I'm sure he did provide a rational basis for his opinion when he attended trial and produced his column inches. The article is a summary of his recollections:
- He would not have convicted JB on the evidence he heard (although he admits he did not attend every day of the trial).
- Despite the above he thought JB guilty based on it appears spurious reasons as you have stated.
- He thought JM's testimony had too many inconsistencies to be relied upon.
Unlike posters on internet forums journalists are not given carte blanche by their editors to write war and peace when the mood takes! 
Really? Please see below &%+((£
His opinion that they failed to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is his unsupported opinion nothing more. Unsupported opinion is never evidence to be relied upon but journalists in particular have a very poor track record. Journalists are trained in communications not substantively trained in many subjects and often are horrible at grasping the key issues.
From a legal standpoint there is no question the evidence was sufficient to establish reasonable doubt.
From a legal standpoint and common sense there is no reason why Julie would make up the things she said even if she had wanted to punish Jeremy by getting him falsely convicted. That is part and parcel of whether to believe someone. He never exhibited any discussion of such issues. He simply published his raw gut impressions which mean zilch to anyone rational and objective.
The raw opinion of people means nothing at all it is a rationale and evidence set forth to support opinions which matter. That he heard her speak doesn't mean his opinion of her is reliable. All it means is even greater opportunity to consider stupid things instead of actually looking at the claims she made.
You seem to think human behaviour is logical and rational. It isn't. There could be numerous reasons why JM was economical with the truth. I gave the example of how the four prosecution witnesses in the Stefan Kiszko case "lied for a laugh" to show how wide ranging the reasons can be. I'm not suggesting JM lied for a laugh. I believe JM was put under enormous pressure by the police and cracked. Similar to how Amanda Knox did with Patrick Lumumba. PL had a cast iron alibi JB didn't. When the police apply brutal interviewing techniques to young women who have no legal representation they are left in a vulnerable position. JM was no doubt brainwashed by EP into thinking JB was responsible. EP told JB during his interviews SC was murdered as she could not have shot herself twice despite the pathologist stating otherwise. If JM was told similar lies EP no doubt brainwashed her into thinking JB was responsible. There's evidence to suggest JM wasn't mentally strong around that time as indicated by the need to take sleeping tablets to cope with her teacher training.
Your claims are totally illogical. You spend your time making up possibilities that she lied without coming up with any evidence that actually suggests she did. Worse yet you ignore the facts when making such up.
1) You IGNORE that Julie told her story to Susan BEFORE she told it to police. That right there refutes your notion that police confused her and got her to change her testimony because of their actions
2) You ignore the level of detail of her story which spans nearly a year prior to the murders. Police didn't put such in her head
3) You admit that Julie and police all knew that Jeremy had no alibi and thus police would have pressed Julie about whether Jeremy did it himself not invent a hitman story and similarly Julie would have no reason on her own to admit a hitman story.
Knox was being grilled by police as a suspect while Julie was not. Police had text messages between Lumumba and Knox and insisted to Knox that her text of see you later meant that she planned to meet him and insisted he met up with her. They interviewed her in the middle of the night, confused her, questioned her in a language she barely knew and told her to imagine what happened when he met up with her. Hours after they pressured her she REVOKED her statement and told them it was false. Trying to suggest this could help prove Julie lied for similar reasons but instead of immediately revoking it like Knox maintained it to this day and testified to such at a trial fails miserably.
Julie was not a suspect like Knox. Julie was not treated as a suspect. Julie told her story before she spoke with police. Police initially didn't believe Julie. In the meantime you ignore that Jeremy had no alibi so police and Julie had no reason to try implicating someone else. Police had no evidence of any sort against MacDonald. There were no text messages or other contact between Jeremy and MacDonald (analogous to those between Knox and Lumumba) that would make police suggest to Julie that MacDonald had been involved. There is nothing remotely similar. You constantly attempt to draw false comparisons between things that are not even remotely similar.
Three 13 year old girls in the Kiszko case claimed the defendant had exposed himself to them. That hardly was direct evidence of his guilt. When adults they recanted and said they lied. Julie was not a 13 year old girl she was an adult. Julie did not come out with a simply claim she proved a long detailed account that would have taken quite a while to make up. The things she claimed are not things that would be made up by someone who wanted to get Jeremy in trouble. She would have made up that he confessed himself to committing the crimes not finger a hitman who in short order could prove the claim false.
You want us to ignore evidence and logic and simply to believe that either police prompted her to finger a hitman or she made such up on her own to get Jeremy in trouble though neither police nor Julie would have a reason to conjure such up. That is what a biased person does. A biased person decides they want to believe something regardless of evidence and logic. You decided to believe Jeremy is innocent and in order for him to be innocent Julie had to have lied and this alone is why you suggest she lied.
I prefer to look at the claims in great detail. The claims of Jeremy expressing desire to kill his family are very detailed over the course of many months. This cuts against the notion such were simply made up suddenly. She admitted to various wrongdoing which she had no need to admit to. This cuts in favor of her telling the truth. If she were going to lie she would not have made up a hitman but would have said Jeremy admitted to committing the murders himself. The hitman story is something only Jeremy would make up and thus cuts in favor of her telling the truth. The fact Jeremy called her right after the murders before even calling police supports that she was telling the truth.
You are desperate to establish she lied but can't. You can't establish she lied with any evidence so instead invoke unsupported opinion of others who don't believe her as if their unsupported opinions mean squat. You admit humans can be irrational and yet say he must have a good reason for his belief because he is a journalist.
