White House Farm, scene of the murders, in 2007
Location	Near Tolleshunt D'Arcy, Essex
Coordinates	51°45′33″N 0°48′12″E / 51.7591°N 0.8032°E / 51.7591; 0.8032
Date	7 August 1985
Victims	Nevill Bamber (61), June Bamber (61), Sheila Caffell (28), Nicholas and Daniel Caffell (6)
Convictions	Jeremy Bamber (24 at the time) convicted of murder on 28 October 1986.
Sentence	Five life terms, to serve a minimum of 25 years; told in 1994 that he would never be released.

The White House Farm murders took place near the English village of Tolleshunt D'Arcy, Essex, on 7 August 1985, when Nevill Bamber, a farmer and magistrate, his wife June, their adoptive daughter, Sheila Caffell, and her six-year-old twin sons, were shot and killed during the night inside the Bambers' farmhouse.^[1]

The police at first believed that Sheila, diagnosed with schizophrenia, had fired the shots, then turned the gun on herself. But weeks after the murders, the ex-girlfriend of Nevill and June's adoptive son, Jeremy Bamber—the only surviving member of the immediate family—told police that Bamber had implicated himself. The prosecution argued that, motivated by a large inheritance, he had killed the family and placed the gun in his unstable sister's hands to make it look like a murder-suicide. A silencer the prosecution said was on the rifle would have made it too long, they argued, for her fingers to reach the trigger to shoot herself. He was convicted in October 1986 by a 10-2 majority, sentenced to a minimum of 25 years, and in 1994 was told he must spend the rest of his life in jail.^[2]

Bamber has protested his innocence throughout, though his extended family remain convinced of his guilt.^[3] The brutality of the murders and Bamber's efforts to secure his release have meant the case has rarely left the public eye. The Times wrote that it had all the ingredients of a classic whodunit: a massacre in the English countryside, overbearing parents, an unstable daughter, a scheming son, a jilted girlfriend, and bungling police.^[1]

Bamber's lawyers have submitted several applications to the Criminal Cases Review Commission for a new appeal; their latest was provisionally rejected in 2011, though they were granted leave to submit further forensic material.^[4] Their evidence included expert opinion that the silencer might not have been used during the killings, that the crime scene may have been damaged then reconstructed by police, that key crime-scene photographs were taken weeks after the murders, and that the timing of Sheila's death was miscalculated. One crucial issue is whether Bamber received a call from his father that night to say Sheila had gone "berserk" with a gun. Bamber said he did, that he alerted police, and that Sheila fired the final shot while he and the officers were standing outside the house.^[5] It became a central plank of the prosecution's case that the father had made no such call, and that the only reason Bamber would have lied about it—indeed, the only way he could have known about the shootings—was that he was the killer himself.^[6]

The Bambers

Nevill and June Bamber

Ralph Nevill Bamber (known as Nevill), 61 when he died, was a farmer, a local magistrate at Whitham Magistrates' Court, and former RAF pilot. He and his wife, June (née Speakman), also 61, had married in 1949 and moved into the Georgian White House Farm on Pages Lane, Tolleshunt D'Arcy, set among 300 acres of tenant farmland that had belonged to June's father. Unable to have biological children, they adopted Sheila and Jeremy—who were not related to one another—as babies. Nevill was described in court as 6' 4" tall and in good physical health, a point that became significant because Bamber's defence was that Sheila, a slim woman of 28, was able to beat and subdue her father, something the prosecution contested.^[7]

The Bambers were wealthy and gave the children a good home and private education, but June in particular was conservative and intensely religious, and reportedly tried to force her children and grandchildren to adopt the same ideas. She had a poor relationship with Sheila, who felt June disapproved of her, and her relationship with Bamber was so troubled that he had apparently stopped speaking to her. The court heard that Sheila's ex-husband was concerned about the effect June was having on his sons; she apparently made them kneel and pray with her, which upset him. She suffered from depression, and in 1982 was treated by the same Harley Street psychiatrist who later saw Sheila.^[8]

Sheila Caffell

Background and marriage

Sheila Jean Caffell (born 1957, 28 when she died) was born to the daughter of a chaplain of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and adopted by the Bambers when she was eight weeks old. She was sent to a private school in Norwich, then attended secretarial college in Swiss Cottage, London.^[9]

Sheila's relationship with June deteriorated significantly in June 1974, when June caught her having sex with a farmhand in a field. She reportedly started referring to Sheila, by then 17 years old, as the "devil's child," which Sheila's psychiatrist identified as the trigger for Sheila's paranoid delusions about having been taken over by the devil. When Sheila discovered she was pregnant from the relationship, the Bambers arranged an abortion.^[10]

Sheila continued with her secretarial course, then trained as a hairdresser, and briefly found work as a model with the Lucie Clayton agency.^[11] Shortly after the abortion, she met her future husband, Colin Caffell, and fell pregnant again twice, each time having a miscarriage. The couple decided to marry in May 1977 when Sheila was 20, to the Bambers' relief, and the twins were born on 22 June 1979. Claire Powell writes that the birth led to a deterioration in Sheila's mental health. She became increasingly erratic, throwing pots and pans at her husband, and once pushing her hands through a window, cutting herself. The couple separated just four months after the birth, and divorced in May 1982.^[12]

After the breakdown of the marriage, Nevill bought her a flat in Morshead Mansions, Maida Vale, and Colin continued to help raise the children from his home in nearby Kilburn. Sheila became friendly with a group of young women, who nicknamed her "Bambi," and who later told reporters that she was vulnerable and desperately insecure, often complaining about her poor relationship with her adoptive mother. One said there was a lot of partying and drugs, particularly cocaine, and lots of men—invariably older—who were interested in the women for all the wrong reasons.^[13] Her brief modelling career ended after the birth of the boys, and she lived either on welfare or took low-paying jobs, including as a waitress at School Dinners, where a traditional British menu is served up by young women in stockings and suspenders. There were also cleaning jobs, and there was one episode of nude photography, much regretted.^[14]

Mental health issues

Sheila's mental health continued to decline, with episodes of banging her head against walls, and becoming agitated to the point where one of her boyfriends feared for his safety.^[15] She decided to trace her birth mother, then living in Canada, and with the help of social services, they met at Heathrow airport in 1982 for a brief reunion, but it seems the relationship did not develop.^[16] The boys were briefly placed in foster care in 1982 and 1983, an arrangement which, the court heard later, seemed to cause no problems.^[17]

She was referred by her family doctor, in August 1983, to the psychiatrist who had earlier treated June, Dr Hugh Ferguson. He said she was in an agitated, paranoid and psychotic state, and he admitted her to St Andrew's Hospital in Northampton, where she was diagnosed as schizophrenic.^[18] He wrote that she believed the devil had given her the power to project evil onto others, and that she could make her sons have sex and cause violence with her. She called them the "devil's children," the phrase June had apparently used of Sheila, and said she believed she was capable of murdering them, or of getting them to kill others. She spoke about suicide, though Ferguson did not regard her as a suicide risk. He treated her with Stelazine, an anti-psychotic drug, and she was discharged on 10 September 1983.^[19]

