GUILTY UK - Helen Bailey, 51, Royston, 11 April 2016 #3

[pinklilies]

The new blog was going to replace the Planet Grief one, not the website about her books.

Re the sewage system, I guess this was all explained to the jury during the house visit, so didn't need to be repeated in court.

And the finances: Both the sons are working, so perhaps they were giving him money towards the household expenses?

Thanks Cherwell. I've deleted my post.

 

[Squamous]

Just looking over the Cambridge News page - have we seen this little nugget before?!

"Mr Polley said the dog, trained to assist in the recovery of deceased victims, ‘indicated’ at a bucket of cleaning materials in the utility room, as well as a bench in the kitchen dining area and a pair of trousers in the main bedroom."

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/fianc-royston-author-helen-bailey-12518246

 

[Rayemonde]

You asking me multiple times to show my source could be conveyed that you think I'm making my comment up. I find that rude...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The rule here is that if we can't link to it, we can't mention it.

 

[BatFace]

It's common practice on websleuths to provide links where possible to information, so people can collaborate on drawing inferences that one person alone may have a different perspective on- it's part of what makes the discussions so fruitful. Asking for a link from another poster does not in any way imply disbelief or rudeness- this has arisen from a misunderstanding of forum conventions, that's all.

 

[ColourPurple]

From Friday January 27 evidence....

Couple had £20,000 in joint account

In the final prepared statement given to the jury, which existed before the interviews on July 12, Stewart said: “Helen and I both have personal bank accounts and one joint account. “We both contribute £600 per month to the joint account. This is for household expenditure. “I have not tried to set up new standing orders from Helen’s personal account to our joint account. “I have not changed the existing standing order from Helen’s account from £600 to £4,000 per month. We have in excess of £20,000 in our joint account’.”


My question is, where did ISs £600 contribution come from ?

We know he had not been in paid employment for some years ( exactly how many we don't know ) and we know that Helen was concerned re his possible financial vulnerability,to the extent of leaving him all her cash/assets. Which further indicates that he did not have large cash reserves himself.

He would not have been able to claim any form of unemployment benefit as he was living with Helen, as a couple - he was not a tenant or lodger, which would have allowed a benefits claim.
He may ( I am not sure ) have been able to claim a disability benefit, but I don't believe that would produce £600 per month.

And finally, although I realise that much of what comes out of ISs mouth is lies, surely he can't lie about this aspect, as it is very easy for the police to check the joint account finances.

I gues he could have recieved a life insurance pay out for the death of his wife but it wouldn't surprise me if he had lied to Helen about his income or savings and that they were rapidly coming to an end leaving him struggling to pay £600 a month. Con-men often do pretend to be wealthy themeselves to attract wealthy victims. Hopefully police have looked into his finances and we'll hear more detail.

 

[snoopydog]

I gues he could have recieved a life insurance pay out for the death of his wife but it wouldn't surprise me if he had lied to Helen about his income or savings and that they were rapidly coming to an end leaving him struggling to pay £600 a month. Con-men often do pretend to be wealthy themeselves to attract wealthy victims. Hopefully police have looked into his finances and we'll hear more detail.

It's possible he was receiving some kind of bereavement allowance. The rules for that have changed now but maybe in 2010 were different... this ceases when you remarry as far as I'm aware


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[ColourPurple]

I feel that the prosecutions case is weakened by having no strong motive - so far. Although one might yet come up during the trial. There was no event for IS to chose that day to murder HB, no waiting mistress or large debt. Due to his ineptness at covering his tracks, I think he might have just overdosed HB accidentally. Someone who is very heavily sedated might fall on their face and smother themselves. But if he or his defence does not bring up this during the trial - admit he drugged her then the jurors can not evaluate manslaughter rather than murder.


I am in two minds whether this was a deliberate or accidental killing (Little Boris was always murder). But he defiantly did drug her. Was he an evil sadistic psychopath enjoying manipulating people's minds or was he just an inept, lazy, malingering covert narcissist trying to grab the power in the relationship because she had the money. He did have a motive to drug her.


I am also now wondering why a highly sociable woman like HB saw so little of her family and friends - at least as a couple. Her brother John had met IS one or twice - even after a relationship of 5 years and living only a couple of hours apart. I wonder if all those Christmas days were spent only with his family. How lonely. Was he trying to put a wedge between HB and her family (she seemed to communicate at least with her mother by phone very regularly). Another technique of the abuser.

