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The Blue Way is a production of Cluarantonn

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Anthony McNeil and Steven Keogh

 

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Edited and Produced by Erin Ferguson – instagram.com/erinfergus0n/

Production Company Name by Granny Robertson

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Man disappears during 104-mile cycle from Fort William to Tillicoultry – BBC News

Search continues for missing A82 cyclist Tony Parsons – BBC News

Police to conduct more searches to find missing man Tony Parsons

Men arrested over cyclist Tony Parsons disappearance – BBC News

Family appeal to end missing cyclist mystery – BBC News

Human remains found in search for missing cyclist Tony Parsons – BBC News

Human remains discovered in search for missing cyclist | STV News

Forensic cops scour Scots farmhouse as two men arrested three years after cyclist went missing | The Scottish Sun

Body found near farm confirmed as missing cyclist Tony Parsons – BBC News

Human remains found on rural estate confirmed as missing cyclist | STV News

Cops find remains of cyclist who vanished three years ago after digging for clues at rural Scottish estate | The Sun

Two men charged with murder of cyclist who vanished during charity bike ride four years ago | The Independent

Anthony Parsons: Two men arrested and charged in connection with death of 63-year-old cyclist

Twin brothers charged with murder of charity cyclist – BBC News

Scots twins appear in court over alleged murder of grandfather who disappeared on cycle ride – Daily Record

Tony Parsons: Funeral held for cyclist missing for three years – BBC News

Twins accused of murdering charity cyclist Tony Parsons – BBC News

Tony Parsons: Twin brothers to stand trial accused of murdering charity cyclist | The Herald

Twin brothers to stand trial over ‘murder’ of charity cyclist Tony Parsons and ‘burying his body in grave’ | The Scottish Sun

Twin brothers to stand trial for alleged murder of charity cyclist Tony Parsons in the Highlands – Scottish Daily Express

Driver admits killing charity cyclist then burying body – BBC News

Driver admits killing charity cyclist then burying body – BBC News

Brute ran over & killed cyclist before twin brother helped bury body on secluded estate to cover up crimes for 3 years | The Scottish Sun

Man admits killing charity cyclist Tony Parsons before burying body with his twin brother – Scottish Daily Express

Tony Parsons family speak of heartache after charity cyclist killed and buried in grave on remote Argyll farm | STV News

Red Bull can helped find body of missing cyclist Tony Parsons | Glasgow Times

Killer driver led girlfriend to shallow grave where he buried cyclist – BBC News

Driver who killed cyclist Tony Parsons then buried body is jailed – BBC News

PIRC investigating ‘allegations of criminality’ against Police Scotland in charity cyclist Tony Parsons case | UK News | Sky News

Two men convicted in connection with the death of Tony Parsons who went missing in 2017 – Police Scotland

Update – Human remains confirmed as missing man Tony Parsons – Police Scotland

Girlfriend suing police she says pressured her into spying on killer

Man stabbed dad to death in broad daylight as he walked toddler in pushchair

Woman who went undercover to help snare killer ex could launch legal action against Police Scotland – Daily Record

BBC Scotland urged to investigate after murder trial witness fled over documentary ‘pressure’ – Daily Record

Filming in Scots courts is in the dock after murder trial ditched – Mail Opinion – Daily Record

Girlfriend suing police ‘who hung her out to dry’ after spying on killer

Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

Hosted by Dawn

Guests – Kevin from the Just Thought Lounge Podcast

Edited and Produced by Erin Ferguson – instagram.com/erinfergus0n/

Production Company Name by Granny Robertson

 

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Dawn of the Fairies by Derek & Brandon Fiechter

 

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Listen to Episode One – Through The Wall: The Case Against Luke Mitchell

 

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00:00:00: Introduction and Welcome
00:00:14: Naomi’s Background in TV Production
00:01:02: Balancing Multiple Roles and Teaching
00:01:52: Naomi’s Interest in True Crime and beginning Podcasting
00:06:49: Naomi’s Experience in Podcasting
00:09:01 Setting the Scene – Luke Mitchell and Jodi Jones
00:11:25: Trust in the Justice System
00:14:25: Questions About Jodie’s Whereabouts
00:15:23: Luke’s Alibi and Meeting Friends
00:18:21: Brutality of Jodie’s Murder
00:20:03: Police Investigation and Handling of Evidence
00:22:42: Search Party, finding Jodie’s Body and Police Treatment of Luke
00:31:03: Naomi’s Reflection on the Case
00:32:29: Emotional Impact on Families
00:35:20: Conclusion of Episode One Discussion

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Dawn: So, Naomi, it’s great to have you on the podcast.

 

Naomi: It’s so nice to be here. Thank you, dawn. Thank you for inviting me.

 

Dawn: Oh, it’s a pleasure. So, Naomi, can you tell us a little bit about yourself before we get into the details? Just about you, what you do, your other podcasts.

 

Naomi: So, I mean, I’ve been a tv producer for almost 20 years, which sort of gives away my age a little bit. But I’ve been doing that, and I’ve mainly worked in factual television. So everything from documentaries to reality tv shows, whether it’s, you know, orchestrating a wedding on don’t tell the bride in an alien cave, or whether it’s cast in the big Brother housemates, or it’s doing documentaries or working on salvage hunters or true crime documentaries. So I’ve kind of done a lot of programming over the years, and. Yeah, and now on the side, I do podcast hosting as well. And I also teach one day a week at a local college, and that’s teaching tv production. And now podcast production as well.

 

Dawn: Oh, well, no, make. My God, you’ve got a lot under your belt there.

 

Naomi: Yes. I don’t sleep very often. I do have two children, and I think they actually are the biggest job, so everything else just feels quite easy.

 

Dawn: It’s amazing that you teach it as well. You must be really passionate about what you do.

 

Naomi: Do you know what? I think it’s just that where I’m from, I live in Essex, and there’s not that many opportunities here. You often have to go into London, and sometimes we have students that the cost of a train ticket, which is extortionate into this local area. And actually, we’ve had such a positive response. And what I think a lot of my students have really gravitated towards, funnily enough, is true crime. They’re fascinated by the psychology. They’re fascinated by the why, not always the what. It’s normally the why. And I find that really interesting and really refreshing that young kids want to do that. So I’m here for it.

 

Dawn: Yeah, it sounds like it. What is your other podcast? You have another podcast as well? Did you start that one first?

 

Naomi: Yeah. So I actually got into podcasting because I live very close to the Lubbock family. So Stuart Lubbock was the man who was found in the swimming pool of Michael Barrymore. He had been raped and murdered, and I knew his family, and sadly, Stuart’s father passed away. And what happened after that is the battle for justice went on for such a long time, and it got nowhere. And there were arrests, and there was all this stuff, but there was also a lack of accurate information in the press. People went forward with Michael Barry more. They went forward with that narrative. And Stuart and his, you know, hit the fact he was a victim. He got kind of pushed to the side. So I spoke to the family, and I offered to do a podcast. They’d already done a documentary for Channel Four, and it’s called body in the pool, and it’s absolutely just mind blowing. And I thought, you know what? I wonder if we can do a bit more, because sometimes with podcasts, more people will speak because you don’t have to give their full identity. So I did a six part podcast series that did really well, and lots of the local press got on top of it. And actually, some of the national press did as well. And then it wasn’t long after that I spoke to Claudia Lawrence’s mum. So Claudia Lawrence went missing in two. Sorry. It was 2009. Sorry. That she went missing. And she was a chef from York, and she was walking to work one morning and she disappeared. And so I worked with Joan, her mother, and we decided together that we would try and do a podcast that would give people a little bit more information about her disappearance and what really happened. Because unfortunately, Claudia Lawrence was a single woman who was living a really social life. But unfortunately, what happened was the press, and there was a lot of misogyny in the way it was reported. They were focusing a lot on some of the relationships she’d had, and a lot of them had been with married men or she’d had, you know, a few boyfriends on the go. At the same time. She was a single, pretty woman in her thirties. You know, why not? Not necessarily the married man and stuff, but, you know, she had a lot. She had fun, and they kind of focused on that. And what happened was the quest for justice with her. It kind of got misrepresented. So a lot of people were sort of like, oh, well, you know, if you’re going to dabble with married men, you know, this is what happens. I actually read comments that actually said that, and I was so. I was so angered, obviously. No, okay, cheating, that’s. That’s a whole separate issue. This is about a woman who’s gone missing and has been taken from her family. And so I did the podcast with her mum, and that was that. That went really well. And then I came across this one. I came across Luke Mitchell and Jodie Jones. And I was looking for another case to do, and I went. I went online and I just started looking for cases that I didn’t know a lot about. And this one kept coming up. It was actually via Twitter. So I went on Twitter and I saw all these supporters of Luke, and all I could see was justice for Luke Mitchell and Jodie Jones. So my initial reaction was, okay, this has been a double murder. That’s what I thought. And then as I looked into it, I realised that Luke is very much alive and has actually been convicted of killing Jodie. And so I kind of. I nearly. I nearly stepped away from it. I thought, oh, well, you know, this is done. Why would I make a series on this? My. My whole thing is to look at justice. And the case got me. It was so odd. It was unlike anything I’d really ever seen before. I mean, there was this. I know, we’ll get into the details, but the whole case against Luke Mitchell felt very uncertain. It didn’t feel like a safe conviction to me. And I’m not someone that, you know, believes that all these people are innocent in prison. I do believe that there are miscarriages of justice, and there has been proven to be with Luke. I don’t know if he’s guilty or innocent. I have no idea. But the podcast and the reason I decided to do it ended up being a seven part series on it, is because the phenomenon that was kind of around it, all these people truly believed that he was innocent. And it was. It was incredible to see a group with tens of thousands of people signing petitions for him, a Facebook group, where people were literally giving up their lives to support this man that they’ve never even met. And I found that really intriguing. And my first true crime podcast I ever listened to was serial, and that was about Adnan Saeed and Hae Min Lee. And I know that almost kind of broke ground with true crime podcasting. And I thought, God, I wonder if this has got similar themes to that. And I’m not an investigator, I’m not part of the law network, but what I am is a storyteller. So I try and tell the story, and I told the story for what I saw, and I did luckily have access to a lot of stuff. And I know we’re going to talk about that, but that’s the reason I ended up taking that on.

 

Dawn: Yeah, well, that was one of the questions I was going to ask you. Why did you? Because I know you said a little bit about it in the first episode, but the same as me, I heard of the story. I suppose, like most people, I thought that he was guilty I didn’t delve too deep, and, you know, I’d always wanted to cover it. It was going to be one of the cases that I covered. But when I met you at Crimecon and you told me about your podcast and I listened to the episodes, you know, like you, I liked only want to do things different, not do it the same way again. And there’s just no way I could, you know, better it or make it come different. You did an amazing job.

 

Naomi: Well, thank you.

 

Dawn: And a fantastic storyteller, really. And the only thing I think of doing was to have you on and to talk about it, and that’s why you’re here today.

 

Naomi: Oh, it’s such a pleasure. You have been so lovely through my. Because, I mean, podcasting is still pretty new to me, and you’re really a queen in this area. So, no, I am at your service.

 

Dawn: No, I appreciate it. But I thought what would be quite good would be all the episodes I listened to, every single one, there was a jaw dropping moment when you were left with what the f. Is going on, what is happening? And I thought, you know, I know you said that you don’t like to give your opinions, and I try not to give mine either. But sometimes I wanted your opinion. I wanted to know what you were thinking and all these jaw dropping moments and all these things you kept telling, and I wanted to discuss it with somebody, you know, what the hell is going on with this case? So I thought it would be good to maybe go through each episode, and for people that haven’t listened to your podcast yet, they could maybe before we start talking about it, they could go and listen and then come back, and then there’s the discussion. So people are thinking the same as I was, that they wanted more. They wanted an opinion or thought. Perfect. It’s a nice combination.

 

Naomi: Absolutely.

 

Dawn: So that was my thought.

 

Naomi: Lovely.

 

Dawn: So shall we start with episode number one?

 

Naomi: Let’s do it. Let’s do it.

 

Dawn: So, in this episode, you just kind of set in the scene. You were telling all the facts. You made it clear that you weren’t going to give your opinions. You were going to try not just the facts. You told a wee bit about Jodie and Luke and what they were like and what they both enjoyed doing and just the events leading up to Jodie’s body being found. And then you start just at the end of the episode, you start to tell of Luke’s sort of isolation by police officers and him being clearly singled out immediately by them straight away.

 

Naomi: Yeah.

 

Dawn: So that was kind of what that episode was about. So, shall we dive in? I’ve got my question in my car. I’ve got so much. Naomi.

 

Naomi: Let’s do it. You throw them at me, dawn. I’m ready.

 

Dawn: So the first question you asked your listeners was, do you trust the justice system? So I’m curious, do you trust the justice system?

 

Naomi: Somebody said something that I feel like. I almost didn’t realise this is how I felt until she said it. One of the people that I box popped said, we have to, because if we don’t, what do we have? And that’s a good point. But when I asked that question at the beginning of the podcast, I think I would have said, yes, I do trust the justice system. It’s never let me down. But then you do open that up a little bit and then you think about the other people that perhaps have been wronged by the justice system. And I don’t even mean just miscarriages of justice, but actually people who have committed horrendous crimes and they’ve had a very lenient sentence, or they’ve got let off on a technicality. I don’t know. I don’t, actually, if I look at it now. No, I don’t. And for many different reasons. But not just a straightforward miscarriage of justice. I think sometimes the other way. It’s really hard, too.

 

Dawn: Yeah. I think before I started podcasting and looking into the stories and covering so many miscarriages of justice, they’re just there. You just assume they’re going to be there for you. If you need them replacing, they’ll be on your side and they’ll do the right thing. But I spoke to the miscarriage of justice organisation, and even though they deal with miscarriages of justice, she still said that. Yes, she does believe in it. It’s flawed, but you’ve got to believe in it.

 

Naomi: Right? Right.

 

Dawn: I’m struggling a wee bit because there must be good ones out there. I know that there are good police officers out there, but, my God, they really make a mess of it sometimes, don’t they?

 

Naomi: Do you know what? I sometimes think like, we’re all human and the police officers are human, and. And I totally understand it’s a stressful job. But I think there are, as we’ve seen recently in the press, dawn, you know, Wayne Cousins, who killed Sarah Everard, and David Carrick, who’s just been done for all those rapes in London, they’re both serving police officers and they. They have committed awful crimes. And I think there’s always going to be bad people in every single industry, you know, nurses, we completely trust them with our lives. But look at what’s happened with Lucy Letbe, you know? So I think, can we ever have a perfect justice system? No. Because it’s made of humans, and humans are emotional beings, and I think the answer is probably no.

 

Dawn: Yeah, and you get that in every job, don’t you? So I guess I’ve had experience. Every job I’ve gone for, there’s always one person that’s just, like, bit of a shit. It’s not quite right. Why would you not have that in? You know, every profession is like you say, we’re just human.

 

Naomi: Absolutely.

 

Dawn: So, yeah, we’ll get further into that. But the other thing you mentioned was the fact that Luke’s teacher expressed a concern because he’d written an essay expressing violence.

 

Naomi: Yes.

 

Dawn: I mean, wow. Wasn’t that really helpful? Was it? I mean, no, I didn’t think much of that.

 

Naomi: No. I mean, do you know what? Around that age. And like I said, I do teach at a college. I have 16 to 19 year olds predominantly, but I do have adults as well. They get to do creative projects and some of the things that they’ve written or they’ve gone out and filmed, because I do broadcast journalism and I do factual television. So a lot of that involves documentary making or it involves news items. And I’ll give them creative freedom. And I’ll say, you know, I’m looking for you to do a sort of in depth documentary on something. You know, it’s completely up to you. The choice is yours, what you do. But here’s the criteria. Syria. And some of the subjects they come back with are really dark. And I know that the creative writing students, they’re in the classroom next to us, and they write stories that, honestly, I mean, God, my podcast seems like a fairy tale compared to some of the stuff they write. I mean, it does give you alarm bells. It does make you think, oh, my God, you know, are you okay? But often I think they’re just pushing boundaries at that time, so I don’t know if it was related or not. But personally. Yeah, I don’t think that is a massive indicator of someone being a killer. Yeah.

 

Dawn: I spoke to a former FBI agent the other week, and she said that.

 

Naomi: I love how you casually just dropped that in.

 

Dawn: But she worked on the shootings in America, and somebody that we. A young boy shot at this school and shot people, and he had done a few pictures the same day, drew a few pictures, and they were very violent as well. So I guess it is difficult to know. Maybe always second guessing. But how would you know? I guess I can’t answer that. But how would you know what you need to be more concerned about? And others just like yours, expressing themselves. I guess it’s. It must be difficult. And looking back, I mean, his school teacher clearly thought, oh, yes, that. That must have been that. But I don’t think you can just, you know, blanket it. All these expressions mean. I don’t think that’s right.

 

Naomi: No, I don’t either.

 

Dawn: Yeah. So when Luke called Jodie’s home, because she’d had. Her mobile was broken and there was no answer the first. The first time. But then he called back again and. Jodie’s stepdad. Yeah, Alan, he answered and he said that, oh, Jodie’s just left. So I’m curious, where was Jodie and where was Alan when Luke phoned the first time? And we weren’t even sure if Jodie had just left. So if Jodie was there, why didn’t she answer the phone? If maybe Alan was in the toilet and couldn’t. If Jodie was there and she just left, I just curious, what was that about?

 

Naomi: We just don’t know. We just don’t know. All we know is that there was an attempt to call the house. Nobody answered. And it could have been that Jodie had already left previously. I don’t. I don’t know what Alan was doing. I know that he had been at work that day, so I’m not sure if he’d just come in, but I have no idea as to why they didn’t answer the phone the first time. And that’s. And that’s ever been addressed.

 

Dawn: Okay. Yeah, that bothered me. Of course. My mind goes, and he’s, what if this and what if that? And maybe Josie was there. Maybe they’re having a fight with it. I’m just going off on.

 

Naomi: The case is full of. Full of what if this one. Yeah, it’s a bit crazy.

 

Dawn: So that was something that I didn’t. Didn’t add up for me there a little bit. So Luke said for his mum to tell Jodie if she turned up at his house to meet him at New battle Abbey.

 

Naomi: Yeah.

 

Dawn: So he must have met his friends there. So he left his house, sat on the wall, and then went and met his friends. So did they not provide an alibi for him?

 

Naomi: They did, but it was. It was past the time of her murder. So the prosecution gave the time of death. I think they said it was around 515. I’d have to go back to my timeline.

 

Dawn: You did. You did.

 

Naomi: It was 515. So I think he didn’t meet his friends until gone 06:00. So in their eyes, he had enough time to commit a murder. But I think for me, what stands out here is that this man. Well, this boy. This boy. I keep saying man because I’ve obviously interviewed him as a man, but I have to really go back 20 years when he was a boy, and he had never had any police record. He’d never had any. Any violent episodes that had ever been reported. And when she was killed, I mean, her murder was absolutely brutal. It was absolutely horrific. So Jodie was found just off a path called the Rhoansdike path, which is a path that leads between two villages, ones where Jodie lives and ones where Luke lives. So it was the obvious route for them to take. Now, on the side of this, there’s a wall, like a stone wall, and on the other side of that wall is a kind of strip of woodland. It’s quite. I wouldn’t say it’s dense, but there’s enough trees there so that when you look into it, you can’t see everything. It’s. It’s got leaves, it’s got branches hanging down. She was found there and she. I mean, God, this is absolutely horrific. And it still. It still penetrates me to my core, when I think about it. So she was 14 years old. She’d been stripped, she was bound, she’d had her breast, one of her breasts cut off. She had been stabbed in the throat, she’d been beaten, she’d been strangled. It was a really horrific murder. But if you take what happened to her and then you put Luke with his friends less than an hour later, that is such a brutal murder. You know, for someone to go from naught to sick, you know, 100 like this, you know, he was actually an animal lover. I know a lot of people say killers, they start with animals. Yeah. And that’s really horrific. And, you know, they might torture a bird or a hamster or something, you know, bugs. And then they kind of progress. Luke was completely the opposite. So he had a. He had horses with his mum, and he also had a dog. And the dog’s very important part of the story, which I’m sure we’ll get onto. But that I just. That was. For me, that was the big thing. And that when he was arrested, there was no DNA from Jodie on him. And I find that so incredibly hard to believe, especially as his hair was dirty and his fingernails were dirty. So how does a 14 year old go from not having killed anyone before or, you know, violently assaulted anyone to doing something like that, that brutality, and then to go and meet his friends and act like nothing’s happened and remain dirty, not have any DNA on him. That, for me was the big, like, okay, wow, there’s something doesn’t quite sit right for me here.

 

Dawn: That did not sit right at all. But we’ll get into that. And also the time of death as well. I want to talk about that as well. I’m not quite sure, but. Yeah, yeah, even that’s 45 minutes. They said it was 05:15 she was likely murdered. And 06:00. He’s with his friends, having a lovely time with no change in his person. Come on. Like you said, that was a brutal murder. How? And nothing was found? That doesn’t make sense. I mean, that’s straight away. Does that make sense to a detective? Why would that be let. Alright.

 

Naomi: I wish I had something that would just have allowed me into the investigators heads just to get a bit of. A bit of clarity and a bit of hindsight. And the investigators who. Who led the investigation, they’ve never done a proper interview where they’ve sat down and kind of given their thought processes and what they were thinking and sort of given a bit of insight into that. They have shied away from media, which is completely their prerogative, and that’s fine. And some of them do still work in the force, so I get it. You know, they’re still employed, but at the same time, it’s really, really hard to comprehend that in its entirety. There’s something off, isn’t there? And 14. I mean, I. You know, I was thinking about 14 year olds. The girl next, who lives next door to me, she’s 15. And I see how they, you know, at 15, you try and act old and you try and act like you, you know, you know all about the world and everything’s great. But actually there are. There are little moments where you realise they’re babies, is still, you know, 14 years, but they still. If something scared them, they still run to their parents or their caregivers, you know, and she’s a year older than that. So I try and put that back, you know, put her to 14 when I knew her and. Yeah, it all feels very weird to me.

 

Dawn: Yeah. I was going to ask you if you knew of any of them. The detectives were still working in the police, so. Yeah, that’s interesting that they’ve had their work basically dragged through mud for years.

 

Naomi: Yeah.

