UK UK - Suzy Lamplugh, 25, Fulham, 28 Jul 1986 #8

[Konstantin]

No one apparently recalls Suzy mentioning having lost any belongings over the weekend, but her colleagues do recall her being preoccupied with finding them on the Monday morning. Together with AL’s claim about never having visiting the pub, and the relief landlord’s claim that he found these items outside of the pub on the Sunday night, the evidence suggests they became lost - not stolen - on the Sunday, rather than the Friday.

There was a phone box just outside the pub right nearby the picnic benches where the pub temp landlord says he found SJL's diary, chequebook and postcard. So they could have dropped there if she sat down there to wait to use the call box on the Sunday after she had visited her parents. She may well have wanted to make calls out of the earshot of her flatmate. I think that's a good theory for how her items came to be there.

There are rumours but actually zero evidence that JC ever went to the PoW. It wasn't the sort of place SJL went to, it was a bit of a dingy old man's pub in 1986 by all accounts.

 

[RichardKimble]

There was a phone box just outside the pub right nearby the picnic benches where the pub temp landlord says he found SJL's diary, chequebook and postcard. So they could have dropped there if she sat down there to wait to use the call box on the Sunday after she had visited her parents. She may well have wanted to make calls out of the earshot of her flatmate. I think that's a good theory for how her items came to be there.

There are rumours but actually zero evidence that JC ever went to the PoW. It wasn't the sort of place SJL went to, it was a bit of a dingy old man's pub in 1986 by all accounts.

If the theory of flowers and champagne is JC then that's a place he's unlikely to visit also.

 

[WestLondoner]

I'm not sure it was a dodgy old man's pub in mid-86. MB, the full time landlord, told DV it had been radically done up and was taking good money. It was also used as a training pub, which argues that it was a bit of a model, rather than a dive.

AL said in a documentary around that time that he and SJL went to the pub on the Friday and she lost her stuff then. This cannot be true I'd they never went there, as he now says. Either way it seems clear she did go there, just maybe not with him.

The claim to have spoken to her on Sunday night and not knowing who rang whom is tosh, IMO. First, they'd been at the beach all day so why couldn't whatever needed to be discussed have been discussed then? And secondly, in 1986 you called landline to landline and you could tell the call was from a payphone from the background noise and the pips when money got low. How did either of them know where to reach the other unless both were at home?

For my money AL fibbed about all this to spare DL's feelings. SJL binned him on Friday and ignored him all weekend. If she spoke to him on Sunday it was to tell him to cotton on and stop bl00dy following her around; a call she woukd nit have wanted to make with Roger the Lodger eavesdropping.

DL's understanding of 'boyfriend' was almost certainly 'bloke she knows socially', not the 80s sense of 'sleeps with'.

 

[Konstantin]

I'm not sure it was a dodgy old man's pub in mid-86. MB, the full time landlord, told DV it had been radically done up and was taking good money. It was also used as a training pub, which argues that it was a bit of a model, rather than a dive.

That's very interesting. So SJL might have gone there socially then, perhaps not with AL. Especially as convenient for home.

The claim to have spoken to her on Sunday night and not knowing who rang whom is tosh

I've always thought that was AL bluffing because he was clearly in love with her or strong feelings and she'd seen him on Friday after him being away but apparently they'd not spent the night which tells you a lot about their relationship or lack of. Then she'd cold shouldered him all weekend.

Either there was no phone call and he'd said there was to spare himself the embarrassment of admitting he'd been dumped or to avoid the police thinking he had a motive to off her, or he knows exactly who called who. He couldn't have called her unless she was at home.

 

[SteveH]

Respectfully if people are going to make assertions about other people making false allegations they better get their story straight. Of course this is something that Cannan could never do.

A contributor said earlier: "Respectfully, if people are going to discuss an author’s views, I think it’s reasonable to suggest that they read their work first. Nowhere in DV’s book does he claim to ‘believe’ Cannan’s alibi."

Yet the same contributor said on 24 August: "DV says Cannan could account for his movements:" If DV didn't "believe" Cannan's story/alibi what in earth does this sentence mean? Or did the contributor themselves misrepresent DV?

However they kindly provided a link to a piece in which Videcette himself spoke:

"Cannan provided alibi witnesses to the police, which were accepted during the 1980s and through to the mid-nineties. But then in 2000, after these witnesses had passed away, the police decided that these witnesses were no longer suitable and began questioning the evidence that those alibi witnesses would have provided.

“I went right back to the beginning and investigated the case from the bottom up. Because my five-year investigation reaches a completely different conclusion as to what happened to Suzy and where she went on the afternoon she disappeared, along with uncovering a wealth of supporting evidence to this effect, I can say that I do not believe John Cannan was involved in her disappearance."