I think there are two clear financial motives:

1. That IS would benefit financially from Helen's death and thought he'd have POA if she was missing.
2. He had recently been in intensive care and may have realised that if he were to die before Helen then his sons would lose their home and would only inherit his minority share of the house value, a small amount in comparison to what they would inherit if Helen died first and then IS got his inheritance to pass on to them.

 

[Duchy]

Just looking over the Cambridge News page - have we seen this little nugget before?!

"Mr Polley said the dog, trained to assist in the recovery of deceased victims, ‘indicated’ at a bucket of cleaning materials in the utility room, as well as a bench in the kitchen dining area and a pair of trousers in the main bedroom."

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/fianc-royston-author-helen-bailey-12518246

Gosh...not seen that before...

 

[ColourPurple]

Just looking over the Cambridge News page - have we seen this little nugget before?!

"Mr Polley said the dog, trained to assist in the recovery of deceased victims, ‘indicated’ at a bucket of cleaning materials in the utility room, as well as a bench in the kitchen dining area and a pair of trousers in the main bedroom."

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/fianc-royston-author-helen-bailey-12518246

Very interesting. So Joe and Nick cleaned up after themselves and one of them left their trousers there...

On a serious note I hope police identified whose trousers they were and took fingerprints from the bucket.

 

[Duchy]

Very interesting. So Joe and Nick cleaned up after themselves and one of them left their trousers there...

On a serious note I hope police identified whose trousers they were and took fingerprints from the bucket.

Maybe that is the main reason he was arrested before body found?

 

[JudgeJudi]

Hello everyone. I’m new to this thread but it’s lovely to see some familiar faces here. IB told me about this fascinating case and, like all of you, I’m shocked beyond belief that any person could be murdered and disposed of in such a horrendous way. And then there’s poor little innocent Boris who was so callously and cruelly disposed of along with Helen.

It’s taken me the past three days to read everything from the very beginning, and that meant staying up until 2-3am each night. Congratulations to everyone who has contributed thus far. You’ve all done an amazing job. It’s no surprise that LE officers frequently come to WS to follow the thoughts of people who think outside the square and come up with some truly brilliant suggestions.

Our common goal is justice for those who no longer have a voice, and occasionally strong opinions can cause emotions to rise. In the end however, we’re all here for one reason. It must give some small degree of comfort to any family members or friends who visit WS to see how many people who, while not even knowing the victim, are prepared to work so incredibly hard to try and help bring these appalling criminals to account.

As a rule I always sit on the fence until I’ve heard both sides as there are always two sides to every story. However, IS appears to me to be 100% guilty and IMO there are no mitigating circumstances. He deserves to spend the rest of his miserable life locked up and having to endure all the prison system and its inmates can and will throw at him.

I have a tiny dog, a Pomeranian, and like Helen and Boris, we’re virtually joined at the hip. This just adds one further heartbreaking dimension to what was already one of the most heinous crimes I’ve ever heard of. To murder Helen by drugging her over a period of months to the point where she was totally incapable of defending herself, smothering/suffocating her and then disposing of her body in an active cesspool of excrement, shows that the perpetrator should be shown no mercy when he’s sentenced. My hope is that under schedule 21 section 5 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 (“a murder done for gain in furtherance of robbery or burglary, done for payment or done in the expectation of gain as a result of the death”) he receives a minimum of 30 years. I’m unsure about the UK but premeditation and poisoning are considered aggravating factors.

JJ

 

[Tortoise]

I've looked up the Air Cadets Bassingbourn Squadron that OS belonged to, to see what time they meet on Mondays, and it's 6:45pm to 9:45pm. It's at SG8 5LX, 5 miles from home, and 10 minutes by car. So he would have left home at around 6:30.

IS was in Cambridge at 6pm. That is a 30 minute drive away, so he would need to have left by 5:30pm.

OS says he saw his father

[FONT=&amp]“I would’ve gone home to change. I did see dad, it was a brief conversation because dad knows my Monday night routine.[/FONT]
[FONT=&amp]“It was normal. Everything was normal. I didn’t see Helen or the dog.[/FONT]

I'm not doubting OS' testimony, just trying to see how it fits. If OS was home before IS left at 5:30pm, but didn't need to leave himself for another whole hour, I wonder why the reference to the conversation being brief - dad knowing his 'Monday night routine' makes it sound quite rushed.

Perhaps he confused himself - the interaction was brief because IS was in a hurry to leave.

Then there is time unaccounted for that afternoon.