In 1985, she became more enthusiastic about religion, to the surprise of her friends who, according to Claire Powell, had not even known she came from a religious family.^[20] She was re-admitted to St Andrew's in March 1985, five months before the murders, believing her boyfriend of the time to be the devil, and herself to be in direct communication with god.^[21] She was discharged just under four weeks later, and thereafter received monthly injections of haloperidol, an anti-psychotic drug that has a sedative effect.^[22] The court heard that her prescription was halved just before the murders, and that this might have made her more volatile than usual.^[21]

She went to stay at White House Farm for a while to recuperate. It was obvious to her friends that her mental health was deteriorating further.^[20] Just before the murders, Colin complained that he was doing 95 percent of the work with the boys, and according to The Guardian he wrote to her father, asking him to persuade Sheila to let the twins live with him most of the time, something her psychiatrist told the newspaper might have made her feel threatened.^[23] Scott Lomax writes that Colin did not send that letter to Nevill,^[24] and according to Bamber, the family discussed placing the boys in foster care over dinner on the night of the murders, with little response from Sheila.^[17]

Despite Sheila's erratic mental state, her psychiatrist told the court that the kind of violence necessary to commit them was not consistent with his view of her.^[22] In particular, he said he did not believe she would have killed her father or children, because her difficult relationship was confined to her mother.^[25] Her ex-husband said the same: that despite her tendency to throw things and sometimes hit him, she had never harmed the children.^[26] June Bamber's sister, Pamela Boutflour, testified that Sheila was not a violent person, and said she had never known her to use a gun; June's niece, Ann Eaton, told the court that Sheila did not know how to use one. Bamber disputed this, telling police that he and Sheila had gone target shooting together, though he acknowledged in court that he had not seen her fire a gun as an adult.^[22]

Jeremy Bamber

Jeremy Nevill Bamber (born 13 January 1961) was the son of a vicar's daughter who, after an affair with a married army sergeant, gave her baby up for adoption when he was six weeks old. Nevill and June sent him to Maldon Court, a private prep school, then Gresham's School, a boarding school in Norfolk, and finally sixth-form college in Colchester. He spent time in Australia and New Zealand, then returned to England to work on his father's farm for £170 a week.^[1]

He set up home rent-free in a cottage Nevill owned at 9 Head Street, Goldhanger (51°44′45″N 0°45′21″E / 51.745857°N 0.755881°E / 51.745857; 0.755881), three to three-and-a-half miles from his parents' farmhouse (51°45′33″N 0°48′12″E / 51.7591°N 0.8032°E / 51.7591; 0.8032). It took five minutes to drive to the farmhouse by car, and at least 15 minutes by bicycle.^[28]

Extended family and financial considerations

The Bamber family was wealthy, and the financial ties and the issue of inheritance within the immediate and extended family caused further complications. The prosecution's case was that Bamber had killed his family to inherit their estate, which included £436,000, the farmhouse where the murders took place, 300 acres (1.2 km²) of land, and a caravan site in Maldon, Essex, called Osea Road Camp Sites Ltd. Because of his conviction, the estate passed instead to his cousins, some of whom were involved in finding the crucial evidence against him—the gun's silencer in the farm's gun cupboard with a fleck of blood on it. The prosecution used the blood to show that the silencer was on the gun during the attack, and argued that Sheila's arms were not long enough to reach the trigger to kill herself with the silencer on it (see below).^[29]

After Bamber's conviction, one cousin on his mother's side, Ann Eaton, moved into White House Farm, and she and several others—Sarah Jane Eaton, Pamela Boutflour, and Robert Woodwiss Boutflour—acquired ownership of the caravan site. Bamber alleged that these financial considerations meant the extended family, specifically two of the cousins, wanted to see him convicted, and may have set him up. The cousins responded that Bamber was a psychopath, and that his allegations against them were part of an attempt to harass and vilify them. One of them said the allegation that they set him up was "an absolute load of piffle."^[29]

The murder weapon

Nevill kept several guns at the farm. He was reportedly careful with them, cleaning them after use, and made sure not to leave them lying around.^[30] The murder weapon was a .22 Anschütz semi-automatic rifle, model 525, which Nevill purchased on 30 November 1984, along with a Parker Hale sound moderator (a "silencer"), telescopic sights, and 500 rounds of ammunition. The rifle used cartridges, which were loaded into a magazine that held ten cartridges. Twenty-five shots were fired during the killing, so if it was fully loaded to begin with it would have been reloaded at least twice. The court heard that it became progressively harder to load as the number of cartridges increases; loading the tenth was described as exceptionally hard.^[31]

The rifle was used to shoot rabbits with the silencer and telescopic sights attached. The court heard that a screwdriver was needed to remove the sights, but they were normally left in place because it was time-consuming to realign them. Nevill's nephew, Anthony Pargeter, visited the farmhouse around 26 July 1985, and told the court he had seen the rifle, with the sights and silencer attached, in the gun cupboard in the ground floor office. Bamber testified that he visited the farmhouse on the evening of 6 August, and loaded the gun, thinking he heard rabbits outside, then left it with a full magazine and a box of ammunition on the kitchen table.^[31]

White House Farm, 7 August 1985

Sheila's visit

On 4 August, three days before the murders, Sheila and the boys arrived at her parents' home to spend the week with them. The housekeeper saw her that day, and noticed nothing unusual, and she was seen the next day with her children by two farm workers, Julie and Leonard Foakes, who said she seemed happy.^[32] One of the crime-scene photographs shows that someone had carved "I hate this place" into the cupboard doors of the bedroom the twins were sleeping in. Authorship was not established, but the Court of Appeal accepted that it was probably Sheila who wrote it.^[33]

Bamber visited the farm on the evening of 6 August, and told the court his parents had suggested to Sheila that the boys be placed in foster care, because of her mental-health problems. The idea was to do this temporarily, perhaps with a local family who could help with the children. Bamber said Sheila did not seem too bothered by the suggestion, and had simply said she would rather stay in London.^[17] Her psychiatrist, Dr. Ferguson, told the Court of Appeal in 2002 that the suggestion would have provoked a strong reaction from her, though he added that, had the fostering suggestion been confined to day-time help, she might have welcomed it. The boys had been in temporary foster care before in London, which had not appeared to cause a problem.^[17]

Barbara Wilson, the farm's secretary, telephoned the farmhouse at 9.30 pm that evening and spoke to Nevill. She said he was short with her, and Wilson was left with the impression that she had interrupted an argument. Pamela Boutflour, June Bamber's sister, also telephoned that evening at about 10 pm. She spoke to Sheila, who she said was quiet, then to June, who seemed normal.^[34]

