Barry George revisited.

[Nicholas]

Michelle Diskin Bates 🎀
@Michelle_Diskin
·
Apr 7
Interesting point of view and perfectly correct, how come most British media couldn’t see through it? Could it be the expediency of it? Barry the cash-cow again! https://mobile.twitter.com/Michelle_Diskin/status/1114970628254314496/photo/1

[Nicholas]

Michelle Diskin Bates 🎀
@Michelle_Diskin
·
Apr 7
Interesting point of view and perfectly correct, how come most British media couldn’t see through it? Could it be the expediency of it? Barry the cash-cow again! https://mobile.twitter.com/Michelle_Diskin/status/1114970628254314496/photo/1

I totally disagree with this! It is not “perfectly correct!” Though I understand why Michelle Diskin Bates would feel the need to peddle such nonsense! Not sure about Extra ie’s motive?

[Nicholas]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0003w40/the-murder-of-jill-dando

@ 38.42

Barry George lived locally “within the scene, almost.”

The search of Barry George’s residents “revealed some circumstantial connections to the crime scene.”

and so it goes on.....

“Nick, who fronted ­Crimewatch for 23 years, insisted a more focused appeal into his friend’s murder could have been beneficial to the investigation

He pointed to the ones after the murder of James Bulger, two, in 1993.

Nick said a forensic ­psychologist told him children who had killed cats always lived within 200 yards of where the animal was found.

Crimewatch then drew ­concentric rings around where James’ body was found to narrow down the search area.

The show helped solve the crime after viewers recognised the toddler’s two 10-year-old killers leading him to his death in Liverpool on CCTV.

Nick added: “It always fascinates me. Why we have this thing that ­detectives have to be police officers? You don’t need to be a warranted officer and have the powers of arrest to investigate a crime.”

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/jill-dando-murder-police-made-14305108

Hamish Campbell reminded viewers in the BBC documentary that the police were a year behind Barry George..

[Nicholas]

M489 28 4 99
Message reports of an odd enquiry in which a man attended cab office
Man wanted verification of time at cab office on 26 4 99 & what he was wearing

[Nicholas]

Barry George's uncle Mike Burke said in his book, "The investigation into the disappearance of Madaleine McCann was possibly the only case to receive more attention than Dando's murder."

He goes on to say;

"I was quite annoyed when I read reports of Doctor Michael Kopelmans medical opinion of Barry.it seemed to me that Barry's inappropriate behaviour was being blamed on the overall family. I sent a protest to Jeremy Moore. In my opinion one is responsible for ones own actions. And it is a cop out to try and blame ones bad behaviour on the family.

Following my experience and with what I subsequently learned, IMO this is often motive enough for some family members to defend their guilty family member.

Reasons can differ but fear of being tarred with the same brush or fear of their own “indiscretions” being uncovered are a couple of examples as to why they will go to such lengths.

[Nicholas]

"Michelle Diskin was in the front room at her home in Cork listening to the morning radio when she first heard that her brother Barry George had been charged with Jill Dando's murder.
She says she felt numb - completely numb. 'I thought: "No, no, it can't be." 'I wanted to phone my mother, but she is a very quiet and private person. How do you ring your mother and say: "Mum, has my brother been arrested for murder?" she says.

Michelle, a deeply religious woman, finally decided to phone and ask if she should pray for her brother. It seemed a more gentle way of dealing with the appalling news. 'Mother said: "It's all rubbish. He didn't do it. It will die down". I didn't know what to do and said to myself: "Could Barry have done this?"

'Could I see anything in the Barry I knew that might be guilty of this - and I couldn't. I thought about his behaviour. He can be aggravating. But no, not murder.'

But on July 2, last year, Barry George, 42, an educationally-subnormal fantasist with an IQ of just 76, was found guilty of the murder of BBC TV presenter Jill Dando.