The trip from doctors to tip takes 11 minutes (according to Google maps)

If the timing of CCTV at Royston Recycling Centre is correct he would have had to have left the doctors by 2:51pm. Yet he didn't arrive at the doctors until 2:54pm, so the tip CCTV clock (3:02pm) must be wrong.

Going with the doctors records, he left there at 3:07pm. So he would have arrived at the tip at 3:18pm.

Strangely, Helen's phone disconnects from the network at 3:18pm. Did he do this in the car, to make it seem as if that was the time Helen left home, while he was out, and switched her phone off so he couldn't contact her?

So from 3:18 there is 1 hour and 42 minutes to fill until 5pm.

The solicitors is 7 minutes by car from the tip, and 5 minutes from home.

Even if he spent 42 minutes unloading boxes & duvet, and dropping off paperwork, there is still an hour missing.

I think he went home after the tip and had to look for Helen's paperwork before going to the solicitors. I wonder if the prosecution has more evidence of his car movements that day. They checked local CCTV and ANPR for Helen's car that morning, but did they leave it too late by the time he was declared a suspect, to check his movements on local cameras?


Another thing that I find strange is the Crown's opening statement -

[FONT=&amp]“A standing order from Bailey to Stewart was modified that same afternoon, and changed to the defendant’s advantage - a standing order from £600 to £4000 - to transfer from Helen’s account to Stewart’s. Although an attempt has been made to clear computer history at the house, this small fragment of information was found.”

This sounds as if it was successfully changed, so I can't understand the attempted access to her bank account at 7:58pm.


[/FONT]

 

[Tortoise]

Maybe he did not put all the proceeds of his house sale into the house in Royston or, possibly, his late wife had a life insurance where he would have been the beneficiary.

Yes, on that note, right there is a possible party with a vested interest in opening an investigation after these proceedings.

 

[Alyce]

Maybe he did not put all the proceeds of his house sale into the house in Royston or, possibly, his late wife had a life insurance where he would have been the beneficiary.

So, just musing along those lines.

His wife died in 2010, how long would that money last ? No mortgage, but has to support himself and two non working children.

House sale was 2014. If he retained most of this money for himself, then yes, he would still have funds to keep paying over what would amount to £7,200 per year into the household account.

However, if he put most of his house sale money into the purchase of Hartwell Lodge, then he might have been running out of cash....perhaps another reason that pushed him to take action when he did.
If this was the situation, I doubt he would want Helen to know just how short of cash he was.

It does seem clear , from the evidence, that he did not have detailed knowledge about Helen's bank accounts
Therefore, I expect the reverse is true and Helen would probably not have known if he was running on empty.

 

[Tasador]

This is my 1st post, so apologies if it goes in the wrong place. I have been following the story of Helen and wee Boris since I first heard on my car radio news that they were missing. I wondered if IS had been making vegetable smoothies for himself and Helen as a tonic with kale and other greens which would I think taste very bitter anyway. Helen was a tea lover and very particular about it I think, so the bitter taste could not be disguised in my opinion.

 

[Duchy]

Great to see you in this thread JJ!

 

[Alyce]

Big thanks to everybody & the ususal suspects for Friday's updates! :loveyou:


I would have been so interested to hear more about the sewage system and the connection between the cesspit and the septic tank, but if that isn't happening, so be it.
The pictures and the testimonials about the excavation are impressive enough. If anything, they prove that he meant bussiness and was never planning to remove her remains. I suspect he must have measured the opening beforehand, to see if she would fit through. IMHO he would not, given his expanding waistline.

If I read the comments well, HB was robbed twice after JS' death: once by IS and before that by her husband's associate in the other firm, the one who testified on Friday saying he had no financial claims on her???

:gaah::gaah:

BIB I had exactly that conversation this morning with OH !!

and, it made me think, again, of the telephone call to the police...the part where IS is asked to describe Helen.
He can't remember eye colour or height accurately but when asked about build he says
.....slim, that's easy.

 

[Duchy]

Another thing that I find strange is the Crown's opening statement -

[FONT=&]“A standing order from Bailey to Stewart was modified that same afternoon, and changed to the defendant’s advantage - a standing order from £600 to £4000 - to transfer from Helen’s account to Stewart’s. Although an attempt has been made to clear computer history at the house, this small fragment of information was found.”

This sounds as if it was successfully changed, so I can't understand the attempted access to her bank account at 7:58pm.


[/FONT]

It doesn't add up does it. Also the bit about the money going into Stuart's account - whereas he says it is a joint account - the one with 20k must be Santander 123 current account - you can have up to 20k in it and earn 3% interest (then, it's gone down now) and also get cash back on direct debits for utilities, council tax and things like that. You have to make sure £500 is put in the account each month.