Telephone calls

There was one telephone line and four telephones at the farm, including two in the kitchen: a cordless phone that had a memory recall feature, and a digital phone. The cordless had been sent away for repair, and a phone that was normally in the bedroom had been moved into the kitchen. This was the one found with its receiver off the hook, the implication being that someone—Nevill, according to Bamber—had been interrupted mid-call.^[35]

A central issue is whether Nevill telephoned Bamber before the murders to say Sheila had gone crazy and had a gun. Bamber said he did receive such a call, and that the line went dead in the middle of it, which would be consistent with the phone being found off the hook. The prosecution said he did not receive such a call, and that his claim to have done so was part of his setting the scene to blame Sheila. This was one of three key points the jury was asked to consider by the trial judge during his summing up.^[6]

Bamber's lawyers have highlighted two police phone logs (below) in support of Bamber's application to have his case referred back to the Court of Appeal. The question is whether these logs describe one call to the police, from Bamber alone, or two calls, one from Bamber and another from his father.^[36]

Telephone log 1

A police log timed at 3:26 am on 7 August (see image, right) was entered as evidence at the trial, but it was not shown to the jury, or seen by Bamber's lawyers until at least 2004. It discusses a telephone call made that night to a local police station. According to the prosecution, the log discusses a call known to have been made by Bamber (see below). According to Bamber's defence team, it may show that a separate call was made by Nevill.^[36]

The log is headed "daughter gone berserk" and says: "Mr Bamber, White House Farm, Tolleshunt d’Arcy—daughter Sheila Bamber, aged 26 years, has got hold of one of my guns." It adds: "Message passed to CD by the son of Mr Bamber after phone went dead." It goes on to say: "Mr Bamber has a collection of shotguns and .410s," and it includes the telephone number 860209, the number at the time for White House Farm. The final entry says: "0356 GPO [the telephone operator] have checked phone line to farmhouse and confirm phone left off hook." The log shows that a patrol car, Charlie Alpha 7 (CA7), was sent to the scene at 3.35 am.^[36]

Telephone log 2

A different police log shows that, at 3:36 am, Bamber rang Chelmsford Police Station using a direct line, rather than the emergency number (999), and spoke to PC West. The court accepted that the officer who recorded the log misread a digital clock, and that it probably came in at around 3:26 am, around the time of the call mentioned in the first log. Bamber said: "You've got to help me. My father has just rung me and said, 'Please come over. Your sister has gone crazy and has got the gun.' Then the line went dead." Bamber said he had tried to ring his father back, but there was no reply.^[38] The log continues: "Father Mr. Bamber, White House Farm, Tolleshunt D'Arcy ... Sister Sheila Bamber age 27. Has history of mental illness. ... Dispatched CA5 [Charlie Alpha 5] to scene ... Informant requested to attend scene."^[36]

Police and Bamber's response

PC West contacted Malcolm Bonnet at the Chelmsford HQ Information Room using a radio link; this conversation was recorded as having taken place at 3.26 am. PC West then spoke to Bamber again, who apparently complained at the length of time West was taking, and said: "When my father rang he sounded terrified." He was told to go to the farm and wait for the police. At 3.35 am, Malcolm Bonnet sent a police car to White House Farm. A telephone operator checked the line to the farm at 4:30 am. The phone was off the hook, the line was open, and a dog could be heard barking.^[38]

Explaining why he had called a local police station and not 999, Bamber told police that night that he had not thought it would make a difference in terms of how fast they arrived.^[39] He said he had spent time looking up the number, and even though his father had asked him to come quickly, he had first telephoned his girlfriend, Julie Mugford, in London, then had driven slowly to the farmhouse. He also said he could have called one of the farm workers, but had not at the time considered it.^[40] In his early witness statements, Bamber said he had telephoned the police immediately after receiving his father's call, then telephoned Mugford. During later police interviews, he said he had called Mugford first. He said he was confused about the sequence of events.^[39]

Scene outside the farmhouse

After the telephone calls, Bamber made his way to the farmhouse, as did several police officers. PS Bews, PC Myall, and PC Saxby drove from Witham Police Station, and passed Bamber in their car. They told the court that, in their view, he was driving much more slowly than them, though Bamber's cousin, Ann Eaton, testified that Bamber was normally a fast driver.^[41]

Bamber arrived at the farmhouse one or two minutes after the police, then they waited for a tactical firearms group to arrive, which turned up at 5 am. Police determined that all the doors and windows to the house were shut, except for the window in the main bedroom on the first floor. They decided to wait until daylight before entering at 7:54 am through the back door, which had been locked from the inside. The only sound they reported from the house was a dog barking.^[41]

While waiting outside, the police questioned Bamber, who they said seemed calm. He told them about the phone call from his father, and that it sounded as though someone had cut him off. He said he did not get along with his sister, and asked whether she might have gone berserk with the gun, the police said he replied: "I don't really know. She is a nutter. She's been having treatment." The police asked why Nevill had called Bamber and not the police; Bamber replied that his father was the sort of person who might want to keep things within the family.^[42]

Bamber told them Sheila was familiar with guns and that they had gone target shooting together. He said he had been at the farmhouse himself the night before and had loaded the rifle because he thought he had heard rabbits outside. He left it on the kitchen table fully loaded, with a box of ammunition nearby.^[43] After the bodies were discovered, a doctor, Dr. Craig, was called to the house to certify the deaths, which he testified could have occurred at any time during the night. He said Bamber appeared to be in a state of shock, broke down, cried, and seemed to vomit. The doctor said Bamber told him at that point about the discussion the family had had about possibly having Sheila's sons placed in foster care.^[44]

The bodies

When police entered the house, they found five bodies with multiple gunshot wounds. Twenty-five shots had been fired, mostly at close range. They said they found Nevill downstairs, and the other four upstairs. Years later, Bamber's defence team cast doubt on the position the police say they found the bodies, using photographs obtained from the police, and suggested the photographs indicate that Sheila died later than the rest of the family (see below).^[45]

Nevill

The police said they found Nevill downstairs in the kitchen, dressed in pyjamas, amid a scene that suggested there had been a struggle, though Bamber's lawyers suggested at appeal that some or all of the mayhem in the kitchen may have been caused by the armed police when they broke into the house.^[46] Nevill's body was slumped forward over an overturned chair next to the fireplace, his head resting just above a coal scuttle. The police said chairs and stools were overturned, and there was broken crockery, a broken sugar basin, and what looked like blood on the floor. A ceiling light lampshade had been broken. A telephone was lying on one of the surfaces with its receiver off the hook, and several .22 shells beside it. He had been shot eight times, six times to the head and face, fired when the rifle was a few inches from his skin. The remaining shots to his body had occurred from at least two feet away. Based on where the empty cartridges were found—three were in the kitchen, and one on the stairs—the police concluded he had been shot four times upstairs, but had managed to get downstairs where a struggle took place, during which he was hit several times with the rifle and shot again, this time fatally.^[47]

