You're underestimating the distance.
It's more than double the distance and just short of an hour's walk.
Via Ballyrisode / Kealfada Bridge it would be an hour and a half.
I wouldn't think it's believable.
If one were to go down that line of thinking there were potential suspects much closer than that, but it is better to try follow what evidence there is than random speculation.
Anyone who believes gardai corruption or cover ups cant or didnt happen should look at the story of the murder of Fr Niall Molloy - there was a documentary on this on RTE last night and part 2 is on next week. Its not inconceivable that a cover up didnt happen in the case of Sophies murder either.
Does anyone know how long Ian and Jules were in a relationship at the point of the murder? And did Ian Bailey have any kind of record for adultery or cheating on Jules? I feel this info is kind of overlooked.
Surely a man who has the confidence and brass neck to turn up to a strangers house in the middle of the night looking for his bit has a history of that kind of thing.
Hard to believe if he's a man who has no past of cheating that on that particular night he chanced his arm to see what he could get, then resorted to murder when he was turned down.
These actions would seem to be committed by a man who wasn't used to being told no, so do we know of Bailey having any past history of infidelity?
Bailey was about 40 years old I think at the time of the murder, so is it conceivable that a 40 year old man got up in the dead of night on December 23rd and walked 2 or 3KM to Sophie's house when it's absolutely freezing cold out. Its late December and on the coast of Cork, I'd imagine temperatures are below freezing.
Kealfeada Bridge where there was also a potential spotting is also about 2KM in the opposite direction of Baileys House.
So is it believable that Bailey walked 2 or 3KM to Sophie's House, killed her and then walked about 2KM in the opposite direction.
Or maybe he turned up at her house freezing cold and angered not to be let in?
Its quite relevant what brought the murderer to this neck of the woods.. This location could be described as the back end of nowhere, it's as isolated as you get.
What motivated somebody to call out to such a remote spot?
Bailey was out drinking till the early hours prior to the murder, he went to bed briefly before getting up again.. Would it be reasonable to suggest he would set off to visit Sophie with amorous intentions sometime after 2am in the middle of winter?? It's a stretch to consider he would knock at somebody's door unannounced at such an ungodly hour - even for Bailey.
The killer may have been a party goer heading up to Alfie's - Albeit a little late, it's a possibility. It's plausible that Sophie heard the gate being opened, came out to investigate and met her demise... But would a standard party goer / stoner, really resort to such violence over an upset, five foot nothing french woman??
The lone opportunist.. Was Sophie in the wrong place at the wrong time? I doubt it.
Could Bailey have been looking to see if there was a party going on at Alfie's - It's very possible. But it seems to me that Sophie tied her boots up with the intension of going outside, what has she seen? She didn't sense any danger, and must have felt confident in confronting whatever situation she was looking at.
Why did Sophie, in a blind panic not run up to Alfie's were she knew people where living? She was a fit, lean girl, and could have ran to Alfie's, thrown a rock through the window and alerted everybody to the danger she was in..
So many ifs and buts..
Brings us back to the fact her house was on a shared access road, so either
A) The killer was looking for her specifically
B) The killer was looking to go on up the hill to Alfie's house, (this Garda story that Bailey said there might be a party on at Alfie's hints that he might not be the only one expecting that).
C) The killer was off track altogether and just happened upon her.
One of these 3 has to be true.
You don't bite the hand that feeds you.
Practically every report, commission or tribunal criticises but stops short of saying laws were broken or illegal acts committed. The people producing the report are instilled there for that very reason. Look at the mother and baby homes commission, 800 dead babies bodies were found in a sewage tank and still the report did nothing to bring justice, in fact it was the exact opposite. Moriarty Tribunal another example.
'The handling of informants, in the main criminals, is a thorny and complex one for all police forces.
Following the behaviour of some gardaí and their informants in Donegal, and the subsequent damning findings of the Morris Tribunal, the entire system was overhauled.
A new system, the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (CHIS), was put in place in 2006 and was modelled on similar systems abroad, including in Britain.
Under the new system all informants, or human intelligence sources, had to be passed on to a central system, where their names and details were handed over.'
2006 so this case is prior.
The Fennelly report makes it sound like small amounts of cash, clothes, tobacco etc. are pretty common things to give informants and it says there is no indication of any misconduct around this.
The trial would surely be over no matter what they gave Graham for statements. I don't think the DPP or a judge would look at it and say 'Ah it was only a couple of hundred pounds, drugs and alcohol they were giving him at a time. Not thousands."
