GUILTY UK - Kempsey, found in a septic tank, Jul'19, missing in 1982 - Brenda Venables *husband arrested*

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Whitehall 1212 said:
For some years now the UK have had what are known as PolSa (Police Search Advisors). They are officers specially trained in how items of all sizes, including bodies/abducted persons can be concealed. This also includes items relating to criminal conduct and explosives. These days a PolSA would most likely be consulted by the officer with responsibility for the missing person investigation.

In terms of searching for people and bodies I would say that the UK's voluntary Mountain and Lowland Search and Rescue Teams are highly skilled. Using various search techniques depending on the terrain, search dogs and drones in close liaison with the Police, who always have primacy with missing persons.
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This was forty years ago though. Imagine how many different situations have been encountered in that length of time.

There was a case local to me a few years ago where the killer hid his victim's body in a churchyard, in the grave of a recently deceased relative. One of the detectives was quoted as saying that they had never come across this before. I had wondered how many people had got away with disposing of a body in this way over the years. Best place to hide a book being in a library, sort of thing.
 
Cherwell said:
I'm not sure what point you're making. Did they know there was a septic tank? I don't think they were all that common, even back then. Most houses are on mains drainage.
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My point is simple.

I cannot count the cases I read about bodies found in:
- unused wells/deserted mines' pits and
TANKS: water/septic/oil ones.

It was obvious that this house had a separate septic tank.
Just a simple demand of a plan of this property would have solved this case and the monster locked in a cell where he belonged.

It was also obvious that he had a motive and as he wasn't seen moving out of the property at that time - it meant the body of his poor wife was hidden there.
 
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Cherwell said:
This was forty years ago though. Imagine how many different situations have been encountered in that length of time.

There was a case local to me a few years ago where the killer hid his victim's body in a churchyard, in the grave of a recently deceased relative. One of the detectives was quoted as saying that they had never come across this before. I had wondered how many people had got away with disposing of a body in this way over the years. Best place to hide a book being in a library, sort of thing.
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Burying lodgers in already occupied graves can't be the easiest deposition method to accomplish. Of course it could make detection subsequently less likely, depending on other measures taken. Not forgetting sufficient evidence can lead to a conviction without a body!

I'm sure a farm has historically provided many opportunities to dispose of a body.

With modern investigative techniques that loophole has been pretty much closed.

After the murders of Helen Bailey and Brenda Venables, I would think identifying if there are underground facilities has become a standard line of enquiry.
 
Cherwell said:
Well, they didn't find the septic tank, did they?
I'm imagining it naturally overgrown with grass.

Close to my house is a storm drain which runs from the road, past the whole of my garden and into a grassy field beyond, where it discharges into a ditch further down. There are inspection covers similar to the one on that septic tank, but they get completely overgrown by the grass. You need a spade to dig the turf off. I've had to show people where they are more than once, if you didn't know they existed you would be none the wiser.

Now obviously the cover can't have been that overgrown, because DV lifted it to hide the body. But if all of the concrete surround was under grass, it wouldn't have been that difficult to hide the rest.
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This is a point that keeps me wondering. The state that the septic tank was in, and its surroundings.
If the area was overgrown, with bushes or with weeds, you'd expect to find traces. Disturbances. Traces from someone who has had to move through the bushes with a body. Or traces that the lid had been lifted.

Our own septic tank, now no longer in use, was located at the end of the lawn (cough) and it was covered with grass. The lid was a concrete slab that covered the entire tank, on top of it was grass on 5 cm of soil, that grass never grew as healthy as the rest of the lawn.
We had to open the tank a few times, wich meant removing sods of grass and lifting the concrete slab. Never managed to put everything back the way it was.
IMO it is difficult to remove an overgrown cover and put it back as if nothing has happened. Even more so if DV hid the body at night or at the break of dawn.

Cherwell said:
I'm not sure what point you're making. Did they know there was a septic tank? I don't think they were all that common, even back then. Most houses are on mains drainage.
Click to expand...

Septic tanks were / are the norm in rural areas where houses are few and far away. The police should have been aware. Apparently they missed the entire plot.
 
ZaZara said:
This is a point that keeps me wondering. The state that the septic tank was in, and its surroundings.
If the area was overgrown, with bushes or with weeds, you'd expect to find traces. Disturbances. Traces from someone who has had to move through the bushes with a body. Or traces that the lid had been lifted.

Our own septic tank, now no longer in use, was located at the end of the lawn (cough) and it was covered with grass. The lid was a concrete slab that covered the entire tank, on top of it was grass on 5 cm of soil, that grass never grew as healthy as the rest of the lawn.
We had to open the tank a few times, wich meant removing sods of grass and lifting the concrete slab. Never managed to put everything back the way it was.
IMO it is difficult to remove an overgrown cover and put it back as if nothing has happened. Even more so if DV hid the body at night or at the break of dawn.



