Jeremy Bamber and the Murders at White House Farm
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It was a midsummer's night in Essex, England. The small village of Tullisant, Darcy was fast asleep when police sirens echoed across the countryside. They were heading toward White House Farm, where the owners, Neville and June Bamber, were pillars in the local community. It was August 7th, 1985, right around 4 o'clock in the morning. Three police officers exited their cruiser at the end of the White House driveway.

Moments later, Neville and June's eldest son, Jeremy, arrived behind them in his silver sedan. He had called local officers about an hour earlier to report a strange, panicked phone call he'd received from his father. His father said that his schizophrenic sister, Sheila, had gone berserk with a gun. Police never heard any gunshots upon arrival. White House Farm was silent other than the soft whine of the Bamber family dog.

Two officers moved up with Jeremy right behind them. As they cut across the front yard, one of the officers saw a shadow looming in an upstairs bedroom. They pulled Jeremy down, and the trio ducked behind a hedge for cover. They anticipated gunshots, but none ever came. Worried for their lives, the officers returned to the patrol car and radioed for backup. They weren't going near the farm without a small army of armored cops and ballistic shields.

As they waited, Jeremy Bamber made a small confession. The day before, he'd gone rabbit hunting on the expansive property. He used his father's .22 caliber Anschutz rifle and remembered leaving it on the kitchen table, still loaded. "Oh God," Jeremy worried. "I hope she hasn't done anything silly." Panic got the better of him. Jeremy begged officers to charge in and help his family, but they wouldn't move.

Finally, around 5 am, a van full of armored officers arrived. They set up shop in a cattle barn near the house, where they held position for two and a half more hours. Instead of charging the property, officers called through a megaphone, ordering Sheila to surrender. Once more, White House Farm answered back with the soft whimpers of the Bamber's dog.

At 7:30, three and a half hours after officers arrived with Jeremy, High Command authorized a raid team to advance on the property. As they moved up, one of the officers saw what he believed to be a woman on the kitchen floor, but it was hard to tell. They gathered on the rear door, which was locked from the inside. Officers smashed it to bits with a sledgehammer and cleared every corner as they moved through the house.

Room by room, they discovered the gruesome scene hidden within the White House walls. Neville Bamber was in the kitchen, slumped in a chair, pajama pants around his knees. His brains were blasted onto the side of the wall, and blood pooled on the floor beneath his chair. He'd been shot eight times through the arm, shoulder, and head. As they examined Neville's body, officers heard movement on the floor above.

They formed up and inched their way up the stairs, wholly expecting to find Sheila on the landing with the rifle pointed toward them. Instead, all they found were more bodies. June Bamber was on the threshold of the master bedroom. She'd been shot seven times. Once between the eyes, and six more times through her head, neck, and chest. Her nightgown was soaked in blood.

The movement they heard was the family dog, Crispy, a Shih Tzu, who was scared shitless under the bed. Across the hall, police found Sheila on her back. Neville's 22 Anschutz lay across her body. A Bible rested beside her. It was open to Psalms 51-55. Underscored in blood was the line, "Save me from blood guiltiness." The twins' room was, by far, the worst of the White House scenes.

You'd think the twins, Daniel and Nicholas, were asleep were it not for the blood dripping from their tiny beds. Daniel had five bullet wounds in the back of his head. Nicholas was shot three times in the face. Jeremy was alone outside when an officer delivered the gut-wrenching news. "You said everything would be alright." Jeremy muttered as he began to cry. "I know," the officer answered.

"We like to think things will work out. She'll ought to be in a nut house for what she's done," Jeremy said before excusing himself to vomit in a nearby field. In one fell swoop, Jeremy Bamber lost everything. His sister went crazy and murdered his family before turning the gun on herself. His father tried calling for help, but by the time police arrived, it was too late. That's the story Jeremy wants you to believe.

but it's not the story police wound up following. Instead, a series of clues, happenstances, and odd behavior suggested that the real killer was standing outside with officers the entire time. According to The Crown, Jeremy murdered his family and staged the scene depended on Sheila. He stood to inherit vast swathes of land and money upon his parents' death. Cutting Sheila and her children out of the picture ensured that everything would go to him.

Family members describe him as a greedy materialist who always put himself first. Every word he says is a lie, a con, or a manipulation. But is that just what the Crown wants you to think? The Jeremy Bamber case is among England's most fascinating murder mysteries. Up there with Jack the Ripper and the Thames Torso Killer. Is Jeremy an innocent man doomed to spend the rest of his life behind bars?