She was killed with a single shot to the head. The gun was pressed so hard against her skull that the imprint of the muzzle remained on her scalp afterwards.

There was, however, not one overwhelming piece of evidence to link George to the crime. In the year since the case ended, no other criminal verdict has excited quite so much interest and there has been an endless debate over whether he was indeed guilty 'beyond reasonable doubt'.

Last month, an appeal against his conviction was rejected by three of the country's most senior judges.

Michelle continues to insist upon her brother's innocence. She is determined to take the case to the House of Lords and, should that fail, to Europe, believing his conviction to be a dreadful miscarriage of justice.

In fairness, she doesn't believe her brother to be an angel, but she insists that does not make him a murderer.

Michelle is a warm, articulate woman with a strong sense of right and wrong. Being in the public eye does not sit easily with her. She is, by nature, a home-builder, a wife and mother to three teenage children.

Their terraced family house near Cork is tidy, comfortable and perfumed with scented candles. It is a tactile household where hugs and kisses are easily exchanged.

Her own London childhood had been tough, often violent. In her late teens, she moved to Ireland to work with mentally disabled children. She had little need to dwell upon her past - until her brother's arrest.

Initially, Michelle believed the courts would clear her brother and she resolved not to speak out on his behalf. Indeed, she didn't want to drag her family into the unholy mess, and, in any case, no direct evidence linked her brother to the crime.

No confession. No apparent motive. No eyewitnesses. No murder weapon was ever found.

There was virtually no scientific evidence, except for minute traces of firearm discharge found in one of George's pockets and described as a 'close match' to particles found in Dando's hair. There was also a risk, acknowledged at the trial, that even this evidence was contaminated.

The prosecution case seemed to be simply that George lived locally and was an oddball with unhealthy obsessions. He was said to be 'fixated' with Princess Diana and to stalk women.

He had been convicted, many years earlier, of attempted rape and impersonating a police officer. He used different names (he was arrested as Barry Bulsara, using the real surname of one of his idols, Freddie Mercury) and lived in a world of fantasy. He was said to be 'obsessed' with guns.

George also happened to be near Dando's Fulham home on the morning of her murder. His own home, a chaotically untidy flat, happened to be just a few streets away. Michelle says: 'Barry was in Belmarsh Prison on remand when I first saw him. I had to see him through a glass screen. It was like being in a confessional box. There was a dark, dingy glass between us and you could hardly hear a thing.

'He looked terribly vulnerable and scared. Almost the first thing he said was: "Shhh, don't talk."

'Then he said: "I have not done what they are saying."

'I was asking questions and he kept telling me to talk to my solicitor. I cried. I think he did too. He said he was sorry that he had put us in this. I couldn't touch him but I wanted him to know he was being supported.

We held up our hands against the glass. I felt utterly overwhelmed that this could be happening to us. At each step along the way I thought it would be stopped. It's unbelievable it wasn't.

'There was no evidence. They just lumped everything up and made out he was one big psycho. Timeframes were forgotten, facts were distorted to make a picture - a very bad picture.

'The police needed somebody, and Barry looked, on the surface, as if he would disappear and nobody would fight for him.

'That's why I have to support him. I have always loved him very much.'

Michelle was the eldest of three children, raised in a cramped highrise flat in White City, West London. The bath was in the kitchen and she shared a bedroom with both her sister, a mentally handicapped epileptic two years her junior, and Barry, the baby of the family.

It was an uneasy household with frequent violent rows. 'Barry and Susan were always very special because I had to look after them when I was small.

'There were a lot of pressures living in such close quarters with people on both sides of you and underneath you. My parents fought all the time so I would take the kids out - sometimes for hours on end.

'It was very difficult. Because Susan had very definite problems that were so big, Barry's were pushed to one side.

'He was a gorgeous baby and, as a boy, was into cars and buildings. He sometimes got into trouble, but he could never seem to understand why.