Septic tanks were / are the norm in rural areas where houses are few and far away. The police should have been aware. Apparently they missed the entire plot.
Click to expand...
It wasn't missed because it was camouflaged by vegetation though. I suspect that the police were in the mindset of only looking for a missing person.

DV was obviously not viewed with enough suspicion, being the last person to see her alive.

Of course hindsight and forty years of advancement in investigation is a wonderful thing.

Retired West Mercia Police constable Peter Sharrock was among the search teams but told how the septic tank was apparently overlooked by those looking for 48-year-old Mrs Venables.

Mr Sharrock said he was not aware any officers searched the underground chamber, adding: 'I certainly never took part in searching the septic tank.

'I walked past it to get to the river area for searches.'

He added: 'Nobody mentioned searching the tank.'

He described how 2019 media coverage about the discovery of human remains triggered a memory of what he now knew to have been the cesspit.

In his statement, read to court on Thursday, he said: 'I am aware from recent newspaper reports a body has been found in a septic tank.

'As soon as I saw an aerial view of the site, I remembered that I'd seen then, what I saw now.'

He added: 'I recall seeing a lump of concrete in the yard of the farmhouse.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Remains of woman found in cesspit 37 years after she disappeared

Retired pig farmer David Venables, 89, is said by prosecutors to have 'got away with murder' for nearly 40 years by allegedly disposing of his wife Brenda Venables, in his septic tank (pictured)
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk
 
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ZaZara said:
This is a point that keeps me wondering. The state that the septic tank was in, and its surroundings.
If the area was overgrown, with bushes or with weeds, you'd expect to find traces. Disturbances. Traces from someone who has had to move through the bushes with a body. Or traces that the lid had been lifted.

Our own septic tank, now no longer in use, was located at the end of the lawn (cough) and it was covered with grass. The lid was a concrete slab that covered the entire tank, on top of it was grass on 5 cm of soil, that grass never grew as healthy as the rest of the lawn.
We had to open the tank a few times, wich meant removing sods of grass and lifting the concrete slab. Never managed to put everything back the way it was.
IMO it is difficult to remove an overgrown cover and put it back as if nothing has happened. Even more so if DV hid the body at night or at the break of dawn.



Septic tanks were / are the norm in rural areas where houses are few and far away. The police should have been aware. Apparently they missed the entire plot.
Click to expand...
It wasn't missed because it was hidden though:

Retired West Mercia Police constable Peter Sharrock was among the search teams but told how the septic tank was apparently overlooked by those looking for 48-year-old Mrs Venables.

Mr Sharrock said he was not aware any officers searched the underground chamber, adding: 'I certainly never took part in searching the septic tank.

'I walked past it to get to the river area for searches.'

He added: 'Nobody mentioned searching the tank.'

He described how 2019 media coverage about the discovery of human remains triggered a memory of what he now knew to have been the cesspit.

In his statement, read to court on Thursday, he said: 'I am aware from recent newspaper reports a body has been found in a septic tank.

'As soon as I saw an aerial view of the site, I remembered that I'd seen then, what I saw now.'


He added: 'I recall seeing a lump of concrete in the yard of the farmhouse.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Remains of woman found in cesspit 37 years after she disappeared

Retired pig farmer David Venables, 89, is said by prosecutors to have 'got away with murder' for nearly 40 years by allegedly disposing of his wife Brenda Venables, in his septic tank (pictured)
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk
 
ZaZara said:
Septic tanks were / are the norm in rural areas where houses are few and far away. The police should have been aware. Apparently they missed the entire plot
Click to expand...

This part of Worcestershire is near to the inspirational places for the setting of "The Archers"

Maybe is was a time when even policemen felt that Elgar's County of beautiful scenery was just like the radio show:

"an everyday story of country folk" where all was wholesome and peaceful.
 
I'm so glad the Jury found him guilty. Poor Brenda, what a terrible end to her life and then he just let her rot in the septic tank for all those years.
And if that wasn't bad enough, he then sold the house including his entombed wife to an unsuspecting relative. I hope he had many sleepless nights over the years and that he has a miserable time in prison. Moo
 
Pig farmer, 89, who murdered wife was known as 'Dirty David' by locals

A pig farmer who murdered his wife and dumped her body in a septic tank so he could have an affair with another woman was known locally as 'Dirty David' because he slept with so many mistresses.

David Venables, 89, was convicted of murder following a month-long trial on Friday, decades after killing wife Brenda, then 48, at their home in Kempsey, Worcestershire, in May 1982.

