Still Missing UK - Bernadette Walker, 17, left parent's car, Peterborough, 21 July 2020 *Arrests* #3

[Rednaxela]

Cambridge Crown Court 1 T20207197
Sarah Walker
Scott Walker
Details: Trial (Part Heard) - Resume - 09:54
Trial (Part Heard) - Legal Submissions - 10:11​

So we've not gone straight back into the Prosecution case today - I wonder what's up...!

Legal Submissions: Legal technicalities are under discussion either within the court (where the jury may have to be removed) or the chambers. The Prosecution and/or the Defence Counsel may be addressing the judge. Under some circumstances the public may be denied access to the court until the submissions are complete.

Now adjourned to 14:00. It appears a juror has taken ill.

Bernadette Walker Murder Trial: Trial not sitting today as juror taken ill

 

[PharaohMark]

Fane Road has allotments. Anybody know if the allotments were searched at all ?

To my knowledge (and I am local and have an allotment plot at Fane Road), they have not been searched as part of the investigation - certainly nothing has been mentioned to plot holders. The allotment is also heavily secure (locked 12 foot high gates and fenced all the way round. Hope this helps.

 

[Tanzanite]

Legal technicalities are under discussion either within the court (where the jury may have to be removed) or the chambers. The Prosecution and/or the Defence Counsel may be addressing the judge. Under some circumstances the public may be denied access to the court until the submissions are complete.

Forgive my almost complete ignorance on this, but can additional charges be brought during the trial, if the evidence supports it and the matter is ongoing? I'm going back to the dropping of the charge of joint enterprise by the CPS. Has that ship sailed permanently now?

Even as I type, I'm imaging it's some form of abuse of process, but the question keeps niggling, and I know there are some knowledgeable people here. My googling mainly seems to bring up references to double jeopardy. Thanks for any wisdom on this.

 

[Alternative Paradox]

I think this is significant- in my opinion eight steps would be from the front of the car to the boot - where the phone was then left for the 2 hours 20 minutes. What did he go to the boot for?

Or rather to place the phone safely somewhere (top of a wall, in a tree or bush, would be quite safe as wasn't it the dead of night) before driving off to perhaps ready a burial site or check out disposal areas.

They are certainly sufficiently 'mobile location' aware to plant phones at locations to provide 'evidence' of where they were at a given time.

As an aside, I worked at Vodafone in the Tech Services Support area in the mid 'noughties' and even then, you could determine a phone's location to within 3m by vectoring the pings received at base stations, providing more than three base stations were responding. I believe LE would be able to be fairly precise as to where cars were parked/stopped.

However, I'm not aware of any forensics tying either ScW or SaW, their vehicles or their clothes, to any form of digging or water activity/immersion.

So, this is my first WS post! Hi to all here and to the contributors everywhere whose posts we have found so enthralling over the time we've been lurking!

 

[Marg from Oz]

Welcome Alternative Paradox.

 

[MissUnderstood]

I don’t doubt for one minute this mother didn't know what was going to happen to her daughter. If this was not planned why would step dad call the mum and tell her! He would tell the mother the same story he told police. She jumped out of the car after an argument. Why would anyone risk making a call to tell someone they killed their child, would your first thought not be ‘hey, they will call the cops on me as soon as I tell them’. Seriously, imagine getting that call? I will not be satisfied with the outcome in this case until this so called mother has some harsher charges brought against her.
Moo

 

[Mercsw]

Okay now I'm am completely confused in regards to Peterborough telegraph post. Photo of face ? Mercedes van ?
I'm completely lost

try having this as your source of local news! It’s not uncommon just written by monkeys copying and pasting! Not the best newspaper I’m afraid

 

[CSIAngus]

problem with the jury?

if one of us were called for jury service and got a case like this, would we be removed if we declared we used this forum? or a similar one?

Y

I don’t doubt for one minute this mother didn't know what was going to happen to her daughter. If this was not planned why would step dad call the mum and tell her! He would tell the mother the same story he told police. She jumped out of the car after an argument. Why would anyone risk making a call to tell someone they killed their child, would your first thought not be ‘hey, they will call the cops on me as soon as I tell them’. Seriously, imagine getting that call? I will not be satisfied with the outcome in this case until this so called mother has some harsher charges brought against her.
Moo

Quite. If that was news then the horror would lead a normal Mum to call the Police immediately unless she was involved. However, she already had BW's phone so the plot began the previous day with her involvement. It's a 'what do we do next' call rather than a 'confessional'.

 

[Thelastleg]

Or rather to place the phone safely somewhere (top of a wall, in a tree or bush, would be quite safe as wasn't it the dead of night) before driving off to perhaps ready a burial site or check out disposal areas.

They are certainly sufficiently 'mobile location' aware to plant phones at locations to provide 'evidence' of where they were at a given time.

As an aside, I worked at Vodafone in the Tech Services Support area in the mid 'noughties' and even then, you could determine a phone's location to within 3m by vectoring the pings received at base stations, providing more than three base stations were responding. I believe LE would be able to be fairly precise as to where cars were parked/stopped.

However, I'm not aware of any forensics tying either ScW or SaW, their vehicles or their clothes, to any form of digging or water activity/immersion.

So, this is my first WS post! Hi to all here and to the contributors everywhere whose posts we have found so enthralling over the time we've been lurking!