'He couldn't concentrate for long periods of time and was taken out of school and sent to special school. But his disability didn't become really apparent until he got older.

'Barry has a rigidity of thought. He gets a thought and isn't able to change tack. If you changed the topic of conversation, he wouldn't be able to stop focusing on the first one.'

Michelle was 12 when their parents separated. She says it was a relief, an end to the dreadful rows. Her relationship with her mother was not easy and by the age of 15 she was living with her father.

'My mother was warmer earlier in the marriage,' she says. 'And less warm towards the end of it.'

When Barry asked to move in with his father, he was refused. 'I'm sure Barry saw it as a rejection. Probably the first of many,' she says.

By the age of 18, Michelle was living in Ireland with her grandmother. She kept in contact with her family and her brother visited for a holiday. 'He was 14 and so sweet I didn't want to send him back. I remember he used to hang about this place called Barry's Tea and wanted to work there in the yard but he was too young.

'But he would pester people, so this man sent him home with a letter saying he would take him out as his helper if I said it was OK. He said that he could see Barry needed special attention.

'The man gave Barry some pocket money and he came back with sausages, milk and bread so he could help with his keep.'

Michelle displays a certain pride when she repeats this story. It becomes clear that achievements which most people would take for granted were enormously special when accomplished by Barry.

For example, she tells how he arrived at her wedding 'all by himself' and had 'even hired his own suit so he wouldn't show me up'. She saw him handing out buttonholes to guests and was 'proud'.

By this time, he had started to create fantasies about himself and, intriguingly, she recalls a relative having to steer him away from talking about the SAS.

During their phone calls, Barry would talk of his obsession about being a stuntman. He tried to join the Territorial Army under the name Steve Major.

'It seemed perfectly innocent. He said he'd chosen it because the Six Million Dollar Man had such a name. When he later changed his name to Barry Bulsara, it wasn't something I was happy with. But he said he really loved Freddie Mercury and he was doing it as a tribute.

'He wanted to be a special person. He wanted to have friends. I can only speculate that these inventions were ways of opening a conversation. Let's face it, it's a bit more of a conversation grabber than "I'm classified disabled and I can't do anything".'

The prosecuting lawyers made much of George's fantasies. 'They tried to turn him into the Anti-Christ,' says Michelle. 'They spoke about his so-called obsession with guns after joining the Territorial Army. But the TA realised he had problems and Barry didn't handle guns. The only ones he's had are a starter pistol and a plastic gun that was stolen and broken.

'They said he had an obsession with Diana and stalked and photographed women. It was mentioned that he was discovered by police in Kensington Gardens with a rope and a knife dressed in Army gear. He told me that he was "doing manoeuvres".

'But he was never charged and there are no records of him being in the grounds by Diana's apartment as has been suggested.

'Even being "on manoeuvres" in the park, is not the normal behaviour of a grown person, but still pretty ordinary if you think like a child. He was going through his ex-SAS stage then - and it was almost 20 years ago.

'When police examined his flat they found a pile of 736 newspapers on the floor. Of course, there were some articles about Jill Dando, but there were more about Manchester United, although he's a Fulham supporter.

'There were also never any photos of women pinned up on the wall as has been suggested. The police found rolls of undeveloped film - 2,597 photographs showing 419 women.

'He wasn't using the photographs to satisfy some strange obsession. He was playing a role - that's all to do with the childish part of his life. And he'd just thrown the rolls of film in the corner - as he dropped everything in his flat and forgot about things.

'When Barry was in custody, the police had nothing to charge him with. They knew he'd been convicted of attempted rape in 1983, which he'd owned up to at the time, but he wouldn't admit to Jill Dando's murder.

'They were allowed to keep him for extra time, but still he wouldn't say he was responsible.

'If you know my brother, he's not capable of not caving in under that sort of pressure. But he does know when he's done something wrong and when he hasn't. The next thing that happened was that a particle (of firearm discharge) turned up in a coat - it was the only reason they were able to charge him.

