Lookout from the Jeremy Bamber forum.

[Caroline]

CW on IA seems to think the blood on SC's face originated from her left eye.  The images I have seen don't show enough of the left eye and even if they did I could only offer up a lay person's opinion.   Then there's blood from the nostrils?  Anyway I might agree that A/PS Woodcock was mistaken but given his testimony corroborates with testimony from forensic scientist Martyn Ismail for the prosecution I think it is safe to assume SC was moved between A/PS Woodcock's observation and SoC images taken.  Clearly JB was not responsible for this.  The appeal court judges were certainly impressed with Martyn Ismail's testimony.  Lets hope the appeal judges are as impressed when it forms part of the defence case at what will be a third historic appeal.

It's clearly not from her left eye Holly and the blood from her mouth would have ran down her chin, try it with some water. The blood has ran from her moth and nose and pooled under her eye, it's not coming from her eye and as such, she must have been laying flat.

[Holly Goodhead]

It's clearly not from her left eye Holly and the blood from her mouth would have ran down her chin, try it with some water. The blood has ran from her moth and nose and pooled under her eye, it's not coming from her eye and as such, she must have been laying flat.

But water is a Newtonian fluid and blood non-Newtonian and this determines flow behavior.

My overall view is that where we have highly qualified experts of long experience they are unlikely to call it wrong.  I place Dr Craig, Dr Vanezis, Prof Knight and Dr Ismail in this category. 

A/PS Woodcock's testimony states SC's head was slightly raised against NB's bedside cabinet.  Fast forward to the 2002 appeal and forensic scientist for the prosecution Dr Ismail with a degree in biochemistry states SC's head would have ended up propped on NB's bedside cabinet.  I believe Dr Ismail was more than capable of accurately determining SC's position following the second fatal gsw by way of bloodstains. 

518. To decide whether we considered that the interests of justice required that we heard Mr Ismail's evidence, we first had regard to the evidence that it was said that he could give. From the blood staining he concluded that following the second and fatal shot Sheila Caffell was lying almost flat on her back with her head propped against a bedside cabinet. For her then to slide to be found in the position depicted in the photographs would have required the downward force to be greater than the friction of her body against the floor. In his opinion this simply was not possible as there would only be the weight of the head providing the downward force. Therefore he concluded that an additional force would have been necessary. It could not have come from Sheila Caffell since the second shot would have been instantly fatal and thus she must have been moved by someone else, for example with her legs being pulled. He also considered that the weight and the friction between her skin and her nightdress was likely to have been less than the weight and friction between the nightdress and the carpet. Therefore, he would expect movement of the body within the nightdress rather than the body and clothing sliding together across the carpet. He pointed out that the photographs demonstrated this effect at the back of the nightdress with the nightdress staying rucked up in its original position. However the front of the nightdress had not demonstrated this effect. Accordingly Mr Ismail concluded that the nightdress had been pulled down after Sheila Caffell slid into her final position. Since on the evidence, she was dead by this stage, Mr Ismail concluded that some one else had arranged her nightdress.

519. Having studied with care the statement of Mr Ismail, we concluded that this was expert evidence capable of belief. Indeed if it had been given and if cross-examination had not revealed flaws in it (which we consider unlikely bearing in mind that there was no application to call any expert evidence to contradict it), had we been on a jury hearing such evidence we might well have been very impressed by it. That evidence in itself could have led to a conclusion of guilt quite apart from the many other matters relied upon by the prosecution at trial. However, we were not satisfied that evidence of this kind was not available at the date of trial if the prosecution had sought to explore these matters and more importantly we thought that Mr Turner was right in his submission that it was very difficult to gauge with sufficient certainty the reaction of a jury to it particularly when we could not judge it against all the related evidence in the trial, which we had not heard.

520. Our conclusion was that we should not therefore admit the evidence and we have had no regard to it in reaching our conclusion. It can, however, be said about it that if it had been called at trial, it may well have represented yet another formidable string to the prosecution's bow in a case where even without any regard to that evidence, it has to be said that the prosecution were able to put forward a very strong case pointing to guilt.

[Caroline]

But water is a Newtonian fluid and blood non-Newtonian and this determines flow behavior.

My overall view is that where we have highly qualified experts of long experience they are unlikely to call it wrong.  I place Dr Craig, Dr Vanezis, Prof Knight and Dr Ismail in this category. 

