Re: The murder of Jodi Jones

[nugnug]

Apparently, one diary went missing. It had been referred to in a statement, which is how the police knew about it, but when the police came to collect it, it couldn't be found.

dident she have more than one dairy though becouse passages of her dairy have been queted.

[sandra L]

Yes, there were three in total, but only two were recovered.

[nugnug]

so what happened to the third im guessing it would of been in her bedrom I am all guessing that should would of removed it from there meaning somebody else did.

[TheArmchairDetective]

What happened to it? It’s obviously been removed or discarded for some reason.  According to Sandra’s book, the Jones family seem good at covering up evidence and keeping people and things out the limelight.  I think a key character in all of this was her brother JJ even though there was hardly a mention of him.

[nugnug]

What happened to it? It’s obviously been removed or discarded for some reason.  According to Sandra’s book, the Jones family seem good at covering up evidence and keeping people and things out the limelight.  I think a key character in all of this was her brother JJ even though there was hardly a mention of him.

im thinking if hetoldhis mother things he read ij jodis dairy theres a good chance he may of told oter people as well and that could of had consuences.

[TheArmchairDetective]

I think there’s more to Joseph Jones than what’s been disclosed.  His alibi that he was at home on June 30th was contradicted by Ferris.  The accounts of Ferris undermined a lot of the statements to be honest, but this guy had a propensity for violence and grossly managed to go under the radar. 

I think Ferris simply shat himself when he realised the screws were onto him and Dickie on the path, hence why he started acting suspicious with the mad hair cuts.  I think there’s more evidence to suggest someone in Jodi’s family is linked to it.  A witness identified a member of Jodi’s family as Stocky Man, who was also the dude who claimed to be at home all day.

That of course would imply - if you read the book - it was Joseph Jones

[nugnug]

I think there’s more to Joseph Jones than what’s been disclosed.  His alibi that he was at home on June 30th was contradicted by Ferris.  The accounts of Ferris undermined a lot of the statements to be honest, but this guy had a propensity for violence and grossly managed to go under the radar. 

I think Ferris simply shat himself when he realised the screws were onto him and Dickie on the path, hence why he started acting suspicious with the mad hair cuts.  I think there’s more evidence to suggest someone in Jodi’s family is linked to it.  A witness identified a member of Jodi’s family as Stocky Man, who was also the dude who claimed to be at home all day.

That of course would imply - if you read the book - it was Joseph Jones

i wonder if ferris actully was with joe that night and hes actully lying about on the bike

i find odd that joe would use him as an albi withot asking ifthe albi was not true.

i mean they all talked to eah other so joe would know ferris was with dickie if was with dickie so joe is hardly likely to say  ferris is with him knowing full well hes been seen somewhere else that leads me to belive joe is telling the truth and ferris was with him and somebody else was with dickie.

[nugnug]

this is of course why jodis gran told ferris not to go to the police becouse by doing so hes leaing joe without an albi.

and also making jodis mum look like a liar

[sandra L]

What happened to it? It’s obviously been removed or discarded for some reason.

Judith seemed to think the police had it, the police didn't think they did (obviously) because they were asking about it.  Another possibility is that it had been collected at some point and is, to this day, lying in a police storage unit somewhere (it's not as if that's never happened in Scottish policing before!!!)

According to Sandra’s book, the Jones family seem good at covering up evidence and keeping people and things out the limelight.

I don't know if it's the case that Jodi's family were good at these things or if it was more that the police just never asked - if you think about it, prior to Jodi being found, Ferris, Dickie, Joseph, Alice Walker, Janine and Judith (at least) all knew that Ferris left Alice Walker's with Joseph on the morning of June 30th and went to Judith's house, but the police had to put out a public appeal for the boys on the moped on the afternoon of July 4th. I would have expected a police investigation of this magnitude should have uncovered the main people in the houses Jodi might have been prior to her murder within the first few days. According to Corinne and others, Judith said, on either July 3rd or July 5th "Thank goodness they didn't find out about Joseph's illness," suggesting it was more a complete failure of police to ask the relevant questions. Likewise, Ferris's claim that his gran told him not to go to the police appears never to have been checked by investigators.

I think a key character in all of this was her brother JJ even though there was hardly a mention of him.

I think it was left looking that way because of terrible failings with the investigation. As I've said so many times, if the right questions had been asked at the very beginning, we wouldn't still (16 years later) be looking at so many unanswered questions.