'But the integrity of the coat had been corrupted. It was put in an evidence bag, sealed, carted away from his flat, photographed on a dummy in a police studio with an officer's shirt underneath and put back in the crate before it was examined by forensics.

'And as far as identification is concerned, there was only one person who said she was certain she saw Barry at 7.30am. She said she saw him by a car, but Barry can't drive.

'Barry has been described as a loner. But he's not. He was always out seeing people. He had friends, people who loved him - who accepted Barry with his differences. They didn't know about the attempted rape, but that happened almost 20 years before.

He paid his price to society for what he did and he'd turned his life around. And, despite his disabilities, he had made a life for himself. He discussed his friends and would say: "There's a guy down the road and he's my friend. I wash his car for him." After he was charged, I started piecing things together.

'There was a big, motherly Jamaican woman who lived across the road. When I went to see her, I could see she really loved Barry.

'She was really pleased to see me and said she hadn't known if anyone was going to help him. She was going to get some friends together to stand outside Hammersmith police station with placards saying: "Free Barry Bulsara."

'She's adamant he didn't carry out the crime.'

Michelle gathers strength from such support. She knows her brother, not as a psychopath, but as 'quiet, softly-spoken and wellmannered'.

During medical examinations before his trial, it was discovered that George had suffered severe brain damage from a physical injury while in his 20s. Michelle says he does not know how it occurred, although she conjectures that perhaps it was something to do with his 'Steve Majors' phase.

In the early Eighties, he was registered disabled and suffered increasingly from epileptic fits. If the problem was not properly controlled he would often stumble around.

Michelle is not convinced that he would have had the ability to plan or dexterity to carry out such carefully executed crime and getaway. Indeed, the case confounded police for a year before Barry's arrest.

'I knew right from the beginning, from his whole demeanour that he's innocent. I could tell when I saw him in Belmarsh - through his body language, his eye contact - before and after his conviction.

'He said to me: "They had to have someone. I didn't do this and I don't know why I'm here. But you do realise I am here for the rest of my life?"

'I said he wouldn't be - that the sentence would be reduced and he replied: "Oh no, not for me. I can't ever say I'm sorry for doing it - because I didn't do it."

'At night, things play over and over in my mind. When you realise this is a miscarriage of justice, it becomes enormous. They have grabbed Barry's life and taken it away from him. They have also taken my life.

'It wasn't an easy thing to decide to become vocal. But I have to stand up for Barry's rights. I'm determined to at least do that.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-135212/My-brother-didnt-kill-Jill.html#ixzz5DQUKMFv4

“In fairness, she doesn't believe her brother to be an angel, but she insists that does not make him a murderer

I’d like to hear from Michelle Diskin Bates (and anyone else who uses this term) WHAT makes a murderer!?

[Nicholas]

“The Old Bailey jury heard that George was incapable of planning or carrying out a series of actions without panicking or triggering an epileptic fit.

Nine years after the shooting of TV presenter Jill Dando on her own doorstep, and seven years after he was convicted of the crime, the jury took less than two days to acquit him.

As he walked from court a free man, Miss Dando's family are now facing the probability that her murder will never be solved.

But what the jury were not permitted to hear was the details of his vile attack on Miss Gray as she reached home.

On the stairs of a block of flats, George overpowered her, smothered her screams with his hand over her nose and mouth and ripped down her jeans to rape her.

As he left, he said 'sorry' before making for the nearest underground station and disappearing. He was not caught for a year.

It is hard to equate this glimpse of George the determined sex attacker with the man portrayed in court and by his family as a victim.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1040746/Barry-George-raped-mums-door-said-sorry.html

[Nicholas]

M489 28 4 99
Message reports of an odd enquiry in which a man attended cab office
Man wanted verification of time at cab office on 26 4 99 & what he was wearing

“We has this guy, agitated, hanging around, soon after the murder...