Police had originally treated Brenda's disappearance as a missing person inquiry and never searched the tank, but finally found her skull and other bones when a cesspit was drained in 2019 by Andrew Venables, who had bought the farm from his uncle.


Venables had begun a series of affairs with other women throughout the marriage and the court heard how he 'wanted his wife out the way' so he could resume a long-standing sexual relationship with another woman named Lorraine Styles, who had a carer for his mother.

He also bragged about his affairs, leading to workers on his 440-acre pig farm to refer to him as 'Dirty David', The Mirror reports.

One former farm hand told the newspaper: 'It was all a long time ago, but those of us who were around back then remember David well. He was a ladies man and clearly wasn’t the sort of guy who was happy settling for just the one lady.

'Poor Brenda had her problems. She was an old-fashioned housewife-type and desperately wanted children. For whatever reason, it didn’t happen for them. I think it ruined their marriage and led to David playing away from home.

'Everyone knew about Lorraine, they’d been at it for years. But honestly, she wasn’t the only one. It was different times back then, men thought they could have any woman they wanted, even if they were married.'


BBM

Duly noted...

Would a court transcript become available? I have so many questions about this case. Not so much about DV as a perp, although I find the alleged motive hard to believe, but the legal points involved.

If I understand the news well, DV was convicted for murder without any description of how that murder was committed? Or did the autopsy come up with indications? But nothing is mentioned in the press.

IMO he was the most obvious person to hide the body, but how was this elevated to murder in legal terms?

On the CPS webpage it says

Despite these challenges, the police and CPS were able to piece together a compelling case that proved Venables was the only person with knowledge of the tank as well as the motive to rid himself of his wife. Venables was found to be responsible after the CPS proved that Mrs Venables was not capable of replacing the tank's lid, even if she had considered killing herself in that manner.

Farmer convicted of 40-year-old murder of missing wife | The Crown Prosecution Service

It is all water under the bridge now, but a live blog of the court sessions would have been helpful.
 
ZaZara said:
Would a court transcript become available? I have so many questions about this case. Not so much about DV as a perp, although I find the alleged motive hard to believe, but the legal points involved.

If I understand the news well, DV was convicted for murder without any description of how that murder was committed? Or did the autopsy come up with indications? But nothing is mentioned in the press.

IMO he was the most obvious person to hide the body, but how was this elevated to murder in legal terms?
Click to expand...

It is not necessary to show how the victim was killed. it is often very difficult for a post mortem to provide a cause of death with skeletal remains or when a body is badly decomposed. There was no cause of death identified in this case, owing to the extent of decomposition.

Murder is a Common Law offence, in that it was made through the annals of the history of Britain and its colonies, from the precedents of Judges rather than being from statutory law, i.e. that which the state has created, such as in the UK Parliament.

Murder requires both a guilty act (actus reus) PHYSICAL ACT and a guilty mind (mens rea) INTENT

To convict a defendant of murder the following points must be proved:

1. The victim must have been a 'person in being' (excludes a baby in the womb)

2. The victim must have died

3. The victims death must have been caused by an act (or omission) of the defendant

4. The killing must be shown to be unlawful (i.e. not a reasonable act of self-defence or defending others, a doctor withdrawing life-support)

5. The mens rea must also be shown beyond reasonable doubt, that being to kill of cause grievous bodily harm

For DV points 1 and 2 would have been demonstrated easily by the prosecution from the DNA identification and medical evidence. BV was identified as such, she had been a person in being and she had died. These were not in dispute.

It was then for the prosecution to also prove 3,4 and 5 beyond all reasonable doubt. These were proven to the satisfaction of the jury, 10-2 majority.

The fact that BV was found in the septic tank shows that BV was concealed. The jury were obviously satisfied that BV, even with depression, would not have chosen such a way to commit suicide and also that is was physically not possible for her to pull the septic lid back on, from within. Neither were the jury satisfied that BV met her death at the hands of a stranger, who happened to know where the septic tank was, and then took her back there. Therefore the jury decided that it was beyond reasonable doubt that DV put BV in the septic tank.

BUT that alone would be an offence of obstructing a Coroner or preventing a lawful burial....NOT murder.

BV was 48 when she disappeared. She had seen a psychiatrist who had diagnosed depression and noted DV's treatment of her. BV did not have any identified physical health conditions that may have caused her sudden death. If this was the case why would DV place BV in the septic tank and not call for an ambulance/doctor. Anyway DV said she went missing not that BV collapsed at home/fell, knocked her head and died and DV decided to put BV in the septic tank rather than call for help!

The jury were presented with evidence of DV's treatment of BV, his philandering and that they had not shared the same bed in the three years before BV's death. They had not had intercourse since the late 1960's. These statements were from the psychiatrists notes. DV had previously said they went to bed together and in the morning when he awoke, BV had gone. He was shown to have lied in Court and to have presented a rosy picture of their marriage that was blatantly not true. His apparent lack of concern/worry/sadness at BV having gone missing in the weeks, months and years ahead demonstrated a continued callousness.

