according to all of the other statements from Judith, Alice and Janine, Jodi's grounding had "petered" out and things had returned to normal two weeks before June 30th. Janine was able to give the exact date of the start of the grounding because it happened on the day of one of her exams. All of them agreed that the grounding ended within 4 weeks, which meant it was over two weeks prior to the murder.

What I don't get, if luke wasn't at home, as is claimed, what was he doing?. He couldn't have been hiding waiting to pounce on jodi as she was grounded as far as he knew.

[sandra L]

There are some claims that Luke didn't return home after school, because he went straight to the woodlands strip to "wait" for Jodi. There are several problems with this theory (not least the witnesses who saw him walking his usual route home).

Firstly, either he would have had to be carrying the weapon with which Jodi was killed throughout his day at school, or he had "stashed" it somewhere in advance. It was never the prosecution stance that the murder had been pre-planned - their approach was that a fight had spontaneously erupted when Jodi allegedly confronted Luke about another girl. From all of the forensic and pathology evidence available, the knife used to murder and mutialate Jodi was a large knife - where did Luke "conceal" such a knife on his person throughout the school day?

The claimed spontaneous fight came about because, the prosecution claimed (without a scrap of evidence), Jodi had found out at lunchtime about another girl. So, staying with the "he didn't go home after school, he went straight to the woodland strip" theory,  Luke had no reason to leave the house that morning carrying a large, concealed knife. He didn't go home at lunchtime, so when did he acquire the knife in order to take it straight to the woodland strip after school?

Then there's the point you make, marty - if the ungrounding that day story is true, Luke would then be waiting in a woodland strip for someone who wasn't going to be out of her house that evening.

Next, there's the curious question of why he would have come out of "hiding" to put himself in full view at the Easthouses entrance to the path (as per the Bryson sighting) - why didn't he just wait at the junction of the paths until Jodi happened along there? If he'd hidden for over an hour, why choose to come out of hiding at all... and what a coincidence that he came out of hiding to be at the entrance to the path in the one minute window available to Andrina Bryson to make her sighting!!

(For clarity, the Bryson sighting was timed at 4.49 - 4.54. It could not have been 4.49, because Jodi did not leave her home until 4.50. It could not have been prior to 4.52:40, because the walk from Jodi's house to the Easthouses entrance to the path was timed at 2 minutes and 40 seconds, so there is just 1 minute 20 seconds for the Byrson sighting to have happened, accccording to the official timings.)

And we still have the mystery of the landline making an outbound call at around 4.15pm, and a dinner that cooked itself by 5.15pm

[John]

There are some claims that Luke didn't return home after school, because he went straight to the woodlands strip to "wait" for Jodi. There are several problems with this theory (not least the witnesses who saw him walking his usual route home).

Firstly, either he would have had to be carrying the weapon with which Jodi was killed throughout his day at school, or he had "stashed" it somewhere in advance. It was never the prosecution stance that the murder had been pre-planned - their approach was that a fight had spontaneously erupted when Jodi allegedly confronted Luke about another girl. From all of the forensic and pathology evidence available, the knife used to murder and mutialate Jodi was a large knife - where did Luke "conceal" such a knife on his person throughout the school day?

The claimed spontaneous fight came about because, the prosecution claimed (without a scrap of evidence), Jodi had found out at lunchtime about another girl. So, staying with the "he didn't go home after school, he went straight to the woodland strip" theory,  Luke had no reason to leave the house that morning carrying a large, concealed knife. He didn't go home at lunchtime, so when did he acquire the knife in order to take it straight to the woodland strip after school?

Then there's the point you make, marty - if the ungrounding that day story is true, Luke would then be waiting in a woodland strip for someone who wasn't going to be out of her house that evening.

Next, there's the curious question of why he would have come out of "hiding" to put himself in full view at the Easthouses entrance to the path (as per the Bryson sighting) - why didn't he just wait at the junction of the paths until Jodi happened along there? If he'd hidden for over an hour, why choose to come out of hiding at all... and what a coincidence that he came out of hiding to be at the entrance to the path in the one minute window available to Andrina Bryson to make her sighting!!

(For clarity, the Bryson sighting was timed at 4.49 - 4.54. It could not have been 4.49, because Jodi did not leave her home until 4.50. It could not have been prior to 4.52:40, because the walk from Jodi's house to the Easthouses entrance to the path was timed at 2 minutes and 40 seconds, so there is just 1 minute 20 seconds for the Byrson sighting to have happened, accccording to the official timings.)

And we still have the mystery of the landline making an outbound call at around 4.15pm, and a dinner that cooked itself by 5.15pm

It's good to see that you are at last considering these questions Sandra instead of blindly claiming that Luke Mitchell is innocent without the slightest scrap of evidence to support it.  All those elements you raise above are indeed very possible and if he is guilty would have come together as the prosecution suggested.

Luke Mitchell was not seen going into his house after school neither was he seen leaving it the entire day.  That in itself is just a tad surprising given that his house was near to the entrance of the housing estate and would have been passed by many residents at various times.  When I visited the Mitchell estate some years ago I carried out several observations and took many photographs.  My conclusion was that Luke Mitchell could not have returned home or departed again unseen unless he was intentionally avoiding attracting attention.

You and I know very well that there is a secluded route across a stream which runs from the end of Roan's Dyke to a point very near the Mitchell home.  A route which coincidentally exits at a field gate on the main road where two women in a car saw a youth matching Mitchell's description loitering suspiciously a matter of minutes after Jodi's murder.  A route which was mentioned at trial having been the subject of some searching by a local resident with some gun dogs.  So the mystery of how Mitchell got home and managed to reemerge back out onto the main road again by 4.50pm is not really a mystery after all.

[John]

Luke called the premium rate speaking clock from his mobile phone at 16:54 only a minute before he was spotted arguing with a female at the east end of Roan's Dyke path. It's safe to say he wasn't at home at this time.

Sandra seems to think he was at home burning the pie while an apparently deaf unobservant Shane sat upstairs watching porn and car videos while listening for someone arriving home.

Just a thought, if there was indeed a burned pie could it be that it was burned because there was nobody in the house to watch it? 

[nugnug]

Depending on which version of events you accept, she was ungrounded wto weeks previously, or at least by Saturday 28th June, when she left Luke's home in a taxi just before 10pm.

If you accept the "ungrounded on the afternoon of June 30th" version, the ungrounding happened a few minutes before 4.34pm - that was the time of her first text to Luke which, it was claimed, was made "immediately" she was ungrounded.

In one statement, Judith said she was sitting on the settee and Jodi was "trying to" talk to her (Judith). the statement says, "I was telling her to be quiet shoo and go out." Later, she said that was her way of telling Jodi she was ungrounded, so it seems, even from judith's own statements, she did not claim that she told Jodi directly that she was "ungrounded" - perhaps because, according to all of the other statements from Judith, Alice and Janine, Jodi's grounding had "petered" out and things had returned to normal two weeks before June 30th. Janine was able to give the exact date of the start of the grounding because it happened on the day of one of her exams. All of them agreed that the grounding ended within 4 weeks, which meant it was over two weeks prior to the murder.

strange how many versions there are.

[sandra L]

Luke called the premium rate speaking clock from his mobile phone at 16:54 only minutes before he was spotted arguing with a female at the east end of Roan's Dyke path. It's safe to say he wasn't at home at this time.

No, not "only minutes before" - in the exact 1 minute 20 second window for the Andrina Bryson sighting - and guess where Mrs Bryson said the male's hands were? Stretched out in front of him, gesticulating at the female ... not clamping a phone to his ear.