There were two wounds to his right side, and two to the top of his head, which would probably have resulted in unconsciousness. The left side of his lip was wounded, his jaw was fractured, and his teeth, neck, and larynx were damaged. The pathologist said he would have had difficulty talking. There were gunshot wounds to his left shoulder and left elbow. He also had black eyes, a broken nose, bruising to the cheeks, cuts on the head, bruising to the right forearm, and circular burn-type marks on his back, consistent with his having been hit with the rifle.^[47] One of the pillars of the prosecution case was that Sheila would not have been strong enough to inflict this beating on Nevill, who was 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) tall and by all accounts in good health.^[1]

June

The police said they found the other four bodies upstairs. June's body was heavily bloodstained. She was found lying on the floor in the master bedroom by the doorway, wearing her nightdress and bare-footed. She had been shot seven times; one shot to her forehead between her eyes, and another to the right side of her head, would have caused her death quickly. There were also shots to the right side of her lower neck, her right forearm, and two injuries on the right side of her chest and her right knee. The police believed she had been sitting up during part of the attack, based on the pattern of blood on her clothing. Five of the shots occurred when the gun was at least a foot from her body. The shot between her eyes was from less than one foot.^[48]

Daniel and Nicholas

The boys were found in their beds, shot through the head. They appeared to have been shot while in bed. Daniel had been shot five times, four times with the gun held within one foot of his head, and once from over two feet away. Nicholas was shot three times, all contact or close-proximity shots.^[49]

Sheila

Police say they found Sheila on the floor of the master bedroom with her mother. She was in her nightdress and bare-footed, with two bullet wounds, one to her throat. The pathologist, Dr. Peter Vanezis—who in 1993 became Regius Professor of Forensic Medicine at Glasgow University—said the lower of the injuries occurred from three inches (76 mm) away, and the higher one was a contact injury. The higher of the two would have killed her immediately. The lower injury would have killed her too, he said, but not necessarily straightaway; the court heard it would be possible for a person with such an injury to stand up and walk around, but the lack of blood on her nightdress suggested to Vanezis that she had not done this. He believed the lower of her injuries happened first, because it caused bleeding inside the neck, which would not have happened to the same extent if the higher, immediately fatal, wound had occurred first. Vanesiz said the blood stains on her nightdress suggested she was sitting up when she received both injuries.^[50]

According to documents obtained by Bamber's defence team in 2005, the first officer to enter the house at 7.34 am, PC Peter Woodcock, wrote of Sheila in his witness statement on 20 September 1985: "She had what appeared to be two bullet holes under her chin and blood leaking from both sides of her mouth down her cheeks." Bamber's lawyers say this is significant because, in their view, had she been shot before 3:30 am as the prosecution says, the blood would have dried by 7:30 am; because it was still wet, they argue she was probably shot no more than two hours earlier (see below).^[51]

There were no marks on her body suggestive of a struggle. The firearms officer who first saw her said her feet and hands were clean, her fingernails manicured and not broken; and her fingertips free of blood, dirt, or powder. There was no trace of lead dust, which the court heard is usually the case when handling .22 ammunition. The rifle magazine would have been loaded at least twice during the killings, and this would usually leave lubricant and material from the bullets on the hands. A scenes-of-crimes officer, DC Hammersley, said there were blood stains on the back of her right hand, but that otherwise they were clean.^[50]

There was no blood on the feet (this was disputed in 2005 by the defence) or other debris such as sugar, which was lying on the floor downstairs, possibly as a result of the struggle. At postmortem, low traces of lead were found on her hands and forehead, but the levels were consistent with the everyday handling of things around the house. A scientist, Mr Elliott, testified that if she had loaded 18 cartridges into a magazine he would expect to see more lead on her hands. On her nightdress, the blood was consistent with her own, and no trace of firearm discharge residue was on it. Her urine indicated she had taken cannabis some days before, and the anti-psychotic drug haloperidol.^[50]

The rifle—without the silencer or sights attached—was lying across her chest, pointing up at her neck, with her right hand resting lightly on it. June's bible lay on the floor beside Sheila, partly resting on her upper right arm. It was normally kept in a bedside cupboard. June's fingerprints were on it, as were others that could not be identified, except for one made by a child.^[50]

Police investigation

Criticism of the investigation

Journalist David Connett, who attended the trial, writes that it was by common consent a truly awful investigation. He asked one Scotland Yard officer to describe it; the officer pinched his nose and screwed up his face.^[53] The trial judge, Mr Justice Drake, expressed concern about what he called a "less than thorough investigation,"^[54] and Claire Powell wrote that "doing a Bamber" briefly became police slang for making a mess of a case.^[55] In 1989, Home Secretary Douglas Hurd tightened police procedures because of the failings of the Bamber investigation.^[56]

Connett writes that the officer in charge, DCI "Taff" Jones, deputy head of CID, was told it was a "domestic" and went off to play golf. He became convinced of the murder-suicide theory, to the point where he ordered Bamber's cousins out of his office when they asked him to consider whether Bamber had set the whole thing up. Evidence was not recorded or preserved, and three days after the killings the police burned bloodstained bedding and a carpet, apparently to spare Bamber's feelings.^[53] The inquest opened on 14 August 1985, and the police gave evidence that it was a murder-suicide.^[57]

The scenes-of-crime officer did not find the silencer in the cupboard. It was found by one of Bamber's cousins days later, and even then it took the police three days to collect it (see below). The same officer moved the rifle without wearing gloves, and it was not examined for fingerprints until weeks later. The bible found with Sheila was not examined at all. Connett writes that a hacksaw blade that might have been used to gain entry to the house lay in the garden for months. Officers did not take contemporaneous notes: those who had dealt with Bamber wrote down their statements weeks later. Bamber's clothes were not examined until one month later, the bodies were cremated, and all blood samples were destroyed 10 years later.^[53]

Unlike DCI Jones, his junior officers were suspicious of Bamber, and when Jones was removed from the case, they began to look more closely at him. (Jones died before the case came to court after falling from a ladder at his home.) Bamber's behaviour after the funeral increased suspicion that he had been involved. The Times reported that, immediately after the bodies were found, he broke down and was offered tea and whisky by police, and apparently managed to persuade them to burn bedding and carpets inside the house. He wept openly at the funerals, supported by his girlfriend, Julie Mugford, after which he flew to Amsterdam, where he apparently tried to buy a consignment of drugs and offered to sell soft-porn photographs of Sheila to tabloid newspapers. He also entertained friends to expensive champagne and lobster dinners. It was this behaviour that served, in part, to draw police attention to him.^[1]