 

Dawn: I would love to have spoken to one of the detectives, like you said, just to get an insight. How do they. There doesn’t seem to be any question, this is who was guilty and that’s what we’re sticking with. And I wonder, do they believe that wholeheartedly, you know, they might narrow mindedly blinkered, just, yeah, this is it. And they’re going to make everything fit with it because they believe wholeheartedly in their guts, if you like, that this person’s guilty, do they know something we don’t? Did they get a gut feeling and their gut was wrong that day? Or is it a case of just somebody is better than nobody?

 

Naomi: It does. It does make. It does make you question that.

 

Dawn: Yeah, I’d love to know the answer to that. How can you live with yourself otherwise, that you’ve done this?

 

Naomi: Oh, yeah. Unless, you know, I mean, what I have thought all along is, what if he is guilty? Like, what if he is? But I think the podcast wasn’t actually necessarily about is he guilty or not? It’s actually about the way the investigation was conducted and that there should be an independent review into how that was conducted because there were failures.

 

Dawn: Agree? And, yeah, we can’t know. You and I can’t know. The only people that know are the murderer, if him or not, and Jodie. But after you put forward all the evidence, there was nothing. It was all circumstantial. I don’t believe you should have been convicted. There should have been more. That’s what I think your podcast has done. It’s just laid to bear the facts.

 

Naomi: But I’m glad that came across because I think it was ultimately collating a lot of things. There was a lot about this case and there always is. I mean, murder investigations are never straightforward. There’s always a complexity. I think because these were two minors without any previous and they didn’t have this turbulent relationship. You know, they’d only been going out a few months.

 

Dawn: It wasn’t like it was only a few months.

 

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, I know. And actually, I think a lot of people said that they kind of had this as a, you know, when you hear about it, you think, oh, God, they’ve probably been together since they were like eleven, and it’s probably been really turbulent and all their friends have probably got an opinion on it. And actually there was none of that. So. Yes.

 

Dawn: Yeah, no, I was surprised. I don’t know why. I thought it was like this big love and something had gone wrong. Four months. That’s not. That’s no time at all. So back to when Jodie’s body was found by Luke. And then. So he said that Luke called the police, but he said to the police that the body’s been found, but he didn’t know it was Jodie. He just said a body. Then Stephen Kelly phones the police and he’s in a state and he’s shouting at the phone that it’s Jodie, and he starts swearing. So how did Stephen Kelly know it was Jodie, but Luke didn’t?

 

Naomi: Well, they both went through the wall. So the podcast is called through the wall?

 

Dawn: Yeah.

 

Naomi: So Luke was already out with his dog, Mia. So I sort of mentioned that before that, you know, Mia was. She was a big. She’s a big part of this because she was a trained tracker dog.

 

Dawn: So Mia, he got Mia and then he wanted to train her as a tracker dog. Was it a police officer was training him or something?

 

Naomi: It was. I think he was a former something. Whether it was the military or the police, I can’t remember. But, yes, she had been trained by somebody. Yeah.

 

Dawn: Why did he want to do that? Just out of interest, weren’t you?

 

Naomi: He was very outdoorsy, the whole family was, but he had a knife to go fishing and camping and all of that kind of stuff. So it was just one of those things, I think, that he was interested in small town Scotland. What can you do? You can utilise the beautiful scenery and countryside that you’re in, and that was part of it. So. And, you know, that kind of going back to how Luke loved animals here, that they’d actually got Mia properly trained, so she was brilliant and he gave her a command and he sort of said, find Jodie. So they were walking along, and as he was walking towards Jodie’s house, so going to Roan’s dyke path, he came across Alice, who was Jodie’s grandmother, Janine, who was Jodie’s sister, and then Stephen Kelly, who was Janine’s boyfriend, and they then decided to go back the way that Luke had gone, just in case they thought he’d missed anything. And I. Do you know what? I kind of understand that, because he was full. And I’m just thinking now, I’m just putting my. Because I’ve got kids. If my daughter was walking on her own and she’d been missing, and her 14 year old boyfriend, who would have been in year nine at school, if we think about it in that way, in year nine, walking towards me, I would probably say, do you know what? I’m a responsible adult. We’ve done this direction. Let’s go back. And so they went back and they went up past this v shaped hole in the wall. So it was kind of. The wall had cracked and it had come away. And on the. On the thumbnail of my podcast, you can see it’s Luke standing in front of the. The v. And they sort of had to kind of actually climb over and through the wall. And it was Luke and Stephen that went together. And Luke, at first sight, he was like, oh, my God, is that like a mannequin? He saw a leg. And then Stephen went over. So that’s her sister, his boyfriend. And then he screamed, and then Alice went over. So that was the grandmother. And she cradled Jodie, which I totally get, like, that’s your granddaughter. And you see her in that state, of course you are going to cradle her. Luke started off on the phone. He was giving them directions and then that when they arrived, they were there under three pieces of false information.

 

Dawn: So where did they get that from? That was something.

 

Naomi: So when he. They hadn’t realised that they had met up, I just think he hadn’t mentioned that nobody else was with him. So he was there. They thought he was on a bike, because he usually travelled with a bike. And when Jodie’s parents had reported him missing, I think they had assumed that he might have had a bike and that he had been the only one to find the body. But of course, he wasn’t. There was. There was four of them and the tracker dog. So that was really, really. It’s quite big information, because the reason that they said they took Luke is because he found the body. It’s worth saying here as well, that Luke. Should I describe what Luke looked like? Because I think it’s quite an important part of the story. So Luke, I guess by nowadays, descriptions would have been like, a skater boy esque. So he had, like, a band, he had, like, long hair, wore bandanas, wore, like, you know, black t shirts with, like, rock stars on them, and he had parker jackets and, you know, it. I mean, to be honest, nowadays, I wouldn’t. I would look up and actually, I don’t think I would have done then, but this was a small village in Scotland, small town Scotland, so I. I can understand why people might have thought, oh, he looks a bit different. Exactly, exactly. And what they did, actually, first was they kept Luke with them and they asked him to show them where the body was. Now, I’m not a police detective, but if a child has come to me and said, you know, there’s a body over there and it’s. It’s really bad. I wouldn’t re traumatise that child by bringing them back at that moment. They didn’t know anything, you know, so that, for me, was a really big red flag that they asked him to go back and show them, because it’s not, like I said, it’s not a really dense forest. This is a strip of woodland. So you can. You can really clearly see the body. You know, you’re in policemen, you know, you can go and have a look.

 

Dawn: Your look should have been able to stand at the other side of the wall and just say, it’s through there, and should.

 

Naomi: Through the wall. Exactly. Exactly, exactly that. So that was another thing that I just. I didn’t think was, you know, very good. And then they took. They took all of them, the. The whole search party. They all went to a local high school where they had sort of cornered off the car park and used that as a meeting point. And there was a point where Luke and Stephen Kelly, Janine’s boyfriend, were sat down on a curb smoking. Family had obviously were starting to hear what had happened. They were all turning up at this point. There was a lot of grieving, there was a lot of crying. And then Luke was asked to get into a police car. But the rest of them, who had found the body and remember, Alice had cradled Jodie’s body. They were left there to kind of mingle with the family and grieve and support each other. But Luke was put in the back of a police car and he was taken to the station. And this is within, like. Like a very short period of time. A very, very short period of time. I need to go back and look at the exact times. But I think within the hour of finding her body and him being taken away. And they said that it was really to get his clothes and put them into forensic evidence. But again, I mean, why wouldn’t they do that with all four? That was what really, really confused me.

 

Dawn: But then Stephen Kelly phoned to see that he found a body as well. So why were they under the assumption that it was only looked and they’re saying, oh, that’s why we took him away to get his clothes. Was it a lack of communication, do you think?

 

Naomi: I think it was because when Jodie’s mother reported Jodie missing, she had been under the assumption that she’d been with Luke all night, so she’d sent a text message to Luke’s phone, because Jodie’s was broken, saying, you know, I think it was like, right, toad, say goodbye to Luke. You’re going to be grounded, you know, of that kind of nature. And that’s when he rang and said, she’s not with me. But I think, you know, they’d obviously gone to the police and said, you know, she was meeting her boyfriend, his name’s Luke Mitchell, and. And then he finds her. I think that is the. The correlation. And they’ve just gone with that narrative.

 

Dawn: Okay, but they just kept going with that narrative, didn’t they? There was no, they did, they did.

 

Naomi: And I think it probably did. You know, the fact that Stephen Kelly that night, you know, had been with Janine and, and Alice, you know, they had all travelled out together to try and find her. So Luke was always the one that had been in that search party in the beginning and he had seen them along the path. So, yeah, he was. He was definitely different from the. Treated different from the rest of them.

 

Dawn: And by them doing that in front of the family as well, that’s putting a target. I mean, what must they have been thinking? They were with them when they found the body. They’re not getting taken away, so straight away your mind would start working. So they were putting a target on his back by the family as well.

 

Naomi: And the absolute shock and grief that they must have felt. I had a bereaved last week, I was telling you about it and I. And it’s only when you have a bereavement that that shock and that grief really hits you again. You know, it really kind of. It makes you think about life. It makes you think of so much life. I can’t imagine that being your child or your sister or your granddaughter and also just having, you know, absolutely no answers. But hold on. You know, she was out. She’s just been out there. Boyfriend, apparently, all night. You know, how are we here? How are we now? In a car park speaking to police officers, giving statements because our child has been murdered. I think everyone’s brains must have just been completely frazzled, but including Luke’s as well, because that was his girlfriend.

 

Dawn: And again, if you think if he didn’t do it, you know, if he didn’t do it, this poor lad, he would be devastated. And he’s not allowed to get in touch with his mum straight away, she thought, and he’s just taken away. I mean, God, at 14 years old, you’d be shitting her servants, you know?

 

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

 

Dawn: That wasn’t handled very well at all. I mean, and, okay, he wanted to get his clothes, but there’s ways to do it, isn’t there?

 

Naomi: Absolutely, absolutely. And I think, you know, they should. That should have been priority to get all of the search party and anyone that went up to Jodie, especially, you know, to take their clothes for forensic evidence, it was very clear from the way that she was left that this was a horrific murder. You know, she didn’t bind herself, so that is how that should have been treated from the get go. And it was. And.

 

Dawn: And especially her gran, you know, Alice, because she was gradling her, so she could have potentially have evidence on her as well if there was anything to find. Yeah, that was. Yeah, that was a bit of a mistake.

 

Naomi: Yeah.

 

Dawn: Naomi.

 

Naomi: Oh, it just. It does, yeah. It can take you into really, really dark place. And, you know, every moment I was doing this podcast, I just, you know, I never sort of wanted to lose sight of Jodie’s face, you know, because this happened to her and it’s just utterly horrific.

 

Dawn: She.

 

Naomi: She did not deserve what happened to her. And if it. If it was Luke, which, you know, again, I just. I can never say I think he’s innocent. I think he’s guilty because I just don’t know. And I don’t think I’d say that about anyone. But if it wasn’t, you know, whoever’s out is out, is still out there, and that’s terrifying.

 

Dawn: Yeah. And that’s what I mean about the police. I mean, surely they’re in that job because they want to maybe see justice done, so perhaps they’ve not got justice. Is that not important? Two years. I mean, I know it’s all about money and all that now, but, God, that should be really rent and forever, shouldn’t it?

 

Naomi: Absolutely, yeah. Yeah.

 

Dawn: And of course, Luke was, when he got to the station by himself, before his mum got there, stripped and everything taken off him and put into a paper forensic suit.

 

Naomi: Yeah, yeah. They had actually seen. He had actually seen his mum. So as they were driving in the police car, they’d seen Corinne. She had been walking towards the station and the car had pulled up and she’d been trying to call Luke on the phone and the police officer actually turned the phone off and then he was like, well, you know, I want to speak to my mum. So then the police officer turned the phone back on and rang her and said, you know, we’re taking your boy to this, to the police station. Jodie’s dead and she’s then running towards the police station. Remember, this is small town Scotland. This is a tiny area and they’ve passed her on the way, they stop. They stop. And then they tell her that they can’t get her in because of potential contamination issues. So she’s left to run. And she did run up to the police station and, yeah, they weren’t reunited for a few hours, so that’s, you know, that’s pretty shocking.

 

Dawn: Do you know, is that. I mean, he’s only 14. He’s a child. Is when they’re. When they try to get the clothes off you and are you supposed to be by yourself? Are you not allowed to have a representative with your family member or an appropriate adult? Is that procedure?

 

Naomi: I mean, you are. You’re just supposed to have somebody else in the room.

 

Dawn: Okay. Yeah.

 

Naomi: Which I believe, if I go back, I’m sure there was two officers. But again, I mean, there was no legal representation at this point, which, I mean, in the grand scheme of things. Did he need it at the time? No, he wasn’t arrested. He was being questioned, and Luke was cooperating. I mean, if that had been my child, I would be absolutely fuming. Because at that point, you know, they really could not have known, you know, this was an hour or so after they could not have known anything, you know, so that that was what really sort of got him stuck in my mind.

 

Dawn: Yeah. And the knew she was coming, you know, just wait for her. And they knew she was obviously there, but that’s a horrible way to treat even bad enough Luke. But the mom as well, that was episode one, so there was a few interesting things in there. Anything else you want to say about episode one?

 

Naomi: No, I just think that was really, like, what I tried to do with that is just set the same. And actually just to kind of open up the story a little bit more from what they may have seen and just to personalise Jodie as well, and to offer some sort of personalisation to Luke as well, just so people could know a little bit more about who they were, because I think that is really important here. And, you know, every time you see a media headline or whatever, you do get lost in the fact that they were children. And I can’t say this enough, and I’m sorry if this bores everyone, but it’s. But they were kids. They were kids. And this is what’s really, really. It just baffles me, the whole thing. But episode two is, uh, is quite the ride.

 

Dawn: You kind of eased us in gently ish in episode one, and then it takes off.

 

Naomi: I remember seeing a review after they’d listened to one episode, and they were like, yeah, you know, I like it. I like her style and I like what she’s doing. But actually it’s taken, it’s taken a long time to get into the story. I thought she wait and then they came back and they were like actually scratching 100 miles an hour. And it does, this case is it does. From now on there’s no rest breaks. It’s pretty full on, isn’t it?

 

Dawn: It is just every episode is like what? You’re really good at that leaving on a cliffhanger.

 

Naomi: Well, yeah. I mean, do you know what, you know, sometimes as tv producers, podcast producers, you know, you want people to come back and follow through the story. So you do have to make hopefully an ethical and moral kind of cliffhanger hanger. I didn’t need to. It was about choosing what piece of information I was going to end on because there was just so many.

Listen to Episode Two – Through The Wall: ‘Scotland’s Most Hated’

 

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00:00:00: Overview of Episode Two

00:00:19: Luke’s Arrest and Initial Processing

00:00:33: Trial by Media and Release of Luke’s Name

00:00:46: Luke’s Movements on the Night of Jodi’s murder

00:01:06: Ethical Concerns About Media Coverage

00:04:02: Police Search at Luke’s Home

00:05:02: Early Suspicions and Labelling of Luke as a suspect

00:06:59: Luke’s Involvement in the Search Party

00:07:27: Transcripts and Statements from Luke’s Family

00:08:27: Changes in Statements Over Time

00:10:01: The Complexity of the Case and Human Nature

00:11:08: Police Focus on Luke as a Suspect

00:12:49: Delayed Interviews with Jodi’s Family

00:13:16: Lack of Clear Motive for Luke

00:14:31: Police Narrative and Media Sensationalism

00:16:45: Luke’s Room and Personal Belongings

00:19:11: Knife and Other Items Found in Luke’s Room

00:21:20: Prosecution’s Evidence and Concerns

00:23:11: Time of Death and Forensic Issues

00:25:44: Luke’s Time at the Police Station

00:27:10: The Talking Clock and Luke’s Alibi

00:29:39: Credibility of Luke’s Family’s Statements

00:30:23: Disturbing Police Interrogation Tactics

00:34:12: Role of the Appropriate Adult During Interrogation

00:36:24: DNA Evidence

00:39:22: DNA on Jodi’s Top

00:40:49: Luke’s Interview with a Journalist

00:44:54: Luke’s Visit to Jodie’s Grave and Media Coverage

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Dawn: Okay, then episode two. So this episode takes us up to the point of Luke being taken to the police station. He must start off again there. And then he’s stripped, and his clothes are taken away, his phone’s taken away, he’s swabbed, he’s photographed, and he’s examined, and it’s all without an adult present.

Naomi: Yes. Yeah.

Dawn: And then you start to talk about trial by media. That was it that comes out, isn’t it? How. How his family and how Luke, his mom, Luke’s name was released to the press, which.

Naomi: Yes. What?

Dawn: Okay, we’ll come to that. Then it brings up to when he was arrested nine months after Jodie’s murder. And then we find out Luke’s movements on the night of Jodie’s murder as well. So that’s what that episode’s about.

Naomi: Yeah, that’s right.

Dawn: Why was his name released? I mean, I remember you saying that it’s. It’s not ethical for the newspapers to. They know they’re not supposed to, but they’re really dependent. But he was 14, so why was that allowed? Why did they do that? I’m saying, why did they do it? But you know what I mean? What’s your thought?

Naomi: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I still. I still grapple with this. And I did. I did ask. So one of. One of the interviewees that I’ve got on the podcast is a media lawyer called Ken, and he’s. He’s taught law and ethics to university students for years. And I said to him, is this allowed? You know, because this feels very wrong. And he said, until somebody is arrested, you can actually say what you want ethically and morally. You know, there should have. There should have been some sort of reprimand internally for the editor, you know, who had chosen to actually print that information. But this was a salacious story. This was a story that was going to sell newspapers and that won over protecting the identity of a 14 year old. And I think what had happened was, as well, there was, you know, this is. I can’t say this has been proven. It hasn’t. But there was speculation that one of the police officers was feeding information to the journalists, and there was a relation in there. So that was potentially a reason that they were going with that. Something that does predate that slightly is that before it was released to the media, when Luke was interviewed that first night and his mother was as well, the tapes. I mean, this is back in the day when they had cassette tapes, and maybe they still do. I haven’t been arrested, but if when you put the tape in, they would have a label on it and Luke’s was labelled suspect and Corins was labelled witness. So very early on, it was very clear what the narrative was. And it didn’t take long before people to realise that Luke was. He was definitely a person of interest at that time. And, you know, if you look at this as a journalist, and I have, you know, so I am sort of a journalist, tv journalist and podcast journalist, I understand. I mean, I’m not like this, but I do see other people who like a sensational storyline. He fit the look. I mean, you know, he looked different. He looked, as we’ve talked, he looked a bit like a skater boy. So to have this kind of dark, moody teenager with long hair and a bandana and this tragedy of this 14 year old girl who’d been murdered in the most brutal way in a small town in Scotland, that was intriguing. People were picking up the paper and, you know, this was front page stuff. This wasn’t buried, you know, deep in on page 36 or whatever, you know, this was. This was front page. So that narrative, you know, fingers pointing towards him, went almost straight away. So do I think it’s wrong? Absolutely. But is it illegal? No.

Dawn: That’s awful.

Naomi: And then I think what really kicked it off was on. On the 4 July, which was four days later, the police arrived at Luke’s home with a search warrant and the press were there. Oh, so there are images, and those images are available online. You know, you can see those on news reports. And Channel five did a two part documentary on this called murder in a small town. And you can see it is, you know, a very average house, absolutely surrounded by photographers. And the police are bringing out, you know, a lot of evidence and they’re put, you know, they’ve got crates. They’ve literally got, you know, crates of stuff they’re bringing out. So it was. It was almost like. Almost like pantomime. You know, people are coming out and it was. And they’re, you know, taking photographs and they’re taking film footage and that’s all still available to look at this day. And like I say, this was in such a short period of time after.

Dawn: She’D been four days, wasn’t it?

Naomi: Yeah, but that’s.

Dawn: Even without investigating, I mean, that was night one they’d had on the tape, suspect with no investigation. Just that was. That was. That said it there, didn’t it?

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: They set their stall out right there.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: And by doing the search warrant again, that’s sending a clear sign, isn’t it? There’s the papers. Can see it all. And absolutely, he had no chance.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: Yeah, I know. So you mentioned something about if Luke had killed Jodie, why would he have led them to her body? You know, by. By being in the search party, would you not have wanted to be far away from it? But I think a lot of people do want to be right involved in it, too, don’t they? And show that they’re helping and.

Naomi: Yeah, and there have been killers in the past who have, you know, they revisit the crime scene and, you know, they do show an interest in the murder, and I don’t really know, you know, the real psychology behind that. But I do remember reading somewhere that they almost relive the experience by going there, and part of their crime is seeing the reaction of other people. You know, it’s seeing that tragedy, it’s seeing that emotion. But I just. I’m just not convinced that that fits Luke at all. And again, I mean, with. With the whole find in the body, there was one thing that was really. That really stood out to me, which was they said that they actually walked past that v shape in the wall, and it was actually the dog, Mia, that doubled back and put her hind, you know, her paws on the v in the wall and started sniffing over the wall. And that had kind of then alerted them. So that I know when there’s, you know, there’s quite a few people that do protests for Luke, and one of the big banners that they use is Luke didn’t find Jodie, Mia did. And then they have a picture of the dog. So that’s just another thing to sort of keep in mind there as well.

Dawn: Yeah. Or, I mean, he could be, you know, she was a tracker dog. He maybe was being clever, but then he wouldn’t have known that her family would say, oh, let’s go back again. It’s just leaving too much to chance there, if that’s what his goal was.

Naomi: Yes. Yeah, absolutely.

Dawn: Yeah. So I’m not sure about that either. You got a lot of transcripts. You went through to read a lot of transcripts. Did you happen to get the transcripts from Luke’s mum and. Well, Luke himself? Did you get to read them?

Naomi: No. So I actually got those through a criminologist who supports him. Her name is Doctor Sandra Lean. She’s. She actually was not a criminologist before Luke’s case. She was a woman that lives locally to Luke, and she had two daughters who went, you know, lived in the area and was obviously very concerned that a girl of her daughter’s age had been found like this. And then she sort of learned more about the investigation and she thought something was wrong and she became quite pally with Corin, his mum. Unfortunately, Corinne, is. Is quite ill. So I spoke to Sandra and she had a lot of the transcripts and that’s where I got them from.

Dawn: And what about the transcripts from Alice? And, I mean, I know you’ve talked later on about the transcripts. Their statements changed a little bit during they. I’m just curious to see what they said at the beginning, because they all seem to, you know, back each other up at the time, didn’t they, right. At the beginning, and then it changes.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Somebody you had on your show said, you know, the first statement is usually the one they would go with, you know, to give them more credit.

