I feel this is how it stands at the moment based on the small amount we know ...
Rape charge ..id "be sure" enough to go guilty without any further thought
I feel with the closing speeches prosecution will again focus on the lies and past convictions and his further actions of sexual deviance that night.
The defence ( going last ) will then try to push to the jury that the lies "could" be for a different reason
The tight timeline
The inconclusive post mortem
The screams from all witnesses put them at a time when at best PR was back at his car
The judge as we know will then direct the to look at each charge separately and say they have to "be sure" she was dead when he left the park or be sure he put her in the river himself
I'm not 100% sure i could "be sure" on the murder
I thinks its all going to boil down to whether the Jury "want him to be guilty" so much they are blindsided by the facts ....or what they have seen and heard in court that we haven't is more compelling
I'm not sure they can want him to be guilty? Surely they can only judge on the balance of evidence and the way that can be interpreted within the law. You can never be 100% sure it's mainly sure.
We don't know what the jury knows but from the very small amount we do know rape is a violent act which would cause harm which could lead to death and which he could have Stopped. That would be murder.
He stalked her and took her to another place - again opportunities to stop or to just rape. He could have done something in the Endsleigh Centre - dark, no cameras.
Whether she was dead or unconscious when put in the river if she died as a result of that act. That would be murder.
For me I can't see any other way in which I think I could reasonably explain his actions before or after that happened. Especially the later show of confidence that he wasn't going to get caught.
For me also I can't see any other reasonable way in which she could have ended up in the river given what we know from the expert witnesses on her ability to walk and run, from what I've seen of the river in the park and from where she was found.
Especially from where he claims to have left her which would have involved heading into the dark after a rape and getting to the river.
The judge at his previous trial believed his actions were not opportunistic. Therefore why would he change now?
His previous actions were geared towards terrorising women.
From what little we've seen of the expert testimony I felt what the pathologist couldn't absolutely exclude and what he felt was more likely of the explanations differed. I felt like he veered towards asphyxiation. Whilst that could just be the way it was reported the prosecution said they do not have prove cause of death anyway.
But thats my opinion and is only based on what we've heard which is a fraction of what the jury have heard.
But based on everything taken together I think he's guilty of the rape, which is an act which would cause harm that could result in death. He's guilty of murder.