Welcome and great first post. What is bothering me is, he didn't seem to have any practical knowledge of how much information his phone records held that was beneficial to the Police. He had it with him on all his trips and even took a photo with it. Why would he take it off his person while he went to dispose of Bernadette? Did he think this was the only bit that his phone records could be used against him to trace whereabouts he had disposed of her body. The other question I have is, when they are able to identify how many steps ScW took, would that be through a Fitness App or how would they know?

 

[Alyce]

Can someone clarify for me: did the family have a car and a Mercedes van? Was the van kept in the lock up garage and the car kept at home?

They each had a Merc - same model

meant to add. The lock up / garage was for storage as far as we could see from the photos taken when police searched it. No space for a car.

 

[Alternative Paradox]

Welcome and great first post. What is bothering me is, he didn't seem to have any practical knowledge of how much information his phone records held that was beneficial to the Police. He had it with him on all his trips and even took a photo with it. Why would he take it off his person while he went to dispose of Bernadette? Did he think this was the only bit that his phone records could be used against him to trace whereabouts he had disposed of her body....

I think that they were both absolutely aware that they could use the phones to 'locate' them when they needed to (hence Scw phone at the lockup, SaW phone at friends house, BW phone close to prison) but, like many I would think, mobiles become such a way of life they become invisible to the carrier, so perhaps, they at times, forgot to not have the phones with them when that would have been better?

Just checked on my own iPhone, in the Health app is counts steps for you - never knew that!

 

[SLouTh]

They each had a Merc - same model

Thank you, I have been lurking and catching up ... and wondered the same question....
Would this model be too old to have GPS? As police can also download data from cars, like phones.... to track past movements....

I have also wondered if ScW parked the van and was then met by another person / another car to take Bea to her final resting place in that couple of hours???

 

[Alyce]

I thought BW was overnighting with her paternal "grandparents", therefore as ScW is the step-father to BW, I guess they could be termed BW's step-grandparents. However, I had always understood them to being ScW's parents.

This photo and message is identified as being to ScW's step-father. This implies ScW's bio-parents separated and that his bio-mother remarried (or "recoupled") at some point in the past, perhaps even dating back to ScW's childhood.

I don't believe we know whether BW was with ScW's bio-mother and partner, or his bio-father and partner.

As a consequence, this photo and text message was not necessarily to the same couple with whom BW was staying.

Perhaps irrelevant, but an observation nonetheless.

I think it's just PT getting mixed up. They were referring to Scott as Bernadette's father at the beginning and have only just worked out that he is not her bio father and have now started to refer to him as her step father. In reality he is not, he is just her mother's boyfriend.
Following on from that, they have probably taken the Step father label and muddled it with Scott's father and stepmother.
Fairly sure the grandparents who are being referred to ( and again, they are not grandparents at all, no genetic link ) are Scott's father and his wife, who is Scott's stepmother.
Without going into detail, the distance of the journey from the *grandparents* house to the house of Sc and Sw in Century Square only fits if it is Sc's father that Bernadette stayed overnight with.

 

[CSIAngus]

Do we know what the significance of Uldale Way is?

 

[Alternative Paradox]

...Would this model be too old to have GPS?...

It appears to be 51 reg, maybe 52 from the picture (can't easily distinguish) so being around a 2001/2003 build, seems a bit early to have GPS (as opposed to simple sat nav) built in.

Seems probable to me that the Police used their phone locations.

 

[Ayashley]

Just a little helpful chart for anyone like me who has a hard time equating steps to distances... lol
https://www.uwyo.edu/wintherockies_edur/win steps/coordinator info/step conversions.pdf

 

[Alyce]

Thank you, I have been lurking and catching up ... and wondered the same question....
Would this model be too old to have GPS? As police can also download data from cars, like phones.... to track past movements....

I have also wondered if ScW parked the van and was then met by another person / another car to take Bea to her final resting place in that couple of hours???

It's a 2003 Model. I have a feeling we sleuthed this, way back, will try and see if I can find the details

 

[jackal67]

I think this is significant- in my opinion eight steps would be from the front of the car to the boot - where the phone was then left for the 2 hours 20 minutes. What did he go to the boot for?

Yes that could be it! Phone left in car while he was doing whatever he was doing totally makes sense IMO

 

[Alyce]

There is a church with a sizeable graveyard at this junction, and lots of tree cover. I wonder whether this has some relevance in any way...?

I also would be interested to know how long ScW has owned/rented the lockup on Montagu Road, which is an extension of Fane Road. Is this perhaps a part of the plot?

He doesn't own it

 

[jackal67]

Or rather to place the phone safely somewhere (top of a wall, in a tree or bush, would be quite safe as wasn't it the dead of night) before driving off to perhaps ready a burial site or check out disposal areas.

They are certainly sufficiently 'mobile location' aware to plant phones at locations to provide 'evidence' of where they were at a given time.

As an aside, I worked at Vodafone in the Tech Services Support area in the mid 'noughties' and even then, you could determine a phone's location to within 3m by vectoring the pings received at base stations, providing more than three base stations were responding. I believe LE would be able to be fairly precise as to where cars were parked/stopped.

However, I'm not aware of any forensics tying either ScW or SaW, their vehicles or their clothes, to any form of digging or water activity/immersion.

So, this is my first WS post! Hi to all here and to the contributors everywhere whose posts we have found so enthralling over the time we've been lurking!

Welcome. Yes the total lack of forensic evidence in this case worries me. Not sure how they hope to prove murder without this or a body?