Nevill's Voice, Jeremy's Voice

[Erik Narramore]

You can tell a lot about somebody from the way they sound.

What did Nevill's voice sound like?  Does anybody here know?

Was it anything like Jeremy's?  Jeremy voice, from audio recordings, sounds to me like a generic Anglian accent with 'educated' modulations and a slight but definite Essex lilt.  Nevill had sought to give Jeremy a good education of at least equivalent to what he received, and this lingers in Jeremy's voice, which has an educated aspect to it.  I also pick up a 'wishy-washy', plaintive aspect to Jeremy through his voice, which I think comes out of spending most of his adult life in high security prisons under submission to the authorities.

I imagine that Nevill sounded quite different to Jeremy.  They were genetically unrelated for one thing.
There was an obvious age gap, from which we can imply a lot.  Maybe Nevill had a Home Counties accent, though it may have been genericised by his War service and other cosmopolitan experiences, and it must also have reflected an advantaged background that saw him attend public school.  Did Nevill ever live in or visit India?  Maybe Nevill picked up an Essex country twang along the way.  He seems to have impressed the Speakmans immensely and rubbed along reasonably enough with the younger Robert Boutflour, which suggests that despite his advantaged upbringing, he was able to fit in and not overbear people.

How does this quality compare and contrast with Jeremy?  It is difficult to imagine Jeremy enjoying the same success as a respected hard-working Grey Man whose jib fitted.  Jeremy was an individualist, somebody who stood out.  Nevill seduced June as her tennis partner.  Jeremy met Julie as a barman at Sloppy Joe's.  Nevill was a worker.  Jeremy was a performer.  Nevill slotted into the farming-business matrix of the Speakmans and Boutflours.  Jeremy was still young and unformed, but seemed more self-interested and short-termist in his horizons and attitudes: the Epicurean to Nevill's Zeno.

Nevill devoted himself to the life of a working farmer and to his local community as a parochial church warden and respected magistrate and youth justice chairman.  Yet he was not of a parochial sensibility.  Like Jeremy, he was able to follow his adventurous instincts when young.  In Nevill's case, this was through War service.  Then he settled down.  In business, he was an important northern Essex farmer, owning a large and successful farm business formed as a limited company, yet he did not put on airs and graces.  He directly-supervised all aspects of the farm operations and, isolated incidents aside, was generally respected in the farming community.  He was also a company director and shareholder in a successful food production co-operative.  He would have been self-confident and comfortable around people at all levels and one can imagine that perhaps his voice was strong, authoritative and assertive.

Jeremy picked up this self-confidence and authoritative air from his adoptive father but it may have been precociously misdirected into youthful arrogance and insecure defensive petulance.  "That is for you to prove" is what Jeremy told the prosecution counsel, Anthony Arlidge, at the 1986 trial.  Barbara Wilson seemed unimpressed with him, perhaps because Jeremy's self-assuredness was out-of-place at that stage as he had not proven himself as a capable farm operator in his own right.

One reason we like to assume this terrible act on the 6th. and 7th. August 1985 was planned is that it makes it easier to discuss and rationalise.  A spontaneous murder - a 'crime of passion', as the Continentals would call it - is harder to understand, often impenetrable to ordinary human comprehension.  It is easier to apply post hoc ergo propter hoc observations to evidence and template on to Jeremy's mind a fully-formed criminal intent.  June's bike must be part of the plan, whereas it may just have been as Jeremy says: Julie borrowed the bike.  Jeremy specifically enquired after Colin about whether Sheila and the twins would be there that week, whereas Colin invited Jeremy to that social gathering and Jeremy may have just been making conversation.  Jeremy showed Sheila how to load the rifle, but Sheila had expressed an interest in guns before and may have just been curious.  Jeremy left the gun out, but guns were left out all over the house.  The bedroom phone was missing, but the kitchen phone was being repaired.

I suspect Jeremy's actions were unplanned and the outcrop of a psychosis catalysed by family tensions, and he instantiated the fake phone call after a genuine call from Nevill that evening.  But let us say I am wrong and it was all planned.  We must then ask: How did Jeremy arrive at the conclusion that Nevill would call him rather than the emergency services?  Surely such a plan would entail considerable risk, due to the inevitable suspicion it throws on Jeremy?  Surely better for Jeremy not to fake (or make) a call at all, to anybody.  So why did Jeremy go down this avenue?  As part of his criminal planning, Jeremy must have given some careful thought to Nevill, and among other things, Nevill's voice.  Jeremy must assume that Nevill would go for the phones, and Jeremy would know that the police would assume this too and would ask why Nevill had not reached the phones and why Nevill's voice had not been heard on the phone by a police officer or a civilian operator like Malcolm Bonnett.  This is especially important if Sheila is to be deemed the suspected killer because she would probably focus on June rather than Nevill.  Who does Nevill call? The emergency services, 999.  Unless there is a reason for Nevill to call somebody else, like Jeremy.  For what reason would that arise?  Nevill might want to keep the incident from the authorities and prefer to manage things within the close family.  However, in reality, Nevill must try to ring 999 because he must know that the perpetrator is Jeremy. Even if Jeremy wears a mask, surely Nevill would still recognise him?

