Website launched for Mark

[Fact Checker]

The prosecution make it clear they do not know when Mark murdered Sami. The window of opportunity is left open between Sept - Feb.

Well that's not what they told the jury at Mark's trial. Summing-up, the Judge said:

"In fact, of course, the prosecution’s case is that Samuel Alexander was killed on 5 September"

"5 September. Of course, that is the crucial date. The prosecution say that is the date when Samuel Alexander was killed by this defendant, the day before he was going to move into the flat"

"You will undoubtedly want to ask yourselves, when did Samuel Alexander die? As I have said, the prosecution say it was on or very close to 5 September".

[Fact Checker]

Are you claiming Michael Borelli QC didn't say "the murder came after a huge build up of tension?"

No. But that's not really the point. He was simply accepting the Prosecution narrative at this point, because that's his job. When the Court finds someone guilty, the defence barrister can't carry on protesting his client's innocence, the game is already over. His duty is to offer mitigation. Well, if my client was guilty, and since you've found him guilty, you should reduce the sentence because x, y, z. It's rhetoric.

[Nicholas]

Well that's not what they told the jury at Mark's trial. Summing-up, the Judge said:

"In fact, of course, the prosecution’s case is that Samuel Alexander was killed on 5 September"

"5 September. Of course, that is the crucial date. The prosecution say that is the date when Samuel Alexander was killed by this defendant, the day before he was going to move into the flat"

"You will undoubtedly want to ask yourselves, when did Samuel Alexander die? As I have said, the prosecution say it was on or very close to 5 September".

He was killed by a blow to the head as long ago as last August. John Price, prosecuting, said Alexander, in the third year of a law and French degree at Kings College London, murdered his dad so he could “lead the life he wanted to lead.” https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/ex-rugby-school-pupil-guilty-murdering-3056706

[Fact Checker]

He was killed by a blow to the head as long ago as last August.

Sadly we do not know the cause of death in this case. There was some speculation about a head injury, but as you can see from the evidence below, this was inconclusive. Similarly, despite their best efforts, it was not possible to ascertain a date of death. The prosecution established that Sami was alive at least until 5 September. As posted in other threads, we now have evidence that demonstrates that he was alive long after this point.

www.freemarkalexander.org/mistake-1
www.freemarkalexander.org/mistake-2

You may find the following attached report useful in terms of confirming that the cause of Sami's death was unascertainable. Please note, things were complicated by the fact that a Scenes of Crime Officer struck the skull with a Kangol pneumatic drill during extraction. It was impossible therefore to establish whether the fractures were caused by the drill or had existed before SOCO smashed the skull. Another Home Office Pathologist later addmited that "I can't completely rule out that those fractures occurred after death".

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=7959.0;attach=15149
http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=7959.0;attach=15151

If Samuel had suffered a head injury, this may not have been fatal. The expert findings suggest that he may well have died of other causes unrelated to the head injury: "There was no evidence of any decomposing blood clot within the cranial cavity. This would be a common accompaniment to severe head injury and often persist even when there is severe decomposition".

EDIT: We've just realised that Daisy posted ac oopy of this over a year ago, apologies for any duplication: http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?topic=8031.0

[Fact Checker]

John Price, prosecuting, said Alexander, in the third year of a law and French degree at Kings College London, murdered his dad so he could “lead the life he wanted to lead.”

But Mark was already 'leading the life he wanted to lead'.

www.freemarkalexander.org/mistake-7/

We know that Mark was already leading a good life, the life he 'wanted'. He was in his graduating year, running his own business, and with a bright future ahead of him. This was a zero-sum game for Mark. He had nothing to 'gain' and everything to lose.

[John]

He was killed by a blow to the head as long ago as last August. John Price, prosecuting, said Alexander, in the third year of a law and French degree at Kings College London, murdered his dad so he could “lead the life he wanted to lead.” https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/ex-rugby-school-pupil-guilty-murdering-3056706

Probably as the result of a fight which went badly wrong. I don't think Mark set out to kill his father but I fear circumstances overtook them and the old man came off worse.