Naomi: Yeah. Because, you know, things change, don’t they? And other. Other things kind of infiltrate your brain. I actually think, though, as well, at the same time, there is something to be said about shock and grief and what that does to you in the beginning. So I have no idea what statement I would have. I would have chosen to believe, first and foremost, but there are significant changes, and if you listen to the episodes, you know, we do kind of talk through them and the discrepancies there and there, there are quite a few, but I think some discrepancies would be completely natural, especially in that state of, you know, shock and grief. You know, our body does lots of things, our mind plays tricks on us and stuff, but, yes, very quickly, narratives and attitudes changed 100%. And you know what? I just don’t. I don’t blame the family because this is such a massive, like, life altering. It’s the worst thing that could possibly happen, isn’t it? There is literally nothing else that could top this. So when I was reading through the statements and, you know, who had said what, I just. I took it all with a pinch of salt. And actually, what I was hoping for was more forensic evidence to come into play, something that would have actually given scientific fact, rather than relying on four people who had all just lost somebody they loved. Yep.

Dawn: And also, you know, when they first gave their statement, I guess they didn’t really know what the police were thinking about Luke or that he might be involved, but then at the trial and later on, they did know. So maybe they were just. Maybe not deliberately, but maybe they just shifted that to try and make it fit as well that they saw him as.

Naomi: Definitely. Yeah, definitely a possibility. I think the thing with this case is, you know, when I started doing the podcast, I really wanted to come up with a really strong conclusion at the end, you know? And what I soon found was, this is so complex, it’s so intricate. And these are all human beings who have the ability to lie. Every single person on this earth has the ability to tell a lie and to keep a lie going. It’s just about finding out who is doing that.

Dawn: I know, I know. More the more. So you talk. Yeah, yeah, we’ll get there. And I was just curious that why did the detectives have Luke in their sights from straightaway? Now, you said he didn’t have a previous record, he wasn’t in trouble with the police, but because it was a small town, did they know off him? Had they ready some sort of opinion about him, that they just thought, he’s our guy?

Naomi: I think, like, I think quite quickly, I mean, from what I can gather, and I’ll never be in their heads, like I said, guttingly, because I would love to know. But what I think straight away, it was, number one, he looked a bit different. Number two, he was Jodie’s boyfriend. And a lot of the time, you know, this looked like a crime of passion. This was a personal crime. It was so brutal. What they did to that poor girl is so personal, or it feels so personal and feel so sadistic that I think they were like, right, okay, well, there’s a guy who looks a bit weird, local weirdo. And Luke, even, he actually described himself as the local weirdo. He was the boyfriend people believed they had been meeting that night. They were due to meet up. There was a discrepant. Well, not a discrepancy, but there is a timeframe where Luke says, you know, he was one place, and then an eyewitness says he was somewhere else, and. And then it just gets really muddy. And I think there were also, at the time, at the very, very early stages, there was no other indicators that it could have been anyone else, because the family had all been together, and there was no local murderer going around, you know, killing young girls or killing anyone. So I think he was possibly. I don’t want to see an easy choice. I think it was probably right to investigate the boyfriend, but I. But I don’t think they kept their minds as open as they should have done.

Dawn: So Luke was taken in and interviewed straight away, but then Jodie’s family, they weren’t interviewed until was at 05:00 in the morning or something. They weren’t a long time later.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: And they had time to talk and discuss. I mean, obviously they’d be devastated.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: The other thing I was going to say was you mentioned how badly she was attacked so severely and so savagely. What would the looks motive have been? You know, he’s saying that this is a very violent, aggressive. It looks like a very violent, aggressive person. He hadn’t, as far as I know, ever portrayed this before. What would have been his motive for doing it? Were they not getting on? Just there energy that said they weren’t getting on?

Naomi: No. There was speculation that there’ve been some adult, I don’t want to say even say adultery for 14 year olds, but some flirting, but with, you know, she flirts with him, he flirts with her. That’s kind of as deep as it. As it ever came out to be. There was no history of them having, you know, really turbulent arguments. There had been no reported violence within the relationship as well. And, I mean, God, at 14 especially, you would hope not. But there hadn’t been that. I’ve never, ever got to the bottom of what that motive could be. But the police said that Luke was this devil worshipping satanist who loved Marilyn Manson and Marilyn Manson. So if. I’m sure everybody will know. But is an american sort of goth punk rocker. He’s quite a controversial character. He’s been accused of some quite serious crimes, actually, in recent years, and he. He is a dark character. He is very strange. Probably wouldn’t want to bump into him on a. On a night out.

Dawn: He sounded all right when he was speaking that interview he did. He sounded quite normal a little bit, didn’t he? I thought I expected.

Naomi: I think he’s quite intelligent, from what I remember researching about him. You know, he. He was a really intelligent person. He was an artist and he actually, you know, he’s. I think he’s still got some of his art up for sale. But one of the paintings that he did was of a case that, God, I think it went back to might have been the forties. It was. It was named as the Black Dahlia and it was a model and actress who had been killed in a similar way to Jodie. Similar. Not identical, similar. And the police ran with the narrative that he was also fascinated by the black Dahlia murder because Marilyn Manson was. And Marilyn Manson had done this. This picture of the Black Dahlia, which is quite. It’s quite jarring to look at. And they felt that that was a big part of him. And they were like, oh, you know, he smokes a lot of cannabis. And he’s just snapped. And he’s done this because of the things he was into. But one of the biggest misconceptions was the fact that he was into Marilyn Manson. So he did have a Marilyn Manson CD, which they got when they searched his home. That CD was actually from a magazine that had been brought after Jodie had died. It was something that his mum had brought him, a music. It came free with a music magazine. And it just so happened to be Marilyn Manson. And that’s where this whole devil worshipping Marilyn Manson narrative fed into the media quite quickly, because, of course, that’s a great headline for them, you know, as. As callous as that sounds. And it does. And this is why I don’t work in the tablets. But that’s the sort of thing that sells newspapers and it creates characters and automatically this story becomes like, you know, a Hollywood film plot, a really dark Hollywood film plot. So to link it to an a list singer out in Hollywood, that just gives it a whole other dimension that makes it more intriguing to people that are going to pick up that paper. So that was ultimately what they felt his motive was.

Dawn: And what was Luke’s room like? I mean, I remember when I was a young girl, you know, anybody that I idolised, you know, there was posters on the wall, there’s posters on the roof. Was his room. What was his room like? Was it covered?

Naomi: I mean, a real typical teenage boy’s room from. From what I’ve heard. And I’ve seen the things that they. That they got from his room. And there are some things that I, you know, did make me raise my eyebrows. So there was 20 bottles of Luke’s own urine. Now, that is weird. Totally weird. One thing that I will say is that one psychologist I did interview during the research said that collecting urine can sometimes happen after a traumatic event, and it’s a reaction to trauma. It’s about something you can control when everything’s being taken away from you. Something you can control. I’m not diagnosing him. I have no idea. But that. That is. It’s weird, but does it make you a killer? No.

Dawn: Did he only start doing that? Do we know after Jodie’s death, or was he doing that before?

Naomi: I do you know what I’ve been told? I’ve read things that conflict, so I have no idea with that, but it is weird. And within that, they also got this Marilyn Manson cd. And there was a calendar that featured Marilyn Manson. And then I think, for me, the thing that made me this is this is the thing that I’ve, I’ve always thought, okay, that’s, that really concerns me is that there was a knife pouch and it was in the, the number inscribed on it was 666, which is obviously the number of the deaf, a demonic number that, for me. Yes, that’s, that’s odd and weird. Would I let my 14 year old have a knife? I don’t know. But then I, in the, in the podcast, I do say my husband, and we don’t live in the country. Well, I suppose we do live in, we nigg, we live near greenery. He’s a fisherman, and I asked him when he got his first knife, and he said it was about 1615 or 16. So he remembers being given a knife to go, you know, to do fishing and to put up the tents and for camping and stuff, you know, in replacement of a swiss army knife, you know. So when you kind of look at it like that, I get it a bit, but it does still bother me. Does still bother me. But again, owning a knife, I’ve, you know, my kitchen is to the right of me and I have got about 20 knives in there. So I don’t know. I don’t know.

Dawn: Did he have that knife before Jordy died? I can’t remember that.

Naomi: That was a, that was the scunting knife, wasn’t it? So I believe that had been brought for his birthday. So there was an empty pouch. I need to remind myself, I thought.

Dawn: He’D been given that knife by his mum after Jodie’s death.

Naomi: For his birthday.

Dawn: For his birthday. And I thought, God, because I remember thinking, okay, well, that’s not so strange. Jodie’s died and he’s written this in the pouch, you know, the date, her birthday and her death. Yeah, okay, fair enough, he’s doing that. But then I thought, God, is not be a bit strange that the mum spying a knife on him when his girlfriend’s been stabbed? You know, that’s what I remember thinking. So I thought, I’m sure it was after.

Naomi: Yes, I think that, yeah, there was definitely a knife bought for his birthday, which was after, so, yes, that was a bit strange.

Dawn: I know what you’re saying about the hunting, but I just think, well, you know, you’re being clearly investigated for this.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: This murder.

Naomi: Yeah, absolutely.

Dawn: Maybe not the best choice. I remember thinking that, you know, I.

Naomi: Never want to judge because I don’t live in, in the countryside, in the small town and stuff. But no, I absolutely think, given the circumstances, that probably wasn’t, wouldn’t have been top my gift list.

Dawn: No, but until when you first started mentioning the knife, I thought that he’d had it previously and he’d written before Jodie’s death, her the end date, you know, the day. And I thought, oh, wow, that’s totally suspicious. But then I realised, no, no, no. So I got nailed.

Naomi: Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, that would have been pretty compelling evidence for sure. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there were two searches done on his house as well, so, you know, the first time they found stuff and then the second time they found more and there was the holy days, wasn’t it? That’s right, that’s right. And those were the things that did. I think out of everything, out of all the kind of evidence from the prosecution, that was what stuck with me the most.

Dawn: The Stanley knife.

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I, you know, I told, like, when I spoke to some of Luke’s, like, legal team and Sandra, you know, I did say, that’s the thing that gets me. And she’s. And she, you know, she’s like, yeah, I understand that. I understand that totally. Really?

Dawn: So that was what made you think, oh, that’s strange.

Naomi: Yeah. Out of everything, really.

Dawn: See, for me, because I remember growing up. Question my growing up, my life, my childhood now. But I always remember there was always a Stanley knife kicking about our house in random places. It was always just, I’ll get the Stanley knife. I always remember that. So. See, I didn’t. I didn’t even think twice about that. I was like, oh, they’re having a laugh now.

Naomi: Yeah. Do you know, it was. It was very. I, you know, to go back to, you know, 20 years. I mean, God, we lived very differently, didn’t we? Things that I. That I did and my friends did there is like, why on, you know, my kids do some of those. So. Yeah.

Dawn: Yes, I know. That’s interesting. I didn’t. I didn’t know that you would have found that strange. This is why it’s nice to talk because it’s different perspectives, isn’t it?

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, it is, it is. I mean, because of everything else, I know that the rest of the episode, I mean, this is very much, I think what episode two does is introduce you to the trial by media element, but then also the kind of evidence from the prosecution, what they found and what they. What they were running with. And then we kind of get into what his defence said a bit later on.

Dawn: Yeah, I’ve got questions about the defence. I’m curious what they actually asked, but we’ll get to that. But I wanted to ask you the time of death, because her body was left out, uncovered all night, and a forensic person came, but they had a bad back and they couldn’t go over the wall, so they had to wait 08:00 in the morning before somebody eventually got there.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: And then just said without doing any tests. Oh, 05:15, was that right? Yes.

Naomi: So her estimated time of death was 05:15 1st forensic officer arrived at 08:00 a.m. so that means that 15 hours went by. There was no tests on her, no tests for rigour mortis or any other kind of time reliant evidence. So when her body was removed from the scene and taken to the morgue, by that time it was around 10:00 a.m. and this was already now national news. I mean, this had happened, like I said, in a small scottish town. This was crazy. This was already in the news, and we, you know, the proper tests hadn’t been done. And that’s. That was insane to me. And I think one of the things that really bothers me is the fact that the crime scene, they didn’t put a tent over her body, and there was precipitation that night. I think it was around 01:00 so there’s water falling from the sky that’s going to get Jodie’s body. And they did also to access her body and to get, you know, some of the equipment in that they needed, they did chop down some of the branches so they weren’t and, you know, for an attack that was that ferocious, that crime scene did not fall into an adequate standard at all. In fact, it was described later on as inadequate how that had been handled.

Dawn: Right. Well, what I was wondering is, by that time, Luke’s been taken to the police station, he’s been interviewed. They’ve already decided they probably got when he gave 22 page statement, so they’re bound to have had his timeline. I mean, this is just speculation, but they needed it to be about that time. So I wonder if they had communicated that to the forensic officer that came, and that’s why they were quick enough to say 05:15 because she already knew that the police needed it to be about that time. I mean, it’s just speculation, but that was where my mind went.

Naomi: Yeah. Do you know what the amount of different thoughts I’ve had, too, especially while researching this and putting everything together, because, you know, it took about six months to do the amount of different scenarios and the what ifs, you know, that crossed my mind, was I probably went through every scenario in my head. And then I tried to rationalise it, and then a new piece of evidence would come or I’d read something else in another statement and it would make me think differently about something I thought differently about before. My mind was just like a load of dots, basically all floating, you know, and I was trying to. It’s almost like trying to put, you know, maggots back in a bag, you know? It was so, so hard. It was so hard. It was.

Dawn: Yeah. Everything you said, you were just questioning everything. How long was Luke actually at the police station for? Do you know when he got to leave again?

Naomi: He was at home the next day, from what I remember. And then the search came on the fourth. So in that time, they did also start to interview Luke’s family as well as they did interview his brother Shane as well.

Dawn: It was interesting that you said that at the trial. One of the police officers said that Luke was the only real suspect that they were considering, but then at the same time, been setting up roadblocks and they were interviewing people. And I just think, which is it? Are you looking for somebody else? Or did they do their due diligence and they ended up coming back to look, or. I just was confused by that statement. This is the only one we’re looking at, but we’re still.

Naomi: Absolutely. I think, as we get further in, you see the amount of other, I won’t say suspects, because they’re not allowed to, but persons of interest that could have had possibly more of a reason to have done this.

Dawn: Definitely, yeah. I wanted to talk to you about the. The talking clock. You know, they made such a big deal about that. But he phoned the talking clock all the time. And I remember when I was a teenager, I used the talking clock. I remember I was waiting for the bus one time and I was checking the time, and I phoned about four or five times in on quick succession. There was a tv in the living room, the video at the time on it. So that was something I did all the time, so I totally got where he was coming from. I would phone it as well.

Naomi: Okay. I don’t know if that’s a scottish thing. My dad used to tell me that it costs too much money and don’t.

Dawn: Call the talking clock when you’re a teenager. You don’t care about that, though.

Naomi: That’s true.

Dawn: Again. Again, exactly.

Naomi: I think also that there was the fact that he had called that other times. It’s worth noting that, you know, back then in 2003, not all mobile phones had the time on the front of the screen. So there was probably a way to add it to the display. I would have been quite young then, but from what I gather at the time, I mean, I don’t know if he was just being a lazy boy and, you know, couldn’t be bothered to look. I mean, that there was. That there was a time, I think it was slow. It was broken. Yeah. And it was. It would never. What? It would never work. It was more decorative. That’s what they said to the police. So he just called the talking clock. And the one thing that I think with that is that. But there was. I mean, that for me, I just. I just didn’t really understand why he called the talking clock. I didn’t understand why he said it was to see when his, you know, mother was going to be home. She would arrive home at 515, which, ironically, was, you know, the. The presumed time of death for Jodie. And he was making the dinner, but he wanted to get the exact time, so, because he wanted to time the dinner and make sure it was ready for when his mum got home. So I don’t know. I mean, you know, people are different, aren’t they? People are weird. Again, I just did. I didn’t feel like that added a lot to convince me either way, to be honest with you, I didn’t think it. It didn’t really make me think, oh, God, that’s so strange that he must have killed her. But it also didn’t make me think, oh, that’s completely normal.

Dawn: Oh, I did. I thought it was completely normal.

Naomi: Yeah. I absolutely think that is. If that. If you say that’s normal, then I. Then I would have.

Dawn: Did I remember it? I loved that talking clock. I used it all the time.

Naomi: I can hear the man’s voice doing it.

Dawn: Yes. It was a proper english voice, wasn’t it?

Naomi: Very times. That’s my accuracy. Yeah.

Dawn: No, I did that all the time. So hang on, though. So if time of death was 05:15 which I’m not convinced by, and Luke’s mum came in at 05:15 so they just weren’t happy. Her statement wasn’t enough to back up what he was saying. Is that right? I know Shane made a mess of his statement later on, but his mom, did she change her statement? Was there anything wrong with that?

Naomi: No, no, they just. Just felt like, it’s a mum, you know? Can you help? What does. What do mums do? They pretty much do anything for their kids, or most of them do. So she wasn’t really seen as someone that was credible. And it’s worth noting that actually, Corin and Shane, his brother, they were both arrested for perverting the course of justice. But those charges were later dropped.

Dawn: So if there were charged with it, then they were thought, oh, you’re lying. But then the charges were dropped, so clearly they’re not lying. So their evidence should have been taken into, you know. Should have been.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Taken as gospel. Then that didn’t make sense. Make up your mind.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Okay. The bit that was awful, Naomi, was when Luke was being questioned about the sex he had with Jodie. Oh, that was really, really disturbing. I didn’t like that.

Naomi: No.

Dawn: It made me cringe. That was. Just got awful. What was that about?

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: And the thing was, I remember you saying that the police had said that they didn’t believe Jodie’s murder was sexual. So why are they asking about this sex if they’re saying it’s not? That doesn’t make sense.

Naomi: Absolutely. From before I knew anything else, as soon as I found out how poor Jodie had been left and what had happened to her, I instantly thought, okay, this is a sexually motivated crime. It’s a sexual sadist. And I also interview a doctor who is, you know, runs a counselling service and has done studying in psychology. And she said, you know, I just told her, you know, how she had been found. And I said, what do you think? She does feature on the podcast? And I said, what do you think about this? Do you think this is a crime of passion or what? And she went, oh, this is sexually motivated crime. Absolutely. And it was never treated that way. So, yes, it was very odd that they went into such detail with a minor about their sex life and some of the questions that they asked, and I’ll always remember these, because, like, it was a. It was a real part of the case that really did disturb me, but it was okay, so when did your sexual relationship start? Okay, I can understand that a bit. And then it got more intense. What kind of, you know, what kind of sex do you like? You know, what do you like about females bodies? What in particular do you find erotic? And the way they were kind of twisting his words. So, for example, I mean, I’ve actually. I’ve actually got it here, and I can read a little bit. But it said that the actual transcript says, when did your sexual relationship start? Luke said, we’ve had sex about five or six times. And it started when we started going out, which was a few months before the questions get more intense. They said, where did the sex usually happen? Luke said, oh, in my room. Then the police says, every time. Every time you had sexual intercourse, it was in your room. But there was a real clear shift in the language there because he had said, the first question on the transcript was, where did the sex usually happen? But in the next time, they said every time. So it wasn’t consistent. So I felt confused just even, you know, reading through these. And I can imagine that that would have completely bamboozled him as well. And also, I mean, he was. He had just turned 15 by, I think, the point this. This interview had happened. Do you often talk about sex in that way? You know, it’s still quite a new thing. And then they start to ask Luke about his sexual fantasies, which, again, for a child, it doesn’t sit well with me at all. So the answer, he says that he just likes nice looking females and that sex was just sex. He, you know, hadn’t kind of over thought it. And then the police officer comes back and says, well, men, most men usually have a particular child of a part of a female’s body that he likes or finds particularly erotic. You know, what do you like? Do you find a particular part? And he says, no. And then the officer is. It sort of feels like he’s trying to make him feel stupid because he says, what, so you’re telling me you just what? I mean, what do you find erotic about a female? And he’s kind of pushing and pushing and pushing. And again, in his language, he says, you know, most men usually find a particular part of the female’s body erotic or whatever, but he’s not a man, you know, he is a child. And by this point, he did have an appropriate adult. His name was Alistair. He sat there. And at no point in the transcripts does he intervene at any point whatsoever. He sat there and let this questioning happen. And for me, I think that that was quite a big failing on his part as well.

Dawn: Do we know if he ever had any training? Did he know how to do his job?

Naomi: Well, he was. He. Yeah, I mean, he was. He was, you know, he was employed as an appropriate adult, but I would. Yeah, I would definitely have put him back in for some training after that, definitely.

Dawn: That was awful. That’s not an appropriate adult there at all. No, I didn’t like that. That made me uncomfortable. Yeah. And it went on. Do you have sex outside? You know, somebody told us that they saw you. Well, was that true? Was that because they lied a couple of times, didn’t they, the police, about, you know, what was that rubbish?

Naomi: Nobody I never quite got to the bottom of that because I only. I had access to a lot of stuff, but not to everything. And the police have been very, very cagey about giving anything out to the media. Like I said, they’ve never spoken about it, so I just had what I had on paper and I’ve just had to run with that. But who. I’m mean, who knows? Who knows?

Dawn: Oh, the other thing he said in, oh, you probably not know this. I’ll see. Anyway, when he was being interviewed under section 14, the police officer said that there’d been an accusation against Luke already of threatening a girl with a knife. Was that true? Did that ever come out? Did he do that?

Naomi: It’s never, it’s. He’s never been arrested for it, it’s never gone to trial. So I. Again, I have no idea. I’ve never seen anything in the media from anyone who has sort of spoken out and said, look, Mitchell did this to me and I think that would have been really compelling if someone had done that. Well, yeah, no one ever has.

Dawn: If I had a statement saying that, that would have been. Yeah, okay, there’s something wrong there, but. Yeah, yeah, but then they also said that they told him that his semen had been found on Jodie’s bra, which was lies as well. So there were just. Sounds like they were just throwing everything at him, trying to trick them.

Naomi: Yeah, the semen on the bra, I mean. Yeah, I mean, that’s quite a deep dive. Refer you to the podcast for that one because that was. I mean, that bamboozled me as well. But then. But I know we’re building to something more, so I’ll maybe save that for. I think I figured out your line of questioning. That will come.