To me the most likely scenario is that the gardai gave him money knowing it was to buy hash. Martin Graham's account is that he told the gardai he didn't know where to get hash himself so they would have to supply it. That sounds extremely unlikely that a known drug user would tell the gardai they were the only ones who could get him drugs. The gardai do seem to have a soft approach to cannabis in the area, if you are to believe the DPP report they knew people that were supplying small amounts of hash and were letting it go.
Whether or not there was a paper trail, if it came out under cross examination that a witness was paid large amounts of money to provide statements then it would cost them the trial. If it didn't come out during the trial the gardai would then be leaving themselves exposed to a homeless drug user who could get them sacked. It seems much more likely that they were leading him on in case he did get information that was useful. Personally I think the garda was trying to get Graham to say 'as I said before, I want a big payout for this' so it would be clear he was almost trying to extort money.
And what date was Fullers statement do you know?
Again comes down to what you believe is more likely, I struggle to believe that Martin Graham would out of the blue mention hash if he hadn't already been given some. Quite strange to ask a gardai for an illegal drug, which was much more frowned upon then than is now.
I believe maybe in the Jim Sheridan documentary they say that the reason a wire was placed on Martin was because Gardai were aware he was being a double agent.
Graham has also stated that the night he told Ian Bailey he was working with the guards he brought with him hash and two bottles of wine that the guards had given him.
You say that its more realistic that Martin Graham went to the guards to enrich himself, but you'd have to wonder why then he would buy wine and hash out of his own pocket and share it with Bailey regularly if he was as greedy as you say.
As mentioned above, its also on audio record that a guard asked him was a statement going to cost them financially.
Also the point about the guards would have to leave a paper trail if it was higher up, don't make me laugh. As discussed posts back, many pages were torn from an evidence book. A bloodstained gate was disintegrated and a wine bottle missing. Are we really to believe there would be a paper trail if they were giving cash to get Bailey to say something incriminating.
"Going to locals"? I believe JT is the only one who may have helped with the "bloody clothes washing". It's not like he was running around the neighborhood asking everyone to wash his blood stained knickers.
I suppose it depends on what you believe is more likely, a man might have a dark sense of humour or a man gotten away with a disgusting murder is now going around confessing to it and telling random locals that he did it.
Same with the washing bloody clothes theory, are we really to believe the same person who committed a brutal crime and left no trace is going to locals and asking them to wash clothes covered in blood.
As explained above, the timing is wrong, Bill Fuller says the conversation was several days before he was arrested. He went to Baileys house to say there were rumours going around that he might be involved. At that point IB had not been officially arrested or accused of anything.
That's not what's in the Fennelly report. As the report explains, any confession or information obtained using bribes would be inadmissable at trial and would likely cause a mistrial. The report says that Martin Graham mentioned hash but the recording shows he was not offered, promised or given hash.
A detective is not going to give a witness thousands of euro out of their own pocket. That would have to be authorised higher up, which would leave a paper trail as the money would have to come from somewhere. The gardai said Martin Graham came to them and said he wanted thousands of euro for information. The gardai told him to take a hike. They offered him some money for expenses, tobacco and clothes. Both of the detectives involved claimed for small expenses for small amounts.
As the report points out, it seems incredible that a garda who was illegally giving a witness a large amount of illegal drugs would ask a technician to go in the car with them to record the conversation.
I think a more likely story is Martin Graham thought he could enrich himself by playing along with the gardai, try to get them to offer him drugs and then go to the papers with the story.
If you think about it rationally, if a garda is that paranoid about a witness that they get a technician to install a secret recorder and travel with him for the meeting, do you think he would actually go on to give the person a big slab of hash?
I would think that the idea that she went out down the lane in the early hours of the night/ morning and just happened into someone who lost the plot after an argument is pretty fanciful. Some sort of sexual predator is possible but then she would very likely have known same person, because that's the norm. They may have had motive if she rejected their advances and they thought they'd be exposed. But they'd need to be pretty deranged to do that and would surely have come to light afterwards. Unless they were skilled in manipulation of stories.....
Other than that, who had motive? Possibly the estranged husband but seems unlikely given how she died and that they seemed to have come to a mutual understanding. If it wasn't Bailey, then the likelihood lies in the other males of the local community. I find it hard to believe that a woman would bash another woman's head like that. Bailey remains No1 suspect, not least on his own admissions and will always be. Frankly the idea that you'd admit to killing in such a well known case and then say it was a joke, is in itself proof that the suspect is deranged.
Bailey claims? Uh huh, ok. Bailey has a habit of blurting out things which he later changes and finds a convenient excuse for... including his initial alibi "claim".