 

[Alyce]

I've looked up the Air Cadets Bassingbourn Squadron that OS belonged to, to see what time they meet on Mondays, and it's 6:45pm to 9:45pm. It's at SG8 5LX, 5 miles from home, and 10 minutes by car. So he would have left home at around 6:30.

IS was in Cambridge at 6pm. That is a 30 minute drive away, so he would need to have left by 5:30pm.

OS says he saw his father


I'm not doubting OS' testimony, just trying to see how it fits. If OS was home before IS left at 5:30pm, but didn't need to leave himself for another whole hour, I wonder why the reference to the conversation being brief - dad knowing his 'Monday night routine' makes it sound quite rushed.

Perhaps he confused himself - the interaction was brief because IS was in a hurry to leave.

Then there is time unaccounted for that afternoon.

The trip from doctors to tip takes 11 minutes (according to Google maps)

If the timing of CCTV at Royston Recycling Centre is correct he would have had to have left the doctors by 2:51pm. Yet he didn't arrive at the doctors until 2:54pm, so the tip CCTV clock (3:02pm) must be wrong.

Going with the doctors records, he left there at 3:07pm. So he would have arrived at the tip at 3:18pm.

Strangely, Helen's phone disconnects from the network at 3:18pm. Did he do this in the car, to make it seem as if that was the time Helen left home, while he was out, and switched her phone off so he couldn't contact her?

So from 3:18 there is 1 hour and 42 minutes to fill until 5pm.

The solicitors is 7 minutes by car from the tip, and 5 minutes from home.

Even if he spent 42 minutes unloading boxes & duvet, and dropping off paperwork, there is still an hour missing.

I think he went home after the tip and had to look for Helen's paperwork before going to the solicitors. I wonder if the prosecution has more evidence of his car movements that day. They checked local CCTV and ANPR for Helen's car that morning, but did they leave it too late by the time he was declared a suspect, to check his movements on local cameras?


Another thing that I find strange is the Crown's opening statement -

[FONT=&]“A standing order from Bailey to Stewart was modified that same afternoon, and changed to the defendant’s advantage - a standing order from £600 to £4000 - to transfer from Helen’s account to Stewart’s. Although an attempt has been made to clear computer history at the house, this small fragment of information was found.”

This sounds as if it was successfully changed, so I can't understand the attempted access to her bank account at 7:58pm.


[/FONT]

I puzzled over this bit as well.
Hartwell Lodge to the doctors is 10 minutes.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/S...7b8ef29a414!2m2!1d-0.0340279!2d52.0480179!3e0

So that fits with IS talking about the dog walker evidence ( fictional ) at 2.45pm, just as he is leaving Hartwell Lodge, to get to the doctors at 2.54pm
His departure must have been earlier than 3.07 though ( the nurse said it was a very quick appointment, I thought a few minutes was the wording used - will check back )

Surgery to the tip is 7 minutes - and he is shown on their clock at 3.02pm

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/R...bbb6163829e435b!2m2!1d-0.0533713!2d52.0774188

proving he could not have gone home after the doctors and then back to the tip - there isnt time. Again, could explain why the nurse was asked about the shirt, as must have had same clothes on at tip, where he is caught on cctv. And, as you said earlier Tortoise, he might have thrown a jumper over the shirt, to try and look different.


Royston tip to Hartwell Lodge - 5 minutes

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/R...d6c67b8ef29a414!2m2!1d-0.0340279!2d52.0480179

Even assuming that one of the timings is slightly wrong, either the doctors log out or the refuse tip, and that these are google best estimates of drive times, it still seems that at 3.18pm he would not be back at Hartwell Lodge.

Which is strange. Because surely, with Helen's phone still switched on, he would not want to be driving around with it in his car. He would have left the phone at the house ( I think ) and then would switch it off when he gets back from his trips, indicating that this is the moment when Helen leaves home, and switches off her phone so as not to be contacted by anyone.

 

[Tortoise]

Just looking over the Cambridge News page - have we seen this little nugget before?!

"Mr Polley said the dog, trained to assist in the recovery of deceased victims, ‘indicated’ at a bucket of cleaning materials in the utility room, as well as a bench in the kitchen dining area and a pair of trousers in the main bedroom."

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/fianc-royston-author-helen-bailey-12518246

That was on their search of April 22nd! The same date as his first recorded police interview.