Dawn: But yeah, just going back to the. It wasn’t seen as a sexual murder, obviously, we said about that semen, but didn’t you say there was semen found in her body as well? Yes, there’s.

Naomi: No, no, there’s a lot.

Dawn: Yeah, I know. Okay.

Naomi: There’s a lot of different things. Most notably, yes, there was DNA found on Jodie’s body, but it wasn’t Luke’s. There was also a condom 50ft from the body and it had fresh semen in it. They didn’t know who that belonged to at the time of the arrest or Luke’s conviction and when it went to trial. But three years afterwards, that DNA was matched to someone who said, and he was questioned, said that he had gone to the woods and. I’m sorry, listeners, I hope you’re not eating for private time. I mean, in a condom. That didn’t make complete sense to me, but I’m not a man. So that he had gone and done that before she had died. But then there was speculation about that timeline as well, because potentially, we can’t completely narrow down the exact time that he went there to do this. So potentially her body was nearby. And did he see it? Did he not? I have no idea. What I will say is that man is now a convicted sex offender, so.

Dawn: Oh, okay. I didn’t know that. You didn’t say that in the podcast, did you? Did I miss that?

Naomi: No. No. I don’t know if I did. Maybe it was still under trial. I can’t remember. He is now.

Dawn: Yeah. Going back to what we talked about earlier, about how some murderers like to go back to the scene. Well, didn’t he go back to the scene the next night and do the same again?

Naomi: Yes, he did. Yeah. He went back to the scene and. Yeah. Did that again. So I found that. I found that particularly disturbing, actually, that someone would go back and do that.

Dawn: Yeah. First time. Okay. You’re saying you didn’t see the body, but this is why I question the timeline. And there’s something else that happens. Why I question the timeline. But if it didn’t see the body, the body, her body wasn’t there, so. Fair enough. But then you came back the next night knowing that a young girl had been murdered. That was like. That’s too much.

Naomi: Absolutely. And I would have been thinking, you know, this is a crime scene, everybody. This was small town, and I keep saying that, but everybody knew what had happened. There was a real danger that crime scene investigators might have come up. You know, how did he know there was no tape still left around there, that there weren’t people still working on the scene? Which, to be honest, there should have been, I think, 24 hours later. But, yeah, that. That always stood out to me as it particularly odd.

Dawn: Yes. I didn’t have done in the first place.

Naomi: Because you’re not in the back. Yeah, yeah. Well, yes, exactly. Yeah. Very, very, very strange behaviour. But yes.

Dawn: The DNA that was found on Jodie’s top was her sister’s boyfriend’s DNA.

Naomi: Yeah. Stephen Kelly. So the. The man who also found her body alongside Luke. Yeah.

Dawn: So could it have been transferred at that time? Do they.

Naomi: So he said he didn’t touch the body.

Dawn: And I know he’s saying that it’s because the t shirt, the top was sister’s top. So, you know, and obviously they were in contact. But you also said that it was washed, it was clean, that have survived the war.

Naomi: Well, so this was from the forensic investigator who, you know, takes stuff from the crime scene and has a look and they said that, you know, they have to do a lot of things. They have to look at the evidence, know, they test, they swab and they smell as part of their examination. And it smell of laundry when you wash clothes. I mean, I don’t know. I’m not an expert in this at all. I find that quite hard to believe. And I did look it up. I did try to do research on that. A majority of journals that I looked at said that it was unlikely, but it wasn’t impossible. So again, you know, a pinch. A pinch of salt with that one. But I found that very odd.

Dawn: Do we know how much of a sample size it was? Was it?

Naomi: I don’t. I don’t know. No.

Dawn: Okay.

Naomi: I’m not sure.

Dawn: I mean, look, did an interview with that. That man that tricked him when Georgie’s funeral was going on. The inter. The journalist.

Naomi: Yes. Oh, goodness, mate. Yeah, the footage of that interview is. Is really weird and I don’t know if you know how it came about, but basically this sky journalist called Jim Matthews knocked on. I think he phoned, actually. Did he phone and said, yeah, are you going to the. To Jodie’s funeral? He had been asked not to go by the family. The reason they’d given him was that, you know, it was a media circus surrounding him. They didn’t want that at the funeral. Do I get it? Absolutely. That. Yeah, that. That totally seems like a reasonable thing to say. Obviously, you know, if. And I say that if Luke is innocent, then that that really sucks for him not to be able to go to his girlfriend funeral. But he decided to do his own memorial at home. So they light a candle and they think that it’s time to kind of take back a bit of the narrative. And Corin, Luke’s mum, thinks this is an opportunity to actually show the world that her son is a nice boy and he’s not this devil worshipping kind of gothic figure that they’ve made him out to be. And this Satan worshipper. So, you know, he comes round and, you know, he looks like a child in this. In physical form. Yes, he’s quite a tall lad and whatever, but actually, he looked. His face. He looks like a baby. He’s got a real baby face. And his mum is sitting there and she’s got his arm around him and. But the questioning very quickly starts off as being, you know, very soft and gentle. And then it really does sort of take a bit of a turn and it becomes quite accusatory. And actually, it really is. It’s not good for the case. You know, this guy really did overstep a line. You know, people think, you know, it’s you. What? You know, what do you think? I’ve actually got. I mean, I’ve got the transcripts from that, and I do. I do read them out on the podcast. And actually, you see that it’s quite dirty journalism, actually. And he. And then he goes into things like, you know, he says. So I suppose the difficulty is from 05:00 p.m. to whenever Jodie was found. That’s a long time to feel and to account for, especially if you use track of time, you know, can you account for every minute? I mean, this is like a police interrogation. This isn’t a journalist. You know, that’s not a journalist’s job at that point before he’s been charged with anything. And he’s a child, so shame on him.

Dawn: Yeah, totally.

Naomi: That was too far.

Dawn: But I felt really sorry for Corinne. I felt really sorry for her because I think she was trying, like you say, trying to help her son, and it backfired. But she couldn’t have known that. She just trusted the wrong person, I think, didn’t she?

Naomi: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And what do you do, you know, if you’ve never been in that situation before? I don’t know, would I have done the same thing? Maybe, you know, maybe if everyone thought my son was this monster and I truly believed he wasn’t, and I wanted them to see, actually, how polite he was or how articulate he was or whatever, you know, I think I probably would have done the same. But it. Yeah, it completely backfired that, didn’t it?

Dawn: But what he said was quite interesting. It made me think. He said he doesn’t care about the police accusations. Yeah, he just wants to find out what happened to Jodie. And that is still the worst thing that’s happened in his life.

Naomi: You know, he was quite sophisticated acting. If that’s acting, you know, if he is, then, you know, he’s got a feeling. He’s got surely got a career in film when he comes out, because that was very convincing. But, yeah, who knows?

Dawn: He also says during that interview that he knew that it was the police’s suspect and that, you know, researched his house all the time and he knew that, you know, all eyes were on him. Do you think antagonised the police that we bit like have him in the papers sort of slating them a wee bit.

Naomi: Absolutely. Absolutely. Reputation for the police doing that job. That’s going to sting and egos are going to get bruised, aren’t they? Yeah.

Dawn: I thought that Luke wasn’t allowed to go to the funeral, which, fair enough, I understand. They didn’t want it into a media circus. But then he went afterwards and put flowers on our grave, which, again, if he didn’t do it. If he did do it, it’s sick. But if he didn’t do it, he’s just putting the flowers on the grave. He didn’t know that the reporters were going to be following them and photographing them. And I thought.

Naomi: I thought that was, again, that was something that if you’re a journalist, that’s the money shot. You want those pictures of the potential killer at the grave, that’s going to sell newspapers, that’s going to cause controversy ethically and morally. Shame on them. Again, you know, that not necessarily even for Luke there, but actually for Jodie, you know, and for her family. They just buried their daughter, you know, and that. That was really hard for me to comprehend, actually. Yeah. Yeah.

Dawn: And I could understand why Jodie’s mom, when she found out, took the flowers and put them back on his doorstep. I understand that. But at the same time, again, it’s sending a clear message, isn’t it? Like, we’re not. We don’t want you. We don’t want anything to do with you. We think you’re guilty.

Naomi: Absolutely.

Dawn: It was hard. Again, if it is, you know, I get why she did it, but if he was innocent. Oh, that’s so harsh. Yeah, it’s really hard. And I always try to think of both scenarios, you know, if you did do it, then, my God. Yeah, that’s a pretty sick thing you’ve just done.

Listen to Episode Three – Through The Wall: The Trial Begins

 

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00:00:00: Introduction and Overview of Episode Three

00:01:02: The Trial Begins

00:02:49: Details of the Trial and Charges

00:07:21: Eyewitness Account

00:13:48: Other Eyewitnesses and Timeline Issues

00:16:07: Jury’s Verdict

00:22:17: Appeals and Potential Conflicts of Interest

00:22:38: Eyewitness Testimony and Its Reliability

00:24:57: Police Appeals and Investigation Gaps

00:26:11: Photo Lineup and Identification Issues

00:27:00: Burning Smell and Missing Evidence

00:28:33: Forensic Evidence and Its Absence

00:29:30: Parker Jacket and Its Significance

00:31:06: Discrepancies in Witness Testimonies

00:33:30: Shane’s Testimony and Its Impact

00:34:02: Knife and Its Significance

00:36:24: Supporters’ Views and Doubts

00:37:06: Police Investigation and Its Thoroughness

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Naomi: So episode three, I mean, we really just look at the trial and what happens there. And, you know, with the trial, it was very much circumstantial evidence, but quite a lot of it. So it was almost like there wasn’t really one big groundbreaking thing that made me think, you know, or anyone, I think, really think, oh, that, you know, he definitely did it because of that one factor. It was the fact that there was quite a lot of little things that did build up, but then a lot of those were completely unravelled during the trial. So again, that was something that I always kept in the back of my mind. So going through some of the stuff. So when we. When I get into episode three, you know, we. We start the scene by him going into the trial and it’s absolute pandemonium. There are people everywhere, there is press. He’s brought in in the van, you know, dropped off right outside the court, you know, ushered in through the crowds. There’s probably a way to get in through the back, I’m sure.

Dawn: I was going to say they usually take them around the back. That was.

Naomi: Yeah, there you go. And there. I mean, at this point. So I’ve got to do my math. So I think he was 16 years old at the time of his trial.

Dawn: Is that why they tried him as an adult, because he. I mean, obviously it’s 16, you’re not. But why was that decision made?

Naomi: No, no, because they take it from when you were. From when you did the crime, but they basically just decided that he was. That he was competent enough to stand. To stand trial.

Dawn: So that’s not right. Who made that decision?

Naomi: Well, yeah.

Dawn: And his defence, did he try and stop it from.

Naomi: Do you know what? There is not that much information on what his defence did. They certainly, in my opinion, and I’m not a lawyer, so, look, don’t take this as a. As a solid opinion, but there was a lot of stuff that they didn’t do that they probably should have done that would have really helped unravel some of the points that the prosecution made, because, again, because they were circumstantial. It was very much how you perceived that piece of information. So, for example, I mean, if we go through some of it. So, for example, you know, he was. The trial started in December 2004, by the way. So this was like a year and a half after her murder, and he was being charged as an adult. He was charged with the murder of Jodie and possession of a knife and supplying cannabis. He pled not guilty to all the charges and he lodged his alibi and incrimination as his defence. It was a long trial. I mean, there was a hundred, over 100 witnesses that were called. The judge was 62 years old, so he was very seasoned, he was very respected.

Dawn: And wasn’t it 42 g’s?

Naomi: Yes, it was. And the jury. So I know in Scotland it’s different. It’s 15 in Scotland. Sorry. And it was eight men and seven women, because often in Scotland you can have a. You can have a majority verdict, so that’s why they have an even. Sorry. An odd number. So the prosecution was basically based on. On three main pillars. Number one, that Luke found the body. Well, we’ve kind of gone through that, haven’t we? You know that previously. Number two, eyewitness accounts put in someone who resembled Luke around the murder scene at the time. And number three, his alibi. So when we look at the eyewitness accounts, there was one lady called Andrina Bryson, and she’s probably the most important part, actually, of this, of the whole trial. So she claimed to have seen a male and a female. So both of them together, and this is someone putting them both together. So that was quite important. At the top of the east houses pass. So this is near to where Jodie’s body was found. Andrina had gone to the supermarket and her bank statement showed her receipt, you know, showed that she had brought her shopping at 04:32 p.m. and then it was estimated that, you know, she got her kids in the car, sorted her bags out, got back in, and it was around five minutes later that she started driving. There were two potential routes that she could have taken to drive home, and one would have meant that she passed this path at 449 and the other at 554. But the issue was that Jodie’s mom initially had said that she had kissed her daughter goodbye around 05:00 but at trial it was said that actually that might have been 450. So that was the first thing that just pricked my ears up a little bit. Andrina said that she’d then seen the female from the side and that she had been talking to the male, and she described the male as looking like shaggy from Scooby Doo. The only kind of similarity I can get there really, is the long hair. They both got longish hair. So maybe at the trial, the timings of Andrena’s statement did vary from her original statement. So she’d originally said that she’d placed the sighting at 540 to 545. And then she had initially said that he was in his early twenties. She thought he was in his early twenties, average height, medium build, with thick hair that was kind of like a sandy brown colour, and that he was wearing a green fishing style jacket, and that he had matching trousers. So, from a distance, with your eyes squinted, potentially, but it. That wasn’t completely accurate. She described the females having dark shoulder length hair, which, yeah, okay, a navy hoodie and light blue jeans. Jodie was wearing a black hoodie, but it had quite a large, bright orange logo on it of an american band called the Deftones. The coroner had said that Jodie’s hair was auburn and not black at the time of her murder. So again, I mean, I was never going to pick this apart too much, because, you know, from a distance, black and auburn, not massively different. It’s not like she was saying it was bleach blonde. So I kind of, you know, I mention it, but it’s not, it’s not something that I. I delve too deep on. Then they talk about the position that they were in. So I think she ended up saying that, like, she saw the two people, like the two of them there, and they weren’t doing anything out of the ordinary. But what really stood out, and I say this in the podcast, quite clearly, was how Andreena ended up identifying Luke to the police. So we know the moment they found Jodie’s body, the police put Luke out there as a potential suspect. That was very obvious with the home searching, and it was in the media. We know, obviously, that Luke was taken in under the section 14 act, and that was the 14 August, wasn’t it? So that would have been around six weeks later. So on that day, one of the policemen took a Polaroid photo of Luke, and it was against a white background, and then the other. So they’ve put them in a photo lineup, not in a real lineup. So they’ve given. They’ve given her him standing against a white background, and then they’ve given some other randoms, whoever they were, and they weren’t in front of a white background. So automatically, that photo does look very different to the rest.

Dawn: And they didn’t have long hair either, did they?

Naomi: No, they didn’t. But then the absolute big kind of bombshell, really, from that episode, was that when they got to court, the prosecution star witness, Andrina, comes up and then she sees him in the dock and she says that she doesn’t recognise Luke to be the person that she saw that day.

Dawn: Yeah, that was a big admission.

Naomi: That was a big admission. That was. Now, I know, you know, a fair amount of time had passed. He did have a different hairstyle. There was, through some of his trial, he had. He had, like, braids, but that was quite. That was quite eye opening. And there was another couple of eyewitnesses as well. And they’d said they’d driven round, and then cyclists had seen. And this is all in the podcast, and this. This goes into quite a lot of detail, but basically, there was no consistent. It wasn’t like all these people had said. I’d seen this person at this time here. If you actually look at the timeline and put all of these sightings together, and we go through it in episode three, you know, in a proper, like, okay, so he was here at this time, then he was here, then he was here. You see that he only had a few minutes to do a few things that would have taken him a lot longer. So the timeline for me never worked, and I was quite surprised the prosecution hadn’t actually. Or maybe they did, and, I don’t know, they. They ignored it and maybe just thought that no one would notice, or maybe they didn’t see it as problematic. But as an outsider looking in, I always did. I always thought, okay, that timeline doesn’t. It doesn’t. It doesn’t correlate. It doesn’t correlate. If all of those witnesses definitely saw Luke and Jodie, then there’s no way they could have been these different places at different times. So that was a big one. And then going on through that as well, you know, there was talks of him, you know, being seen on the path. Then there’s the stuff about the jacket, and then, you know, there. There was the missing knife pouch that comes back up in the trial. And again, you know, I’ve kind of mentioned this. This is something that does go ding, ding, ding in my head. Yeah. So they found something was missing, and it was the knife from the knife pouch when they went to search Luke’s house, and it was not found during either of the searches of the house. The knife pouch had some inscriptions on it. It. So, first of it had 666, which I said. And then you mentioned it also had JJ. So Jodie Jones. And then it had 1989 to 2003. So, yes, that was her year of birth and her date of birth. So then we look at the injuries that she had, and we go through the type of blade, and the knife that was used on Jodie was never found. But this knife that was missing was found by Corin in her house. So she’d been in possession of the knife. She said that Luke didn’t have the knife in his bedroom at the time. She only gave it to him when he needed it. And when she founded it, she gave it to Luke’s solicitor, who then handed it over to the police. Nothing was ever found on the knife. The police said that they thought she’d gone out and brought a replacement knife and the real knife had been hidden. But that knife they handed in and the Parker jacket that then ended up with Corinne being arrested because they thought then that she was now involved in. In buying these replica, you know, Parker jackets and knives. So that’s when that all kind of started to unravel. And I would really have liked to have interviewed Corinne. And I did. I did use a clip of her from. From a previous interview and in the Channel five documentary, it showed, you know, she’s. She’s an ill woman. She’s. She’s very poorly and she lives in absolutely awful circumstances. She’s got no money, she’s got no electricity. I don’t think she’s got a toilet in her house. Think she has to go outside the one. It’s. And she’s, you know, she’s. She’s an older woman now and it is. It’s. It’s really, really sad. So we kind of go through all of that. We do go through Shane’s statement, which we sort of touched on as well. So he’s seven years older than Luke and he lived at home with Corinne and Luke. He worked, he had friends. He was. He was a pretty normal guy. But on the day of Jodie’s murder, he had gone to work. That was shown. And he usually came home at 330 on the 3 July. So that was three days after the murder. Shane told the police he came home, but he couldn’t remember much about the night. His first statement was quite vague, said he couldn’t remember what he had for dinner or when he went back out. And then his next statement was taken on the 7 July. So four days later. And that was exactly a week after Jodie’s murder. And he said that his friend had reminded him that on the night in question, he had stopped by his friend’s house to help fix his car. But then his mum had also said that. Well, no, you were at home because, don’t you remember? Luke burnt the pies that he was cooking for us. And, you know, they’d had a bit of a discussion about that, so that, again, was just something. And because, you know, I don’t think Shane. I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know him. He doesn’t speak out about anything. He’s got his own issues, and he doesn’t talk to the press. It’s absolutely fine. Totally respect that. But with that, you know, the statement was quite vague. But again, you know, if you said to me, you know, what did you have for dinner last week? I got a clue. And then there was a member of Jodie’s family had also forgotten exactly where they’d been and what they’d eaten that night. Now, I understand that, as you know, that was a significant trauma. But obviously, you know, that pressure on. On Shane, maybe that could have done the same to his brain. That’s. That’s the only thing that I would have said. But it was. That was, again, something that, you know, you would hope that if your brother was being looked at for a potential murder, that you would try your best to really, you know, try and. Try and remember that. But, yeah, there was a thing about Shane, and he was saying that he was at home, but he was looking at porn on the Internet, and he didn’t think his mom or Luke were home. So, again, that just. That. That raises questions. Absolutely raises questions. One thing that was really, really bad, though, was that during the trial, when he was being cross examined, they showed him pictures of Jodie when she was dead, naked, mutilated.

Dawn: There was no need to do that.

Naomi: Absolutely none. And I. You know, that was obviously in front of all the friends, family, the jurors, you know, everybody got to see that. And he asked to take a break, and then he was asked to look at more photos. He wasn’t given that break, and he was seen to be wiping away tears in the box as well. So there was a lot of back and forth. And in the end, Shane sort of said, you know, I don’t know if Luke was in the house or not. I can’t be sure. My days are all confused. I remember saying about fixing a friend’s car. I remember burnt pies. But instead of. Instead of lying and coming up with a narrative, he just said, I don’t know. And I do think that. That it does feel like strong evidence against Luke. It does feel like the prosecution maybe got a one up on that, and it didn’t look great for him. But. But again, I don’t. I don’t think that’s enough to say that he definitely did it. And that was really all they had. There wasn’t. There was nothing else that was groundbreaking during that trial that made. I mean, they touched on the Marilyn Manson stuff as well. So you know, we’re kind of going into episode four a bit here, but the police had painted this picture of the guy, I think, without really. Without really knowing him. And then all this stuff about Marilyn Manson and him being a Satan worshipper and going up the path and, you know, coming back on the path and. Was it him that found it? Was it the dog? There’s just so much. When you put it all together, it just doesn’t really make sense to me. So just. Just to summarise it, you know, the three pillars, like I said, were, you know, that Shane’s alibi was sketchy and in the end, he ended up saying, I don’t know, that he. That Luke found the body, but along with other people, and that he had been an eyewitness, had placed him near to the crime scene. And that was basically it. And, yeah, it was 42 days long. I mean, that is a long time to sit through a trial. And, you know, we’ve been to. We’ve been recording this now for like. Like two and a half hours and we’re, you know, we’re kind. We’re kind of looking at this and we’re confused over some things. You know, we get bamboozled by things. Oh, my God. Yeah, I forgot about that. Oh, I forgot about that.

Dawn: Which is surprising because of how short amount of time it took them to find to come up with a verdict, because 42 days worth of circumstantial evidence, all this information, that was really quick. Yeah, really quick. Too quick, I think.

Naomi: Well, potentially, yeah. I mean, there was, for me, because it was a majority verdict as well. You know, we don’t know what that was. And in Scotland, there is something that prohibits jurors from talking to the press afterwards. So we’ve never. But, you know, no one’s ever really got into the minds of what the jury thought, so that’s what happened. And then he was sentenced. And I sort of try and go. I try and go back to that in there and try and really think about what they. What they must have all been feeling, because, like I said, it was a media circus. There were so many people that were so invested on this trial. And even actually halfway through the trial, it’s worth saying that two newspapers actually reported stories. The BBC wrote an article that said, no DNA link in Jodie murder, and the Times wrote a headline, no DNA evidence to link boyfriend with Jodie murder. And that was. That was really big for me because I thought, they’re two very reputable. They’ve seen.