Fingerprints on the rifle

A print from Sheila's right ring finger was found on the right side of the butt, pointing downwards. A print from Bamber's right forefinger was on the breech end of the barrel, above the stock and pointing across the gun. He said he had used the gun to shoot rabbits. There were three further prints of insufficient detail to be identified.^[58]

The silencer

On the day of the murders, the police searched the gun cupboard in the ground floor office, but did not examine it or search for the silencer or sights for the rifle. Three days later, members of Bamber's extended family visited the farm with Basil Cock, the estate's executor, and during that visit, one of his cousins, David Boutflour, found the silencer and the sights in the cupboard. The court heard that several people had witnessed this discovery: Boutflour's father, Robert Boutflour; his sister, Ann Eaton; the farm secretary; and Basil Cock. The family took the silencer to Ann Eaton's home to examine it, and later said they found the surface had been damaged, and there seemed to be red paint and blood on it. They told the police, who collected the silencer on 12 August, at which point they reportedly noticed an inch-long grey hair attached to it, but this was lost before the silencer arrived at the Forensic Science Service at Huntingdon.^[59]

The family returned to the farmhouse to search for the source of the red paint, and found what they said was recent damage to the underside of the red-painted mantel above the Aga cooker in the kitchen. A scenes-of-crime officer, DI Cook, took a paint sample on 14 August, and it contained the same 15 layers of paint and varnish found in the paint flake on the silencer. On 1 October, casts were taken of the marks on the mantel, and the marks were deemed consistent with the silencer having come into contact with the mantel more than once.^[59] In February 2010, Bamber's legal team submitted evidence that they said showed the marks had been created after the crime-scene photographs were taken (see below).^[3]

A scientist at Huntingdon, a Mr Hayward, found blood on the inside and outside surface of the silencer, the latter not enough to permit analysis. The blood inside was found to be the same blood group as Sheila's, though possibly a mixture of Nevill's and June's. A firearms expert, a Mr. Fletcher, said the blood was backspatter, caused by a close-contact shooting. Tests at the lab indicated it would have been physically impossible for Sheila to have reached the trigger to shoot herself with the silencer attached.^[59]

According to Bob Woffinden, a second firearms expert testified that the .22 Anschütz was unlikely to produce backspatter, especially when fitted with a silencer, and a third, Major Freddy Mead, who appeared for the defence, said there was no reason to believe the silencer had been used. Woffinden writes that it was not clear that the blood was Sheila's, only that it was the same blood group. It was also the same blood group as Robert Boutflour's—the father of the cousin who found the silencer—who was in the house when the discovery was made.^[60] In February 2012, The Observer reported that gun experts commissioned by the defence in the US and UK concluded that the silencer may not have been used in the killings (see below).^[61]

Part of Bamber's defence is that the cousins who discovered the crucial evidence were beneficiaries of the estate, which his defence team say taints any discovery they say they made. Ann Eaton, who was present on the day the silencer was found, moved into White House Farm after the murders, and continued to live there with her family as of 2010.^[3]

Julie Mugford's allegations

Background

It was because of Julie Mugford's statement to police a month after the murders that Bamber was arrested. They had started dating in 1983 when she was a 19-year-old student at Goldsmith's College in London; she was still studying there when the killings occurred.^[30]

Mugford admitted to a brief background of dishonesty. She had been cautioned in 1985 for using a friend's chequebook to obtain goods worth around £700, after it had been reported stolen; she said she and the friend had repaid the money to the bank. She also acknowledged helping Bamber in March or April 1985 to steal just under £1,000 from the office of the Osea Road caravan site his family owned; she said he had staged a break-in to make it appear that strangers were responsible. The admission added to the picture of her own and Bamber's lack of credibility.^[30]

In March 2012, Bamber's lawyers told the media that, as part of their submission to the Criminal Cases Review Commission, they had found a letter dated 26 September 1985 showing that the assistant director of public prosecutions involved in preparing the case against Bamber had suggested Mugford not be prosecuted for the burglary, the cheque fraud, and for a further offence of selling cannabis. She subsequently testified against him during his trial in October 1986. The judge told the jury that they could convict Bamber on Mugford's testimony alone.^[62]

First and second statements to police

Mugford was at first supportive of Bamber after the murders; newspaper photographs of the funeral show him weeping and hanging onto her arm. On the day after the killings, she told police that she had received a telephone call from him at about 3:30 am on 7 August, during which he sounded worried and said, "There's something wrong at home." She said she had been tired and had not asked what it was.

Her position toward Bamber changed on 3 September 1985, after they rowed about his involvement with another woman. She threw something at him, slapped him, and he twisted her arm up her back. She went to the police four days later and changed her statement.^[30]

In the second statement, she said he had talked disparagingly about his "old" father, his "mad" mother, his sister who he said had nothing to live for, and the twins who he said were disturbed. Bamber denied this, saying she was motivated by jealousy, but other witnesses offered similar testimony. Mugford's mother said Bamber had told her he hated his adoptive mother, and that he had described her as mad. A friend of Mugford's testified that Bamber had said around February 1985 that his parents kept him short of money, his mother was a religious freak, and "I fucking hate my parents." A farm worker testified that Bamber seemed not to get on with Sheila and had once said: "I'm not going to share my money with my sister."^[63]

In discussions Mugford said she had dismissed as fantasies, she alleged that Bamber had said he wanted to sedate his parents and set fire to the farmhouse. He reportedly said Sheila would make a good scapegoat. Mugford alleged he had discussed entering the house through the kitchen window because the catch was broken, and leaving it via a different window that latched when it was shut from the outside.^[63]

She said she had spent the weekend before the murders with him in his cottage in Goldhanger, where he dyed his hair black, and that she saw his mother's bicycle there. This was significant because the prosecution later alleged he had used the bicycle to cycle between his cottage and the farmhouse on the night of the murders. She told police Bamber had telephoned her at 9:50 pm on 6 August to say he had been thinking about the crime all day, was pissed off, and that it was "tonight or never." A few hours later, at 3:00–3:30 am, she said he phoned her again to say: "Everything is going well. Something is wrong at the farm. I haven't had any sleep all night ... bye honey and I love you lots." Her flatmates' evidence suggested that call came through closer to 3 am. He called her later during the morning of 7 August to tell her that Sheila had gone mad, and that a police car was coming to pick her up and bring her to the farmhouse. When she arrived there, she said he pulled her to one side and said: "I should have been an actor."^[63]

Later that evening she asked Bamber whether he had done it. He said no, but that a friend of his had, whom he named; the man was a plumber the family had used in the past. Bamber allegedly said he had told this friend how he could enter and leave the farmhouse undetected, and that one of his instructions had been for the friend to telephone him from the farm on one of the phones in the house that had a memory redial facility, so that if the police checked it, it would give him an alibi. Everything had gone as planned, he said, except that Nevill had put up a fight, and the friend had become angry and shot him seven times. The friend had allegedly told Sheila to lie down and shoot herself last, Bamber said. The friend then placed the bible on her chest so she appeared to have killed herself in a religious frenzy. The children were shot in their sleep, he said. Mugford said Bamber claimed to have paid the friend £2,000.^[63]

