Found Deceased UK - Nicola Bulley Last Seen Walking Dog Near River - St Michaels on Wyre (Lancashire) #11

[poirotoupierrot]

I'm increasingly open to most things but I do have trouble with the notion of Nicola willingly abandoning Willow.

Same. Which is why I assumed abduction. But if someone knew she was leaving they could make sure the dog was OK? Hr leaving it off the lead would suggest not going of her own volition.

 

[pineapple23]

The bench and location of the harness are red herrings, as discussed earlier.

In your opinion perhaps. Theories may vary... Me I'm still open to various things..

 

[WSA01]

Re-reading the thread, if the harness was found midway down the bank as suggested, that makes is strongly likely that NB was nearer the river edge, IF there is a deep hole underwater then could it be possible that by sheer incredibly bad luck she fell straight down that hole (if as suggested it's about 20 ft deep she'd surely have died and if it was narrow maybe her body is stuck in the hole)

It does feel like the police divers would have found her though?

 

[kittythehare]

This case is diminishing from the media it feels today - I’ve got awful feeling this will become unsolved case

It may well happen like that.
Missing cases often take years, some never have resolution.
Search and Rescue and Search and Recover do not always find people in the water,
They can only try.

 

[cottonweaver]

This garage, along with the Grapes pub, is the only business in the immediate vicinity. Very hard to believe LE waited till Thursday 9th to ask for CCTV for the day(s) leading up to NB’s disappearance. It’s almost as though they were pre-occupied with other another theory. MOO

It reads as if it's two separate visits:
'
'They had already taken images from the day of her disappearance'
“These officers were different to the ones in uniform, they seemed very assertive.”


Officers in uniform on first visit took footage of day of her disappearance and then 2nd visit - last Thursday - was the plain clothes police. ( asking for cctv coverage of 24 hours before the last sighting of the mum.)

Two 'suspicious' men spotted by witness near Nicola Bulley's dog-walking route

A WITNESS told police he spotted two men acting suspiciously — close to Nicola Bulley’s dog-walk route the day before she disappeared. It came as cops took CCTV footage from a garage in St Michael’…

www.thesun.co.uk

can you spot the camera?

Google Maps

Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps.

www.google.com

 

[kittythehare]

Re-reading the thread, if the harness was found midway down the bank as suggested, that makes is strongly likely that NB was nearer the river edge, IF there is a deep hole underwater then could it be possible that by sheer incredibly bad luck she fell straight down that hole (if as suggested it's about 20 ft deep she'd surely have died and if it was narrow maybe her body is stuck in the hole)

It does feel like the police divers would have found her though?

The dog could have moved the harness.
Water movement could have moved Nicola..

 

[kittythehare]

It reads as if it's two separate visits:
'
'They had already taken images from the day of her disappearance'
“These officers were different to the ones in uniform, they seemed very assertive.”


Officers in uniform on visit visit took footage and then 2nd visit - last Thursday - was the plain clothes police.

Two 'suspicious' men spotted by witness near Nicola Bulley's dog-walking route

A WITNESS told police he spotted two men acting suspiciously — close to Nicola Bulley’s dog-walk route the day before she disappeared. It came as cops took CCTV footage from a garage in St Michael’…

www.thesun.co.uk

can you spot the camera?

Google Maps

Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps.

www.google.com

That was my reading of it too.

 

[wrpd]

IMO I agree with you 100%. Finding an untethered dog without its owner is unusual, finding a mobile phone without its owner, even more unusual. So to come across both of these in one place would immediately raise red flags to me personally & I would check the dogs collar for a number & go from there. I just couldn’t/wouldn’t walk away from this situation no matter how busy I might be, but that’s just me. MOO

Completely agree. This part of the timeline must be very difficult for the family.

 

[Beginnersleuth]

Hired to do what? By whom?

I thought this as well because to leave no evidence and it be so quick sounds really professional - like a hit job, no idea who would hire them.

 

[ayrshireguy]

Not sure. Something made the boss drive a fair distance to meet with her locally in Garstang. Something was important enough that they needed to be face to face to discuss rather than FaceTime/ zoom.
Most docs / files can be transferred online ..

As soon as she got back from that meeting she told her parents to stay longer .. so she could have a zoom meet. Wasn’t planned or else she’d have already scheduled extra time from her parents and wouldn’t have to ask them.
She therefore may not have let her partner know everything as he wasn’t in. I have lots of thoughts on this, don’t you?

IF this is financial related and these two 'suspicious' men were involved this may turn out to be much bigger.

A targeted attack with some level of planning. NB will be long gone.

 

[zellner]

I see it as perfectly possible that up in the top field, where she was last sighted, NB could have been accosted by someone who had been watching from behind the fence of the Rowanwater site. Bundled her into a vehicle or detained her in that site temporarily and then who knows…

Phone could have been returned to the bench as a decoy.

I don’t know what the CCTV situation is around the back of the Rowanwater site but I haven’t heard it mentioned as being covered. I know LE have said they have searched Rowanwater properties but NB could have easily been whisked away before they got there.

 

[Beginnersleuth]

I thought this as well because to leave no evidence and it be so quick sounds really professional - like a hit job, no idea who would hire them.