Dawn: There’s nothing.

Naomi: Yeah, it’s not, you know, a kind of red top tabloid. These are. These are proper news outlets. So that for me, that, again, that was just something that really made me think. And it just, you know, this was national news now. And actually for small town Scotland to be in the national news, that was mad. But it took them just 5 hours to reach majority verdict. And that’s crazy after 42 days. I mean, look, they might. Maybe they just wanted to get the hell out of there. 5 hours. That. That’s crazy. But what that tells me is that I wasn’t in that jury room, of course, but for 5 hours, that tells me that everyone believed what they believed. And maybe they did change their mind within that 5 hours. But they would have had to have been convinced quite a lot after 42 days because whatever that was, I think.

Dawn: I would have gone in there as a jury member saying, I haven’t got bloody clue. We’re going to have to debate this. And I would have had to gone through each thing and saying, aye, but what about I. But there’s this. And that’s what I would have needed. Unless they went in there and there was a certain amount of people, the majority were like, yep, we think he’s guilty. And that’s what won it. There was no much debating going on. Where could they get a jury that. You said this was national. Everybody knew what was going on. How are they going to get a jury that is impartial?

Naomi: I know.

Dawn: See, that’s another thing.

Naomi: I know. And then he got the. And then the sentencing come around, so it’s 20 years minimum. And that’s. That’s a. Look, I am all for long sentences. I think that crimes like this, you, you know, it infuriates me when I find out that, you know, somebody who’s killed a child gets eight years or something. It’s the one thing about our justice system, especially that I hate 20 years minimum. For someone who’s 16. It means they, you know, they could be out by the time they’re 36. So, you know, they can have a life, they could have kids, they could get married. Okay, that’s great. But if he is innocent, then actually he’s lost his best years. And that, that was always something that stuck with me. But at the time, that judge had been told by a jury that he was guilty, so actually maybe that was an adequate sentence. I don’t. I don’t know if I necessarily blame the judge for the sentencing because it was such a horrific crime and there would need to be some serious rehabilitation in here. And the way she was taken was. Was just awful. But it’s just always that. But what if it’s the.

Dawn: What if. What if, especially when, like you say, there was no. It was all circumstantial evidence and the timeline even, you know, like I said, did the jury sit there and actually plot it out and say, hang on a minute, there’s. I just wonder what. I want to know what’s going on in that jury room, because. But with maybe just bamboozled by all this and the prosecution sounds like they were just thrown in the kitchen sink at everything and maybe they’re just like, oh, you’ve lost me.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: With. With what you were saying about Luke on the stand and just saying at the end, you know, what I don’t know doesn’t say to me that it mean I, okay, he’s let his brother down. But at the same time, if Luke did do it and his mum was protecting him and his brother was, you know, getting on it, then they would have had a story straight, wouldn’t they? They would have had it straight by then. They would have had it perfect. And he wouldn’t not be. He wouldn’t be confused, he would just know. Stick to it.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Admitted that was. Maybe tells a wee bit more telling than what we.

Naomi: Absolutely. And then. And then we go on to, obviously, now he’s. He’s now serving his sentence. He’s tried to appeal the sentence many times, but it’s worth mentioning, this, for me, was the most jaw dropping thing, actually, out of. Out of everything. So the. The person that looks at the appeals is, is the lord advocate and her name is Dorothy Bain and she’s rejected those appeals. They don’t have to give a reason why. So they can just reject. You know, they can say something very flippant like, you know, we believe that, you know, there’s no cause for speculation about any other suspects in this case or whatever. You know, we feel like we’ve got the right person. We did a fair trial, we’re happy with. With the investigation. But then I find out that Dorothy Bain is married to Alan Turnbull, who was the prosecutor in Luke’s trial. And that, for me, is, you know, come on, Scotland’s not that small. There’s got to be other people. Can you. You can’t take that, surely.

Dawn: Conflict of interest if ever there was one. There must be. She must have a deputy or something that in these circumstances should be able to. But then would she be impartial, whoever the deputy?

Naomi: Exactly. That’s the thing, isn’t it? You know, we don’t know if they’re all at dinner parties together every Sunday. Who knows, you know, but that’s frightening that you’re stuck.

Dawn: That’s it.

Naomi: That’s it. That’s it. You’re kind of stuck.

Dawn: So, yeah, I wanted to just mention about Andrina because she gave an amazing description of these two. The boy in the ghetto. She saw as she was just driving past. If I’m driving, I don’t really notice anything. I mean, she was driving, not in the passenger seat. So how was she able to give such a detailed description? You know, the jacket and everything? Two of them.

Naomi: Yeah. It did seem for something, because I thought when I read her statement, I thought after she described them that she would maybe say something like, you know, she saw them fighting or she saw them arguing or really animated, but none of that came. So that did always make me think that was a lot of detail for someone to remember, especially with children in the back of the car as well. Like, just knowing, like, you know, they’re always kicking your seat, you know, I think they were quite young children, from what I remember. So I did always think, okay, well, that’s a lot of detail. Maybe she’s just a really observant person, but it definitely did make me make me think and ponder for a little while.

Dawn: Yeah, it did me as well. It really did. Unless she was sitting in traffic. But even if you’re sitting in traffic and you notice something, as soon as you move off, it’s gone. I mean, maybe that’s just me because I have a horrendous memory, but. And maybe other people can retain things, I think.

Naomi: You know what I mean, knowing. Knowing the road. Because I went on Google Street View and I did the route. And I also on the channel five documentary, murder in a small town, one of the detectives, he actually does that route, and he’s got his. I think it’s his niece in the car, who’s a young woman, and they’re driving past and he doesn’t really tell her what they’re doing. And she spots, you know, they plant some people there and she spots them and she. And she can’t recall them, even though she’s not driving, and she knows that she’s supposed to be looking out for something. So that’s quite an interesting scene to watch, actually, because it does kind of put you in there a bit. Lots of people have tried to talk to Andrina Bryson, but she’s never spoken to the press. And I believe she moved out of Scotland actually, as well.

Dawn: Wow. Okay. I can understand why she didn’t talk to the press because that was. I mean, it was. It was hinging on that really, wasn’t it, her statement, what’s really going on?

Naomi: So, yes.

Dawn: I was going to say. So the couple that she saw, and obviously they thought it was Luke and Jodie, but did the. Did the police make an appeal for NMD to come forward if maybe. Was that you, or did they just. They decided that’s who it was?

Naomi: Yeah, I mean, I never, ever saw any evidence of that come out. There was never any other names that were associated directly with that sighting. And that. That should have been something, I think that should have been looked into a lot, especially as it, like you say, it was one of the main things that they were holding this case up with in court. The law does say, and I’ve looked into this, where a physical person identity parade can be done, then it should be done. So that was one thing. It was a photo lineup. So she was given these photos. So there was a. Again, in that documentary, there was someone who was an expert in eyewitness testimony, and he said, you know, if you put someone in front of a white background, you know, it looks like a police station, doesn’t it? It looks like a holding cell. It looks very much like a mug shot. So, you know, all those little things they could potentially subconsciously philtre through, and.

Dawn: Your eyes are going to be just. They’re going to be drawn to that stark white background as well, aren’t they?

Naomi: I would imagine so, yeah. And especially with only having one guy with the long hair as well, you know, I would have thought all of them would have had long hair.

Dawn: So was that just the police that were involved in that? Because I remember watching one time, well, like you said, they’re supposed to bring in in person, and then they’re supposed to have the solicitor with them as well. So none of that was done. It was just done behind Luke’s back completely. Just did it themselves. Nobody’s supervising. I feel like.

Naomi: Yeah, they must have done, because that. Yeah, that was how. How she identified him. That’s bad.

Dawn: Okay, I’ve got to come back again, and we talked about this, but I’ve made a note of it again, and it must have really stuck in my mind, and it’s this, the burning smell. I’ve written down that it was a female member of the family who had said they’d burn the clothing. I’ve got that. So I’m gonna have written it again. Was that not right.

Naomi: No. So it was a Parker jacket that Luke apparently had had on. And one of their neighbours, they were interviewed, you know, door to door inquiries, and they said because they searched the house, they couldn’t find any evidence. So one of the things they have to consider is, has anything been burned or destroyed? And so they did have a kind of log burner thing in the back garden. So they asked the neighbours, you know, did anyone smell any burning? And someone said, yes, there was someone was having some kind of fire or subtle bonfire or something that night. But from what I believe, and this was. It was quite murky, this. This particular bit. And actually, of all the things in this case, this is the one that I never completely got my head completely around because they did look in the log burner and there were no clothing fibres in there. It also wasn’t clean, but yet they were still quite certain that because this one neighbour had smelled some sort of fire and they didn’t straight away, didn’t say, oh, yes, it was that house, you know, it was just generally someone in the area, I guess, if you think, you know, if one of your neighbours had a barbecue, if you live on a. On a normal road, you know, where there’s several houses, you’re not going to know exactly who that is unless you kind of had a look. So again, that just. That just struck me as something that was a bit odd, that there was no fibres found in that log burner, but it was dirty. Nice.

Dawn: It’s very like Luke as well. Nothing found on him, but it was dirty. It’s like a pattern going on here, isn’t there?

Naomi: That’s right. And I think just due to that, the. How brutal that murder was, you know, that poor girl suffered so much. I just. You’d have to be an. You’d have to be a genius, really, to be able to evade all DNA detection, I think, and still be dirty. That’s pretty mad. Yeah.

Dawn: He’s a clever lad. If he’s able to do that, really. Some skills.

Naomi: Yes. Yes. What, at 14? I was doing my times tables. You know, I think you forget how young 14 is sometimes. You know, it’s. It’s so young. You know, you’re. You’re midway through secondary school. Maybe that’s me being much older than 14 now. Yeah.

Dawn: I’m trying to think back and I was like, nope, not clear. That’s a long time ago.

Naomi: We probably thought we were much older than we were.

Dawn: Oh, yeah. We knew it all back then, didn’t we?

Naomi: Absolutely.

Dawn: Who said that? He was wearing this. What happened about the Parker jacket? I know somebody said he was wearing it and he said, no, never had it. But then his mum went and bought a green Parker jacket. When did this story all start? And why did she do that?

Naomi: When it was going, oh, God, I know. So there was a blue one.

Dawn: It would have been.

Naomi: Well, yeah. Do you know what? There were several discrepancies. And a really good. A really good source for this was just looking through some of the witness testimony and seeing this, because some of. There was a couple of boys that Luke went to school with and they said that they’d seen him sitting on a wall, and although they’d been sitting on the wall and he’d walked past, I can’t remember which way around it was, but they’d seen him wearing this kind of green Parker jacket. And Andrina Bryson, she’d gone by and she’d said he was wearing a kind of green fishing jacket sort of thing. So call me a bit ignorant, but, you know, those sort of coats I would sort of think would look the same, so I wouldn’t kind of spit feathers on them. But the boys said, oh, you know, it’s the coat that Luke wears all the time. The only thing was no one, including Luke’s family, had a photo of him in this jacket. So for him to have worn that all the time and to no one have had a photo of him with it would just. Just made me think, oh, that’s a bit strange. And then he did have a green Parker jacket. After his house had got searched and the police had taken a lot of the stuff into evidence, his mum obviously was like, oh, well, you know, you’re going to need some new clothes. So she went out and got that, I think, not knowing the significance of a green Parker jacket. So that’s where it all becomes very, very, very confusing.

Dawn: It is. What the hell is with that Parker? I couldn’t get past that. And about the photos, I know what you’re saying, but I don’t remember taking a lot of photos, you know, unless we’re on holiday, when we were. When we were young.

Naomi: Yeah. Yeah.

Dawn: I just didn’t get that. That was. That. That one stuck with me as well. It was another one.

Naomi: It always felt quite flimsy to me anyway. It. You know, I think there were definitely other pieces of evidence that were definitely more damning, if you like.

Dawn: Oh, yes.

Naomi: It really felt like they kind of played on the confusion, you know, on these really, these details that didn’t really hold much weight, but they put together a lot of tiny little bits of what they thought was circumstantial evidence. But actually, I don’t think. I don’t think it was. I think they. It just felt like a bit like they were grasping at straws sometimes as an outsider looking in, they probably know, you know, the police. I don’t completely distrust them. You know, I’m sure that there is something that. Something in there and something that drove them and was more of a reason maybe, that was ever made public. But it did just seem. It seemed like a big part of the case when really there, again, forensically, there was nothing there to prove it. And that’s what I would have been really trying to focus on, I think. Really trying to forensically link him instead of talking about the fact that he possibly burned a jacket that nobody could actually confirm that he definitely had.

Dawn: Yeah. I can’t decide whether the devil’s advocate where the three of them in it together. Look, his brother and his mum, and they’d come up with what to see and they had the jacket and they burnt the jacket and blah, blah, blah, all that. And they were covering up and I don’t know. Well, then Shane was on the stand. He just said, you know what? I don’t. I can’t remember. So was that him just. He just couldn’t go along with a lie and he’s just been like, I don’t know, to try and get himself out of it or did he genuinely just not remember and there was no cover up, there was no lie? I don’t know. I don’t know. There’s a couple of sticking points, I think. I’m not sure.

Naomi: I think. Yeah, it’s, you know what? His brother’s never really spoken out afterwards and I totally understand that there was a big media, you know, for all going on, and he would, I’m sure, probably have, you know, suffered from that had he spoken out more. And that. That was always. That was always a thing. When I was going through it, I was like, you know, you kind of will him to say something useful. Yeah.

Dawn: But it was really honest of him to just say, I did think that. Good for you for being honest, because you could have just lied and stuck to a story if there was one. But he didn’t.

Naomi: Yeah, I did think that. I did think it’s much easier to kind of stick to a story. You know, there would have been time for them to have spoken, but he just. He didn’t have the answer and he was very. He was seemingly. I mean, look, he could. He could be an award winning actor, but I don’t think he is. I think that generally he just didn’t. Didn’t know if it was an award.

Dawn: Winning actor, then he would act and make them believe that, yes. His brother was in there.

Naomi: Oh, yeah, that’s true.

Dawn: Yeah. Yeah. He would have wanted to help if he could. So that. That one made me think he’s telling the truth. That’s why I thought that one. We talked about the knife as well, previously and how, you know, the knife wasn’t found. And then Luke had his knife, but then his mum found it and gave it to the police, gave it to her solicitor and they gave it to the police, but they thought that was the original she’d bought him, that it was replacement. But did they ever look into that? Did they ever find out where she bought it, when she bought it? Did they do any investigation at all? Naomi? Just not.

Naomi: I mean, there was. There was. I had access to some of the stuff. There was some stuff I didn’t have access to. And the knife was always the point. And I was really clear when I spoke to different people who, you know, do support Luke, I always said, you know, the thing that bothers me the most about this whole case is the knife, and is about the knife pouch. And there is an episode which is later on where I do interview some of his supporters, and some of them said, you know, I said, is there something that, you know, because they believe Luke is innocent, they’ll come up and say it. I’m not 100% there, so I won’t ever say it. I don’t think I’d ever say it about anyone, because I just don’t know unless you’re there or you’ve got some sort of real physical proof. My feeling is that something is wrong here, but they are very convinced that, no, he is innocent. But I said to them, what is there must be something that casts some doubt. And it was always the knife that was brought up. Circumstances re the search of the knife. I mean, all I know is that they searched it. They find the pouch. They took photos of the pouch. You know, it did have JJ, the initials JJ, and then the year of Jodie’s birth and then the year of her death. So that was quite poignant. That, to me, was very. It was very eerie. And I think it was because it was on the knife pouch, you know, and knowing that a knife was used in the attack, that all very much doesn’t sit completely right with me. But then the explanation that was given, it’s not incomprehensible. His mother, you know, might have taken the knife off of him or just given it to him when he needed it, but I would have thought it was in the pouch. That’s the bit that trumps me every time.

Dawn: Okay.

Naomi: What did you think about the knife?

Dawn: I didn’t think about what was written on the pouch. I honestly didn’t overthink that. I just thought that was him just expressing himself. But the knife? Yeah. I wanted them to have done more digging into that, to be conclusive. When did you buy? Is there proof? You bought the night before. I wanted more research to be done. I wanted more, you know, like you say, facts. I don’t know.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: I don’t know. It’s annoying. I think the police should have a chick, like, a list and tick boxes, and until every tick box has been done and they’re, like, satisfied, then I don’t think the investigation should ever stop.

Naomi: I know. It really, really is something I think a lot of people have mentioned as well. And people that do think that, you know, Luke is in prison, rightfully. I know that it is something that, you know, they use as convincing for their argument, and I. I do, you know, you do end up seeing both sides.

Listen to Episode Four – Through The Wall: Seek Jodi, Find Jodi, Jodi’s Hiding

 

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00:00:00: Introduction and Naomi’s Initial Thoughts

00:01:02: Pathologist’s Findings and Knife Details

00:02:45: Public Interest and Police Reluctance for Review

00:03:43: Luke’s Decision Not to Testify

00:05:03: Jury Deliberations, Experiences and Majority Verdict

00:07:47: Luke’s Alleged Motive

00:08:57: Luke’s Behaviour in Prison

00:10:17: Length and Detail of Police Statements

00:16:03: Sandra Lean’s Petition for Independent Review

00:21:14: Items Taken for Destruction

00:22:22: Essays by Local Drug Addict

00:25:10: Personal Feelings on the Case

00:27:12: Green Parka Jacket and Its Significance

00:28:10: Desire for Answers and Independent Review

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Naomi: One of the things that I think that was quite interesting, though, was there was a pathologist who examined Jodie’s body and it was. Oh, it’s an italian guy, Professor Anthony Basuthil. He said the injuries to Jodie were caused by a stout, sharp, pointed blade. And Luke’s knife was a four inch scunting blade. But like I say, this was apparently, this blade in particular was apparently brought after Jodie’s murder. But again, you know, I can’t remember if I said this previously, but he likes outdoor activities, he likes camping, he likes horse riding, he like caravanning and doing the tracking with his dog metre. So it’s not necessarily unusual to have a knife at that age. And I think I might have mentioned, like, my husband, he’s a fisherman, he had a knife when he was about 16. I don’t. I mean, the fact that she gave the knife in as well, I don’t know. There was nothing found on the knife. They thought it was a replacement one. Was the real knife being hidden? It was never found.

Dawn: It was a big thing at the time. Should they not have appealed to people? Okay, this is woman come in and bought this knife recently. Can you come. You know, something, done something.

Naomi: Yeah, I could have.

Dawn: Sorry, interrupting.

Naomi: No, no, no. And also, I forgot to mention as well, it had on the pouch there. This was another thing as well. The numbers 666 were also etched into the material.

Dawn: Yeah.

Naomi: So that’s, you know, that was always a thing that got me. But then I weigh it up against a lot of the other stuff. And, you know, this is. This is why this case, I think, feels so unique. And this is why there had to be a six or seven part series on it in the end. And this is why people are still talking about it 20 years on, because of the complexities of all of this. There’s so much contradiction in one case that it’s really, really hard to get your head around, isn’t it?

Dawn: It is. And this is the thing, you know, we’ve got. There’s a lot of people that are saying he’s guilty and there’s a lot of people saying he’s not. But what we all really agree on is that there’s a lot of discrepancy, there’s a lot of things that are unanswered, a lot of questions unanswered. And I just don’t know why the police are so scared to. I mean, is it money? Is it resources? But why are they so scared to do a review of it? You know, are they scared to what they’re going to find. Yeah, it’s going on for so long now, he’s not going to get anywhere because he’s not admitting to it, which, if he didn’t do it, he’s absolutely right even to get out. You’ve been so long in there for something that you didn’t do. If he didn’t. No, I’m not admitting I did it. I get where he’s coming from and they’re not given an inch either. And I just think, oh, come on, give a wee something. Review it. You’ve got police detectives, previous police detectives that are saying there’s something not right. What are you frightened of?

Naomi: I think there’s a lot of public interest and ultimately we have a justice system to protect the public. So, you know, and obviously, you know, Luke’s stay in HMP, you know, is funded by the taxpayer. I do. I do think there is public interest and that should possibly be taken more into account. Then I understand that a review of it will cost a lot of money and if they are that set on the fact that they’ve got the right person, then okay. But I would really like to hear more from them on why, 20 years later, they still think 100% that they’ve got the right person, despite any forensic evidence.

Dawn: Well, yes, exactly. I mean, I know we’re going to come to it, but they’ve started destroying the evidence as well, so come on, if you’re starting to do that, you need to step up a wee bit. Luke says he wasn’t allowed to take to the stand. Did you speak to him about that? Did he want to take to the stand? Did he want to have his seed? Did he feel confident of the outcome of that?

Naomi: You know what, we didn’t speak about that directly, but Donald Findlay was quite adamant. His QC was like, it’s not a good idea for you to do that. And I think it’s really subjective. It’s what surprises me. And I think what surprised a lot of people on the podcast was how articulate Luke was and how. How gentle and mild mannered he seemed to be, considering his situation. Obviously now he’s a man in his thirties, so it’s very different from being a teenager. I don’t know what he was like then. And I’ve seen, obviously seen the interview of him on sky, and I think that was an absolute catastrophe. And because that had been put out before the trial, I think they just saw how awfully that went and just thought, no, we’re going to keep him off the stand?

Dawn: Yeah. I know that a lot of people see, if the person they’re accused doesn’t take to the stand, they see that as, for some reason guilty. But was he fit 15 at that time, wasn’t he?

Naomi: He was 15, yeah.

Dawn: I mean, God, that’s daunting. I think I can see Donald Finley’s sides. Yeah, I can, yeah. I just wondered. He said in your episodes that you’d love to hear from a jury member, you know, that they can’t, you know, you can’t contact him and they can’t see what happened in there. But did anybody ever reach out to you, I’m curious, after your episode.

Naomi: No, I wish.

Dawn: Even off the record.

Naomi: Off the records. Yeah.

Dawn: I’d have taken that.

Naomi: Yeah, absolutely. No, I do wonder because, especially because it was a majority verdict and we don’t know what that majority was, so that at least one person, by telling us it’s a majority, at least one person said they didn’t think he was guilty. But I would have loved to have known if that was, you know, 123-4567 you know, I don’t know how many people thought that. I’d love to know.

Dawn: I suppose it would give you a wee bit of hope, really, wouldn’t it, if it wasn’t such a big gap.

Naomi: Yeah. What’s some insight, I think, into what that deliberation room would have been like as well.