A/PS Woodcock's testimony states SC's head was slightly raised against NB's bedside cabinet.  Fast forward to the 2002 appeal and forensic scientist for the prosecution Dr Ismail with a degree in biochemistry states SC's head would have ended up propped on NB's bedside cabinet.  I believe Dr Ismail was more than capable of accurately determining SC's position following the second fatal gsw by way of bloodstains. 

518. To decide whether we considered that the interests of justice required that we heard Mr Ismail's evidence, we first had regard to the evidence that it was said that he could give. From the blood staining he concluded that following the second and fatal shot Sheila Caffell was lying almost flat on her back with her head propped against a bedside cabinet. For her then to slide to be found in the position depicted in the photographs would have required the downward force to be greater than the friction of her body against the floor. In his opinion this simply was not possible as there would only be the weight of the head providing the downward force. Therefore he concluded that an additional force would have been necessary. It could not have come from Sheila Caffell since the second shot would have been instantly fatal and thus she must have been moved by someone else, for example with her legs being pulled. He also considered that the weight and the friction between her skin and her nightdress was likely to have been less than the weight and friction between the nightdress and the carpet. Therefore, he would expect movement of the body within the nightdress rather than the body and clothing sliding together across the carpet. He pointed out that the photographs demonstrated this effect at the back of the nightdress with the nightdress staying rucked up in its original position. However the front of the nightdress had not demonstrated this effect. Accordingly Mr Ismail concluded that the nightdress had been pulled down after Sheila Caffell slid into her final position. Since on the evidence, she was dead by this stage, Mr Ismail concluded that some one else had arranged her nightdress.

519. Having studied with care the statement of Mr Ismail, we concluded that this was expert evidence capable of belief. Indeed if it had been given and if cross-examination had not revealed flaws in it (which we consider unlikely bearing in mind that there was no application to call any expert evidence to contradict it), had we been on a jury hearing such evidence we might well have been very impressed by it. That evidence in itself could have led to a conclusion of guilt quite apart from the many other matters relied upon by the prosecution at trial. However, we were not satisfied that evidence of this kind was not available at the date of trial if the prosecution had sought to explore these matters and more importantly we thought that Mr Turner was right in his submission that it was very difficult to gauge with sufficient certainty the reaction of a jury to it particularly when we could not judge it against all the related evidence in the trial, which we had not heard.

520. Our conclusion was that we should not therefore admit the evidence and we have had no regard to it in reaching our conclusion. It can, however, be said about it that if it had been called at trial, it may well have represented yet another formidable string to the prosecution's bow in a case where even without any regard to that evidence, it has to be said that the prosecution were able to put forward a very strong case pointing to guilt.

Regardless or whether it is a Newtonian fluid or not, the blood would have ran down her chin - not to the sides of her mouth and it would have been impossible for it to have run UP her face and reach her eye if she was sitting up - regardless of what 'experts' say. Explain how it is possible for blood to run up and I'll concede the issue?

[Holly Goodhead]

But there's no reliable information as to SC's found position.  A/PS Woodcock describes SC's head as slightly raised against the bedside cabinet.  This was based on his visual perception and recollection.  Dr Ismail concluded from the bloodstains that SC was lying almost flat on her back with her head propped against a bedside cabinet after the second fatal gsw. 

From my lay person's perspective I don't have a clear image of SC's found position based on the above and it's not clear where the blood is originating from.  Blood appears to run from her nostrils and then backwards up the outer sides of her nostrils.  Blood appears to run from the corner of her left eye backwards and forwards.  Blood appears to run from her mouth and run to the sides over her cheeks with a greater distribution to the left than the right. 

Blood is a non-Newtonian fluid and doesn't follow Newton's law of viscosity so no I don't think it follows blood would necessarily run down her chin.  It's all to do with viscous forces in blood over surface and shear rates.  I only have an awareness of it through something I did many years ago.  It's way beyond me.  I don't know why you doubt Martyn Ismail?  He has a degree in biochemistry which would cover this sort of thing.  He no doubt underwent further study/training in interpretations of bloodstains. 

[Caroline]

But there's no reliable information as to SC's found position.  A/PS Woodcock describes SC's head as slightly raised against the bedside cabinet.  This was based on his visual perception and recollection.  Dr Ismail concluded from the bloodstains that SC was lying almost flat on her back with her head propped against a bedside cabinet after the second fatal gsw. 

From my lay person's perspective I don't have a clear image of SC's found position based on the above and it's not clear where the blood is originating from.  Blood appears to run from her nostrils and then backwards up the outer sides of her nostrils.  Blood appears to run from the corner of her left eye backwards and forwards.  Blood appears to run from her mouth and run to the sides over her cheeks with a greater distribution to the left than the right. 

