Two Moderators
Further evidence regarding the sound moderator has been found since this page was written, please see the Sound Moderator page
So why is the silencer so important in this case?
At the 1986 trial the judge stated that it is “inconceivable” that Sheila committed the killings. This is because it would have meant her attaching the sound moderator to the gun, fighting in the kitchen, going upstairs shooting herself with the silencer attached to the gun, going back downstairs, putting the silencer away in the cupboard, going back upstairs to shoot herself and this time fatally.
The judge goes on to repeat this four times saying each time “Is it conceivable” or “it is inconceivable” stating that the defence case upon this red/paint/silencer/scratch mark issue alone has no merit at all, and over two pages he instructs the jury to accept the Prosecution’s case as it is inconceivable that Sheila was in any way responsible for the killings. Incidentally, the sound moderator was not found by police when they searched the house, but it was allegedly found three days after when police handed keys over to the relatives. Ann Eaton, Robert Boutflour and David Boutflour were all present when David Boutflour found it in the cupboard. The relatives were key prosecution witnesses at the trial and later went on to inherit their share of the Bamber estate after a legal battle with Jeremy's other cousins Anthony Pargeter and Jackie Wood.
We now know that, in fact, the silencer did not make those scratch marks in the paint on the underside of the mantle shelf until sometime after all the crime scene photographs had been taken, rendering the judges summing up to be factually incorrect, and therefore the trial unfair.
The silencer was hugely important to the Prosecution because blood which allegedly came from Sheila was found inside on the baffle plates. As the scratches on the mantle are proven to have been made after the first crime scene photographs were taken, the evidence of the silencer is now invalid. This includes the paint on the silencer, and the blood inside the silencer as well.
25/06/10: Two moderators found at WHF. Read the article in the Essex County Standard.
So why was the silencer's reference number tampered with? Simply, because the second silencer had been found much later than the Police originally stated. The Police merged the two silencers together to try to create continuity of the trail of evidence. But this was difficult, because all documents relating to finding the silencer had to be backdated, as there were none that were written on the 10th of August 1985 when it was supposed to have been found. The moderator which was found at the farm originally had been taken for forensic examination and it was not considered to have been used in the shootings.
Updated 23/06/10
The latest evidence to emerge in this case is the startling fact that the original exhibit labels for the Sound Moderator contained the wrong case reference number. This highlights the backdating of evidence by Police.
The first exhibit label shown on here is one fabricated by Essex Police to give a false ‘chain of evidence’ trail. Key to showing that this is a faked document is that its case number is SC/786/85 which DID NOT exist on 13th August 1985. This case number was not allocated to the investigation until after the 7th September 1985.
From the 8th August 1985 to the 7th September 1985 this case was numbered SC/688/85. So if this exhibit label was a genuine original it would have the case number SC/688/85 on it and not SC/786/85. A Police Inspector said he produced this exhibit label on the 13th August 1985.
So why did the Police backdate evidence? Clearly they didn’t find this sound moderator at the scene because if they had it would have the original case number on it and not one that hadn’t even been assigned to the case at the time it was supposed to have been found.
This is quite simply a disgrace. Backdating evidence in this way is a serious offence. The CCRC have had this document for some considerable amount of time and still nothing has been done.
14/06/10
The evidence of the photographic specialist, Peter Sutherst, is supported by a large number of documents, which also prove that the scratches were made the following month, and not on the 7th August 1985.