If this was so it wouldn't have been allowed as an appeal point at the 2002 hearing, so no it's all to play for at the next appeal. Imo Michael Turner's performance at JB's 2002 appeal was so poor he should be struck off for gross incompetence and negligence. I think most will agree the blood stain evidence of all exhibits is key to the case. MT failed to understand key material, notably Dr Lincoln's report for the defence at trial, and appreciate blood stain test results pertaining to the bible were not disclosed to the defence at trial. As you said the bible was exhibited at court and therefore should have been retained indefinitely by EP. The appeal court judges took a dim view of the fact all exhibits had been destroyed and agreed they would rule in JB's favour if points were made that were unable to be proved due to the destroyed exhibits. All the evidence surrounding the bible suggests June walked around the bed holding it and dropped it in the vicinity it was found:
- June's blood groupings were confirmed on the carpet and blue socks where the bible was found
- The bible belonged to June and was kept on her bedside table
- June was deeply religious
- Having sustained 5/6 gsw's June was able to get out of bed and walk to the other side and back therefore there's no reason she wouldn't have reached for her bible in her hour of need
- The only identifiable fingerprints on the bible belonged to June
- June's hands were contaminated with blood as confirmed by Dr Vanezis which wasn't the case with SC
- JM's WS states MM placed the bible on SC's chest. Had the blood stain results been disclosed to the defence in all probability this would seriously dent JM's testimony. As the bible was destroyed the court would have no option other than to rule in JB's favour.
MF could potentially be discredited if it comes to light he was less than truthful on his cv/job application. I struggle to understand why an expert witness in ballistics would need to fall back on "a small amount of experience of an air rifle as a small boy". Beggars belief. The Gov has acknowledged quality failures at FSS during the 80's.
June suffered mental breakdowns requiring in-patient psychiatric care during 1955 and 1959. SC was placed in the care of the Bambers during 1957 so was exposed to June's severe depression in the lead up to her 1959 breakdown. According to Dr Ferguson June made a full recovery. JB was not even born until 1961 so no he avoided exposure to June when she was suffering severe depression during critical periods of his development.
Have you read the 2002 appeal report? It was covered as part of the 2002 appeal hearing (ground 9) so can't be brought up a new appeal. Read the 2002 appeal document - the bible was available for the defense to scrutinise if they had wanted - see below!
Ground 9 – the Bible 405. Ground 9 is an allegation of non-disclosure relating to the Bible found beside Sheila Caffell's body. The precise complaint is that the prosecution failed to disclose at trial the pages at which the Bible had been opened. Mr Turner draws attention to two distinct matters, two photographs of the Bible and documents relating to an inquiry made to a local Rector about the relevant pages.
406. Photographs of the scene, which were before the jury at trial, clearly showed the Bible lying open but face down beside Sheila Caffell's body. Since the Bible was face down, it is not possible to ascertain from these photographs the pages at which the Bible lay open.
407. Two further photographs of the Bible have been located by those advising the appellant. When they were taken and by whom they were taken is not known. It is clear from the photographs themselves that they were not taken at the scene. But must have been taken at some other location following the removal of the Bible as a potential exhibit by the police. The photographs record the blood staining on the Bible. From this staining it is immediately obvious that the Bible has been shut whilst the blood remained wet because marks on one page are mirrored on the adjoining page.
408. The pages on which the heavy staining appears in these photographs are pages including part or all of Psalms 51-55. It is said that these pages are significant and represented "Sheila Caffell's suicide note". A number of passages are highlighted and it will suffice if we give one example, taken from verse 14 of Psalm 51:
"Save me from blood guiltiness O God…"
409. The evidence suggests that the two photographs were not brought to the attention of the defence and Mr Turner once more submits that the only explanation for this is wilful concealment by the police.
410. In addition complaint is made that a visit to discuss the relevant pages with the local Rector was not disclosed to the defence. This allegation stems from documents which came to light during the subsequent inquiries. These documents record that on a day ,which seems to be early in the inquiry into the shootings, DC Barlow was instructed by DI Miller to see the Rector to see if there was any significance in the open pages. Since at that stage the case was thought to be one in which Sheila Caffell had committed suicide, such an inquiry seems a natural one to have made. The only record of the outcome of that instruction appears in a note made by DC Barlow at a much later date which reads:
"I did see the Rector but he couldn't help us in any way on (the) point…"
411. Mr Barlow has since that time been forced to retire from the police force following a severe stroke. He does not now think that he did see the Rector. However, so far as we can tell, his record quoted above was not drawn to his attention and we conclude that he did see the Rector. We are not, however, surprised that a fruitless inquiry made almost 17 years ago does not stick in his memory following his enforced retirement from the police.
412. Mr Turner submits that there was a duty on the prosecution not only to disclose the photographs but also the fact of the visit to the Rector.