“He (Barry George) left H.A.F.A.D and went to try and get a lift a free lift from a taxi...

“He was trying to get out of the area but he didn’t have any money...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0003w40/the-murder-of-jill-dando

[Nicholas]

“We has this guy, agitated, hanging around, soon after the murder...

“He (Barry George) left H.A.F.A.D and went to try and get a lift a free lift from a taxi...

“He was trying to get out of the area but he didn’t have any money...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0003w40/the-murder-of-jill-dando

@ 35.17 minutes

“This man first entered the enquiry on 28th April 1999 - within two days of the murder of Jill Dando

[Nicholas]

@ 35.17 minutes

“This man first entered the enquiry on 28th April 1999 - within two days of the murder of Jill Dando

Hamish Campbell said, “we are one year behind him”

[Nicholas]

Following my experience and with what I subsequently learned, IMO this is often motive enough for some family members to defend their guilty family member.

Reasons can differ but fear of being tarred with the same brush or fear of their own “indiscretions” being uncovered are a couple of examples as to why they will go to such lengths.

Michelle Diskin Bates 🎀 Retweeted

Michelle Diskin Bates 🎀
@Michelle_Diskin
·
8h
Replying to
@DrSusanYoung1
Barry George is on trial again
@DrSusanYoung1
. Of course no one else will be brought to justice...no one is investigating!
✴️Police/media, stop referring to autism in derogatory term...oddball, loner, weirdo! You offend many families with this discrimination, not just Barry.

[Nicholas]

George also raped his Japanese wife Itsuko Toide, who left him after 11 months of a marriage filled with violence and intimidation. In an interview published today, she gives a remarkable insight into the mind of a man filled with rage and hatred of women.

George met Miss Toide after she had suffered a sexual assault herself and was feeling highly vulnerable. They married after a romance lasting four months. Almost immediately he began subjecting her to a series of sexual and physical attacks at the cramped ground-floor council flat that they shared in Crookham Road, Fulham.

The jury was not allowed to know that George had a long history of stalking women in the area where Miss Dando lived, although detectives found clear evidence that he had followed at least 419 women in Fulham, taking 2,597 photographs of them.

The judge also ruled during pre-trial legal argument that the jury should not learn that George had been arrested in 1983 while prowling in the grounds of Kensington Palace, close to the private apartments of the Prince and Princess of Wales, clad in camouflage fatigues and wielding a commando knife.

Despite these revelations, George's defence team announced they were to launching an immediate appeal.

One possible ground for appeal may be the discovery that one of the prosecution witnesses, Charlotte de Rosnay, 29, was involved for a while in a relationship with a member of the murder squad, Detective Constable Peter Bartlett.

[Nicholas]

@ 35.17 minutes

“This man first entered the enquiry on 28th April 1999 - within two days of the murder of Jill Dando

Interesting that Michelle Diskin Bates recently compares the murder of Jill Dando to that of the killing of Veronica Guerin in Dublin!?

[Nicholas]

“The former Crimewatch host, 71, believed Metropolitan Police officers focused on the wrong lines of enquiry after the presenter was killed.

Jill, 37, was brutally shot dead outside her home in Fulham, London, in April 1999.

Following her murder, officers linked her death to her work on the show as a possible motive for her murder.

Nick said pursuing that line of enquiry was “foolish” before adding it was rare that criminals targeted people involved in justice.

He told The Daily Mirror: “The thing is, and not so much the fault of the senior investigating officer, but top brass, they had this intuitive and, we thought, rather foolish view, it would be to do with Crimewatch.

“And we knew it would not be to do with Crimewatch. In modern times, there has never been a judge attacked for sending someone down, a prosecuting solicitor, or anybody.”

Focus also centred a Range Rover that had been spotted on CCTV near to where Jill had been killed.

Nick added: “Already it was clear that this had such big publicity, the risk was they would get swamped with literally thousands of lines of enquiry.”