[sandra L]

i wonder if ferris actully was with joe that night and hes actully lying about on the bike

i find odd that joe would use him as an albi withot asking ifthe albi was not true.

i mean they all talked to eah other so joe would know ferris was with dickie if was with dickie so joe is hardly likely to say  ferris is with him knowing full well hes been seen somewhere else that leads me to belive joe is telling the truth and ferris was with him and somebody else was with dickie.

But it wasn't Joseph who said Ferris was with him that afternoon, it was Judith. Joseph said Ferris only stayed a short while - less than half an hour - then left around 1 o'clock (which ties in with other statements that Ferris was in Dickie's house by 3 o'clock). The problem with that is, Judith's reason for cancelling the home visit by the psychiatrist then falls apart - she said it was so that Joseph could continue smoking cannabis with Ferris, up in his room, but if Ferris had already been gone for two and a half hours by then, that can't be correct.

Also, according to Judith, Ferris left her house "at some point" before Jodi got in from school at approximately 3.50- 3.55, but she (Judith) cancelled the appointment at 3.23pm, so Ferris must have left within less than half an hour of that cancellation, but Judith didn't hear him leave (even though the reason for the cancellation was so that he and Joseph could continue smoking).

The story about Ferris supposedly returning to Judith's house at 6pm that evening didn't emerge until more than a week into the investigation. It's probably just coincidence, but 6pm - 7pm (approximately) was the only time Judith's statements didn't provide an alibi for Joseph, so it ends up looking like Ferris (again) was supposed to be Joseph's alibi that evening, but failed to show.

What's surprising about all of this is that they were all talking from the early hours of July 1st - we know a group of Jodi's extended family members were in Judith's house by 4am and even more gathered in Alice's house later that morning - there was plenty of time to check with each other whether their recollections about June 30th tallied with other people's.

[sandra L]

I think there’s more to Joseph Jones than what’s been disclosed.  His alibi that he was at home on June 30th was contradicted by Ferris.

I think there's more to a great deal of things than what's been disclosed. It doesn't necessarily mean any of them are "linked" to the murder, it just means there are huge areas of doubt about what was going on within Jodi's wider family that day.

The accounts of Ferris undermined a lot of the statements to be honest, but this guy had a propensity for violence and grossly managed to go under the radar.

Ferris left so many people looking "suspicious" - again, the problem is, a lot of what he said was never followed up properly. We can infer, from some of the other statements, that he appeared to be telling the truth in places (for example, Yvonne Walker's assertion that Ferris intended to go to the police on July 1st and tell them he was on the path, on the moped), except that Ferris later denied saying that to Yvonne. Or the Dickies' statements that Ferris was in their house prior to 3pm. Trying to unravel what's true and what isn't from Ferris's statements is challenging. Several people with propensities for violence managed to go under the radar in this case.

I think Ferris simply shat himself when he realised the screws were onto him and Dickie on the path, hence why he started acting suspicious with the mad hair cuts.

Why though? If they saw, nothing, heard nothing, knew nothing, why would they sh*t themselves? They were just a couple of lads messing about on a moped. The guy on the pushbike didn't sh*t himself when he realised he'd been on the path at the relevant time - he just called the cops and told them so. The dog walkers who were at the top of the path at the relevant time didn't sh*t themselves, they just called the cops and told them.

I think there’s more evidence to suggest someone in Jodi’s family is linked to it.

I don't. At the moment, the best that can be said is that there could have been stronger circumstantial cases built against others (some members of Jodi's family, some not) than the case that was built against Luke. That doesn't mean any of them were "linked" to the murder, it just means they could have been fitted up for it just as easily as Luke was. The only person "linked" in what we would consider traditional terms is the sister's boyfriend because of the DNA deposit on Jodi's t-shirt and the implication that other deposits came from that original one. If the claim about rainwater/washing machine transfer is discredited, then, apart from the condom and the unidentified DNA profiles, it is the only solid evidence "linking" another person to the crime scene and the body.

A witness identified a member of Jodi’s family as Stocky Man, who was also the dude who claimed to be at home all day.

That of course would imply - if you read the book - it was Joseph Jones

But all that tells us is that his alibi was not what it was claimed to be. It doesn't "link" him to the murder - everything we know about Joseph is circumstantial. What we know might have built a circumstantial case against him that a jury would have considered "compelling," but it wouldn't actually prove he did anything wrong.