You bring up 2 scenarios where witnesses recanted- one recanted within hours and yet police ran with it anyway while in the other scenario the recanting occurred many years later. Here there was no recanting period. The testimony here was much more complex, much more detailed and directly implicates the defendant in the planning stage. His admission of being responsible after isn't really significant. It is her testimony regarding the planning that is significant as well as the evidence that right after the murders that he phoned her before police. The notion he planned to murder them and frame Sheila but didn't have to because Sheila went crazy and killed them for real is not the least bit credible.
There's nothing in her "story" supported by extraneous evidence. It was all passed to her by EP cobbled together by EP and the relatives.
According to JM JB did elaborate further. JM said JB explained in detail at Bourtree Cottage on 7th Aug how he had arranged for MM to carry out the murders. He then added they should not talk about it in the house in case it was bugged! If JB thought the house was bugged why would he explain in detail how he arranged for MM to carry out the murders thus incriminating himself?
"About 8.30pm the same day DS JONES and DC CLARKE left the house leaving Jeremy and myself alone. We went and sat in the lounge and I think the first thing Jeremy said was that he was glad the day was over. I then said to Jeremy "Did you do it". He said, "No I couldn't have done it, Matthew did it". I knew to whom he was referring. He said that before he had phoned me that morning Matthew had phoned from the house, which I took to be the farm, and said that everything had been completed and proceeded to tell him about his father who he stated that for his age he was very strong and had put up a fight. He said that Mathhew had said he was sorry because during the fight with his father he had had a mental blank and had fired 7 shots into him. I asked Jerry if the twins and Sheila had felt anything and he said the boys were still asleep and didn't wake up and that Sheila had lay down on the bed and shot herself under the orders of Matthew who put a bible on her chest. He told me that he had told Matthew where the gun was going to be, how to get into the house. He had found out what bedroom they had all been sleeping in as Sheila and the twins frequently slept in different rooms when they visited the farm, He also told Matthew how to leave the house so it appeared locked, and the route back to Goldhanger. I asked how much he paid Matthew and he said "£2,000". Jeremy said that when Matthew phoned him from the hose he told him that he was going out of the country and it would be in both their interest if Jeremy didn't know where he had gone. I did mention to Jeremy where he could get £2,000 as I knew he hadn't got it. Jeremy told me that he had to find a way of getting it without the police finding out or the accountant. I forgot to tell you about the phone in the house. When Jeremy changed his plan from burning the house down to shooting the family, he told me that he was going to make it look as if Sheila was responsible and the grounds would be that she was mad having been in a mental hospital. He also told me that there would be a phone call made from the house because the last phone call made would be recorded. He said the call would be made=made from the White House to his house. He didn't say who would =make it or why. I know there was portable phone in the house with a memory key which when pressed would phone back to the last number called. The conversation regarding the phone took place when he changed his plan in April time this year. I would like to add that the conversation I had with Jeremy the day the police were at the house on Wednesday 7th August 1985 might not be in the correct order of speech. DURING THIS CONVERSATION JEREMY DID TELL ME THAT WE SHOULD NOT TALK ABOUT IT IN THE HOUSE IN CASE THE HOUSE WAS BEING BUGGED"
But hang on a minute Julie, according to you JB has just fessed up about how he arranged for MM to carry out the murders and yet according to you he also believed the house was bugged thus incriminating himself. Isn't that what's commonly referred to as 'locking the stable door after the horse has bolted'?
If some wish to treat JM as a credible prosecution witness that's up to them but they won't be convincing me she was anything other than unreliable.
http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=284.0;attach=1112
http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=284.0;attach=1114
All you are doing is demonstrating you are too biased to approach this case in a rational manner.
1) Your claim that EP fed Julie everything is complete hogwash. The details she told about Jeremy plotting to kill his family by fire but changing it to shooting them and pretending Sheila did it came from Julie herself. You have zero evidence to suggest police and family fed such to her.
2) You keep ignoring that the family and police believed Jeremy committed the crimes himself. they didn't suspect he had hired a hitman. They would not have prompted a hitman story from her let alone to name a hitman who in short order could establish the tale false. Jeremy had no alibi police and Julie had no reason to suggest someone other than Jeremy himself committed the murders
3) Jeremy didn't believe the house was bugged. Jeremy didn't want to provide more detail about the murders fearing he would give away that he committed them himself so he made up the claim that the house might be bugged and they needed to stop talking about it as an excuse to stop talking about it. Jeremy LIED to Julie about hiring MacDonald to kill his family. He didn't fear police hearing the tale because it was a lie. He knew it was a lie and that if it got back to police that upon investigating it they would determine it was false. He wouldn't care if police had been listening but he knew they weren't. His lie was to be used against Julie. This lie:
A) fooled Julie into thinking he was less cold blooded than he actually was
B) fooled Julie into thinking that there was a hitman who would go after her if she told police anything
C) intended that if she went to police anyway despite the fear then police would find out this tale was false by investigating MacDonald and his financials and not believe anything Julie said from that point forward.
These are logical reasons why Jeremy made up the hitman story. Neither you nor any other Jeremy supporters can come up with a single rational reason why someone other than Jeremy would make up the hitman claim.
Jeremy had no alibi so police had no reason to invent a hitman story period let alone to pick MacDonald as a mark.
For the same reason Julie herself had no reason to make up a hitman story. If Julie were simply a pissed off girlfriend she would have said he admitted to committing the murders himself. "He called me before the murders saying he was going to kill his family and make it appear that Sheila did it, then called me around 3AM saying he had carried out the murders" That would be sufficient. He really did call her before and after and it would just be his word against hers of what they discussed. That's what someone lying would make up. Not a long involved tale of him graduating from burning the place down to shooting them and especially not a hitman story.
People who choose to believe that Julie made up a hitman story though it makes no sense do so not because of evidence and logic but because of their own internal bias and subjective feelings. As such they can't justify their views and have a hard time even explaining why they believe such.