Bamber's arrest

As a result of Mugford's statement Bamber was arrested on 8 September, as was the friend Mugford said he had implicated, though the latter had a solid alibi and was released. Bamber told police Mugford was lying because he had jilted her. He said he loved his parents and sister, and denied they had kept him short of money; he said the only reason he had broken into the caravan site with Mugford was to prove that security was poor. He said he had occasionally gained entry to the farmhouse through downstairs windows, and had used a knife to move the catches from the outside. He also said he had seen his parents' wills, and that they had left the estate to be shared between him and Sheila. As for the rifle, he told police the gun was used mostly with the silencer off because it would otherwise not fit in its case.^[64]

He was bailed from the police station on 13 September, after which he went on holiday to Saint-Tropez. Before leaving England, he returned to the farmhouse, gaining entry by the downstairs bathroom window. He said he did this because he had left his keys in London and needed some papers for the trip to France; he did not borrow keys from the housekeeper who lived nearby. When he returned to England on 29 September, he was re-arrested and charged with the murders.^[64]

Trial, October 1986

Bamber was tried before Mr Justice Drake (Sir Maurice Drake) and a jury at Chelmsford Crown Court in October 1986 during a case that lasted 19 days. The prosecution was led by Anthony Arlidge QC, and the defence by Geoffrey Rivlin QC, supported by Ed Lawson, QC.^[53] The Times wrote that Bamber cut an arrogant figure in the witness box; at one point when prosecutors accused him of lying, he replied: "That is what you have got to establish."^[1]

Prosecution case

The prosecution case was that Bamber was motivated by hatred and greed. They argued he had left the farm around 10 pm on 6 August and later returned by bicycle in the early hours of the morning, using a route that avoided the main roads. He entered the house through a downstairs bathroom window, took the rifle with the silencer attached, and went upstairs. He shot June in her bed, but she managed to get up and walk a few steps before collapsing and dying. He shot Nevill in the bedroom too, but he was able to get downstairs where he and Bamber fought in the kitchen, before he was shot several times in the head. Sheila was also shot in the main bedroom. The children were shot in their beds as they slept.^[65]

They argued that Bamber then set about arranging the scene to make it appear that Sheila was the killer. He then discovered that she could not have reached the trigger with the silencer attached, so he removed it and placed it in the cupboard, then placed a bible next to her body to introduce a religious theme. He removed the kitchen phone from its hook, left the house via a kitchen window, and banged it from the outside so that the catch dropped back into position. He then cycled home. Shortly after 3 am, he telephoned Mugford, then called the police at 3.26 a.m to say he had just received a frantic call from his father. In order to create a delay before the bodies were discovered, he did not call 999, drove slowly to the farmhouse, and told police his sister was familiar with guns, so they would be reluctant to enter.^[65]

They argued that Bamber did not receive a call from his father—that Nevill was too badly injured after the first shots to have spoken to anyone; that there was no blood on the kitchen phone that had been left dangling; and that Nevill would have called the police before calling Bamber.^[66] The prosecution position was that, if the call to Bamber really was the last thing the father did before shots were fired, and if he thereafter dropped the receiver, the line to Bamber's home would have been left open for one to two minutes, and Bamber would not have been able to telephone the police immediately to let them know about his father's call, as he said he did.^[35] That the line would not have cleared in time for him to call the police is one of several disputed points.^[67]

The silencer played a central role. It was deemed to have been on the rifle when it was fired, because of the blood found inside it. The prosecution said the blood was Sheila's, and that it had come from her head when the silencer was pointed at her. Expert evidence was submitted that, given her injuries after the first shot, Sheila could not have shot herself, placed the silencer in the downstairs cupboard, then run back upstairs to where her body was found. There was also expert testimony that there were no traces of gun oil on her nightdress, despite 25 shots having been fired and the gun having been reloaded at least twice. Prosecutors argued that, had Sheila killed her family then discovered she could not commit suicide with the silencer fitted, it would have been found next to her; there was no reason for her to have returned it to the gun cupboard. The possibility that she had carried out the killings was further discounted because, it was argued, she was mentally well at the time; had no interest in or knowledge of guns; lacked the strength to overcome her father; and there was no evidence on her clothes or body that she had moved around the crime scene, or had been involved in a struggle.^[66]

Defence case

The defence responded that the witnesses who said Bamber disliked his family were lying or had misinterpreted his words. Mugford had further lied about Bamber's confession, they said, because he had betrayed her, and she wanted to stop him from being with anyone else. No one had seen him cycle to and from the farm. There were no marks on him on the night that suggested he had been in a fight, and no blood-stained clothing of his was recovered. The reason he had not gone to the farm as quickly as he should have when his father phoned was that he was afraid.^[68]

They argued that Sheila was the killer, and that she did know how to handle guns because she had been raised on a farm, and had attended shoots when she was younger. She had a very serious mental illness, had said she felt she was capable of killing her children, and the loaded rifle had been left on the kitchen table by Bamber. There had been a recent family argument about placing the children in foster care. The defence also argued that people who have carried out so-called "altruistic" killings have been known to engage in ritualistic behaviour before killing themselves, and that Sheila might have placed the silencer in the cupboard, changed her clothes, and washed herself, which would explain why there was little lead on her hands, or sugar from the floor on her feet. There was also a possibility that the blood in the silencer was not hers, the defence said, but was a mixture of Nevill's and June's.^[68]

Summing up and verdict

The judge said there were three crucial points, in no particular order. Did the jury believe Julie Mugford or Jeremy Bamber? Were they sure that Sheila was not the killer who then committed suicide? He said this question involved another: was the second, fatal, shot fired at Sheila with the silencer on? If yes, she could not have fired it. Finally, did Nevill call Bamber in the middle of the night? If there was no such call, it undermined the entirety of Bamber's story, and the only reason he would have had to invent the phone call was that he was responsible for the murders.^[69] The jury found Bamber guilty on 28 October by a majority of 10 to two; had one more juror supported him, he would not have been convicted. The judge told him he was "evil, almost beyond belief" and sentenced him to five life terms, with a recommendation that he serve at least 25 years.^[70]

Appeals

Leave to appeal refused, 1989 and 1994

Bamber first sought leave to appeal in November 1986, arguing that the judge had misdirected the jury. The application was heard and refused by a single judge in April 1988. Bamber's lawyer requested a full hearing in front of three judges, arguing that the trial judge's summing up had been biased against Bamber, that his language had been too forceful, and that he had undermined the defence by advancing his own theory. The lawyer also argued that the defence had not pressed Julie Mugford about her dealings with the media, but should have, because as soon as the trial was over her story began to appear in newspapers. The judges rejected the application in March 1989.^[71]