[Nicholas]

Probably as the result of a fight which went badly wrong. I don't think Mark set out to kill his father but I fear circumstances overtook them and the old man came off worse.

IMO Mark harboured deep seated resentment towards Sami

[Angelo222]

http://www.freemarkalexander.org/diary/#top19
http://www.freemarkalexander.org/diary/#top20
http://www.freemarkalexander.org/faq/#church

Mark doesn't for a minute deny that he took his eye off the ball here. There a number of problems. First of all, he was used to his dad either not being around, going away on 'business' trips without further explanation, and not returning his calls. This was just normal behaviour in their household. Odd to all of us, but normal for them.

Secondly, he had been brought up not to question his father's intentions, not to put his nose into his father's business. He, like his mum, had grown up in an environment in which huge emphasis was placed upon guarding his father's privacy and secrecy. So, even if Mark was concerned, or worried, which he was, he wouldn't have dreamed of involving the authorities, for risk of getting his father in trouble and upsetting him.

Thirdly, Mark drew some reassurance from the fact that the social services were monitoring his dad. If there had in fact really been an issue, they would have contacted him, or so he thought. The fact that they hadn't allayed his concerns.

Fourthly, Mark had become completely absorbed in his life at university, where he was not only studying, and enjoying student life, but running a business. Mark has a habit, evidenced here in this very Forum, of committing himself to too much and losing track of other things, like Rosie's letter. It took him 8 weeks to respond to her. It took him almost 12 weeks with his father, before he realised something was up on his return to the UK. Mark has never claimed to be perfect, but innocent people are no less fallible than the rest of us!

Finally, of course, Sami had had a go at Mark the last time they spoke. Mark was holding out for an apology, stubbornly, proudly, perhaps, but nevertheless he didn't want to be the first one to reach out.

All of this created the conditions in which Mark didn't react quickly enough to his father's silence, and failed to read the warning signs that something was wrong. Mark constantly questions whether he could have prevented his father's death if only he had acted sooner, and this possibility, that he could somehow have saved his father continues to plague Mark to this day.

These two sides of the same coin don't add up in my opinion.  All these claims about a secret life, going away on business etc are not borne out by any evidence and are not reflected in his finances. The other side of this is Marks claim that social services were looking after him, he was after all in receipt of benefits. It just doesn't add up.

[Angelo222]

IMO Mark harboured deep seated resentment towards Sami

And his failure to pass his legal exams was the last straw or at least the straw which broke the camel's back. When Sami learned that his son had flunked his law studies and would not be going to study in Paris, that probably infuriated the old man and he exploded in rage.  One can only imagine what happened next.

[Angelo222]

So we should make distinction there between Sami's private life (finances, aliases, business arrangements etc.) and what was going on around the house, which clearly wasn't a matter of secrecy. Sami involved Mark in various jobs around the house which didn't require specific expertise, in order to save money. This was meant to be one of them. The tragic irony is that Mark was just trying to help out.

All the evidence supports this, because the layers are clearly made of different materials, and laid to different standards. Moreover, Mark wasn't at the property long enough to conduct all the work required to excavate the site, mix the layers, and lay them professionally. In all of November, when the prosecution insist the burial took place, he was only there for a total of 3 hours.

The different layers of mortar are consistent with them being laid hurriedly by an amateur, they had no function other than to entomb Samuel Alexander's burned remains.  The only person who could possibly have had the means to do it and had an excuse to be there was the son, Mark Alexander.  And claiming he was only there for three hours is a pathetic attempt to make excuses for him.  He could have gone to the house any day he wanted. His girlfriend's claim that he was with her every minute of every day that he wasn't in lectures is so far fetched to be laughable. In fact, is her testimony even credible?

[mrswah]

The different layers of mortar are consistent with them being laid hurriedly by an amateur, they had no function other than to entomb Samuel Alexander's burned remains.  The only person who could possibly have had the means to do it and had an excuse to be there was the son, Mark Alexander.  And claiming he was only there for three hours is a pathetic attempt to make excuses for him.  He could have gone to the house any day he wanted. His girlfriend's claim that he was with her every minute of every day that he wasn't in lectures is so far fetched to be laughable. In fact, is her testimony even credible?