I think tragic accident or highly planned abduction with more than one person, and would suspect someone that she knew or was familiar with on some level. No idea who.
Wonder if there’s more feeling of what’s gone on in the village - hasn’t been any neighbours on camera saying much etc vs normal reporting.
Maybe because friends have been quite forthcoming and proactive about it and seem very confident in front of the cameras that the news outlets haven’t needed to look elsewhere?

MOO

 

[WSA01]

The bench and location of the harness are red herrings, as discussed earlier.

why are they red herrings?

 

[Hel44]

My best guess (MOO) would be that he is frustrated at the lack of intense searches in the local area and failure to consider other hypotheses despite there being no evidence for the current hypothesis. I’m sure if it was our family member missing we would feel the same.

 

[cottonweaver]

I see it as perfectly possible that up in the top field, where she was last sighted, NB could have been accosted by someone who had been watching from behind the fence of the Rowanwater site. Bundled her into a vehicle or detained her in that site temporarily and then who knows…

Phone could have been returned to the bench as a decoy.

I don’t know what the CCTV situation is around the back of the Rowanwater site but I haven’t heard it mentioned as being covered. I know LE have said they have searched Rowanwater properties but NB could have easily been whisked away before they got there.

This is a good clip if anyone wants to visualise the top field.

It's an American Youtuber but it's the clearest - and only - animated map I have seen which tracks NB's route. Better than some of the other maps imo

Quite short but useful. Starts around 2mins in, ends around 6mins

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[sriraaacha]

It doesn't matter where the phone/harness/lead were found imo because Willow could have easily moved any of them before the witness got there.

 

[zellner]

Thanks, been Googling for half an hour to try to understand "ordnance datum" but all I could conclude is that all 3 measuring sites use the same method so should be comparable and the one that is mainly quoted in this thread is the depth at the weir (0.4M) but the two upstream monitors are 7M leading me to think the weir measurement is after the weir - would make sense because the point of a weir is to hold back water like a dam so upstream will be deeper.

So what I'm getting at, is the water is deep near the bench - potentially 3-4 times the height of NB.

It has been explained before that the ‘Deep Hole’ warning sign attached to the tree by the bench is because the first few feet near the bank is shallow and rocky but in the centre of the river there it drops to 3-4 metres. My understanding from an interview with PF is that this hole has been searched more than once. It is possible that NB could have slipped or fell in for unknown reasons, lost footing on rocks and ended up struggling in the deep water. I still find it slightly implausible that the dog would not have gone in after her and also that the body would have then moved downstream fast enough for it not to be spotted. PF says that bodies tend to sink, in which case searching the hole and that area early on would have most likely found something but there’s nothing, so I am still of the view that an abduction from the top field is just as plausible a possibility as drowning.

 

[pineapple23]

My best guess (MOO) would be that he is frustrated at the lack of intense searches in the local area and failure to consider other hypotheses despite there being no evidence for the current hypothesis. I’m sure if it was our family member missing we would feel the same.

Plus imo he won't even want to think of the river accident theory as there is only one outcome with that.

 

[cottonweaver]

My best guess (MOO) would be that he is frustrated at the lack of intense searches in the local area and failure to consider other hypotheses despite there being no evidence for the current hypothesis. I’m sure if it was our family member missing we would feel the same.

yes but how could they have failed to consider other hypothesis if they have been - for the entire 2 weeks plus - been actively running down leads and inquiries which have nothing to do with being in the river?

When they say - as they did at the last press conference that they're currently working on 500 active lines/pieces of info, with 40 detectives on the job, that means they're intensively investigating. Surely? ( Those detectives aren't in rubber suits in boats)

They did the 1 mile radius land search early on and as early as 30th Jan they were appealing for dash cam footage from drivers through the village ( Link below)

Paul Ansell is definitely frustrated but who wouldn't be if their partner had gone missing and there was no evidence leading to a discovery or a crime?

30th Jan Missing dogwalker´s phone found on bench by river as police appeal...

 

[JaneDawn]

Agree dog owner routines are predictable, including locations likely to be, and I say this because I own a dog. In terms of the "window of opportunity", apparently she was spotted at 9.10 and phone found on the bench at 9.35. A lot can happen in 25 minutes. Just think of how people over the years have been abducted off the streets in a flash. They say she was logged on a Teams call, video off and on mute. If she had headphones on, she probably wouldn't have been aware of someone behind her. I can't imagine she'd have fallen into the river and not cried out for help. Also, can't believe she she'd travelled so far and fast, such that she was out of sight when her phone was found. These are just my thoughts....

I mentioned above about the possibility of NB on the Teams call listening through headphones and wondering if this was the case, where are the headphones? I have just come across this photo showing NB with phone headphones. I think it is highly probable that if she was on the Teams call, video off, mute on, she most likely would have been listening through headphones as many people, including me, do when on a Teams work call. If this was the case, then I find it highly strange that if for some reason she had to enter the river, she would have left the phone on the bench and advanced to the river with her headphones in her ears. Wouldn't you leave both phone and headphones together...or is it just me that does that? Just my thoughts...