The majority jury decided that the circumstantial evidence, based on witness evidence from the time and medical evidence, together with DV having been shown to have lied to the Court meant that BV had been been killed unlawfully, that DV was the perpetrator and that it was demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt. It does not have to show that DV intended to kill BV, just that that jury are satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that DV intended BV serious harm.

You may not consider it to be entirely black and white. Your uncertainly is echoed by there being a majority verdict, where two jurors were not persuaded by the evidence. There is rarely a smoking gun. This is a matter of the evidence being considered as a whole and deciding for oneself.

This process is the whole basis for jury trial, when a defendant is judged by their peers based only on the evidence presented in court. It's not perfect, as nothing can be, but it is the best system there is in a democratic society.
 
Whitehall 1212 said:
It is not necessary to show how the victim was killed. it is often very difficult for a post mortem to provide a cause of death with skeletal remains or when a body is badly decomposed. There was no cause of death identified in this case, owing to the extent of decomposition.

Murder is a Common Law offence, in that it was made through the annals of the history of Britain and its colonies, from the precedents of Judges rather than being from statutory law, i.e. that which the state has created, such as in the UK Parliament.

Murder requires both a guilty act (actus reus) PHYSICAL ACT and a guilty mind (mens rea) INTENT

To convict a defendant of murder the following points must be proved:

1. The victim must have been a 'person in being' (excludes a baby in the womb)

2. The victim must have died

3. The victims death must have been caused by an act (or omission) of the defendant

4. The killing must be shown to be unlawful (i.e. not a reasonable act of self-defence or defending others, a doctor withdrawing life-support)

5. The mens rea must also be shown beyond reasonable doubt, that being to kill of cause grievous bodily harm

For DV points 1 and 2 would have been demonstrated easily by the prosecution from the DNA identification and medical evidence. BV was identified as such, she had been a person in being and she had died. These were not in dispute.

It was then for the prosecution to also prove 3,4 and 5 beyond all reasonable doubt. These were proven to the satisfaction of the jury, 10-2 majority.

The fact that BV was found in the septic tank shows that BV was concealed. The jury were obviously satisfied that BV, even with depression, would not have chosen such a way to commit suicide and also that is was physically not possible for her to pull the septic lid back on, from within. Neither were the jury satisfied that BV met her death at the hands of a stranger, who happened to know where the septic tank was, and then took her back there. Therefore the jury decided that it was beyond reasonable doubt that DV put BV in the septic tank.

BUT that alone would be an offence of obstructing a Coroner or preventing a lawful burial....NOT murder.

BV was 48 when she disappeared. She had seen a psychiatrist who had diagnosed depression and noted DV's treatment of her. BV did not have any identified physical health conditions that may have caused her sudden death. If this was the case why would DV place BV in the septic tank and not call for an ambulance/doctor. Anyway DV said she went missing not that BV collapsed at home/fell, knocked her head and died and DV decided to put BV in the septic tank rather than call for help!

The jury were presented with evidence of DV's treatment of BV, his philandering and that they had not shared the same bed in the three years before BV's death. They had not had intercourse since the late 1960's. These statements were from the psychiatrists notes. DV had previously said they went to bed together and in the morning when he awoke, BV had gone. He was shown to have lied in Court and to have presented a rosy picture of their marriage that was blatantly not true. His apparent lack of concern/worry/sadness at BV having gone missing in the weeks, months and years ahead demonstrated a continued callousness.

The majority jury decided that the circumstantial evidence, based on witness evidence from the time and medical evidence, together with DV having been shown to have lied to the Court meant that BV had been been killed unlawfully, that DV was the perpetrator and that it was demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt. It does not have to show that DV intended to kill BV, just that that jury are satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that DV intended BV serious harm.

You may not consider it to be entirely black and white. Your uncertainly is echoed by there being a majority verdict, where two jurors were not persuaded by the evidence. There is rarely a smoking gun. This is a matter of the evidence being considered as a whole and deciding for oneself.

This process is the whole basis for jury trial, when a defendant is judged by their peers based only on the evidence presented in court. It's not perfect, as nothing can be, but it is the best system there is in a democratic society.
Click to expand...

Thank you. That clarification is really helpful. IMO it was obvious that DV was the most likely person to have put BV into the tank, and also that this wasn't a suicide or an act by a stranger. So the next steps to build the conviction of DV as a murderer in the sense of the Common Law are tiny steps, and there are a lot of them.

I guess the Coroner delayed his case so that it would not interfere with the conclusions of the jury.
 
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