413.
The only value of the photographs would be if the Bible itself was not available for inspection since if it was, the page at which it was open could very readily be found. We permitted both Mr Terzeon, the defence solicitor at trial, and Mr Edmund Lawson QC, junior counsel at trial, to give evidence about this aspect of the case. Mr Terzeon suggested that he had particularly wanted to ascertain the pages at which the Bible was open. He said that as a result he had asked the police and been told that the pages were not known. When he was asked why he had not looked at the Bible itself, he said that it was his recollection that it had been missing at the time.
414. If Mr Terzeon's recollection was right, we find it astonishing that nowhere is this recorded in any document nor does Mr Edmund Lawson have any recollection of any such problem. The fact that the police had lost an exhibit at some stage that the defence were anxious to view is we suggest the sort of detail that tends to stick in trial counsel's mind even when other details fade. Further Mr Terzeon had no recollection of the Bible being produced at trial as it undoubtedly was. If it had been missing and if the defence were attaching to it the importance that he now suggests, it must surely have come to his attention and would, we have no doubt, been carefully scrutinised. Such scrutiny would inevitably have revealed the relevant pages because the pages were so heavily bloodstained. Blood had also dripped down the edges of the pages on one of the sides when it was opened. Thus by turning to the end of this mark on the page edges one could immediately identify the bloodstained pages with little effort.
415. We are satisfied that whilst Mr Terzeon is doing his best to assist the court, his recollection in this regard is faulty. Even if he was right, any deficiency in this regard would have been cured when the Bible was produced at trial.
416. The fact that the defence made no play of the Bible's pages may very well have something to do with another aspect of the matter. The more each member of the court looked at the photographs in order to deal with this point, the more difficult we found it to reconcile the actual bloodstaining with the defence case. The largest area of blood seems to have got onto the Bible when it came into contact with a pool of blood beside the body. As already observed the Bible must have been shut whilst the blood was wet. It does not seem very likely that it was still wet hours after the event when the police might have handled it. If this is so, it was shut by someone and then reopened to lie beside the body after Sheila Caffell had been shot. These matters along with other considerations of a similar kind were placed before us by the prosecution on an application to call fresh evidence with which we will deal later. It did not, however, require fresh evidence for us to see that there was a potentially powerful point that might have been made in this regard by the prosecution at trial.
417. The explanation why the pages at which the Bible was open was not explored by the defence may be explicable by these matters. Counsel with the experience of Mr Rivlin QC, and with his acknowledged reputation for thoroughness, may well have decided that far from helping these matters might have presented a yet further major hurdle for the appellant to overcome and consequently decided to leave well alone. In any event we are satisfied that production of the original exhibit provided all the information that the photographs would have revealed and that there was no failure to disclose in this respect.
418. The information that the Rector had been visited was, on all the available evidence, of no help to anyone. The record shows that he could not help in any way. Thus there was nothing that could assist the defence and accordingly nothing that required to be disclosed.
419. We are satisfied, therefore, that there was no failure by the prosecution to disclose any material in this regard that required to be disclosed. Even if we had reached a different conclusion, we fail to see how it would have assisted the appellant. The pages only became relevant if Sheila Caffell had turned them up but that begged the very question that the jury were going to have to answer, namely who killed Sheila Caffell. Was it Sheila Caffell who opened the Bible as a part of her suicide or Jeremy Bamber who did it as part of a plan to make it look as if Sheila Caffell had committed suicide? Mr Turner suggests that if it was the appellant it is remarkable that he did not himself pursue this aspect of the matter. However for the appellant to suggest that these pages were of some critical significance required him to know what they were. If he was the killer, he could hardly make any great play of this aspect of the case without risking others realising that he had more knowledge about the matter than he would have had if he was innocent.
420. For these reasons, but particularly because we are satisfied that there was no failure to disclose matters of significance this ground fails. We should add that we were asked to hear evidence from Dr Ferguson in respect of the significance of these pages but we are satisfied that the evidence was available to the defence at trial and that in any event Dr Ferguson could not assist on the critical question as to who chose to open the Bible at this page. We, therefore, declined to hear this evidence.
421. For the sake of completeness, we should record that those acting for the appellant had obtained a statement from Dr Gillingham, a theologian, dealing with the theological significance of the pages at which the Bible was open. No application was made to us to admit this evidence. If it had been, we would have rejected the application. Such evidence could have been obtained for the trial because we are satisfied that the relevant passages could have been obtained by those acting for the appellant. In any event we do not consider that this evidence would have been admissible at trial because there was no evidence to suggest that Sheila Caffell had any particular theological training or expertise which would have enabled her to read more into the passages than would have been apparent to the jury from looking at the passages themselves. Further we have no doubt at all that even if admissible, this evidence could not have had any impact on the jury's verdict.