All my points about other people and the circumstances surrounding them are made to demonstrate how very poor the police investigation was and the extent of the double standards required to make the case against Luke stick.

[TheArmchairDetective]

“It doesn’t necessarily mean any of it is linked to the murder”

The amount of contradictions in all of the statements between the members in this family certainly make it look as though someone knows something and aren’t letting on.

Do you think there are people who know more than they have let on?

You answer the previous points in a way that sort of says, well, perhaps one could view it as suspicious, but it was the fault of the Police not to take it further.  I can see that you don’t want to name or blame, but are there, in your opinion, people outlined within the book who should be sent down for the crime? Or, do you consider that this murder was committed by a complete stranger?

You do make several “hints” along the way in the book as to who you think could be responsible, and that these hints are definitely geared towards an inside job. 

Also, in the Stocky Man chapter, who was the witness who came forward that identified him as a member of Jodi’s family, and was this sighting considered credible? Think this was page 111 in your new book...

[TheArmchairDetective]

“The only person "linked" in what we would consider traditional terms is the sister's boyfriend because of the DNA deposit on Jodi's t-shirt and the implication that other deposits came from that original one”

Do we have any further information yet as to whose DNA was contained within the saliva, short colourless hairs and sweat? I’m aware that they only tested this against Mitchell, but has there been any developments over the years that may point to someone else?  Could the short colourless hairs have been deliberately treated with peroxide as a means of avoiding leaving a trace? Could these have been dog hair? What are these samples that we know of, and does anyone else match these other than Kelly?

Lastly, what do you presume will happen from this new knife that has been reported in the media? I don’t mean the 2010 “Luke” knife; I mean the one found in a dry-stone dyke by a local farmer hiding under rocks some 500yards from the murder site.  Where do things stand with this? The media say Luke Mitchell’s campaigners want this knife to be tested. 

Where are we at with this?

[sandra L]

The amount of contradictions in all of the statements between the members in this family certainly make it look as though someone knows something and aren’t letting on.

It does make it look like that, and that's the problem - since those contradictions were never followed up to confirm or refute, there is clearly a large amount of reasonable doubt in this case which, unfortunately, ends up turning the spotlight on Jodi's family. As I said in the book, there may be perfectly innocent explanations for all of them, but since the questions were never asked, we just don't know.

Do you think there are people who know more than they have let on?

Yes, but not necessarily members of Jodi's family or extended family.

You answer the previous points in a way that sort of says, well, perhaps one could view it as suspicious, but it was the fault of the Police not to take it further.  I can see that you don’t want to name or blame, but are there, in your opinion, people outlined within the book who should be sent down for the crime? Or, do you consider that this murder was committed by a complete stranger?

My answer doesn't "sort of" say it - it's the whole point. The police should have taken all of it further - our convictions are supposed to be based on proof "beyond reasonable doubt". It's up to the police to investigate areas of doubt and eliminate them - they didn't do that.

I wouldn't name or blame - to do so would be to do what was done to Luke. I've no idea whether people outlined in the book should be "sent down" - every single one of them would be entitled to a fair trial, based on solid evidence and it would be up to a jury to decide who should be "sent down". And, even then, the jury might get it wrong.

I've said for many years, there's a huge possibility that this was a stranger murder (as in, the killer didn't know Jodi personally).

You do make several “hints” along the way in the book as to who you think could be responsible, and that these hints are definitely geared towards an inside job.

My apologies, I didn't intend for anything in the book to suggest I was "hinting" at any individual or even group of individuals - my point was intended to be, repeatedly, why don't we have answers and explanations for this, this and this. 

Also, in the Stocky Man chapter, who was the witness who came forward that identified him as a member of Jodi’s family, and was this sighting considered credible? Think this was page 111 in your new book...

The sighting was considered credible from the off - it's 50% of what police appeals for "Stocky Man" were based on! If you mean, was the identification credible, I'd say, on the basis of the information available to the witness, yes, it probably was. The witness pointed out a particular male from a group of several males not known to him/her and said - he's the guy.  Had that been an ID parade, it would have been called a "positive identification." The problem was, the police buried that information and it didn't re-emerge until 2013/14. The witness did not name the male -s/he merely pointed out a male in a crowd as the person referred to as Stocky Man and that information was never released to the defence.

[nugnug]

i wonder if the dairy might resurface at some time.