I think JB's defence at trial was very poor. The QC's may have been experienced but what experience did they have with cases involving firearms? They certainly didn't have experience of a mass shooting as WHF is the only unwitnessed case during peacetime.
I disagree that the strategy at trial was the right one. JB said he used the rifle on the eve of the murders sans silencer. The silencer was found on SC's body sans silencer, so why would anyone think it a good idea and attempt to choreograph a correlation between the silencer and crime instead of repudiating it?
Admin on Blue, a non-practising criminal barrister, had this to say about it:
I am of the view that, like Julie Mugford's evidence, the moderator should have been excluded from the trial.
The problems with the moderator evidence were fatal and I would summarise them as follows:
1. It was found in the vicinity of the crime in a place that the police had already searched.
2. Point 1 could be excused if the police investigation had been diverted to a 'murder-suicide', but it wasn't. Not exactly. Stan Jones suspected Jeremy Bamber from the start. And why were the police conducting a search, if not to find evidence of this kind?
3. Even if we dismiss the concern in 1 and 2 above, the moderator was claimed to be found by individuals who were personally vested in Bamber being convicted and imprisoned. That doesn't mean they were trying to frame him. They may have made a genuine find. The real question is whether there is evidence that the moderator was used in the killings. There is, but it is weak and inconclusive and not enough to establish the matter.
4. The moderator was tampered with and forensic traces were removed by those individuals who found it before it was handed over to the police.
5. The moderator was collected and passed to the police with insufficient care. First, it was taken away from the location of the crime to a completely different property some miles away without any regard for forensic integrity. Then, it was then handed to a drunk officer who transported it in a cardboard tube [I'm almost laughing as I type this] back to the investigation team to be examined.
6. The grey hair reported to be on the moderator was lost before it could be forensically examined.
7. Blood was found in the interior baffles of the moderator, but no photographic or diagrammatic record was made of this blood patterning.
8. The blood was grouped as type 'A' and Sheila was blood type 'A', but grouping does not prove that the blood was Sheila's.
9. Post-trial, Low Copy Number ('LCN') DNA testing of forensic traces revealed results that are highly-probable to be Sheila's, but the 2002 appellate judges dismissed these results as meaningless. The LCN method does not tell us the source of the relevant traces that formed the sample for testing purposes and the risk of cross-contamination and accidental contamination pre- and post-trial is very high.
10. Even if we take a leap of faith and assume that the blood was Sheila's, this still does not prove that the moderator was used in the killings. To prove that, we would need to hear evidence about blood patterning, suppressor blowback, and wound ballistics, and attempts to find evidence along those lines have proved inconclusive.
I think, however, there is one important weakness in the points I make.
Point 8. It's easy to dismiss the grouped blood finding, but we need to explain why the blood was there. There was a quantity of it, I am given to understand. It wasn't just one speck found following a careful examination, it was quite an amount of blood, and the 1990s defence expert in this matter has outlined why the blood was probably human blood.
That's a weakness, but it's not enough to assail the objections. To me, the moderator is a dead duck. That doesn't mean Bamber is innocent, far from it, but it weakens the case against him quite considerably - which is worrying, when you consider that he may be a mass murderer.
It is possible (I only say possible) that the relatives at the time had similar concerns, as well as legitimate concerns about Bamber's attitude to their business and financial interests, and realising that Essex Constabulary were diving well below snorkel depth, in desperation they manufactured the evidence.
I see one problem with that theory, though. How would they know the correct grouping of the blood for the silencer? This, in turn, gives me a disturbing thought, which is that one way they could have found out was by speaking to a police officer.
To be clear, I am not alleging this. I do not believe the moderator was used in the killings, and I personally take the view that the relatives introduced this evidence
innocently.