Dawn: My sister did it. She was actually a jewor in a murder trial recently and she hated it. She’s really into true crime and, you know, she watches all the true crime programmes, but she says that it was. It was awful. And the decision that had some abuse afterwards, because what’s reported in the newspapers is not what actually happens.

Naomi: And I don’t think snapshot, isn’t it, sometimes. And there’s no context and they don’t.

Dawn: Tell the truth a lot of the time either. So what they were reporting wasn’t really what was happening in court. They weren’t given the full picture. So then, obviously, when there was a. One of them was found innocent, my sister, she knew, I think, in herself, that he probably was guilty, but they hadn’t given the evidence. There was nothing to prove that. There was a schedule of a doubt and they were called, the jury were called all names and how would they feel if they were stabbed and burned and. Oh, God.

Naomi: Oh, my goodness, it was awful.

Dawn: So I wouldn’t wish that on anybody.

Naomi: Oh, and you know what? The trauma that jurors go through as well is absolutely just. Actually, it’s really funny. You’ve brought that up, that there’s a future episode of my. Of the real podcast I’m doing. And it’s actually about jury members, obviously. It’s a true crime podcast that the jurors somehow end up implicated in a crime or the crime. So it’s. It’s quite a. It’s quite a crazy episode, actually. But it. But also going through some of, you know, the really traumatic stuff that they have to see and they have to hear, especially as Jodie’s photos were shown in court as well, you know, the photos of her body.

Dawn: Yeah. Wasn’t it? Why would they do that? I don’t understand.

Naomi: Impact. Impact. I think it’s a. It’s a technique that Jodie spam were there, though. Yeah, it feels. It feels like. Almost like, for me, it feels if that was my loved one, it would feel like they were being violated all over again.

Dawn: Yeah, for sure.

Naomi: Awful. Awful.

Dawn: What was Luke’s motive? What could have been his motive?

Naomi: This is it, isn’t it? I mean, I never had the answer to that because there was never any. I mean, you know, the. The prosecution had said, you know, tried to make that there was a love triangle thing going on. There was not, you know, these were kids that were going out with each other for a couple of months. It wasn’t that deep, I don’t think, you know, I know that obviously, it’s puppy love, teenage love, all this kind of stuff, but, you know, this wasn’t a jilted husband who had, you know, been left for his best friend or anything like that. And, you know, there was no behaviour that anyone reported that suggested that either of them were overly jealous, that there’d been any kind of violence in their. Within their relationship or at all. So it seemed just so unlikely that that would be how it ends in that murder, that murder that even to a, you know, a serial killer, that’s a pretty brutal murder. So it just. That always, for me, that was the only real motive that they ever came up with. But there. I mean, that wasn’t based on anything, it was a speculation. So I’ve always struggled with it.

Dawn: Somebody. I can’t remember who it was, but they said that basically the violence, the degree of the violence that was put upon Georgie, somebody said, I’m sure they said that psychopaths are really aggressive. So since he’s been in prison, has he. Do you know if he’s been. Has he been assessed, has he been. Had a counsellor, a psychologist? And has he been assessed to have that kind of disorder. A psychopath.

Naomi: No, he’s not started any violence in prison since he’s been there. And I just think, you know, in a place like a prison where actually having a fight is sometimes seen as entertainment, you know, I’ve interviewed so many people who’ve been in prison and, you know, been in there for a duration and known people as well and, you know, fights, you don’t really overthink them in prison. You know, it’s sort of part of the, part of the lifestyle, if you like, which is awful to say, and obviously not for everybody, but it is. So if you were that way inclined and violence was something, you know, if you take someone like Charles Bronson, you know, he’s, he’s been violent many a times in prison and fights and all of this. And that’s because he is a violent man and that’s. That’s what he’s done. So. Yeah, for that to have never played out again, it just seems strange, doesn’t it? That’s your one crime that you do in your whole life. Yeah, and it’s that.

Dawn: And you don’t, I mean, I’m not professed to be an expert, but they say that you don’t just start off murdering, it’s an escalation. And there was no signs of that either. That was a brutal, that was brutal. I mean, that’s somebody out of their mind. Somebody said that, wasn’t it? Somebody out of their mind. Yeah, but then he went on, he went on to give a 22 page statement to the police, didn’t he? Was that that night? How was he so calm? I mean, I know that he spoke to somebody and they said that he’s likely in shock because they’re so calm. 22 pages, you think he would have, you know, it would have maybe hit him eventually. That’s a lot.

Naomi: Do you know what randomly 22 pages feels like a lot. You know what? I’ve recently read statements that are hundreds of pages.

Dawn: God, really?

Naomi: And they are. I mean, oh my goodness. You know, I’ve told you, dawn, obviously the case I’m doing at the moment, which is going to be a ten parter, that one. The amount of statements that I have, I have access to absolutely everything in this police file. I shouldn’t have it, but I do. And I’m working under this sort of journalistic privilege. I know what I can say and legally can’t say, but reading some of those statements, you know, I’ve opened the file and I’m like, oh my God, there’s 170 pages in here, you know, and it’s like, wow. So I did used to think 22 pages was a really long statement, but actually, I sort of now see that as. Okay, that’s probably a. Yeah. As I think we sort of said, you know, he was sort of singled out from day one as the suspect, so. Yeah. Do you know what? Maybe. Maybe I would have thought that 22 pages is adequate. You know, when you read these kind of statements from the police, some of them are like. And I was wearing, you know, blue socks and pink underwear and black trousers. And, you know, it’s. It reminds me sometimes of when you, you know, you’ve got, like, a word count on an essay at school. You know, like, you’re at 450 words and you’ve got to make it 500 words. So you just start adding in these random words, and that’s what some of these police statements feel like. I mean, they obviously, they have to be extremely thorough, and I know that’s why they’re doing it. But that sometimes, you know, that’s sometimes how it reads.

Dawn: That’s a good insight. I wondered how you got that, because that’s real and raw, not what you read in the papers, which is what a lot of my stuff is. And I know it can’t really be always trusted.

Naomi: No, I mean, I had. I had all that access with Stuart Lubbock as well. The guy who was found in Michael Barrymore’s swimming pool. He was the first series that I did. And because Stuart’s family had sued the police, they. Part of that process means that they have to hand over everything, every single statement, every single toxicology report, coroner’s report, crime scene photos, absolutely everything. So again, I was just given this. This folder, and it was, God, it was so thick. I mean, had to have help carrying it to the car. Like, that’s how thick it was. And you have to sit there and go through it all. And obviously you sit there and you look at anything. I need to Google. Google half of these words because, you know, especially in toxicology reports, you know, if you’re not medically trained, then you have to go back and have a look through. So it was. Yeah, it was really quite, quite something. So it is great insight, and it does give you a real unique perspective. But also, at the same time, it’s so much work because you sort of feel like you can’t just read one or you can’t just read half. You have to read the whole lot, otherwise you’re not, you know, having a balanced view. And so then you have to sort of make this commitment to yourself and you’re like, I’m going to read every single thing in here. And lawyers get paid, you know, 200 pounds an hour to do that.

Dawn: So, yeah, you’re doing it because it’s what you enjoy. Well, I don’t mean enjoy, feel passionate about.

Naomi: Yeah, that’s the bit I believe that would do.

Dawn: And you’ve got to take it in as well. It’s not just a case of reading it like you read a book, but you don’t take it in. You’ve got to understand it and take it in because you’ve got to then, you know, interpret it.

Naomi: Yeah, that’s it. That’s it. And choose and sort of know legally what you can put out there as well. That’s. That’s very difficult because, you know, if it’s not out in the public domain, you might be able to mention some things, but you can’t mention anything that will jeopardise the case. You can’t, you know, mention people that haven’t been mentioned before. You don’t know if they’re dead or alive. It’s, you know, that all of that factors into it. It’s a real. It’s a real minefield. Yeah, yeah.

Dawn: Which makes sense why somebody like me, when they asked, could I have, you know, some people like, yeah, no, you’re not a journalist. I’m like, that makes sense now.

Naomi: You know what, though? I don’t think that matters. You know, I think. But you’re really intelligent. You do really good research on your podcast. You know, I’ve listened to your episodes and they’re. They’re in such detail sometimes.

Dawn: You know, more though, I want to know the truth.

Naomi: You could. You can collab with me on the next one if you want. I’ll be really happy to have some help through them all.

Dawn: Oh, my God, I would love that. I just immerse myself. I love immersion. That’s. I don’t. You probably sound like you’re the same. You need to immerse yourself in everything. I read everything I can. If I can get a book, I’m happy because, you know, it’s a little bit more truth to that sometimes.

Naomi: It’s a real insight, I think, into the processes as well, because you see who they’ve interviewed and, you know, you can. You can go as far as taking it and looking at like, what times, you know, they interviewed someone or where they interviewed someone. All that information is there and it does really bring it to life. It brings the whole process, you know, it all. But it feels very, very real.

Dawn: That’s the difference, isn’t it? Watching it on the tv is one thing you can kind of detach yourself, but what you’re doing is actually raw, real. It’s happened. Yeah.

Naomi: Happened. Yeah.

Dawn: Yeah. Sandra Lean, she did a. She started a petition back in 2021 to have a full independent review of the case of Luke’s case. Now, was that. I know she took that to, obviously, the Lord Advocate, Dorothy Baron. It was knocked back. But is that still ongoing? Can we still sign that petition? Do you know?

Naomi: It’s still up, and you can still sign, but whether it will go any further, who knows? I think there’s a lot of answers. There’s a lot of questions that need answering. And a review by someone completely independent might offer that, because so many people have chipped in, especially online, you know, people that work either as detectives or they’re former FBI agents even, or they’re criminologists, they’ve sort of had a look at the overview of the case. And even in the murder in a small town documentary, you know, people were saying, okay, this definitely needs looking at. There’s something not quite right here. This feels like a very unsafe conviction. And I think that came across in the. In the podcast as well. I interviewed so many different people, and I never, ever said to them, you know, I want you to tell me that he’s innocent on this. You know, I want you to allude to that. I never did. I said, be really honest, you know, and I was kind of hoping that someone would come on and say, actually, I think he’s absolutely guilty, and this is the reason why. But I never got that. I did. I did ask a journalist who has reported on Luke a lot, and she was. She was very kind, and she said, you know, I’m sorry, but I can’t, because she said that she’d been attacked by some of Luke’s supporters online for speaking out. And. And her thing was, you know, I trust the justice system. The appeal keeps getting knocked back. There’s no reason for me not to believe them. So I’m going to report on this as if he is a convicted murder, which is what he is. So I did understand that to an extent. I definitely do. But it was a shame I couldn’t get somebody on the podcast. I would have loved to have had someone who was really passionate about it in the other direction, just to get their insight and just. Just to sort of. Just to take their points on board. But, yeah, I didn’t. I didn’t get yeah, I know what.

Dawn: You’Re saying there about, you know, you understand her point of view because she believes in the justice system, and that’s fair enough. But as a journalist, would her interest not be piqued that there are some answered questions? I just wonder, what, has she found something? Has she really gone into it? Or is she just taking it all at face value as well?

Naomi: I really don’t know. You know, I wish I’d had a chance to have more of a conversation. I just said, you know, thanks for your reply. I’m sorry that’s happened to you. Journalists, really. I think, for me, is to react to things that are going on, things that are current. For me, the reason I picked up the podcast, and I said this at the beginning, the reason, it wasn’t for Luke, and actually, it wasn’t at the beginning. It did in the end, when I’ve read the story properly and I got into it, it was for Jodie in the end, but it was actually because there were so many people that were convinced by this that it was almost like, wow, what are we all missing? Because 25,000 people who signed that petition, you know, that is a huge number of people. What have they all signed, and why have they all signed it? You know, I would have loved to have known that. And I did speak to people who signed the petition, and I did get. I did get their insight into it. But for me, that was why I took on Luke’s case in particular, and Jodie’s, and Jodie’s murder, because there were so many people that were talking about it. This was a live situation, if you like, and I think, you know, in my head, that’s, journalists report on live situations, but they don’t have to necessarily agree. So I can’t see it both ways.

Dawn: Oh, no, not at all. No, no. She’s entitled to her opinion, but she shouldn’t be. She shouldn’t be attacked for that. Like, you see, nobody knows, and you’re entitled to your opinion.

Naomi: I’d really love to see something one way or the other, you know, to kind of sum this up, but I just don’t know if we’ll ever get it. And that’s a bitter pill to swallow sometimes.

Dawn: Yeah. Yes. If they’re so sure and there’s something that led them there and we’re not seeing it, just tell us. Just put it to bed. This is it. This is what we found. It’s conclusive, done. But there’s, there’s not. They’re not doing that.

Naomi: They’re hiding something’s happening, isn’t it? Something’s happening, definitely, yeah. I don’t know what it is. Wish I did.

Dawn: I know, I know. I was going to say, regarding the Lord advocate, though, they’re not in there for very long, are they? That kind of transition. Quite a lot of time. So she’s in there just now, but there might be a chance when she’s out, that they can maybe take it.

Naomi: Back again, potentially, maybe.

Dawn: What stage is it at the moment? Do you know? Is there appeal and another appeal in the process or is it just. We’re stuck just now?

Naomi: There’s none at the moment. I think the main focus now is to do some further testing, which is. Was sort of under the radar, I think, a little bit, and then all legit. It’s all going through the systems and to find out why this evidence was destroyed. Or was it in the process of being destroyed also?

Dawn: It wasn’t actually destroyed. It was the fingernails, wasn’t it?

Naomi: That was one of the items. Yeah. It was Jodie’s fingernails. Yeah.

Dawn: Do you know what the other items were?

Naomi: Yeah, I’ve got a little list, actually.

Dawn: Do we know who yet told the.

Naomi: So there’s. There were. There was a whistleblower.

Dawn: Yeah.

Naomi: It was happening. Yeah. The people close to everything know who, but they won’t. They won’t reveal who. So the fingernail DNA was taken away by police to be destroyed. So that was the. That was the main item. There were two knives as well. There were swabs that had swabbed other blades as well. Burnt clothes. A green Parker style jacket. So we’ve talked about that. That was actually. I don’t think that was the Parker jacket that belonged to Luke. I’ve got a feeling that was his friends, one of his school friends. And was there and tested. There was more than a hundred items, though, that were taken. No. To be.

Dawn: To be destroyed. But they hadn’t been destroyed yet.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: Wow.

Naomi: Yes. Another thing that was taken as well was. Which I found really bizarre. There were two essays that were in that the title of the essays were no remorse. And it was. These essays described killing a girl in the woods. And these were done by a local drug addict who lived very close to where she was found dead.

Dawn: Has he been mentioned? Have we mentioned him yet or not?

Naomi: We’ve gone through the suspects, haven’t we? Have we gone through the suspects?

Dawn: Yes. Yes. Because. Is he dead now?

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: Yeah. Yeah, we talked about him. He did that. He’s. That’s his.

Naomi: The two essays.

Dawn: Bloody hell.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: Okay. Have you seen them, have you?

Naomi: I haven’t seen them. I have not seen them, no. No. There was also some reports. I can’t remember if they were Jodie’s medical records or psychology reports or something, but there was something there as well. And I think for me, if you looked in any of their, the papers around December last year, the headlines always mentioned her fingernails. It’s like one of the most important pieces of evidence the murdered person’s fingernails can hold. So, so many clues in there or so much evidence in there. So for them to be taken away, you know, it’s not like it was a, you know, a bottle that was found half a mile from the crime scene. They thought, oh, we don’t really need that anymore. You know, this was her fingernails or scrapings of her fingernails, but it’s just mad.

Dawn: Why? Was there any people that said why they were doing this?

Naomi: No. I mean, we’ve not had the why.

Dawn: But.

Naomi: Have a guess. No.

Dawn: Dorothy bean.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: Jesus.

Naomi: The, the lord advocate, that is, was married to the prosecutor. So Luke’s legal. It has emerged now that Luke’s legal team could potentially sue the prosecutors after it emerged that they sanctioned the police to destroy evidence from this murder, from Jodie Jones’s murder. A letter from the lord advocates government solicitors admitted that the evidence had been taken away and then confirmed that they have now stopped destroying the rest of the evidence and that it’s been halted. But now they’re in the process of finding out what evidence is salvageable and what’s not.

Dawn: My God. A jaw is still on the floor. I cannot believe she did that. Oh, she can’t get away with that. Oh, that’s a cracker well bomb. Uh huh.

Naomi: It feels quite personal, doesn’t it? This is me now. This is me now completely removing myself as the podcast host and as the producer of through the wall and all of that. It is now just sort of looking in and thinking, this really does feel quite personal.

Dawn: It just makes them look bad. They keep doing it. We’re ignoring, there could be a mistake. We’re not doing a review and now we’re going to destroy the evidence. They’re really, really not making themselves look very good.

Naomi: No, no.

Dawn: Shocked. Shocked by the hope. I’m glad that there’s something in place. I’m glad it came out. If that person hadn’t come forward. Shit, they got away with it.

Naomi: Well, yeah, I mean, and that would have been a real, you know, if they had ever got to appeal, that would have been a real shocker to know that all the evidence had, you know, have been taken away. Yeah.

Dawn: Curious what they say that, why they did that. What’s their reasoning?

Naomi: This is the sad thing, you know, they never really have to be held accountable. They don’t have, like, they don’t have to give a reason for not doing an appeal of a conviction. They don’t believe that they have to unless they are sued. I don’t think they have to give a reason.

Dawn: I think he’s got any choice. He’s got. They’ve got to start suing them, haven’t they? Just stop it. Otherwise they’re just gonna.

Naomi: I know I would if I was in that team, but. Yeah.

Dawn: Yeah. God almighty. When you said, when it comes to forensics, there was so much you could say in your podcast, but you told everything of really significance and all of that. There wasn’t. Was it anything else? I mean, obviously, I know you mentioned it. Was there anything else that stood out for you that you can think of at all?

Naomi: No, no, not really. It was. The one big thing that I would have liked to have gone into a little bit more, potentially, was the motive aspect, which we just kind of touched upon because. Because there wasn’t any. And that I felt there should have been a lot more focus on that. You know, for any crime that’s committed, you know, whether it’s a war crime, whether it’s a serial killer or, you know, there’s always usually some sort of motive. And because there wasn’t one, it was just something I wish I knew more about. I wish I knew more about the lack of motive, but there just wasn’t anything there for me to look into.

Dawn: Yeah, it bothers me because there was so many, you know, others potential. Oh, no, I’ve got something else I want to mention. Parka jacket. See, you blew my mind with the Dorothy Bay, and I forgot I had this quick because you mentioned one of the items was a parka jacket, a green parka jacket that was going to be up for being destroyed. But you said it wasn’t looked. It was his friends.

Naomi: That’s right.

Dawn: So do you think maybe he could have borrowed his friends at some point and that’s what the boys who seen him, he was maybe wearing his.

Naomi: Yeah, maybe. I didn’t actually know about this other Parker jacket in evidence until it was reported as one of the missing items. It was not something that I’d come across before.

Dawn: Yeah. So that’s been bothering me, this bloody Parker jacket. And then it’s like, there you go, you swap clothes, you swap jackets. You swap clothes when you’re younger. You could have been. You could have seen him wearing that and thought it was his and it wasn’t. So we could stop there. Let’s put that. That’s neat. I’m happy.

Naomi: See, I just like.

Dawn: I just like an animal.

Naomi: Oh, God. Wouldn’t we all love an answer to this? Honestly, every case, you. And you must get it as well. Every case that you research, even if it’s a solved case as of this. I mean, that, you know, this obviously, this conviction, we’re talking about it because it feels unsafe. But even the cases that are solved that we cover, you know, in our podcasts, there’s always just questions. I’m like, if we just had the answers to this, you know, it would sit much better with. With us. You know, it’s. Yeah, it’s. Answers are what we need.

Dawn: Exactly.

Naomi: And I feel like that’s. In this case, that’s what we’d get from an independent review.

Dawn: That’s all it is. I mean, we could come out with the same outcome. It could be. No, all these questions are answered, and that’s fine. That’s okay. But just do the independent review. There’s something not right. That’s all. Just come on.

Listen to Episode Five – Through The Wall: ‘People of Interest

Listen to Episode Six – Through the Wall: ‘Luke’s Army

Listen to Bonus Episode – In Luke’s Own Words

 

Call to Action:

Please consider subscribing, rating or reviewing this podcast as it really does help others find us. It’s thanks to your ongoing support that we continue to be able to bring you Scottish Murders. 

 

00:00:00: Introduction and Episode Five Discussion

00:00:44: DNA Samples and Local Offender

00:02:05: James Faulkner and the Condom Evidence

00:03:10: Odd Behaviour and Admission

00:05:19: Crime Scene and Path Details

00:07:26: Joseph Jones and Mental Health Issues

00:09:24: Police Investigation and Persons of Interest

00:11:46: Jury and Circumstantial Evidence

00:14:20: Gordon Dickie and the Dogs

00:17:18: Cannabis in Jodie’s System

00:19:29: Scrunchie and Clothing Description

00:21:20: Unsafe Conviction and Media Influence

00:23:43: Mark Kane and Similarities to Luke

00:25:48: Sandra Lean’s Involvement

00:28:20: Public Response to the Podcast

00:30:05: Matt Elliot’s Documentary and Legal Issues

00:31:45: Luke’s Prison Experience and Restrictions

00:33:29: Police Obsession with Luke

00:35:29: Luke’s Early Prison Experience

00:38:38: Luke’s Mental Strength and Support

00:41:13: Public Support and Podcast Impact

00:42:49: Comparison of Different Prisons

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Naomi: Episode five. I liked episode five, but, you know, I liked. I liked doing all of them, but episode five, for me, felt like things, some of the ties were coming together. You know, there was so much information to sort of talk about and so to actually sidestep that a little bit and actually look at different people of interest that I felt was quite. It felt like it added the kind of why I was doing this, do you know what I mean? Because before, up until that point, I’d sort of really just been going through the evidence on what had been presented at trial and, you know, who Jodie was and who Luke was. And this actually offered potentially. Potentially, I say, another person of interest aside from Luke.

Dawn: I couldn’t remember this. I couldn’t get this right in my head. So there was five. Five DNA samples found on Georgie and we knew one of them was Stephen. Was there another one that was a local offender? Was that. Was that something? Was that right?