I don't know whether the girlfriend's testimony is credible, but was it not said that the first two layers of concrete were laid professionally, and the third one, done by Mark, was amateur?  From what I have read, it seems that Mark was no expert at laying concrete, he admits ordering and laying the third layer, so who laid the others???

[Myster]

SN appeared for the prosecution (although according to FC she now seems to be part of MA's support team) so she must have had an inkling that something was amiss with his tale, if true, that he saw Sami within the first five days of February.

There were three allegedly professionally-executed mortar layers (of cement, sand and water) with Sami's body embedded in the middle.  Having had experience of laying concrete myself when young and fit, it doesn't take much effort to produce a reasonably professional-looking job.  Mixing sand and cement mortar by hand on a large plywood board or tarmac drive is easier still, the resulting mix then placed in a bucket or barrow, poured wherever needed, and contained by a timber board as shuttering if necessary.  If sufficiently fluid it will flow to find its own level, or for better compaction would be tamped with a spade or piece of wood, then finished off with a float or trowel to produce a smooth surface.  It isn't rocket science, doesn't require trained professional skills as some experts would have you believe, and here it was was done in three stages allowing each layer to set with no great rush to complete the job.  Anyone watching workmen complete the two other earlier root-barriers near the house would have a good idea of the procedure.

[Fact Checker]

And his failure to pass his legal exams was the last straw or at least the straw which broke the camel's back. When Sami learned that his son had flunked his law studies and would not be going to study in Paris, that probably infuriated the old man and he exploded in rage.  One can only imagine what happened next.

Mark didn't fail his exams, he achieved no lower than a 2:2 in all his modules in his first two years at university. Most students would be happy with this, but Mark was aiming to graduate with at least a 2:1. The realisation came that the only way for Mark to do this was to change to the straight law course and stay in London, rather than going for the double-maitrise in Paris (which gave students two law degrees, an English one and a French one). Sami was a pragmatist. He only wanted the best for Mark, so this was an entirely practical and sensible decision.

http://www.freemarkalexander.org/mistake-8/

[Fact Checker]

He could have gone to the house any day he wanted. His girlfriend's claim that he was with her every minute of every day that he wasn't in lectures is so far fetched to be laughable. In fact, is her testimony even credible?

Hi Angelo, we've posted quite a lot on this point, although our hands are tied in that we can't divulge the evidence in full at this stage until Mark's next appeal is heard. Hopefully the posts below help answer your questions though. Senta had no reason to make this up if that's what you're suggesting. All she said is that her and Mark slept together every night. That means that Mark wasn't gallivanting to Drayton Parslow in the middle of the night to bury his father in the early hours. It means that he had to have been back from any visits to the house by the evening to spend time with her, or else she would have realised he was missing and got suspicious.

We question how it is that Mark could have traveled undetected, and without leaving any evidential trail, particularly when:

1) The route out of London was covered by Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras. This rules out him using his car.

2) Every taxi company in the local area of Drayton Parslow kept records of the journies taken. These were trawled and journies to Prospect Close established. This rules out journies outside of those dates.

3) None of the evidence from any of the other sources gathered either at trial, or subsequently, points to Mark traveling outside of the dates originally established by the prosecution. To the contrary, they provide evidence of him being in London during that time. This includes cell-site data from Mark's phone geo-locating his position, transactional data from his banks, and other data.

The combination of data does in fact tell us exactly when Mark arrived, and when he left. The taxi journals log collection and drop-off times. The cellsite logs when Mark's car was traveling away from or towards Drayton Parslow. The ANPR cameras log when Mark entered or left London. Everything is there.

The purpose of the evidence gathering exercise was to demonstrate that one doesn't need to rely upon one source alone. All of the independent sources corroborate each other.

The times that the cellsite place Mark in London are corroborated by other independent sources that put him in London.