Yes but I believe Bailey claims he was repeating what Gardai were trying to beat into him when he was arrested.
As in guards were telling him you saw her in Spar and got turned on etc.
Deleted due to accidently hitting send whilst typing
Because Martin Graham went to Ian Bailey and told him what was going on and the gardai were bribing him to get incriminating evidence, and gardai got wind.
You majorly understate what Gardai reportedly offered him, ounces of pure afghan hash, cash for statements. It wasn't a sambo during a catch up meeting he was being given.
On the bandon tapes you can clearly hear a gardai ask him "I suppose that's going cost us a bit financially, is it?" in regards to Graham giving a statement. Being given hash is also discussed on the tapes.
This quote is from Bill Fuller - repeating what Bailey said to him. Rejection CAN be a motivator in the mind of an already disturbed person. And attempted rape often results in the killing of women whether accidental or not.
I believe that was McKenna, there's one article which seems to confuse Mr C for McKenna but the Fennelly report states they are separate people.
Rejection across a pub floor or in the queue at Tesco is a very different scenario than a weirdo showing up at your door like a freaky stalker while you're alone in a remote place, in the middle of the night and them possibly stinking of drink.
The quote is what Bill Fuller testified IB said to him a few days before he was arrested and interrogated, so it couldn't be him regurgitating what the gardai told him. IB denies the conversation ever took place. Bill Fuller testified at the libel case and travelled to France to testify at the trial there, which seems to make it unlikely he was motivated to make it up to help the gardai.
From the dawn of time, men have chanced their arm for the love of a fair maiden... Rejection does not result in the smashing of the said fair maidens skull....
By the way, I think that quote was from a Gard interrogating Bailey?
"You saw her in Spar and she turned you on, walking up the aisle with her tight arse. You went to see what you could get and she was not interested." - Ian Bailey
That's quite close to my own feeling on the circumstances. She saw or heard someone opening the gate or driving down the lane, or prowling around the house. Either she had been up and awake anyway or she got up and went to confront them. An argument ensued and the killer may have struck her without thinking. She panics and runs and is chased down, by which time the killer is in a completely uncontrollable rage.
As far as the husband in concerned, I've not seen any reliable information that he was in financial difficulty or actually needed to have life assurance on his wife when he was by far the main earner and had assets. It seems unlikely they had to sign a mortgage together, most accounts say he bought the house in Toormore outright for her. She just had to pick a place. So I don't buy any of the motives of financial gain or messy divorces. By all accounts they had left their troubles behind. Her relative in one documentary says that she told him she was leaving Daniel, but that was while she was having an affair.
It seems unlikely that, having been divorced at least once if not twice before that Daniel would be green enough to walk into a divorce that could leave him broke.
I am open to the notion that this was a random act of insanity.. But what caused it? What triggered such a brutal response?
There are many possible suspects with better motives than Bailey. I'm not ruling out a French connection either, basically because the husband would have gained from Sophie's death, like avoiding a costly divorce settlement & being the benefactor of a life insurance policy..
One things stands out here.. The sheer brutality of the assault. The many blows to the head with a building block, the doc martin foot print on her neck / face. The violence was so excessive it's relevant.
I believe the murder was not planned by the murderer.. The slab and concrete block were just fortunate to be at the place of the murder.
What threat did Sophie present to her assailant?
We know she was quite vocal when she wanted to be, didn't shy away from confrontation, could fight her own corner if needed..
Based on there being no struggle inside the house, and the assumption that Sophie purposely tied her boots up to go outside, would it not seem logical that she was alerted to something or somebody outside??
So who would be outside on a winters morning? I say morning as all the evidence suggests it was around breakfast time .....
Sophie didn't draw the curtains in her house, she liked the lighthouse beam to enter into her cottage, she would leave the lights on at night before she went to bed.
Is this not a perfect scenario for the local peeping tom??
As daylight is breaking, Sophie notices a unusual shadow outside, or catches the peeping tom near the windows..?? She goes out to confront him, threatens to tell his family and call the Gards, the pervert know's he'll be finished in the community, and has probably been in bother before for similar acts of voyeuristic offences..
He pleads with Sophie to spare him, she refuses and returns to the cottage to phone his Mother and the Gards.. In that instant, the peeping Tom makes a rash decision to silence his accuser forever.. She puts up a fight, scratches him, hurts him, he loses the temper.... And the rest is history.
One random man. One act of random violence. The family wouldn't want it getting out so conspire to protect him.
All pie in the sky I know, but it makes more sense than some of the theory's I've heard..
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