1986 - Lord Maurice Drake 1986
"The sound moderator is clearly of very great importance, and the evidence relating to the sound moderator could, on its own, lead you to the conclusion that the defendant is guilty."
1989 Lord Lane C.J in the Court of Appeal
"The question of the silencer, quite apart from where it was found and how it got there in the cupboard, loomed very large first in the view of the Judge, certainly in the view of this Court and plainly in the view of the jury, because when they came back to ask a question it was a question directed to this very point".
"We need to hear blood expert's evidence regarding the blood in the silencer, (a) a perfect match of Sheila's blood, (b) what was the chance of the blood group being June and Ralph's mixing together"
"That of course was fatal, the jury accepted it"
"What is sometimes overlooked is that a direction to the jury reflects the sort of case with which the Judge was dealing. A strong prosecution case will inevitably result in what may be strong comments. Exactly the same with a strong defence case, that may justify strong comments."
1994 - Lord Justice Simon Brown - judicial review application.
"Part of the prosecution case was that blood inside the silencer, the result of back spatter, was Sheila Caffell's. If it was, that clearly was decisive against the defendant. The point plainly loomed large in the jury's thinking because the only question they asked during the entire eight hours of their deliberation was one directly relating to it. The question was whether the blood inside the silencer "was a perfect match of Sheila's blood" and whether there was a "chance of the blood group being June and Ralph's mixing together". The answer given was that the blood grouping was consistent with it being Sheila Caffell's blood and that the possibility of it being a mixture of her parents blood was remote. That exchange followed the jury's overnight stay at a hotel; two hours later they convicted by a majority of 10 to 2."
2000 - CCRC
"The Commission considers that the fresh evidence relating to the silencer severely undermines the Crown's case against Mr Bamber as it was presented to the jury."
"the DNA results as they stood began to support the theory put forward by the defence at trial"
2002: Lord Justice Kay Court of Appeal.
"Mr Webster concluded"
"The CCRC, in their statement of reasons, more or less excluded the possibility of contamination. In my opinion, the Commission was wrong to do so."
"We have no doubt at all that if this evidence had been placed before a jury, they would have concluded, as we do, that in accordance with the emphasised part of Mr Webster's report quoted above, the DNA testing results were rendered "completely meaningless".
"Each member of the court has reached the conclusion that there is nothing in any of the matters raised before us that throws doubt upon the safety of these convictions. "
2012: Mr Justice Globe. Judicial review Bamber vs CCRC
"If there was evidence that the silencer was on the gun when the fatal shot was fired, then there would be little doubt about the safety of the conviction. But if there was no silencer on it, then there was, for the purposes of this application, sufficient that it might be necessary to refer it to the Court of Appeal on the basis that there was a real possibility that the sister was the murderer"
"Plainly if her blood flake was in the silencer it was a very formidable issue for Mr Bamber to overcome. It is suggested that on the basis of the materials put before the Commission there is a proper basis for investigating, even at this stage 27 years later, the possibility that it got there through contamination. The Commission took the view at paragraph 186 of its decision that there was no basis upon which that should be questioned. It is, in my view, not necessary for us to resolve that issue. I will assume that there may be some basis for challenging the conclusion."
"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."
"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."
"The evidence of Dr Fowler does not grapple with the evidence of the fight in the kitchen and the paint evidence, to which I have referred; second, it does not grapple with the contemporaneous evidence of Mr Fletcher and Dr Vanezis at the trial, which dealt with these issues."
"I cannot see how one can begin to say those are points that the Commission can in any way be criticised for arriving at. They must be plainly within that ambit of judgment open to the Commission. It therefore seems to me very, very difficult to see how, on the analysis that I have briefly summarised, the conclusion in relation to the evidence of Dr Fowler is susceptible to challenge."