Suspect in disappearance of Suzy Lamplugh should not have been named - Property Industry Eye

Suspect in disappearance of Suzy Lamplugh should not have been named - Breaking news for estate agents and the residential property industry. Independent, unbiased, and factual reporting. A forum for discussion and debate of topics of the day. Subscribe for our free daily newsletter.

propertyindustryeye.com

Then on 22 September the same contributor wrote:

"From DV’s book (chapter 64):

We were particularly interested in Cannan’s whereabouts around the time Suzy had gone missing. We asked Cannan about his alibi and what he said next was rather interesting:

“My mother and I provided the Met with my simple alibi for 28 July 1986. We were in Birmingham nearly all day on Monday, 28 July. Had the Met acted quicker, my sister and brother-in-law would have provided 100 per cent watertight corroboration. Both, sadly, are now dead. What I do remember well is how frustrated and surprised we felt by the pedestrian pace of the Met to interview us all.”

DV later writes:

Back in the summer of 1990, following renewed media pressure about the case, the police had gone back to Cannan again and interviewed him at length over the summer months. They’d spoken with several people in the Birmingham area who’d confirmed that they had seen Cannan in the West Midlands on the day Suzy went missing. By September 1990, police said that no further questioning was planned, and by October 1990, police were adamant that there was no evidence to support a charge.

To say Cannan had selective amnesia doesn’t really seem fair."

In 2019 Videcette whinged to the Daily Mail:

"'I believe that I know who killed Suzy Lamplugh.

'I've named that person to the police. He is alive well and at large, and has remained at large for the last 30 years.

'Who knows what he's been doing in that time.'...

'They've had this information for over a month and they've dragged their heels.

'The Met's a massive organisation and I don't understand why they've got a live named suspect with all his details and they won't do anything about it.'"

Retired detective says he knows who killed Suzy Lamplugh

Retired Met detective David Videcette conducted a three-year re- investigation and believes prime suspect, convicted killer John Cannan, is innocent of the 1986 murder of Suzy Lamplugh.

www.dailymail.co.uk

They've had his information for over six years now - boy, that's REALLY dragging their heels if there is anything whatsoever to support Videcette's allegations. You know, like evidence. The Met must get crazy theories about this or that incident foisted on them multiple times everyday.

Name me ONE serious researcher who has said anything positive about Videcette's claims.

I am not going to waste my time reading a book by someone who is patently a charlatan. I can remember seeing an interview with David Icke once and he said that if a person hasn't read all his books they can't evaluate or criticize his views. Okay, so I suppose I now have to read his entire canon before I can say that he "believes that an inter-dimensional race of reptilian beings called the Archons have hijacked the earth and are stopping humanity from realising its true potential". Actually I think I'll just take Wikipedia's word for it thanks.

 

[rvlvr]

Yet the same contributor said on 24 August: "DV says Cannan could account for his movements:" If DV didn't "believe" Cannan's story/alibi what in earth does this sentence mean? Or did the contributor themselves misrepresent DV?

No misrepresentation here. An argument was being made that Cannan couldn’t account for his movements on the day of Suzy’s disappearance, but DV said Cannan could. And did. And that this alibi was apparently accepted by police for a number of years.

DV’s own research established some weak support for Cannan’s alibi. On the contrary, no evidence has been presented to contradict it. Coupled with everything else we know about this case and the absence of any evidence that Suzy was even murdered, never mind by whom/where/how/when, it’s reasonable for someone to say they believe Cannan had nothing to do with her disappearance, imo.

Perhaps one day the Met will surprise us with some kind of smoking gun that puts this case to bed. But I doubt it. I said yesterday that it’s pitiful how little they have to show for their efforts, but it’s probably bordering on the criminal given how much (public) money they’ve spent fruitlessly pursuing a single line of inquiry.

 

[Klclevi]

In Aus ( we have state based police forces) for cold cases rewards are offered . Generally up to $1 mil for information. Does this not happen in the UK?

 

[Klclevi]

I'm not sure it was a dodgy old man's pub in mid-86. MB, the full time landlord, told DV it had been radically done up and was taking good money. It was also used as a training pub, which argues that it was a bit of a model, rather than a dive.

AL said in a documentary around that time that he and SJL went to the pub on the Friday and she lost her stuff then. This cannot be true I'd they never went there, as he now says. Either way it seems clear she did go there, just maybe not with him.

The claim to have spoken to her on Sunday night and not knowing who rang whom is tosh, IMO. First, they'd been at the beach all day so why couldn't whatever needed to be discussed have been discussed then? And secondly, in 1986 you called landline to landline and you could tell the call was from a payphone from the background noise and the pips when money got low. How did either of them know where to reach the other unless both were at home?