It later finished with more than 7,000 lines of enquiry, according to Nick.

While Nick said it would be ridiculous to claim he and the team would know as much about crime as officers, he added the group’s experience of investigating would lead them to follow different lines.

He continued: “We did understand a lot and certainly the editor and I, we would have done it very differently.”

Barry George, 58, was convicted of Jill’s murder in 2001 but was released on appeal in 2008 when the case was quashed.

The Metropolitan Police told Daily Star Online: “The investigation into Ms Dando’s murder remains open, therefore we cannot comment in any detail other than to say we will always explore any new information which may become available.”

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/771869/jill-dando-murder-nick-ross-crimewatch-fulham-london-barry-george-conviction-quashed

“Detective constable John Gallagher said after his arrest, George had claimed to have seen a Range Rover “acting suspiciously” on the day Miss Dando was killed.

Read more: https://metro.co.uk/2008/06/23/gun-holster-found-at-dando-suspects-home-207645/?ito=cbshare

[Nicholas]

"Your Lordships, I am not sure of the propriety of writing to you, but you cannot have been blind to the barrage of publicity claiming Barry George is innocent.

Some of the coverage has been openly one-sided, though some - like last week's Panorama which took up George's case - has been even more disturbing.

You, as senior judges, are supposed to be above all this, unimpressed by such non-judicial murmurings.

But you are only human and given the febrile atmosphere surrounding this case it would be remarkable if you had not been influenced in some way.

So allow me to set out something by way of balance. Let me start by saying that while there can never be certainties in cases like this, I remain confident that Barry George killed Jill Dando.

That said, on the basis of the evidence, as it was presented at his original trial, I confess I was surprised that the jury found him guilty.

In particular, I was always unimpressed by a piece of evidence that lies at the heart of his latest appeal: a microscopic fragment of firearm discharge residue that was found in his coat pocket.

Barry George's supporters now claim that this tiny speck underpinned the entire prosecution case, though in fact he had already been charged with Jill's murder before tests on the particle had even been completed.

At George's trial, the prosecution argued that this residue matched samples found on Jill's hair and clothing - as well as the cartridge found at the scene.

The defence had ample opportunity to challenge that evidence. Yet now they say there are "new" grounds to question its significance.

So far as I am concerned, nothing has changed; I am as unconvinced about the particle now as I was then.

Even so, if you, my Lords, agree that this piece of evidence was such a crucial that it alone swung the jury, then it follows that George's conviction was unsafe.

But should you uphold his appeal - and I suspect you may well do so - it does not follow that Barry George is innocent, any more than that everyone who is convicted by the courts is definitely guilty.

The police and prosecution lawyers cannot speak out in public in advance of the appeal.

However, before reaching your judgment I urge you to consider clues that have had much less media prominence than the case for the defence, so that if you deem the original verdict unsafe, at least you'll consider a retrial rather than outright acquittal.

Then at least we will have another chance to review all the evidence, some of which was not admissible at the original trial.

But for the time being, let's stick to what we know already.

Despite all the speculation that Jill Dando must have been killed by a professional hitman, the practical evidence is that her murder was very amateur indeed.

I do not say this with the benefit of hindsight - it was obvious from the start.

Jill was shot outside her home in Gowan Avenue in Fulham, an address well-known to locals but which she went to irregularly because she lived with her fiance.

She had no special plans to visit her home that day and an extensive trawl of West London's CCTV cameras shows she wasn't followed.

So her killer either acted impulsively, or lay in wait - neither course suggestive of sophistication.

According to a neighbour who picked out Barry George at an identity parade, he had been hanging about some hours before the shooting.

In any case, whoever killed Jill had prepared no means of escape.

There was no getaway vehicle, and Gowan Avenue has few side streets, so the killer took a big risk in walking away where he would be visible for some time. (Her fiance's address, on the other hand, was much better shielded for any potential ambush.) This is hardly the signature of a well-planned crime.