Naomi: So there were other people of interest. So there were five DNA profiles on Jodie. Most of them were unknown. So there was the DNA from Stephen Kelly that we just. That we just discussed, that apparently came from the t shirt from her sister. And then there was the condom, as we’ve talked about as well. So there was sperm on Jodie, there were sperm heads and semen and they were in different areas on her. The amounts were small, but they were there. So, again, so most of those have remained unknown. And the only two that we have confirmed is Stephen Kelly. And then in the condom, that was the local sex offender.

Dawn: That’s the local sex offender. Oh, see, I was getting mixed up there.

Naomi: Oh, sorry. No, so that’s. Yeah, that’s. That’s the guys in the condom. And I think now, I mean, we can name him. It’s public knowledge and it’s. And it’s in there. So his name’s James Faulkner and he did actually go to the paper to defend his innocence.

Dawn: Just tell me all about this guy. This. This was crazy. Wow.

Naomi: Yes. So there was fresh semen found in a condom. I think it was 50ft or something from Jodie’s body. Now, at the time when they found this, James Falconer was not on the DNA register. He hadn’t. I don’t know if he’d committed any crimes previously, but his DNA wasn’t in the system. So when they ran it, it didn’t hit any matches, didn’t match Luke, didn’t match anybody. So it was just an unknown male profile at that time.

Dawn: Is that why it didn’t know about him at the trial. Is that right?

Naomi: That’s right, yeah. Because they didn’t know who it was. And it was three years later when he was convicted of another offence that he. That obviously his database went in and then there was a match when he was questioned and he said, you know, that he did that. And then what was really bizarre is, like he just said the following night, having known that, you know, Jodie’s body had lied there overnight and there’d been a big crime scene, you know, that he went back and did it again. Very, very, very odd behaviour.

Dawn: Why would he admit that? Why would he.

Naomi: Oh, I don’t. I have no idea. I mean, why would you do it in the first place? He said it was to have privacy. But, I mean, God, you live in small town Scotland, you know, there’s plenty of other places you could have gone. Not that tiny patch of woodland or, you know, there was no reason to do it there, you know, just. Just go in the shower like everyone else. I don’t know if that’s what people.

Dawn: Do, but, like everyone else, probably not.

Naomi: On a crime scene where, you know, because you’re, you know, you’re disrespecting that that young girl’s, you know, last place alive. It’s just. It’s just barbaric, really, is. When he was questioned at first, though, it’s important to know that because he said he did this, sorry, between eight and 09:00 p.m. and then when he was questioned, he said that his friend had given him the condom. But when they asked his friend, he said, no, I didn’t give him a condom. So then James was probed further and he. He said, well, I had to say something, didn’t I? And it’s like, well, no, he didn’t, really. So I find. I find that whole situation incredibly, incredibly weird, really. And that. That information has been out in the public domain for quite a while, actually. People. There are actually, you know, posts that people are talking about this in depth online. And I did. I did read through it and lots of people were speculating and, you know, again, the fact that Jodie’s crime scene was never considered a sexually motivated assault and murder, you know, is very. It’s very strange. Anyway, he did actually speak out, which a lot of the other persons of interest have not, and he was, you know, he was openly said to the police, you know, this is what I did. I went for this. Oh, God. I’m sorry, mum or dad, if you’re listening. Posh wank. And that always was a bit icky, but, yeah, the rest of the DNA is. Is unknown.

Dawn: The only other thing I could think of then was maybe her body wasn’t there at that time because they weren’t sure whether maybe she’d been killed somewhere else. So maybe she wasn’t there. But it’s still bloody weird. You went back to the same place the night after. You can’t get away from that.

Naomi: But, yeah, I think it was. I’ve always been convinced that, you know, she was killed there.

Dawn: What about the blood, though, do you think? I suppose we didn’t get to the crime scene until the early hours of the morning, so.

Naomi: That’s right. That’s right. And there was participation, and she was.

Dawn: Moved as well, wasn’t she?

Naomi: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s. You know, it’s a. That path, Rhone’s dyke path, the one that goes between two. I spoke to quite a few locals, and it, you know, it’s a path that people use all the time. It’s the main path and also that hole in the wall, which is how they would have had to have got there in the first place. It’s actually really high up. It’s on the. On the thumbnail for my podcast. You can see it and, you know, you’d have to really, you know, hoist yourself up to get over it. You couldn’t just step over it.

Dawn: That’s the only way into that. To the trees in the wooded area into that part.

Naomi: Yeah. From the path, which is where she was seen or where, you know, where witnesses had seen her walk into. Yeah.

Dawn: Okay. Oh, see, in my mind, that’s good to know because in my mind, I painted it that, you know, there was houses over that way, and you could walk from the houses in a different direction towards. So that’s good. Okay. I just painted it differently.

Naomi: Do you know what? It’s worth having a look on Google Earth because it doesn’t look how I expected it to look. And actually, I remember when I first started talking to Sandra Lane, she sent me a sort of diagram that she had drawn of, you know, the path and what it looks like. And, you know, I then went on to Google Earth and had a right, you know, a look from above, and then I had a look on street View. And, you know, it’s weird. I thought it was really, really secluded, but actually, no, I mean, and it’s in close proximity to houses, to roads, to a big field that, you know, goes over towards. I think it’s the university that’s on the back. So it’s a really. It’s. It’s. We. I would just suggest anyone that’s got a real interest in this case, I would go and have a. Have a search for the Rhone’s Dyke path. That’s Roan. And then d yke path in Dalkeith. Have a look at that. And you’ll see the hole in the wall and you’ll see where she was found.

Dawn: So then the other one was Joseph Jones.

Naomi: What?

Dawn: Again, that was a. What? He was following her. He was seen behind her. Oh, God. And yet. So he’s mentioned that he detected her before and he didn’t like her. Why? What was going on there? What was the dynamic?

Naomi: Quite complex mental health issues. From what I’ve seen. He’s diagnosed schizophrenic. So, on the murder in a small town documentary on channel five, they didn’t name him. They did suggest it was someone close to Jodie and they described him as a stocky man. And then it was leaked online and suddenly the whole world knew who it was. And now, you know, there are so many. I’ve seen countless posts on Twitter, on Facebook of current pictures of Jodie’s brother and sort of naming him and saying he was. He was the stocky man. And people came forward and said that he had attacked her before, that he had an obsession with knives, that he had caused injuries with knives before. And my thought was that, you know, the reason this wasn’t talked about on the Channel five podcast was because he was a vulnerable person, because of his mental health issues. But seemingly now, you know, I don’t know who leaked it, but it has been leaked countless times over. Joseph Jones has never spoken to the media. His mum’s never spoken to the media, which is absolutely their prerogative and doesn’t prove or disprove anything. But it just. It’s just something else to add. So there were two witnesses that saw a stocky man following her from the house up to the road that she would have taken down to the path. It’s also worth saying that he had an appointment with his mental health worker on that day that Jodie was killed and that he cancelled it. And the reason he had had it is because he had been having psychotic.

Dawn: Episodes and he was ruled out. Did the police know it was him at the time? Then? The police knew he was the stocky man, even though it wasn’t reported?

Naomi: I don’t know that, actually. I don’t know how far they went into questioning him or investigating him, because I never read any of his statements? I never had access to that. But what I would say is that given the amount of time and effort they were putting into Luke from day one, even if there were other suspects. Well, you’re not supposed to say suspects. Someone told me that the other day. You’re supposed to say persons of interest. Okay, so other persons of interest then. I don’t know how much they would have delved into it if they were already kind of convinced that they had the right person in Luke.

Dawn: Yep. Oh, you’re right. I agree with you. But still, seeing close by, there’s a violence. He’s been violent before. He was. Jesus.

Naomi: I do know what his alibi was, though. His alibi was exactly the same as Luke’s, that he was at home with his mom.

Dawn: Oh, that’s right. I remember that. And yet Luke’s mom and brother were questioned and they were charged with lying. And their one, Joseph’s, was just taken as given.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Oh, yeah. Double standards again, though. Why Luke? He wasn’t known to the police. I mean, it’s a small area. Was he. Did somebody take a dislike to him? What the hell? Why do they fixate on him?

Naomi: Yeah, I wish I had that answer. I think, you know, if you just looked on paper at who looks like a good fit for this murder, somebody who’s. I’m not. And I’m not. I’m not implicated. I don’t know. Like I said, I don’t know who did it, but I would just think I would probably spend quite a lot of time looking at the person who did have a history of violence and schizophrenia which led to psychotic episodes, purely just because, you know, the pathologists had said this was a psych, you know, this was done in a fit of rage almost, you know, psychosis. Even. So, you know, because it was so brutal. I definitely think, you know, had I been investigating, it definitely would have been a priority for me.

Dawn: And that’s all we’re saying. You know, we’re not saying this is a suspect or somebody we could be interested in. We’re just saying. Did you look into them? If you’d just given them the same amount of attention as you had looked and still come out with the same conclusion, then this speculation wouldn’t be going on. Just look at these people.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: And then there was the moor pad boys as well.

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: So that was her cousin, wasn’t it?

Naomi: So her cousin and her second cousin. Yeah. Right. Both related to her low level drug dealers. And, yeah, they’re just seen by two separate independent witnesses on the field. Driving their mopeds around that leads onto the path. So that was, you know, definitely, again, just. I don’t know how. How much they looked into that. I don’t know.

Dawn: It’s just people that were in the area. That were in the damn area. Yeah. It’s just looking at them. Yeah.

Naomi: I think the thing that everyone sort of where alarm bells started to ring was that one of them, John Ferriss, Jody’s cousin, he basically, he didn’t tell the police that he was at that path until five days after the murder. So if I knew my cousin had been killed on that path, you know, I would have said, oh, my God, you know, I was there and I’d be trying to really wrap my brain to think, did I see anybody else?

Dawn: Yeah.

Naomi: And then he actually only came forward because these other witnesses who I think, I think, I am almost certain it was two witnesses from, like a business or something that was. That was placed near the field. And you know what mopeds are like, they’re so blooming loud, aren’t they, that they looked out and they saw these two. There was two different people that saw them? Oh, no, actually, no, there was more than that, actually, because more came forward. I think there was about six from the same workplace that had said, you know, they’d seen these two boys driving around on a homemade moped as well. One witness actually spotted the moped leaning against the wall of the path and it was unattended. So where were these two boys who had been riding around? Where were they when this was left unattended? What were they doing? And then the biggest thing was that John Ferris, he had quite long, curly hair. He cut off all his own hair straight afterwards, completely hacked it all off. So that is very, very strange. And something else that also came out when I was talking to a few, a few people, and I got one of the statements was that Gordon Dickey’s dad, they called him Dickey senior, he had been along the path that night and he was walking eight dogs. I mean, that in itself is incredible, but in his statement, he describes going through that v shape hole in the wall. Now, remember what I said? I said, you have to almost hoist yourself up to get into it. I think it’s like. I think if I remember correctly, it’s 4ft off the ground with eight dogs.

Dawn: Yeah.

Naomi: So you’ve got eight dogs.

Dawn: Yeah.

Naomi: And they were spaniels, and I used to have a spaniel, so I know. I know what they’re like and they’re very energetic. But to get eight of them through into this woodland. I don’t really know why, because, you know, I’ve always had dogs, and, you know, we take them on fields.

Dawn: Yeah, look at them.

Naomi: I run, they won’t, you know, so I don’t know that that was. That was just a bit weird. And he put himself there between 05:30 p.m. and 08:30 p.m. that’s that, for me, always stood out as a very big timeline, especially on that day, you know. You know, that someone. You know, because he knew Jodie. Jodie had been murdered. He knew the family. 530 to 830, that. That is a very big timeframe, you know. You know, roughly when you walk the dogs, I think most nights you’d. You’d say, oh, well, I normally take them out for their walk, you know, around six. It could have been anytime between six and seven. That sounds really plausible. But 530 till 830 sounds like a long period of time.

Dawn: It does. And also what stood out for me was the fact he had five dogs in the area where Georgie was the.

Naomi: No, he had eight dogs. Oh, eight dogs.

Dawn: Eight dogs.

Naomi: Eight dogs.

Dawn: But Georgie was lying.

Naomi: And as I said, I had a spaniel, and they can smell, and I don’t know if you know, this. This is a fun fact that I learned on a pub quiz once. They can. They can smell up to 20. Is it 20 kilometres. 20 kilometres away?

Dawn: That’s a lot.

Naomi: And they can even detect things that are up to 40 metres underground.

Dawn: Oh, wow. And he detect George?

Naomi: Well, he said he didn’t. He didn’t see anything, but he obviously did step through something, because his boot was tested and there was blood found on his shoe.

Dawn: And was it Georgie’s blood?

Naomi: We don’t know.

Dawn: Ah, damn. That was my question, because how. He could have got. Fair enough. He could have got it as he’s just walking along. No problem. That would mean Jodie’s already there and she’s dead. So why did your dogs not say anything? Say anything, do anything?

Naomi: Yes.

Dawn: That makes no sense to me at all.

Naomi: This is why this episode, for me, was one of the most impactful, I think, because, okay, there is some stuff with Luke that is, you know, like we’ve said the night that the knife pouch and stuff, that’s dodge. This stuff is just as, if not more, you know, questionable. I definitely have a lot of questions, and they. There doesn’t seem to be any answers for them.

Dawn: No, there’s not. I don’t get that. See, if it doesn’t. I’ve always thought, if it doesn’t make sense, it’s not adding up, then it’s not right. There’s something wrong.

Naomi: Something wrong, definitely.

Dawn: So why was that not. Which made me think that maybe she was killed somewhere else. But if there’s blood on issue and it was Jodie’s blood, then that suggests I’m now. So it’s just, again, not knowing.

Naomi: Yeah. Yes.

Dawn: And then there was cannabis found in Jyoti’s system as well. But this just assumed it was Luke. But the cousins were. The drug dealers, weren’t there.

Naomi: That’s right.

Dawn: She could have been with them, having a wee. Smoking something. It’s just speculation.

Naomi: Absolutely, yeah. I mean, it’s plausible. It’s plausible. They’re definitely all. Everything you’re saying is thoughts that I’ve had. Definitely.

Dawn: The other thing that was there was the scrunchie. The comment about the scrunchie was that. What was. I forgotten. I’ve not made a note about that. What was that about again? I usually make my notes and I’ve just put scrunchie. Well, that’s really helpful, dawn.

Naomi: No, you’ve done. I mean, so basically, you’ve done exactly what a journalist did, so.

Dawn: Oh, that was. Right.

Naomi: Just wrote it when they had the conversation with Corin and Luke. But there was no context around it. In court, this person said he didn’t know why he wrote it at all, or whether he wrote it, whether he said something about it, or whether Luke said something he just couldn’t remember. The prosecution turned it around a little bit and just said, well, he must have been talking about the scrunchie that was found in Jodie’s hair. I mean, come on, it was 2003. Most girls did have a scrunchie in their hair. Yeah. And also, you know, Luke, just the position that he found Jodie in, it would have been quite difficult to have seen it. Alice did then, you know, the grandmother did then cradle her body. So I don’t even know if he would have seen that. And Luke had said as well, you know, he wouldn’t have used the term scrunchie. It wasn’t a word that he would have said. Hair band or something. You know, he wouldn’t have said that. Yeah.

Dawn: It’s a girly thing, isn’t it? Scrunchie.

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dawn: And then there was the clothing description he mentioned. She was asked what she was wearing. They worded it wrongly, didn’t they? They started to see what was she wearing that day, and then they changed it to night. And he’d said, baggy cords. And I put two things here. I was like, well, either they’ve mixed them up by starting off by saying, it’s the day, and you saw her at school and she was wearing the cords, or was that his first slip up? And he’s like, oh, shit. I can’t tell you what she was wearing at nighttime because I didn’t. I wasn’t supposed to see her. I’ve got two things there, but I don’t know.

Naomi: Yeah, that one, I just sort of left that open ended, because, again, you know, it’s all about interpretation. When you were there, so who knows? I mean, there were definitely times when. And I think we might have mentioned this previously, but whether police did try to confuse him, I believe, and I will stand by that. You know, when they would say things when they were talking about where they usually had sex, you know, where did the sex usually happen? Now that’s in the transcript. And he’d say, in my room. And they came back and said, what, every time? Every time. And that’s not what they said initially. So they’re trying to get him to trip over his own words.

Dawn: In fact, I’ve changed that question. I noticed that you said that from day to night, and he’s just got mixed up. I thought that, but I thought, oh, or was that your first slip up?

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dawn: He said it was a 42 day trial, and there was so much obviously put forward. Is there anything you can think of that you haven’t said that made you think, is there anything in there again that you thought?

Naomi: No, I mean, I just think the conviction is unsafe. I think that’s probably, as far as I can say without being detective and without, you know, having a qualification other than journalism. I just think it’s unsafe. And there is a lot someone said in. In the case. Actually, I interviewed someone who does media law, and we were talking about trial by media, and I said to him, I said, why do you think Luke was found guilty? And he said it was the fact that there was lots of little bits of circumstantial evidence, but he was like. But actually, none of them were very big. None of them made you sit up and go, oh, yeah, that’s convincing. They were very, very, very tiny pieces of circumstantial evidence that continued to build, and that was possibly the reason that he was found guilty.

Dawn: Just thinking about the jury as well. They might have had, like us, they might have had questions that maybe wanted to know more about the park or the knife, but they can’t. They don’t have the opportunity to ask that. They just have to hope that the defence is going to bring it up so that they can talk about it. So they might have just had to go with what they’ve been told. So it could have been maybe wanted to know more as well so they could make that decision, you know, more clear.

Naomi: So there is somebody called Scott Forbes. So Scott, I haven’t actually ever spoken to him personally. He’s someone that did some kind of legal training and he now is. Is one of Luke’s main supporters. He was on the Channel five documentary and he was being interviewed by Michael Neal and John Sellings, who were two retired police detectives who had kind of were re examining the case for the purpose of the documentary and they were looking at other potential suspects. And Scott is interviewed by them and says, you know, can you tell us a bit about what you’ve heard? And he says, well, I had a friend called Mark Kane, and Mark Kane was known to use drugs. He, I think, had some mental health issues as well, and he was on a cocktail of drugs. Allegedly, this is all allegedly, this is from Scott. The night that Jodie died. He lived very, very close to the crime scene. There was a field that kind of separated Mark Kane from where she was found. And he was. He was doing a methadone programme at the time, and he was a student at New Battle college, and that was what was minutes from the crime scene. And he was. The next day he saw Scott and he said he had scratches all on his face and, you know, he sort of alludes to, you know, the fact that he knew a girl was killed in the woods. So they, they interview him, and when you see a picture of Mark Kane, he looks exactly like Luke. You know, he’s got long hair, he’s the same kind of complexion, the same kind of build. Mark died in 2018. His mum, I think her name was Norma, she found him dead in a chair. And his cause of death was never confirmed. But, you know, he had done drugs potentially. That could have been a factor there. Who knows? But that was someone who, you know, that. That obviously, definitely raised flags.

Dawn: Do you think just your personal opinion that Luke is doing the right thing by saying he’s not going to say he’s guilty for a murder he says he didn’t commit? Do you think that’s the right. Just personally, it’s not his opinion. Do you think that’s the right way to go? Or would you suck it up and just say, all right, I did it just to get out.

Naomi: No, I wouldn’t. I’ll tell you why. I know it’s really hard. The thing is, there’s a couple of reasons that I understand why Luke is. Well, there’s three reasons I think Luke is doing this. Number one, he says he’s not going to admit to something that he hasn’t done. Number two, he’s not got a life outside of prison, you know, because he was incarcerated at such a young age. So he’s not. Not got kids on the outside. He’s not got a partner on the outside. You know, his mother is very ill. He’s got a father and brother, but, you know, that’s not enough to keep him doing that. But I think the main reason is, and this is what he has said to me, to us on the. On the podcast, that if he admits it, then if someone else did kill Jodie, they get away with it, and. And they’re still out there. And one thing that I have, you know, I have always, as soon as I find any sort of time, and I know that it’s something that Luke’s team have looked into before, is whether there’s any other murders that sort of fit the mo, you know, fit kind of the way that Jodie was killed. Is there anyone else that has been murdered where there’s an unsolved case or maybe even a solved case where that killer could have also have killed Jodie? Yeah, no, that’s interesting because to look into. But, my God, that would. That would be a big undertaking.

Dawn: Yeah, it would. But, yeah, you’re right, because it’s.

Naomi: I.

Dawn: Unusual, isn’t it, that you do it once and then you don’t keep going if you get away with it, especially.

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Dawn: Sandra Lee, obviously, she, you know, heard of the case, and she had two young daughters at the same age as Jodie. And she said it just didn’t sit right with her. She just knew there was something not right. Was there anything she’d heard, you know, locally, you know, living in that area, that maybe made her think that? Why did she think that when everybody else was thinking the worst at that time? Did she mention.

Naomi: She just sort of said that when she started to look into the case they had against him, and I think she was quite shocked that he would been named in the papers, you know, and that he was also. I think what also resonated with her was that Luke was the same age as her daughters as well. So to see this kind of trial by media and then to investigate, you know, to sort of look into the points of the case and what they said they had against him. And then she got in touch with his family, and she spoke to Corin, and she met Luke, and it kind of snowballed from there, really. But I think her initial interest in it was, you know, wow, this is absolutely awful. I want to protect my children, so I want to find out more about it, because she wanted to be reassured that there wasn’t some mad serial killer on the loose, you know, who was going to start targeting other teenagers in the area. So I think her initial sort of look into this case was very. Was almost spurred on by her wanting to just be sure that her own children were safe. And the more she got into it and more the layers came off, you know, she felt compelled to do something interesting.

Dawn: Okay. I’m glad she did mind. I bet he looks glad she did as well. He’s got a friend there, I think, hasn’t he?

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: Does Sandra work with anybody else, or is it just Luke? She focuses on, you know, for miscarriage?

Naomi: She has in the past. She has in the past, but at the moment, she’s just. She’s just working on Luke’s case.

Dawn: Did you hear from anybody at all after your episodes came out? Did anybody reach out and say anything to you one way or the other, or did you have any. Nothing.

Naomi: No. And people who were from the area did start to sort of try and engage on social media. I have. I’ve never put a kind of email address out or anything because my worry is that people might, if they do come to me with any information, then that could potentially shalee, hinder a case. So I try to kind of put it out there and then kind of try and signpost everyone you know, and say, if you know anything about this, you know, call the, you know, whatever police force it’s under or, you know, crime stoppers especially. I always try and refer people to them. I think that this case, there are groups that are set up, but there’s a Facebook group in particular. And because Luke’s legal team and criminologists, they’re all very much in the public domain, they speak very openly about the case, and they constantly appeal for information from people. So I think that, you know, had anyone been moved to come forward before now, that they probably would have done it via one of these Facebook groups or, you know, directly to maybe Sandra lean or to somebody like that, or his lawyer.

