Vic, apologies, I forgot, can I also ask you:
3. Does your 'JB did it' theory view JB as the murderer or does it favour the idea of a hitman?
Dear Keira,
Goodness! Where to begin......
The phone call. 'Terrified' father calls....doesn't call 999, gets phone book, calls witham, back to phone book, calls chelmsford, gets agitated, calls Julie, leaves house, gets overtaken by Police car. (Team JB now creeping time of call and introducing another call to get round some of the problems with this.)
Jeremy adamant father said "Sheila" has got THE gun, so completely rules out anyone else being involved. (Team JB have in the past said he may have misheard this, to introduce someone else)
Read the actual descriptions of what was done to the victims.....Arc of bullets into one of the twins heads, Nevill's injuries to his face, all done by Sheila? A woman whom Jeremy himself admitted to having never seen fire a gun as an adult. How many times did she load the magazine? You try doing it! It's bloody hard going! And by Sheila? Yeah right!
Jeremy leaves gun in kitchen having shot rabbits without the sights on. For a start, especially with the twins in the house, Nevill would never have left it there. Secondly, what would JB have been doing shooting rabbits without the sight? (Bit convenient this rifle just lying around)If JB is innocent and the family framed him, then the silencer wasn't used. How can you shoot all those different people without anyone making an escape without the silencer?Sheila didn't have anywhere near enough blood on her top to suggest she could possibly have shot herself once, moved, then had another go. Oh, and without hardly a trace of anything on her hands to suggest she'd fired the rifle anyhow....
Julie told police that a hitman was to blame. Why? If she was lying then why not simply blame JB. Bit of a strange move to blame someone else instead.
Also WHY? Why would the police believe the evil relatives instead of taking the easier option and just blaming Sheila. Is it not possible that they were telling the truth when members of the police weren't convinced with the initial decision? If you, as a relative found the explanation so completely ridiculous would you not investigate it? Would you welcome JB back into the fold if you believed he may have wiped out half your family?
Have you ever considered how many people would have had to have lied all these years?? Hundreds...Relatives, Police, reinvestigation police, friends, ballistic experts, the list is endless.......and not ONE has ever come forward, even when JB offered ONE MILLION pounds to break cover.....
Just a brief selection of reasons......
Vic - You have set out fairly the main factors which have convinced you of Jeremy Bamber's guilt. Others have already posted responses but I would like to deal with the points which you have made relating to the rifle and silencer, because there is a genuine contrary argument which can be advanced in relation to each of your points. I apologise to other members of the forum who will have read earlier posts of mine dealing with several of the points but I do believe that it is important that Vic's points are answered. I will deal with the points briefly following the order in Vic's post.
1. The "arc of bullets" fired into the head of one of the twins is not indicative of anything. The rifle was light in weight and semiautomatic with a light trigger pull. Anyone, whether or not experienced in the use of firearms, could fire a sequence of shots very rapidly. The "arc" of shots could easily be the result of the end of the barrel moving slightly during the course of the shots being fired. The number of shots strongly suggests to me that the murderer of the twins was involved in a frenzied attack rather than a cold calculated execution. A single shot to the head of each of the twins at close range would have been sufficient to cause death. It would also have been the natural method to be used by a calm and calculating murderer in that there would have been more rounds left in the rifle to deal with the remaining victims.
2. It is not hard to load the magazine of a .22 Anschutz rifle. At the trial evidence was given that it became progressively harder to load bullets the nearer the magazine came to be full. The final round (the 10th) required some effort and the jury were invited to experiment themselves with loading bullets into the magazine. However the first 6 or 7 rounds are very easy to load. It is only as the spring within the magazine becomes more compressed that loading requires more pressure to be applied. It is likely in my view that the rifle at WHF was reloaded several times during the course of the shootings, with perhaps 4 or 5 bullets loaded each time. I have also explained on an earlier thread the ease with which individual rounds can be loaded and fired, by placing a round directly into the breach of the rifle rather than into the magazine. i believe that it is likely that this happened with some of the shots to Nevill and possibly to June.
3. It is perfectly possible to use the Anschutz rifle to shoot rabbits without the telescopic sights being fitted. The rifle had what are known as "iron sights" fitted as standard (the photographs of the rifle show these clearly) and the telescopic sights are an optional attachment. The standard "iron" sights enable the rifle to be fired accurately and quickly, particularly at close or moderate range. The telescopic sights assist with shooting accurately particularly at longer range, but only if they have been properly "zeroed". There is no evidence about whether the telescopic sights had been properly and recently zeroed. If this had not been done, the telescopic sights would have been an impediment to shooting rabbits. If therefore on the evening before the killings at WHF Jeremy Bamber saw rabbits near the house, he may have found it more convenient to remove the telescopic sights and rely on the standard "iron" sights. There would be nothing sinister in this.
4. There is evidence that weapons security was lax at WHF. This was not unusual at the time, particularly for farmers. Now the accepted practice is for both shotguns and rifles to be stored when not in use unloaded in approved steel cabinets, firmly secured to the premises and in an area of the house where the cabinet cannot easily be seen. The situation in the mid 1980s was very different. Shotguns and rifles at WHF were not stored in secure cabinets. If Jeremy Bamber left the rifle on the settle in the scullery at WHF I do not believe it can be said with any degree of confidence that Nevill would have moved it.
5. The evidence is that the ammunition used was Eley hollowpoint subsonic. Even without the silencer fitted the noise of shots being fired would not have been great. There would not have been the "crack" generated by standard supersonic ammunition. It would have been perfectly possible for the shootings at WHF to have been carried out without a silencer being attached to the rifle. In addition we have no way of knowing the order in which each person was shot so I do not accept that the evidence indicates that a silencer was attached to the rifle at any stage.
Vic - I respect your views and accept that many people share them. However it is important to point out the contrary views on the points above which are at least as credible as the views you have expressed. It is also important to remember that if there are two alternative credible conclusions which may be drawn from proven facts, the defendant should be given the benefit of the doubt.