This is where we come to another problem for the Crown.  How can they explain the lack of a 999 call from White House Farm, even if it was an abortive call?  The fact that Nevill was shot in the face does not prevent him dialling 999.  For one thing, he may not have been cognisant of his injuries at that point and surely would have tried to dial 999 anyway.  Why didn't he?  Why did he run for the kitchen?  Or did Jeremy take him there at gun point?  If that is what happened, why didn't Nevill fight more for June, Sheila and the twins, and why would Jeremy take him downstairs at gunpoint leaving June still alive and conscious, albeit seriously injured?  And why at this crime scene do we find the kitchen phone free of blood marks?

And what about phone records?  Jeremy would know that phone bills then were not itemised, as he must have received bills at Goldhanger.  (Or did he?)  Would Jeremy know whether calls were itemised at the exchange end?  Would Jeremy have understood that 999 emergency calls were recorded, as were ordinary calls to the police?  This was back in the 1980s.  Was that common knowledge then?  For instance, were there popular TV series with 999 recordings that would have made him aware of this?

A still more pertinent question: If Jeremy did not know any of these things but had thought of them as part of his criminal planning, then how does he go about finding out the position without leaving an evidence trail?  This was before the internet and worldwide web.  He can't just carry out a Tor search.  He would have to make enquiries of BT, the police, maybe a public library, and so on, or ask people he thinks are 'in the know'.  How does he do this without the risk that the people he contacts become witnesses for the prosecution later down the line?

Thinking all this through, maybe for the sake of completeness we should explore the notion of an actual 999 call from Nevill.  The scenario would be that Jeremy comes to the conclusion that he could fake Nevill's voice, or have a Fake Nevill make a abortive 999 call with some vague noise to the operator to indicate he is in trouble.  But could Jeremy credibly throw Nevill's voice?

If that is too far-fetched, then consider what the Crown allege Jeremy did as it is: he entered a property and wiped out his own family, including two small boys, then left, and did all this without leaving any direct forensic evidence of the act.  He did it for money, they say.  In a way, that's far-fetched too.  Really, whether something is far-fetched or not often depends on one's point-of-view and how one interprets the evidence available.

There is evidence for a 999 call from Nevill.  The question is whether it is good evidence or we should just fall back on the default explanation that the civilian operator, Malcolm Bonnett, took one call, from PC West, who in turn spoke to Jeremy.  I have to say, the default explanation seems the more reasonable, but we are reliant on the evidence in front of us and the two phone logs could be interpreted in Jeremy's favour.

[Erik Narramore]

I don't believe there was a 999 call from Nevill, and I don't consider it a central issue anyway, but it is a matter of weighing the evidence.  It's not enough just to dismiss it as 'far-fetched'.  What's 'far-fetched' is often subjective and down to a point-of-view.

Furthermore, there is a hole in the Crown's case here because if Nevill didn't make a 999 call, we have to explain why.  In doing so, we have to accept and acknowledge that 'making a 999 call' does not necessarily entail speaking into the phone.  If Nevill is so critically-injured that he can't physically speak, it doesn't follow that he can't dial 999 and make the call, it only means that he can't speak to the operator.  Emergency calls in which there is no conversation with the operator are not uncommon.

[Erik Narramore]

To be clear, I entirely comprehend the counter-argument: Chinese whispers, natural re-interpretation of what Bamber says to West, etc.  I'm not putting on a tin foil hat here.

But....there is a log record that could be inferred to be a call from White House Farm.  That is fact.  Deny it until you're blue in the face, but the log exists.  It's then a matter of interpretation and who offers the best evidence.  You could take the view (and I probably would take this view) that Bonnett's evidence at trial should supersede the log.

But wait....Did the defence have the opportunity to cross-examine Bonnett about this at trial?  He gave evidence at trial, but was the counterpart log disclosed?  If the evidence was not adduced, then how can we say it has been tested?