We know that Mark made 9 separate trips from London to Drayton Parslow between September and November 2009. This isn't disputed. What we now know however, and what no-one thought to consider at trial was that these trips taken together would not have given Mark enough time to carry out all the different elements of the crime.

[Fact Checker]

All these claims about a secret life, going away on business etc are not borne out by any evidence and are not reflected in his finances.

There is quite a lot of evidence on these leads. We will try and give you a sense of some of that here:

1) The map below shows:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?usp=sharing&mid=1KA3FOKs9h4rHVnYRoVBGS1AxegcQzcx0

a) A list of properties used by Sami over the years.

i) Some were purchased under one of his aliases (e.g. El-Kalyoubi, Alexander).

ii) Some were purchased in the name of a woman, using a power of attorney. Her family describe how she was "in such fear of [Sami] that she... gave him power of attorney" over her financial affairs. Sami secured mortgages in her name without her knowledge, sold the properties without repaying them, and then left the lady laden with the debt.

iii) Some were used as addresses to register aliases with various public bodies without actually purchasing the property. Sami would look for unoccupied houses currently on the market, and then claim that his alias was a tenant there (e.g. Jacob).

All of these properties became virtual bases for credit and benefit fraud. When bailiffs turned up to these properties looking to recover debts they would find that nobody lived there. Sami even registered a car with DVLA at one of the properties to avoid repaying the loan.

Sami would set up redirection agreements with Royal Mail to redirect mail addressed to an alias from the property to his own home.

We have evidence for these activities under 6 aliases, many of which have been linked to his Alexander alias by credit agencies like Experian. We are still looking for evidence in relation to 5 further known aliases.

b) A list of GP surgeries where Sami registered himself under different aliases.

c) A list of schools where Sami enrolled Mark under different aliases as a child.

2) One victim of fraud has described Sami as follows: "He is basically a clever thief and has meticulously planned to make easy money out of a naïve young girl and me". He alleges that "my signature has been forged on the deeds of trust and the transfer of the mortgage" in order to place his step-daughter's share of the property into Sami's own name without her family realising.

3) In relation to Sami's dating habits, the Judge said this during his summing-up:

"A further piece of police evidence related to text messages that were on Samuel Alexander's phone, relating to some slightly odd messages that you were taken through... You will remember the text message that said things like 'spoil sport', 'sleep tight', 'Why are you blanking me?', 'Night, night, kiss, kiss' and so on. Of course, it is said that it appeared he was sending these sort of text messages or receiving them from various women, young women that he had been in contact through these sites online, which we know he visited as well. But they were not able to locate these subscribers for the these numbers".

"That officer also was able to confirm that on the computer from the computer reports that Samuel Alexander used a variety of profiles when he was online. Even if he used his own name, it would vary from Sami, Sam, or Samuel. Sometimes he used other names like Dave with the Forbidden Affair site, and various other names... another one he went on frequently was called White Label Dating".

"She confirmed, the lady police officer, that throughout the period from April to July 2009 Samuel was regularly connecting onto such sites, and indeed had been using such sites for quite a long time prior to 2009. There were thousands of pieces of contact by him to such sites. One particular email went back to November 2006 to somebody called Irena saying 'You say the sweetest things", and so on'".

"Also one of the numbers that was found on Samuel Alexander's mobile was traced to a man... but he knew absolutely nothing of any contact with that particular phone number. He was the man who apparently sold SIM cards on and thought it was maybe on of those somebody had ended up using to have a phone call on 1 September with Samuel Alexander's phone..."

"The computer expert... said there were various browsing sessions of internet sites between 1 - 4 September on Sami's profile, most of that browsing was on adult dating sites or adult chat rooms... between 1 - 25 August there were a number of chat sites and adult contact sites, and also a significant proportion of the sites appeared to be sites portraying pornography, some them depicting young women and teenage girls, but not underage girls."

You may recall us previously posting a copy of the CPS admissions on this particular issue:

http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=9578.0;attach=15147;image