Blood is a non-Newtonian fluid and doesn't follow Newton's law of viscosity so no I don't think it follows blood would necessarily run down her chin.  It's all to do with viscous forces in blood over surface and shear rates.  I only have an awareness of it through something I did many years ago.  It's way beyond me.  I don't know why you doubt Martyn Ismail?  He has a degree in biochemistry which would cover this sort of thing.  He no doubt underwent further study/training in interpretations of bloodstains.

The reliable information is the picture - blood doesn't run up. Woodcock clearly made a mistake. There is a  trail of blood that has run from her mouth, up to the eye and from her left nostril up to the eye (a bleeding nose would also run DOWN her face, not up), the blood has then pooled under the eye which has then run down past the outer corner of her eye. This couldn't happen if she had been sitting up. You don't need to study to degree level to know that blood can't run UP - the only forces that would make it do so have to be supernatural. You can see that the blood has run up as opposed to down because of the small amount of blood that is running from the right nostril - see below. You must have had a nose bleed before - I bet it never ran up your face?

[Holly Goodhead]

The reliable information is the picture - blood doesn't run up. Woodcock clearly made a mistake. There is a  trail of blood that has run from her mouth, up to the eye and from her left nostril up to the eye (a bleeding nose would also run DOWN her face, not up), the blood has then pooled under the eye which has then run down past the outer corner of her eye. This couldn't happen if she had been sitting up. You don't need to study to degree level to know that blood can't run UP - the only forces that would make it do so have to be supernatural. You can see that the blood has run up as opposed to down because of the small amount of blood that is running from the right nostril - see below. You must have had a nose bleed before - I bet it never ran up your face?

The picture is at odds with testimony from a first respondent and forensic scientist so no I don't find it reliable at all.  I find the picture highly controversial! 

Your interpretation of the blood trails above is that blood run from her mouth to her eye.  Dr Vanezis' autopsy report contradicts your interpretation.  He states:

"There was blood around her mouth which had run down her face in a vertical direction.  In addition there was also a small amount of blood around her nose":

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=666 

So it seems CW on IA was correct in that the blood on SC's face originated from her left eye.

If SC's head was flat to the floor following the 2nd fatal gsw then surely the blood we see from her nostrils would have pooled in the bridge of her nose or that area?

Based on info from first respondent, pathologist and forensic scientist it seems the blood trails on SC's face were entirely consistent with her head slightly raised/propped up against NB's bedside cabinet with blood running down vertically run from her left eye and nostrils. 

[Holly Goodhead]

The picture is at odds with testimony from a first respondent and forensic scientist so no I don't find it reliable at all.  I find the picture highly controversial! 

Your interpretation of the blood trails above is that blood run from her mouth to her eye.  Dr Vanezis' autopsy report contradicts your interpretation.  He states:

"There was blood around her mouth which had run down her face in a vertical direction.  In addition there was also a small amount of blood around her nose":

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=666 

So it seems CW on IA was correct in that the blood on SC's face originated from her left eye.

If SC's head was flat to the floor following the 2nd fatal gsw then surely the blood we see from her nostrils would have pooled in the bridge of her nose or that area?

Based on info from first respondent, pathologist and forensic scientist it seems the blood trails on SC's face were entirely consistent with her head slightly raised/propped up against NB's bedside cabinet with blood running down vertically run from her left eye and nostrils.

I see from the pathology report Dr Vanezis describes the blood trails on SC's arm as running vertical.  These trails are running in the same direction as the blood on SC's face so I'm not sure what he means when he states running vertically down her face. 

Why didn't he mention the blood around her eye?

The blood trails from eye, nostrils and mouth seem to contradict each other with the description of SC's head raised against the bedside cabinet and the soc image of her head flat on the ground:

                                                  Trail eye          Trail nostrils          Trail mouth
                               
Head raised against BSC         Consistent                 Consistent                       Inconsistent

Head flat to floor                    Inconsistent*              Inconsistent                   Consistent

I think SC's head was raised against BSC and blood pooled in her mouth which was then dislodged upon being pulled down by her feet. 

*On the assumption the blood originated from the eye as opposed to the mouth

[Caroline]

The picture is at odds with testimony from a first respondent and forensic scientist so no I don't find it reliable at all.  I find the picture highly controversial! 

Your interpretation of the blood trails above is that blood run from her mouth to her eye.  Dr Vanezis' autopsy report contradicts your interpretation.  He states:

"There was blood around her mouth which had run down her face in a vertical direction.  In addition there was also a small amount of blood around her nose":

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=666 

So it seems CW on IA was correct in that the blood on SC's face originated from her left eye.