Because of the criticism of the police investigation by the trial judge, Essex police held an internal inquiry, conducted by Detective Chief Superintendent Dickinson. Bamber alleged this report confirmed that evidence had been withheld by the police, so he made a formal complaint, which was investigated in 1991 by the City of London Police. This process uncovered more documentation, which Bamber used to petition the Home Secretary in September 1993 for a referral back to the Court of Appeal, refused in July 1994.^[72]

During this process, the Home Office declined to give Bamber the expert evidence it had obtained, so Bamber applied for judicial review of that decision in November 1994; this resulted in the Home Office handing over its expert evidence. In February 1996, the Essex police destroyed many of the original trial exhibits without informing Bamber or his lawyers. The officer responsible said he had not been aware that the case was on-going.^[72]

Court of Appeal, 2002

The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) was established in April 1997 to review allegations of miscarriage of justice, and Bamber's case was passed to them at that time.^[73] The CCRC referred the case to the Court of Appeal in March 2001 on the grounds that new DNA testing on the silencer constituted fresh evidence.^[74] The appeal was heard by Lord Justice Kay, Mr Justice Wright, and Mr Justice Henriques from 17 October to 1 November 2002, and the decision published on 12 December. The prosecution was represented by Victor Temple QC, and Bamber by Michael Turner QC.^[30]

Bamber brought 16 issues to the attention of the court, 14 of them about failure to disclose evidence, or the fabrication of evidence, and two (grounds 14 and 15) related to the silencer and DNA testing:^[75]

Although most of the issues were reviewed by the court (point 11 was withdrawn by the defence before adjudication), the reason for the referral was point 15, the discovery of DNA on the silencer, the result of a test not available in 1986. The silencer evidence during the original trial came from a Mr Hayward, a biologist at the Forensic Science Laboratory. He had found human blood inside the silencer, and had asserted that its blood group was consistent with it coming from Sheila, but not from any of the other victims—though he said there was a remote possibility that it was a mixture of blood from Nevill and June.^[87]

Mark Webster, an expert instructed by Bamber's defence team for the appeal, argued that Hayward's tests had been inadequate, and that there was a real possibility, not a remote one, that the blood came from Nevill and June.^[87]

The defence further argued that new tests comparing DNA discovered in the silencer to a sample from Sheila's biological mother suggested that the "major component" of the DNA in the silencer did not come from Sheila.^[90] A DNA sample from June's sister, Pamela Boutflour, suggested the major component came from her.^[88]

The court concluded that June's DNA was in the silencer; Sheila's DNA may have been in the silencer; and that there was evidence of DNA from at least one male. The judges' conclusion was that the results were complex, incomplete, and meaningless since they did not establish how June's DNA came to be on the silencer years after the trial, did not establish that Sheila's was not on it, and did not lead to a conclusion that Bamber's conviction was unsafe.^[88]

In a 522-point judgment dismissing the appeal, the judges said there was no conduct on the part of the police or prosecution that would have adversely affected the jury's verdict, and that the more they examined the details of the case, the more they thought the jury was right.^[91]

Appeals against whole-life tariff, 2008 and 2009

The trial judge recommended a minimum term of 25 years, but in December 1994 Home Secretary Michael Howard ruled Bamber should remain in prison for the rest of his life.^[92] In May 2008, he lost a High Court appeal against the whole-life tariff in front of Mr. Justice Tugendhat, upheld by the Appeal Court in May 2009.^[93] In January 2012, Bamber and three other whole-life prisoners lost their appeal to the European Court of Human Rights to have their sentences reduced.^[94]

Campaign to overturn the conviction

A campaign gathered pace over the years to secure Bamber's release, and from March 2001 several websites were set up to discuss the evidence.^[95] Bamber used one of them in 2002 to offer a £1m reward for evidence that would overturn his conviction.^[96] His case was taken up by former MPs George Galloway and Andrew Hunter, and Bob Woffinden, a journalist who specializes in miscarriages of justice. Woffinden argued between 2007 and 2011 that it was Sheila who shot her family, then watched from an upstairs window as police gathered outside the house, before shooting herself. He changed his mind in May 2011, writing that he had come to believe Bamber was the killer.^[97]

Andrew Hunter alleged in the House of Commons in 2005 that evidence was being withheld from the defence, including access to the notebooks of Inspector Taff Jones, the first officer in charge of the investigation, who believed Bamber was innocent, but who died before the case came to court.^[98] In August 2005, Bamber's lawyers wrote that there were four million documents in the case, one quarter of which had not been disclosed to the defence. Thirty-eight boxes of papers were provided to the new defence team, including photographs that had not been part of the defence papers during the trial or appeal, according to Bamber's lawyers.^[99]

Evidence gathered for CCRC, 2004 onwards

Bamber launched a fresh attempt in 2004 to obtain another appeal, with a new defence team that included Italian legal adviser Giovanni di Stefano.^[100] Di Stefano asked the Criminal Cases Review Commission in March 2004 to reopen the case, based in part on the new photographs of the crime scene.^[101] In 2007, the lawyers arranged for Bamber to undergo a lie detector test, which he passed.^[102] The CCRC rejected the 2004 request, but the defence team made a fresh submission in January 2009. The CCRC announced in February 2011 that it had also provisionally rejected this submission; it sent Bamber's lawyers an 89-page document setting out the reasons and invited them to respond within three months. It extended the deadline to allow the defence time to study all 406 crime-scene photographs, and in September 2011 granted them an indefinite period in which to pursue an additional line of inquiry.^[4]

Apparent movement of Sheila's body and the gun

File:Sheila Caffell crime scene.JPG

One of the more serious allegations is that the first officers to arrive inside the house may have inadvertently disturbed the crime scene, then attempted to reconstruct it. Crime-scene photographs obtained by Bamber's lawyers, but not made available to the original defence team, show that Sheila's right arm and hand have moved in relation to the gun, which is lying across her body. The gun itself has also moved. Yet another image shows the gun propped up against a window.^[103]

Former Lancashire Detective Chief Superintendent Mick Gradwell, shown the photographs by journalists from the Guardian and Observer, told them: "The evidence shows, or portrays, Essex police having damaged the scene, and then having staged it again to make it look like it was originally. And if that has happened, and that hasn't been disclosed, that is really, really serious."^[103]

Location of Sheila's body

The location of Sheila's body was also disputed. The police said they found her upstairs with her mother, but PC Collins reported seeing through a window what he thought was the body of a woman just inside the kitchen door. PC Woodcock then hit the door with a sledgehammer to force entry.^[104] Later police reports said only Nevill had been found in the kitchen and the other four bodies upstairs.^[47]