There is also a log record that has at least one raid group officer apparently reporting one male and one female in the kitchen.  Again, probably a simple mistake.  Common sense would suggest so, due to the difficulty of Sheila moving around the house after one shoot and the lack of a forensic footprint for this.  But do we know it was a mistake?  How do we know that Sheila had shot herself at this point?  We have no times of death confirmed.  Again, I'm not saying this is my view, but why should it be seen as far-fetched?  It could be that there was a female downstairs in addition to Nevill.  (Or, much less likely, it could even be that there was a male in addition to Nevill).  Probably not, but we don't know.

I'm not suggesting that I would include this sort of thing in any appeal, but the point is that it's not about what anybody believes.  It's about evidence.

One side has a piece of evidence.  The other side says, 'No, you've got the wrong end of the stick there.  It was all a mistake.'  The judges should weigh it up, shouldn't they?

The logs are evidence and need to be considered in the context of the failure to previously disclose this material and, if I understand correctly, a reluctance to disclose and a failure to correct the record.  In a fair trial, the defence must have the right to test the evidence.  It's then up to the appeal judges to decide if they think the defence has produced good evidence that shakes the convictions.

Specifically going back to the phone calls, the better point for the defence in my view is to highlight the difficulty for the Crown in explaining Nevill's movements from a time-and-motion point-of-view in light of the ballistic evidence and also why he didn't dial 999.  Surely, if Jeremy did this and he is lying about the call from Nevill, then Nevill must have at least tried to dial 999, even if he was injured in the jaw/face?  Why is there no evidence for that?

[Erik Narramore]

To me, it doesn't matter whether it happened this way or not.  That's not the point.

The duty of the defence is to test the Crown's case, not go round second-guessing the police.

Was the counterpart log disclosed or not?  If it wasn't, then it's fresh (untested) evidence and ripe for appeal.  That's not to say it should be an appeal point, only that it could be.

An appeal judge (indeed, a juror too at a re-trial) could quite legitimately take the view that even if Nevill never made the call, a 999 call would still have to be made for the prosecution case to be consistent and therefore the convictions might be unsafe.  There is also the issue of whether prejudice has been caused to the defence through non-disclosure.

Let me tell you that if I was a juror at re-trial, I would conclude that the log is wrong on its face but that the failure of the police to disclose it was prejudicial and the lack of evidence of a 999 call by Nevill undermines the prosecution case.

[Erik Narramore]

I'm not sure I would agree that there is no evidence for a 999 call, but you say there was disclosure. Obviously, you'll appreciate there's lots of evidence, so I may have got things backwards-upwards on the disclosure issue.

Let me put it this way.  The point is that, in my view (I'm not a lawyer, so it's only an opinion), non-disclosure can be prejudicial to the defendant in and of itself.  This is because non-disclosure prevents the defence testing the evidence and also prevents the defence raising questions that arise from the evidence, such as whether the Crown's extrapolations are consistent with the Crown's own case.  This is because all bits of evidence have to fit the narrative or be consistent with the 'story' or case theory.

In this instance, the Crown extract from the logs that Nevill never made a 999 call.  Yet, if I understand things correctly (you seem to be saying differently, it doesn't matter either way really for the moment) the Crown didn't disclose the full log at trial.  This means the defence were prevented from considering whether this bit of the Crown's theory made sense in view of the adduced facts.

And in that same vein, we still have the problem that Nevill doesn't call 999.

[Erik Narramore]

I have outlined the time-and-motion flaw with Sheila in the Crown's case on a different thread.  If the Crown cannot establish that Sheila was under sedation, then I think the flaw could be fatal for the prosecution.

The issue with Nevill is of a similar kind, and while not as serious for the prosecution, it raises questions.

The relevant points are:

(i). The Crown deny that there was any 999 call from Nevill.

(ii). The main stairway is steep and narrow.

(iii). Two spots of blood were found between the main landing and the kitchen, respectively on the wall of the mainstairway and on the jamb between the foyer and the kitchen.

(iv). There was no blood on the kitchen door.

(v). There was no blood on the kitchen phone.

(vi). There was a struggle in the kitchen between Nevill and the killer.

(vii). Nevill was shot upstairs, roughly four times according to the Crown, and then four more times in the kitchen.

(viii). Nevill moved himself from upstairs to the kitchen - according to the Crown.

I find it difficult to reconcile all this with Jeremy being the killer, simply because in those circumstances:

(a). Jeremy would have already fired at June upstairs and left her seriously injured.