Dawn: Oh, you met Matt Elliot, you spoke to on your podcast, and he mentioned that he was wanting to make a documentary about the case. But then things took a turn, and there was a lot going on behind the scenes. What was he meaning? What was he talking about?

Naomi: It was just kind of legal stuff. What we could say, what we couldn’t say. It was also just dynamics. And I think there was a lot of people that are kind of all fighting towards the same goal, but perhaps on different wavelengths. So Matt has taken a step back from that for the time being. I hope. You know, he’s a great filmmaker. He’s done some really good other films, and he also works as a videographer. He does stuff for charities, he does stuff for weddings. So I think that that’s been. That’s been a bit of a catalyst. And also, you know, he’s complete. He’s right down south in England, so he’s really, really far away from Scotland. And there was. There were blockades and, you know, there. There are things prohibiting Luke from stopping talking to the media. So until he’s released, I know I got away with it, but, you know, and I know that he. Since Luke has had some videos put out on YouTube that he’s done with his team, they’ve recorded phone calls and they’ve put them online, because I think he’s just a bit sick of not having his say so. Yeah, I know. For now, the documentary is just on pause, but hopefully it will. It will reignite. I think it would be really interesting. But. But saying that also, channel five did a fantastic job with murder in a small town. Stephen Bennett, who is the director, he did a fantastic job.

Dawn: Yeah. Was there any repercussions for Luke after speaking with you? Because I know he said that. Was it the governor he was having a lot of problems with. And.

Naomi: Yes, or with me. Luckily, it seems to go under the radar, considering how many downloads it’s had. That did surprise me. You know, we are talking hundreds of thousands. But when he put the stuff out on YouTube, yes, there was repercussions. He was actually moved. Prisons and privileges were taken away. That has now been resolved. But it’s. Yeah, it’s. It’s rubbish.

Dawn: Putting things out on social media or speaking to the press is suggesting to them that there’s an escalation and it’s tendencies of violence, blah, blah. But why is he being punished? Why is he not allowed to speak? Oh, I don’t understand. You’re not allowed to do that?

Naomi: No, you’re not supposed to speak. Well, well, no, I mean, that’s. Okay. So this is. This is something that is definitely for a legal mind. There is a clause that says you can talk to the media once you have been convicted and you, you know, you are spending your sentence. So, for example, I mean, you might have seen other documentaries where they’ve spoken to the prisoners in prison. I don’t know if it’s because, you know, they’re still trying to appeal. I’m not sure what their specific reasoning was for doing all that to Luke, but all I know is that it was quite quickly rectified and that he was back in the prison that he was in prior. So I don’t know if it was. I mean, maybe it’s. Maybe it’s fear tactics, maybe, you know, the police or, you know, the jail staff, maybe they’re worried about what he’s going to say. I don’t know. But, yeah, luckily, at the moment, from what I know, that’s kind of gone.

Dawn: Away now somebody’s flexing their muscles, aren’t they? Just to say, we didn’t. We’re the boss.

Naomi: That’s definitely one theory. Absolutely, yeah.

Dawn: He was trying to basically be allowed out, to start learning to work outside and, you know, live in the community, be allowed to go out and then come back in in the night. And then they put the kibosh on that because they were doing an investigation, a recent review. Why are the police. Why do they have such a thing obsession about him? If they think he did it, he’s done his time. Are they scared that he’s going to go out and do it again? Is that what they’re frightened of? Or they just. He’s caused them nothing but bother? He’s been in the spotlight all this time and they’re just going to make life difficult for him.

Naomi: It’s funny because he’s been a. You know, I’ve actually seen proof that he has been a good. What you would call a good prisoner. You know, there’s not been drugs smuggled in. You know, he’s. From what we know, he’s done educational practises, he’s, you know, he’s not hurt the guards, he’s not caused problems. So I really don’t understand. And see, this is the area that I wish I had more answers to and I think this is the area that I think Luke wishes he had more answers to as well. Well, all I would say is that I think it’s a much smaller system than we perhaps realise. And, you know, I think we, you know, we flex that definitely through looking at the Lord advocate and her being married to the prosecutor and, you know, it’s just so it just all feels like a very small network that I don’t think anyone’s really managed to sort of penetrate.

Dawn: No, it’s clear that the police are still keeping tabs on what he’s doing because, you know, they’re just putting a stop on him getting any further. So he’s still been watched anyway, isn’t he?

Naomi: Someone is, definitely. Yeah, someone is.

Dawn: I’ve been dreading asking this question because he was only such a young lad. What was prison like for him at the beginning? Do you know? He mentioned that he was hurt, basically. And do you know anything?

Naomi: Yeah, I mean, I don’t think it’s been an easy ride for him. I think mentally as well, I think that’s been the worst because this happened, you know, pretty quickly. I’m not talking about sort of the trial, but actually how quickly the suspicion fell on him and how quickly his whole life was uprooted. So if you think you know absolutely everything you know about your life and all your security is all of a sudden taken away from you and you are now completely out of control. Also, if he didn’t kill Jodie, just imagine, just play devil’s advocate for a second. Then he has witnessed his girlfriend’s mutilated body. He’s had to call the police, he’s had to be with the family when they found out. He’s had to hear the screams of her grandmother. Then he’s been trialled by media, he has been attacked, he’s been followed by paparazzi, and he’s then been put into a situation where he now has to all of a sudden know the law. You know, he has to know terminology. He has to deal with a defence attorney, he has to deal with being swabbed and strip searched and put into a cell. Then he’s put through trial. And not only was it just a trial, but it was a trial that was absolutely flooded with cameras and with people outside, you know, literally, you know, screaming at him. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of the footage, but I mean, it’s. It’s chaos. It’s absolute chaos. And this, this guy who should be at school is walking through this crowd, you know, and then he goes into a room with, you know, professional lawyers and legal counsel and he’s not even done his GCSE’s and that’s all against him. And that I think for me that I will say this, actually, and I don’t say this lightly. I’m surprised he’s still here with us. I’m glad that, you know, he is, because, you know, even if he did do it, you know, well, then prison actually is where he should be, because that ultimately is harder. I say this because I have had several people very, very close to me take their own lives through. Through circumstances that, you know, completely overwhelmed them that were more simple to describe than this. Just as horrific. Everyone’s reason for doing it ultimately isn’t is the beast that will get them, and it is absolutely awful. So there is no downplaying. Absolutely, you know, anything. I actually know someone who took his own life because he lost his job, and that for a lot of people, they might go, oh, my goodness. But actually, you don’t know what’s going on in that person’s head, and you don’t know what that job meant to them. So I can’t believe that, given everything, that he’s still here. I can’t believe it. That says. That says a lot. But I do know that mentally, of course, you know, having spent your whole. All your formative years, really, in a prison cell and around much older people than you, you know, he was the baby for a long time. That’s really difficult. That’s really, really difficult. And to have very limited access to your family and to your friends. You know, your friends are gone, really. The friends were people he had to make in prison. But actually, I do know that from what I remember him saying, he doesn’t have massively, you know, really close friends in prison. He just kind of gets along with everyone and just tries to keep himself to himself. So what he does rely on is the contact from people like his legal team and Sandra and some of his supporters that, you know, had never actually met him until they started supporting the case. I know that quite a few of them go to visit him in prison. Some of them write to him. Some of them speak on the phone that he does have access to email. So it’s obviously a very regulated email. And the emails, I think, are printed off, and then they’re given to him once they’ve been scanned and checked. But he does have a group of supporters, and I think as that group of supporters has grown over the years and something that really made it take off, actually, it was only two years ago when murder in a small town came out. That was the catalyst for a lot of his support. So before that, that it must have felt very, very isolating. If he did it, if he did kill Jodie, then. Then there’s no sympathy. You know, you reap what you sow. But if he didn’t then, my God, what have we put this guy through?

Dawn: You know, I cannot imagine him going through that and then having. It’s that door banging, you know, in the prison cell and that echo on you standing there on his first night. What the hell must. If he is innocent, like you said, I put that. How did. How is he staying so positive? I mean, I know there was some anger coming out towards the end when he was speaking, but like you said, he was so articulate, it was so intelligent sounding and so positive. You know, he was annoyed at some of the things were happening, rightly enough. But I just. I don’t know how he’s done it. Like, I don’t know how he’s done it.

Naomi: I don’t either, you know? And that call was. That was about, I think, maybe 40 minutes worth of footage. And it, you know, like you say, that was near the end. I mean, that was pretty much the way it was played out in the podcast was pretty much in chronological order of the questions that were put to him. So for him to get angry quite late on, you know, if. If I was him, and I was, you know, saying, I did not kill this girl. I did not do this murder, my God, I would have wanted to shout from the rooftops, but I do think maybe that’s a sign of his intelligence, that he knows that you. You know, you get more bees with honey, don’t you, than anything else. And maybe that’s. Maybe that. That’s why. But I was there. The one thing I will say is, I was so surprised at how calm and articulate he was. Yep.

Dawn: It was because we.

Naomi: We. You know, we’d heard those little bits and pieces on murder in a small town. We’d heard a little tiny clip, but not massively conversational. They were just sort of little sound bites that were kind of peppered around the rest of the information, whereas this was really, you know, just in conversation with really, wasn’t it? You know, it was.

Dawn: It was real. He was being very real and open and. Yeah, it was really compelling. It was interesting listening to him.

Naomi: Yeah.

Dawn: God knows how he’s done, how blows my mind. He must. He’s got some inner strength, I think, because he’s managed to not let it consume him, because I would. It would just. That rage and the anger would consume you a lot of people. But he seems to have controlled it.

Naomi: Absolutely. I remember when I put out. Because I put out. That was episode six when I spoke to him, and then I had so much kind of footage from him, and you know, I thought, well, I’ll just do a bonus episode and I’ll put out the rest of the interview. And it was so funny because when I uploaded it, you know, you can see your statistics, can’t you? You know, you can see them climb and doing well, and it refreshes the platform. I was with it refreshed every hour, and I remember refreshing it on the first hour, and it had tens of about 10,000 downloads in the first hour. But most of the downloads were for the last episode, which was like, bonus episode in Luke’s own words. And quite a few of them missed episode six. So they’d kind of come in halfway through the conversation. And it’s because, you know, there was all these supporters that were kind of on the brink, you know, waiting for this release. You know, I trialled the podcast. I told them it was coming. I told people that, you know, we were going to hear from Luke directly and that just people were waiting for it. And literally the minute it came out, people. People were listening to it. So it just goes to show that people are really invested in this. They really are.

Dawn: Yeah, it must be nice for them. It’s a shame it’s taken from two years ago to really. To get that support and see it, you know, because I must have been. Felt so alone.

Naomi: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, prison, I can’t imagine how awful it must be. I mean, obviously, like I say, if you’ve committed a crime, then absolutely that’s what it’s there for, you know. In fact, I did. I did a podcast episode, though, on. On Berwyn Jail, which is in Wales. And it was the first super jail that was built in the UK. And it has. It has got. It has loads and thousands and thousands of prisoners and it’s got like a wellness centre and a gym and everyone’s got telephones and, you know, I think you can wear your normal clothes in there. And then there was like something ridiculous. Like 18 female guards have been caught having sex with inmates and there have been. Rugs have been found everywhere. One poor guy, bless his heart, you know, he had overdosed on spice and he had died in his cell. And because it was. It had been really easy to acquire these. These drugs and sort of remain, you know, for such a long time without supervision that he’d managed to overdose and die within his cell. And it was awful. And it was one of those jails. And I thought, God, you know, that kind of prison. And there are people in there that have committed some really serious offences, you know, armed sexual assaults. But it does just sort of blow your mind, doesn’t it? Just blow your mind that there. There are prisons like that, but then there are also prisons that are, you know, done the way that I think we on the outside all think prisons are run. If you haven’t been to prison before or you don’t know anyone that’s been in prison, then I think we all think they are like what we see on the tv, but sometimes they’re not.

For more details on the latest developments please visit to lmTranscriptdiscussion.blogspot.com

 

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00:00:00: Introduction and New Information on the Case

00:03:54: Divisions Within the Community

00:07:39: Potential Outcomes and Future Implications

 

Episode Credits

Hosted by Dawn

Special Guest: Naomi Channell

Produced by Erin Ferguson

 

Transcript:

Dawn: I spoke to Naomi Channel in late 2023 regarding the Jodi Jones and Luke Mitchell case that she covered in depth on our podcast, real. However, before I was able to release this episode, some new information came to light. This new information has come from the fact the trial transcripts have now been obtained and are now being compared to previously released information and are showing some inconsistencies. While we don’t go into these details, you can find out more from lmTranscriptdiscussion dot blogspot.com, which you’ll also find in the show notes. Here’s the brief discussion I had with Naomi following the new information coming out.

Naomi: So when I went to do the podcast, I did say, you know, has anyone got any transcripts? And everyone was really like, no, no, no, we haven’t got any. Like, the court never released them. You can usually do a freedom of information request, and I noticed that you can see a log as well of everything that’s been requested, even if it’s denied. So online, you might have seen things before. And I noticed that people had been. I didn’t recognise any of the names, but people had tried to get hold of the court transcripts, which I thought might be journalists, it might just be interested people, it might even be Jodie’s family. But then got hold of quite a few of these transcripts, and she’s been going through them. And whilst I would say there’s not. I haven’t. I haven’t had a chance to sit and go through all of them as yet, but there are some questions. I still. I look back at what I put on the podcast, and I would say that 99% of it is still accurate. But there are a few things that I think have not necessarily been disproven, but the whole picture wasn’t given in context. So some things look a little bit different. But I need to kind of. I need to kind of sit down and look through it all and has done this blog, which I’m sure you’ve seen. I think I sent you the link.

Dawn: Yes, you did. I’ve gone.

Naomi: Which has. Which has. So you probably know more than me at this stage, because I’m actually doing as well as my weekly podcast. I’ve got two big deep dives on the go as well. One’s coming out at the end of March, which has been a case that. I mean, if you think Luke Mitchell and Jodie Jones is complex, this one will just take your. Blow your head off. But I think it’s just, I need to. When I look at that I really need to pay a lot of real attention to that. And also, Luke’s parole hearing is in April, so I kind of. I didn’t want to do an update episode or anything on my podcast until I sort of do it all in one go. And potentially, you know, maybe I’ll speak to Luke again. I’m not sure. But whatever happens, I mean, what’s really happened is that the camp has sort of completely divided. And actually, what’s interesting is that no one is saying. Well, that I’ve seen. No one’s gone from saying Luke’s innocent to Luke’s guilty. What they’re doing is they’re kind of questioning the group that they were in, and they’re questioning how much context they had for every piece of information. Now, there was a claim, and I still don’t know how factual this is, so this is kind of just there. But there was a claim that Sandra and Scott knew about the whistleblower way before they talked about it. Now, potentially, there could have been a reason for that. So I’m not one to judge. I’m sort of thinking, okay, well, all right, that’s. You know, I haven’t spoken to Sandra in a while, actually. It would be good to catch up with her. But you think.

Dawn: Do you think she’ll speak to you? Because you said you’d gone into hiding her shit? Because I haven’t seen any about her from her anywhere.

Naomi: Yeah, yeah, she has. I mean, I’ve got her personal details, so, you know, there’s always a chance. I do. It’s really conflicting because you cannot. You only get parts of the story from everyone. But. But the one thing that has been really horrible is that people are taking chunks out of each other on Twitter. And I don’t know if you’ve. If you’ve had a look, I can show you. Some of them are just. There’s no. There’s no need for it.

Dawn: You know, I’ve forgotten why they’re doing. Why they were doing what they’re doing.

Naomi: I think so, dawn. Yeah, I think they have. So that’s why when I thought, oh, yeah, this pod’s coming out and it’s kind of been sort of floating there. The last few weeks, I’ve sort of been looking like dipping my toe in, but I’ve realised that the magnitude of the stuff that’s been reported, it’s so big that I will have to put on a full wetsuit and dive in. I don’t think this is one for skimming your toe in because there are a lot of claims to be made, and the transcripts are getting put out, like, weekly now. So there’s also a YouTube channel as well. I can’t remember what it’s called, but this guy’s kind of looking over it as well, and he’s sort of more on the side. He never comes out and says, luke is guilty, but I don’t think he believes Luke is innocent. But what he is is he’s quite polite, and he doesn’t jump down anyone’s throats. He’ll sort of say, well, I respect that, but I think he only gives respect to the people that have been respectful to him. So some people have come at him for guns blazing, and, of course, you’re going to retaliate, and I think that’s why. But there has been some, like, doxing online, there’s been some calls to personal mobile phones that shouldn’t have happened. And it’s getting, it’s getting quite messy behind the scenes. And it’s, it’s such a shame because I think the, I think it’s kind of been lost in that community, which, one of the members who was in that Luke is innocent kind of group, they likened it to a cult, which is obviously a really strong word. It’s like, wow, okay, so that’s, that’s pretty, that’s a pretty bold statement, but I wasn’t fully in it. I was always on the peripheral and just kind of, I didn’t want to get too far in because I still don’t know what I believe. Truly, I still don’t. I have. But what I’ve said all along, and I still totally say, is that Luke, I don’t think, in my eyes, got a fair trial. I think the media, as someone that works in the media as well, you know, I work in tv and podcasting as someone that does work in the media. His rights were really. And I know people will say, what about Jodie’s? But if he didn’t kill Jodie, then we’ve got two victims on our hands. And that think that’s the, and he was a child, so that needs to. Yeah, be a bit more leeway.

Dawn: But, no, I totally agree. It’s like nothing that’s average that’s come out so far is so damning that I would straightaway think, oh, absolutely guilty. There’s nothing. It’s not like that. There’s just contradictions and little innuendo insertions. There wrong words here and there. There’s that kind of thing going on. The parka jacket, it wasn’t a parka jacket, it was a green shirt. Just things like that. But still nothing that I would say what it’s done for me is just kind of damage the credibility wee bit. That’s what it’s done.

Naomi: I think that’s exactly. Yeah, that’s. That’s spot on. That’s spot on. I mean, we’ll know within weeks if he’s going to be out and if he is, then stuff is really. Stuff is really going to kick off. It really is. I can’t imagine what it. What. That online community, there are people where their whole profile is like justice for Luke or free Luke Mitchell or whatever. So if that. If that happens, if he comes out, then what happens then? And what if, you know, he doesn’t want to meet them, he doesn’t want to thank them for that because he might just want to go into hiding, he might want to bugger off and live in New Zealand. He might want to do something completely different. I don’t know, but it’s going to be. I think people feel like they know him because they look. They’ve looked at those clips of him, but you got to remember he was a 14 year old child then and he’s a mid 30s man now. This is over 20 years on and it’s going to be a very interesting time.

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Father Sorry For Murderer | Aberdeen Evening Express | Wednesday 28 March 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

US cold case cops re-examine brutal murder of Scots nurse stabbed in neck with scissors – Daily Record

Theology students in murder inquiry | The Herald

Scots nurse murder suspect ‘tried to cheat lie detector test’ after victim found strangled – Daily Record

Suspect in murder of Edinburgh nurse in US accused of trying to cheat lie detector

Cops Set To Arrest Nurse Police In A Us City Are Satisfied They Know The Man Who Murdered Scots Nurse | Daily Record | Saturday 14 April 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

Nurse | Aberdeen Press and Journal | Wednesday 28 March 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

News | Aberdeen Evening Express | Saturday 15 May 1999 | British Newspaper Archive

Cameron Brooks | The Scotsman | Saturday 15 May 1999 | British Newspaper Archive

Heartbreak Visit | Edinburgh Evening News | Thursday 29 March 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

11 Put Heat On Daily Record Thursday April 5 1990 But You Must Phone Before 9 April Right Now At | Daily Record | Thursday 05 April 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

Death Of Former Church Moderator | Dundee Courier | Thursday 01 February 1996 | British Newspaper Archive

Churchman’s Daughter Strangled | Dundee Courier | Wednesday 28 March 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

326 Quizzed By Murder-Hunt Police | Aberdeen Press and Journal | Thursday 29 March 1990 | British Newspaper Archive

Killer Of Scots Nurse | Aberdeen Press and Journal | Saturday 15 May 1999 | British Newspaper Archive

Elizabeth Mackintosh: Suspect identified in 33 year old cold case where Edinburgh woman was murdered

US murder suspect ‘will not face charges’ after Edinburgh nurse killed – Edinburgh Live

True Believer Podcast – YouTube

The unsolved murder of seminary student Elizabeth Mackintosh re-examined on Cold Justice

PressReader.com – Digital Newspaper & Magazine Subscriptions

Scottish Immigrant Found Dead Inside a Church

Elizabeth Mackintosh: Hope of justice for murdered nurse three decades on

Scottish Immigrant Found Dead Inside a Church | by Olive Barker | Medium

Cold case detectives probing murder of Edinburgh nurse in US identify suspect – Edinburgh Live

Unsolved murder of Elizabeth Mackintosh at Covenant Seminary in Creve Coeur : r/StLouis

Seminary Statement on Elizabeth Mackintosh | Covenant Seminary

US detectives probe 1990 murder of Scottish nurse Elizabeth Mackintosh

Cold case police identify suspect in nurse’s killing

New Podcast on Covenant Seminary Student Murder Victim Elizabeth Mackintosh — THE BAGPIPE

True Believer Podcast

Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

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Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

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Robbie from the Cold Tapes Podcast available at:

COLD TAPES PODCAST (@coldtapesofficial) • Instagram photos and videos

COLD TAPES | Facebook

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Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

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Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

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Old Glasgow Murders: August 1891 – Body of a Child Found in a Box Left in Queen Street Station

The Dundee Courier | Dundee Courier | Thursday 27 August 1891 | British Newspaper Archive

Supposed Child Murder In Glasgow. | Dundee Evening Telegraph | Wednesday 26 August 1891 | British Newspaper Archive

Notes and Comments. | Glasgow Evening Post | Wednesday 26 August 1891 | British Newspaper Archive

Death Of Mr. Raike3. | Renfrewshire Independent | Friday 28 August 1891 | British Newspaper Archive

Old Glasgow Murders: 2017

Scottish Murders is a production of Cluarantonn

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