Nor did the method of attack show any level of skill. The gun was not a proper firearm (it had been converted from a replica), there was no silencer, the bullet was home-made, and the killer held the muzzle against Jill's head risking forensic evidence transferring on to it - none of which is the hallmark of a professional assassin.

Furthermore, Jill's key was in the lock, and anyone with any sense would have pushed her inside and shot her there to muffle the sound and hide the body.

The killer was really not very proficient.

This is all a bit removed from the conspiracy theories that swirled around and distracted the investigation, including a laughable story that the murder was connected to Serb extremists who were unhappy with one of Jill's charity appeals.

(I know how the rumour originated. It was based on a mild letter of complaint from a viewer, which got more and more exaggerated in the retelling.)

As for the killing being a reprisal for Jill's role on Crimewatch, this would have been as unique as it was improbable.

Judges who sentence criminals, barristers who prosecute them, police who investigate them and prison officers who incarcerate them have rarely been threatened by those they have jailed.

And besides, if anyone was daft enough to go for a Crimewatch presenter they would more likely have gone for me, as I had been with the programme for far longer.

But Jill was glamorous. As I pointed out to the police from the beginning, when you look for a motive you usually look to people who know the victim. And through the medium of television, everyone knew Jill - she was in their homes routinely.

It was clear to me, as it was to the forensic psychologist called in by the detectives, that given the celebrity status of the victim, and given the shambolic nature of the killing, the murderer was likely to be one of those men who have a sexual fixation on a public figure but "who separate their internal world from external reality to such an extent that they need no direct physical contact at all with their target, and - because of their narcissism and absolute belief that their fantasies are real - may not need their victim to see them even as they pull the trigger".

(That was what I wrote to detectives privately early in the investigation.)

In short, the killer was likely to be someone with a personality disorder - someone much like Barry George.

It has been suggested that the police were fixated on Mr George from the start, at the expense of any other line of inquiry, but alas the opposite is true.

It was a year before he came into the frame, and the way he did so is instructive and shows why, on balance, I believe him to be guilty.

Soon after the shooting, the police received calls from two independent sources pointing to Barry George as a suspect.

In both cases he had visited places near Jill's home soon after the killing, and in both cases he had gone back to try to persuade the witnesses that he had been there at a different time and in different clothes.

These witnesses were so alarmed that they rang police repeatedly, and were deeply frustrated that their calls went unheeded.

It was not until a review of the inquiry, 11 months later, that a detective became excited by these leads.

That delay may seem shameful, but you must remember there had been literally tens of thousands of callers to the inquiry.

One of the penalties of headline crimes is that they attract more quantity than quality of information - and most media and public pressure on the investigators had been to discover a criminal plot.

It was only when all the conspiracy theories proved bankrupt that the "lone weirdo" option began to take centre stage.

Some commentators have alleged that, in desperation, the cops just picked on Barry George as "a local nutter".

As we have seen, that is not true; ideally, they would have picked on him the day after the murder.

Besides, even when George did become a suspect, the senior investigating officer remained unconvinced - there seemed to be no hard evidence against him.

But slowly a pattern of apparent coincidences emerged which, for me, is quite convincing.

This was not just a man with the sort of personality disorder one might associate with such a crime, but one who lived locally and had been near the scene before and just after the crime took place.

Here was a man who took photos of female presenters as they appeared on his TV (how many other people do that?).

Here was a man with a history of violence against women. Here was a man who carried knives and had a fixation about guns. Here was a man who lied about his whereabouts on the day.

And, contrary to defence claims that he was mentally incapable of organising anything like a shooting, here was a man who lived out his fantasies daily, following women in the street (sometimes, as with Jill, into their front gardens), getting into the grounds of Kensington Palace wearing a balaclava and armed with rope and a knife when Princess Diana was alive (and didn't she remind you a little of Jill?), and living the life of stunt man.