An entry in a police radio log said: "0737: one dead male and one dead female in kitchen," and a minute later: "0738: one dead male and one dead female found on entry." At 7:40 am, the incident log noted a message from a Detective Inspector IR: "Police entered premises. One male dead, one female dead." At this point police had not yet searched upstairs. When they did, they reported: "House now thoroughly searched by firearms team. Now confirmed a further 3 bodies found."^[98] The chief prosecution lawyer, Anthony Arlidge QC, told Bamber's lawyers in 2005 that he had not seen these logs.^[99] A retired police officer who worked on the case told journalists in 2011 that the logs were simply mistaken in reporting that a woman's body was found downstairs.^[105]

Time of Sheila's death

photograph

Other evidence not made available to the defence before 2005 were photographs of Sheila taken by a police photographer at around 9 am on 7 August. Bamber's lawyers argue that the images show Sheila's blood was still wet, and that, had she been killed before 3:30 am as the prosecution said, her blood would have congealed by 9 am.^[99]

Bamber's lawyers also cited a statement, dated 20 September 1985, from one of the first officers to enter the house at 7:34 am, PC Peter Woodcock.^[99] Woodcock said of Sheila: "She had what appeared to be two bullet holes under her chin and blood leaking from both sides of her mouth down her cheeks." In 2005, the defence obtained reports from two medical experts, a Professor Marco Meloni and a Professor Cavalli, who expressed the view that Sheila had died no more than two hours before the time of the photographs or PC Woodcock's description of the leaking blood. This would place her death during the period Bamber was standing outside the house with the police.^[99]

Scratch marks on the mantelpiece

The defence team gave the CCRC a report dated 17 January 2010 from Peter Sutherst, a British forensic photographic expert, who was asked in 2008 to examine negatives of the kitchen taken on the day of the murders and later. In his report, he argued that scratch marks in paintwork on the kitchen mantelpiece had been created after the crime-scene photographs had been taken. The prosecution alleged that the marks had been made during the struggle in the kitchen between Bamber and his father, as the silencer, attached to the rifle, had scratched against the mantelpiece. They said that paint chips identical to the paint on the mantelpiece were found on or inside the silencer.^[100]

Sutherst said the scratch marks appeared in photographs taken on 10 September, 34 days after the murders, but were not visible in the original crime-scene photographs. He also said he had failed to find in the photographs any chipped paint on the carpet below the mantelpiece, where it might have been expected to fall had the mantelpiece been scratched during a struggle.^[100] He was asked by the CCRC to examine a red spot on the carpet visible in photographs underneath the scratches on the mantelpiece. He said the red spot matched a piece of nail varnish missing from one of Sheila's toes.^[106] He concluded that the scratch marks had been created after the day of the murders.^[100]

"Challenge to persons inside house met with no response"

Another piece of evidence found by Bamber's lawyers was exhibit 29, a one-page list of radio messages from the scene. The lawyers went to court in March 2004 to force the police to hand over anything else they had. It transpired that exhibit 29 was 24 pages long.^[98] One of the radio messages indicated that police had tried to speak to a person they believed was in the house, while Bamber was standing outside:

Template:Quote box4

Discovery of the telephone log

In August 2010, the Daily Mirror reported that the defence team had located a police telephone log that had been entered as evidence during the trial, but had not been noticed by Bamber's lawyers, and was not part of the jury bundle. Bamber's defence team said it showed that someone calling himself Mr Bamber had telephoned police on the night of the attack to say his daughter had one of his guns and was going berserk (see above).^[37] Stan Jones, a former detective sergeant who worked on the case, said the log was not new. He told The Essex Chronicle: "The only person who telephoned the police was Jeremy Bamber. There is no way his father phoned. To suggest it is farcical."^[105]

Reports that the silencer may not have been used

In February 2012, The Observer reported that gun experts commissioned by the defence had concluded the silencer may not have been used in the killings. That the gun had a silencer on it during the murders was so crucial to the prosecution's case that the judge, when instructing the jury, said the silencer "could, on its own, lead the jury to believe that Bamber was guilty." The experts' reports stated that the absence of a silencer would explain the burn marks on Sheila and Nevill's bodies, which were dismissed as a "mystery" during the trial.^[61]

One of the reports was written by David Fowler, chief medical examiner for the state of Maryland in the United States; other experts involved in that investigation were Ljubisa Dragovic, chief medical examiner of Oakland county in Michigan, and Marcella Fierro, a former chief medical examiner for the state of Virginia. A second report was written by Daniel Caruso, chief of burn services at the Arizona Burn Center, and a third by experts working for Dr. John Manlove, a forensic scientist in Oxfordshire in the UK.^[61]

Letter regarding Mugford

Bamber's lawyers told the press in March 2012 that they had found a letter, dated 26 September 1985, from John Walker, assistant director of public prosecutions, to the Chief Constable of Essex Police, discussing the prosecution of Bamber. Walker wrote that he was suggesting, "with considerable hestitation," that Mugford be told she would not be prosecuted for drugs offences, burglary, and cheque fraud, offences she had confessed to during her police interviews regarding Bamber. Bamber's lawyers said this raised the possibility that she had been persuaded to testify in the hope the charges would not be pursued. According to The Guardian, the trial judge told the jury that they could convict based on Mugford's testimony alone.^[62]

See also

• David Bain
• Lyle and Erik Menendez

Notes

Further reading

• Jeremybamber.co.uk; also see jeremybamber.com, accessed 3 May 2011.
• Galloway, George. "Lie Detectors: Jeremy Bamber", House of Commons, 15 May 2007.
• Hutchison, Peter. "Jeremy Bamber: a profile", The Daily Telegraph, 11 February 2011.
• The Guardian. "Jeremy Bamber", a selection of articles.

Books and book chapters

• Appleyard, Nick. "Tonight's the Night" in Life Means Life. John Blake Publishing Ltd, 2009, p. 103ff.
• Caffell, Colin. In Search of the Rainbow's End. Hodder & Stoughton Ltd, 1994.
• D'Cruze, Shani; Walklate, Sandra L.; and Pegg, Samantha. "The White House Farm murders," in Murder: Social and Historical Approaches to Understanding Murder and Murderers. Willan, 2006, p. 117ff.
• Lomax, Scott. Jeremy Bamber: Evil, Almost Beyond Belief?. The History Press, 2008.
• Murder Casebook 7: The White House Farm Murders. Marshall Cavendish, 1990.
• Powell, Claire. Murder at White House Farm: Story of Jeremy Bamber. Headline Book Publishing, 1994.
• Wilkes, Roger. Blood Relations: Jeremy Bamber and the White House Farm Murders. Penguin, 1994.

Television and video

• Anglia Television. Bambers' funeral service, August 1985, from 01:31 mins.
• Anglia Television. Real Crimes: Jeremy Bamber (2003).
• Guardian Films. "Jeremy Bamber conviction challenged by new photographic evidence", 21 February 2010.
• Guardian Films. "Jeremy Bamber: Will new evidence bring historic third appeal?", 30 January 2011.
• Yorkshire Television. The White House Farm Murders (1993).