(b). Nevill must have been running for the kitchen phone.  Why else would he run for the kitchen rather than stay upstairs and try to save Sheila and June?

(c). Nevill was already gravely injured, according to the Crown, yet he is able to move from one part of the house to another with the killer in pursuit.

Was there something else, other than the phone, in the kitchen itself or something in a different part of the house that required him to go via the kitchen?

If Nevill is running for the kitchen phone, then this does not have to be a completely rational decision.  Nevill, we assume, is injured in the face/jaw, but it doesn't follow that he would not try to dial 999.

If there is no blood on the kitchen door, this suggests that the kitchen door was already open and Nevill does not try to block his attacker by shutting the door behind him.

If there is no blood on the kitchen phone, then this means Nevill never reached the phone.

Yet Nevill has left behind his wife and daughter, and is injured, because he wants to reach the phone.

There are blood prints on the worktop near the phone.

It seems to me there are two main possibilities:

1. Jeremy was the killer and caught up with Nevill just as he reached the worktop.  They then struggle (or whatever happened next).

2. Sheila was the killer and the kitchen struggle occurred at the beginning of the incident.  Nevill is already injured and goes for the phone again but Sheila stops him.

I have to say that 2 does seem to me more credible.  If Sheila was the attacker, Nevill would have been quite hesitant about what he was doing, especially if it was early in the incident and he had already spoken to Jeremy.

The problem with 1 is that, if you look at the position of the prints and also consider the narrowness and steepness of the hallway stairs, Nevill had the advantage and would surely have reached the phone in any event.  If Jeremy had already opened the line, all Nevill had to do was replace the receiver, take it off again, and dial three digits - which takes seconds.  Thus, not to touch the phone must have been a choice - it's much more likely he makes that choice for Sheila rather than Jeremy.

There are two ways the Crown could overcome this:

Solution 1: Nevill reached the phone but the abortive/broken 999 call was not recorded at that time; furthermore, even if the line had remained open at the caller's end, it would have been terminated by the operator after a short period of time, and no further investigation would have occurred.  Jeremy took it on himself to wipe the phone clean of blood, thinking that blood on the phone would be inconsistent with the staged call from Nevill.

Solution 2: Nevill reached the phone but Jeremy stopped him just as he was re-dialling.  A police officer used the kitchen phone on the morning of the 7th., wiping it clean of blood, and this has never been recorded or admitted, perhaps because only one officer was aware of it having happened and he didn't realise the significance of what he was doing at the time.

Solution 1 can only be confirmed by somebody with knowledge of how emergency calls worked at that time, but in any event, this gives me another thought about a possible kernel for Jeremy's idea of staging a call from Nevill.

One theory I have is that he got the idea due to a genuine call from Nevill that I hypothesise was made the previous evening and that may have catalysed his rage, but there is an alternative possibility.

It's possible that Jeremy got the idea for staging a call after terminating Nevill's abortive 999 call.  This may have occurred to him due to the fear (whether justified or not) that the police could and would trace back Nevill's unsuccessful call and so he decided there and then that he would have to stage a call from Nevill to himself, thinking (rightly or wrongly) that this would somehow cover him.  He then realises also that a call to Julie may help him, so he rings her at about the same time that he rings the police.

[Erik Narramore]

It doesn't seem very plausible that Sheila would be asleep - especially given the close proximity of the three bedrooms.  You are basically telling us that she slept through most of the mayhem, perhaps awakening drowsily but not reacting quick enough to stop Jeremy manhandling her into the master bedroom.

Let's say this is it.

Wouldn't she struggle with Jeremy and try to run?

How come Jeremy leaves no blood trail in the second bedroom and in the master bedroom?

How come Sheila has no blood on her feet?

If you have Sheila going to the master bedroom of her own accord, again how does she not get blood on her feet?  How does she not get June's blood all over her?  Why doesn't she check on the twins and leave blood in the twins' bedroom?

If you have Jeremy carrying her to the master bedroom, how does Jeremy incapacitate her to do this?  And why doesn't she struggle with Jeremy, given that he won't be holding the rifle?  Or do you think she slept through that too?

That being said, you're the Bachelor of Education, Mrs Smerchanski - with Honours too - so I assume you'll come up with a coherent explanation for all this.

Perhaps murdering people is something you have experience in?  Maybe insider knowledge, even?

[Erik Narramore]

I'm not sure about the claim that it was all over in a matter of seconds, simply because the context to the situation is that you have her asleep.

Jeremy's memory and sense of responsibility will have been affected by drugs is.  This whole issue of how drugs affected Jeremy's reasoning and intellect interests me greatly.