For my money AL fibbed about all this to spare DL's feelings. SJL binned him on Friday and ignored him all weekend. If she spoke to him on Sunday it was to tell him to cotton on and stop bl00dy following her around; a call she woukd nit have wanted to make with Roger the Lodger eavesdropping.

DL's understanding of 'boyfriend' was almost certainly 'bloke she knows socially', not the 80s sense of 'sleeps with'.

Agree- its tosh. She kicked him to the curb on the Friday and he was not a happy camper - even 35 years later. I guess she could have called him on the Sunday just to placate him , but if so surely he would remember those details about who called who and so forth.

 

[WestLondoner]

I am not going to waste my time reading a book by someone who is patently a charlatan.

I wouldn't dismiss DV quite as quickly as that. He lays out quite clearly why the plod were so unhelpful. They'd nailed their colours to the Cannan mast and the trigger for the last lot of diggings they did seems to have been conversations he had with them where he raised doubts about Cannan. They then moved to reassert and reinsist on Cannan.

When he delved, with the original SIO, into who else was on the suspect grid, he found they'd never had one.

When he asked how they came to declare Cannan their prime suspect, it turns out there was nobody else.

When he asked how the 2000 investigation proceeded, he found they reinvestigated everyone previously cleared plus Cannan, and cleared them all again minus Cannan, therefore it was Cannan.

The fact they've done nothing about his findings in six years doesn't undermine DV, IMO. Look at how long it took them to admit they'd framed Stefan Kiszko: 15 years or something?

What does undermine DV is that his case doesn't stack up. He does not show the pub was empty and closed, nor does he show why CV or anyone else there would have murdered SJL or concealed any accidental death there. He does not show why anyone would choose a hiding place that would incriminate only one person, or at most two, were her body later to be found. He does not explain how this hiding place under a floor was not discovered a few years later when that floor was lowered during a rebuild. The mysterious calls related by CV could be sinister or he could be remembering what happened when. The name and phone number CV says he gave to the police in 1986, that they denied knowledge of in 1987, could be CV making it up, but they could also be the police being economical with the actualité and denying knowledge of a piece of evidence they had ineptly lost.

What he does show is that SJL may never have gone to 37SR and that the pub should have been searched on 28 or 29 July 1986. It was one of only a few places she might have been headed:

Her flat - searched
37SR - searched
123SR - searched
The PoW - not searched. Why not?

It's a clear procedural oversight from 1986, in other words, but it's not the answer.

DV also persuades me that we still haven't bottomed out what really happened at 37SR. HR said he heard a couple leaving, but he can't have done if she did not have the keys to get inside in the first place. The police found no sign anyone had been inside that day, which says she didn't have keys. And if she did have the keys, how did MG get in the same afternoon? The initial reconstruction of 37SR elicited no witnesses, a second one did, but funnily enough, while several people now claimed to have seen Mr Kipper, nobody remembered MG plus colleague's visits to 37SR when they made a lot more fuss - why not?

As I say, I reckon about 70% this was Cannan, not least because he had access to a place she could disappear into a short distance away, but there's no slam-dunk that points only to him.

 

[WestLondoner]

Agree- its tosh. She kicked him to the curb on the Friday and he was not a happy camper - even 35 years later. I guess she could have called him on the Sunday just to placate him , but if so surely he would remember those details about who called who and so forth.

He definitely got the bum's rush all weekend.

What she actually did on Friday is far from clear. AL was away Wednesday to Wednesday so you'd expect a bit of a reunion on Friday given she was not going to be seeing him on Saturday. Maybe they did go to the PoW as he later claimed (but no longer does), and maybe she did lose her stuff there; or maybe it was a very short "date" in which he was told essentially that he was on his way.

I am not sure whether she was invited to that 21st on the Saturday and brought along a different bloke as her +1, or whether she was not personally invited but came as the +1 of someone else, but either way that's the Saturday given over to someone else and not the bloke she's supposedly dating. Then on Sunday she goes to the beach without him, he follows, and then she leaves without him, and he follows again. She then went to her mother's house and home where Roger the Lodger was waiting. If she felt the need that Sunday to emphasise to AL that he really did need to sling his hook, she's going to struggle to do so in private in either of those places, and he needs to be at home first. So conceivably she does so from the pub payphone which, if you look at the map, she drove right past to get from her mother's house to her flat.

AS conceded that things were altered in his book but that they weren't important. Until you've convicted the killer you don't know what's important and what's not, but my guess would be that the little thing altered was that by Friday 25th July AL was no longer among SJL's blokes and she was in fact down to three. I am not convinced this is unimportant.