If SC's head was flat to the floor following the 2nd fatal gsw then surely the blood we see from her nostrils would have pooled in the bridge of her nose or that area?

Based on info from first respondent, pathologist and forensic scientist it seems the blood trails on SC's face were entirely consistent with her head slightly raised/propped up against NB's bedside cabinet with blood running down vertically run from her left eye and nostrils.

How does what you have posted suggest that blood originated from her left eye? Where in Venezis's statement does he even HINT at blood originating from her left eye? How can you not find a crime scene picture reliable? This is the body of Sheila Cafell, the blood flow tells a story. The trails are not MY interpretation you can see from the blood flow on her face that she couldn't been sat up at least certainly not when the blood flowed. Her head MAY have been raised slightly when shot but she didn't remain like that and Woodcock must have been wrong. Venezis said her head was slightly raised when shot, not that she had to have remained like that and clearly she didn't because as I think you know, blood can't run up in the position.

You can see on this picture that blood has ran from her nose slightly on the right side and I have highlighted the blood running from her mouth to her eye on the left side in yellow. The blood is dry on her face so has been like that for some time - Woodcock was just mistaken as it CW.

 

[Caroline]

I see from the pathology report Dr Vanezis describes the blood trails on SC's arm as running vertical.  These trails are running in the same direction as the blood on SC's face so I'm not sure what he means when he states running vertically down her face. 

Why didn't he mention the blood around her eye?

The blood trails from eye, nostrils and mouth seem to contradict each other with the description of SC's head raised against the bedside cabinet and the soc image of her head flat on the ground:

                                                  Trail eye          Trail nostrils          Trail mouth
                               
Head raised against BSC         Consistent                 Consistent                       Inconsistent

Head flat to floor                    Inconsistent*              Inconsistent                   Consistent

I think SC's head was raised against BSC and blood pooled in her mouth which was then dislodged upon being pulled down by her feet. 

*On the assumption the blood originated from the eye as opposed to the mouth

Because it came from her nose and mouth - which he did mention.

[Holly Goodhead]

Here Dr V describes blood running down the length of June's leg as vertical so I'm confused as as these trails run in the opposite direction of the trail on SC's arm which he also describes as vertical 

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=684;image

[Caroline]

I see from the pathology report Dr Vanezis describes the blood trails on SC's arm as running vertical.  These trails are running in the same direction as the blood on SC's face so I'm not sure what he means when he states running vertically down her face. 

Why didn't he mention the blood around her eye?

The blood trails from eye, nostrils and mouth seem to contradict each other with the description of SC's head raised against the bedside cabinet and the soc image of her head flat on the ground:

                                                  Trail eye          Trail nostrils          Trail mouth
                               
Head raised against BSC         Consistent                 Consistent                       Inconsistent

Head flat to floor                    Inconsistent*              Inconsistent                   Consistent

I think SC's head was raised against BSC and blood pooled in her mouth which was then dislodged upon being pulled down by her feet. 

*On the assumption the blood originated from the eye as opposed to the mouth

It didn't

[Caroline]

Here Dr V describes blood running down the length of June's leg as vertical so I'm confused as as these trails run in the opposite direction of the trail on SC's arm which he also describes as vertical 

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=684;image

The blood did run vertical (ie North to South, up/down)

[Caroline]

Here Dr V describes blood running down the length of June's leg as vertical so I'm confused as as these trails run in the opposite direction of the trail on SC's arm which he also describes as vertical 

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=199.0;attach=684;image

You're looking at it from the perspective of how the body is laid, he's looking at the nature of the trails.

[Holly Goodhead]

The blood did run vertical (ie North to South, up/down)

He describes the blood on SC's face as running vertically:

"There was blood around her mouth which had run down her face in a vertical direction.  In addition there was also a small amount of blood around her nose".

I would describe the blood running from SC's mouth as horizontal.  The only blood I see on SC's face running vertically is the blood running from her eye. 

[Caroline]

He describes the blood on SC's face as running vertically:

"There was blood around her mouth which had run down her face in a vertical direction.  In addition there was also a small amount of blood around her nose".

I would describe the blood running from SC's mouth as horizontal.  The only blood I see on SC's face running vertically is the blood running from her eye.

I think you are getting bogged down in interpretations and there is no blood running FROM her eye. When he talks about 'vertical' he means it's running down. He didn't mention blood running FROM her eye because no blood ran from her eye, it ran TO her eye from her nose and mouth.