On one memorable occasion he starred in a daredevil feat shown on local TV in which he roller-skated down a ramp and leaped across a row of buses.

It is true that his mental condition has been deteriorating, and it may well be that he is now incapable of acting as coherently as he once did.

I wish he could be transferred to secure accommodation where he can be cared for, rather than remain in prison. But the evidence of his previous capacity and guile is scattered through his history.

So what about the theory that a fantasist like Barry George might deliberately have put himself into the frame to make himself the centre of attention?

This might explain his attempts to give himself false alibis.

But such calculated behaviour is at odds with everything the defence claims about his mental incompetence.

And in any case, he seems not to have wanted to be the centre of attention.

It is conceivable that he might have set about trying to construct his alibis out of misguided fear, though in successive police interviews he never said he was worried about being picked on for the murder.

Nor did he protest that in the past he had been routinely harassed by the police, as later claimed by the defence.

In fact, he had been spoken to by officers a couple of times over perhaps a decade - not unusual in that part of London, especially for a young man who often behaved strangely.

The first occasion was after a disturbance in a McDonald's restaurant, the second was when he was tailing a woman.

And nor, as his supporters now claim, is there reason to believe he was fearful of being set up for Jill's murder because he had been a suspect for a previous notorious crime - the stabbing of Rachel Nickell on Wimbledon Common.

Yes, it is true that he was one of many hundreds of people routinely interviewed in connection with the case, but though he had been convicted of assaulting a woman and later jailed for attempted rape, he was never accused or even vaguely suspected of the Nickell murder.

In any case, the fact that he can be put in the right place at the right time for Jill's murder is not particularly troubling; but the fact that he tried to confuse the key witnesses about his movements on the day is suspicious, to say the least.

There is much other evidence, too, against Barry George.

Each piece on its own is inconclusive, but not when added together.

It is a regrettable fact that as forensic science has advanced, juries have become more and more dependent on technical evidence and less willing to convict on the basis of indirect corroboration.

Indeed, the very phrase "circumstantial evidence" has become almost pejorative. But how many coincidences does it take before we accept that there is a meaningful pattern to them?

I submit to you, your Lordships, that the accumulation of evidence is compelling, and it is quite a list. I urge you to verify how the early conspiracy theories were demonstrably fatuous.

I ask you to consider how the insistence that Barry George was mentally incapable of such a crime is simply contrary to fact.

How his trail of false alibis and continuing pattern of lies appears manipulative rather than fantastical.

How his personality disorder is plainly not benign (as we know from previous violence and stalking).

How his obsession with guns and female TV presenters is curious. How his availability at the scene is proven, and so on.

Let me put it another way: If Barry George was not responsible for Jill Dando's murder, we would need to invent someone of the same build, same appearance, same behaviour, same infatuations, same mental instability and same location, as well as having to disregard his palpable mendacity.

Finally, let me say this. Jill hated miscarriages of justice. So do I.

And though I was her friend and colleague I have no animosity towards George. In fact, having once worked with people suffering from epilepsy and damaged personalities, I feel sorry for him.

Nor, as a TV presenter so closely associated with Crimewatch, do I relish the idea of imprisoning an innocent and vulnerable person when the consequence must be that a dangerous killer is free.

Yet, on balance, I think that the judicial system got the right man, even if the process was imperfect.
What really matters is that whoever killed Jill Dando should not be at large to do something terrible again.

I wish you well with your deliberations.
Nick Ross


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-491452/Dando-murder-I-know-Barry-George-killed-friend-Jill.html#ixzz5Bazr8W52

”I know Barry George killed my friend Jill

“So allow me to set out something by way of balance. Let me start by saying that while there can never be certainties in cases like this, I remain confident that Barry George killed Jill Dando.

That said, on the basis of the evidence, as it was presented at his original trial, I confess I was surprised that the jury found him guilty.


I agree with Nick Ross!