Or is he a cold, calculated killer who murdered his nephews to make a quick buck? Part 1: The Devil's Daughter Neville Bamber met June Speakman when he was in his mid to late 20s and working as a magistrate in his local court system. Before that, the well-built, 6'4" man was a decorated pilot in the Royal Air Force. Remember his height and physical stature, as it'll play a role later in the story.

Neville and June married in 1949 and settled on 300 acres of Speakman farmland in Tolisant, Darcy, which June's father graciously leased them. Soon after their wedding, June began struggling with severe mental illness. Doctors believed it was due to grief brought on by her inability to conceive a child. June was a deeply religious woman. She believed her barren womb was a punishment from God.

Every failed pregnancy deepened this belief until June eventually slipped into psychosis. She was hospitalized with paranoia and depression and underwent several rounds of electroshock therapy. After the White House murders, her psychiatrist would tell police that June saw everything in terms of good and evil. That belief did irreparable harm to her daughter years later. Nobody knew that Jeremy and Sheila Bamber were adopted.

Neville and June's inability to conceive was the best-kept secret in Essex. Jeremy Bamber was born in January 1961 as the result of an affair between a young woman and a British Army sergeant. The couple wasn't ready to raise a child and gave the baby up for adoption after six weeks. Neville and June Bamber came along six months later and brought baby Jeremy home. Four years later, they adopted baby Sheila.

Sheila's biological mother was the 18-year-old daughter of Eric J., a senior chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Eric knew Neville from his days in the RAF and believed the Bambers would make an excellent adoptive family. He couldn't have been more wrong. June was always hard on Sheila, to the point where it left permanent mental scars.

As a teenager, June called her the devil's child and blamed her typical teenage behavior on satanic impulses. Apparently, the devil was making Sheila flirt with boys and sunbathe naked. Sheila couldn't take it anymore. On her 17th birthday, she moved to London and launched a modeling career. On stage and in her social circles, Sheila was known as Bambi.

She met and fell in love with Colin Caffell, an artist in the big city. They quickly moved in together, but their relationship was far from perfect. In his book, In Search of the Rainbow's End, Colin writes how violence was just below the surface. Things got worse when Sheila became pregnant. According to Colin, there were times we could have killed each other. For June Bamber, an out-of-wedlock baby was the devil's work.

She insisted they get married, and Sheila and Colin obliged. Sadly, the baby was stillborn shortly after the ceremony. A second pregnancy ended in a miscarriage, and soon, Sheila began having the same religious delusions as her mother. God was punishing her with infertility. Sheila believed, and her mother reinforced, that she omitted an evil aura.

Despite the aura, Sheila gave birth to twin boys, Nicholas and Daniel, in 1979. Colin left her for another woman shortly after. While pregnant with the twins, Sheila's parents bought her a small flat in Hampstead, an upscale residential community north of Camden Town in London. Alone with her delusions and the twins, Sheila came apart at the seams. Murderous hallucinations ravaged her mind.

She even called social services one day, worried that she might harm the children. When Nick and Daniel were four, Neville and June took them in while Sheila sought treatment at St. Andrews, the same psychiatric hospital that treated her mother all those years ago. According to her doctor, Sheila had bizarre delusions. She thought her sons would seduce her and saw evil in both of them, Nicholas more than Daniel.

She feared he'd grow up to be a woman-hater and potential murderer. Above all, Sheila's greatest fear was that she'd one day kill the boys. The doctor diagnosed her with paranoid schizophrenia and prescribed an assortment of antipsychotic pills. Sheila's mental struggles ended her modeling career,

She soon went on welfare and took odd jobs cleaning and waiting tables. Once, she posed for nude photographs, a decision she regretted for the rest of her short life. Her employers recalled her showing up disheveled and dirty. Often, they'd find her staring into space with this empty look in her eyes. Neville and June noticed her deteriorating with each trip out to White House Farm.

One time, Sheila offered her 13-year-old cousin drugs and ranted about committing suicide. By then, Sheila had stopped taking her prescribed meds. Instead, she was self-medicating with cocaine and marijuana. She began hearing voices and believed the devil was following her, chasing her even. Five months before the White House murders, Sheila flew into a frenzy at her London flat.

She began beating the walls with her fists and accused those trying to help her of trying to kill her. After the incident, a friend of Sheila's told the police, "I was extremely scared for everyone's safety. She was behaving like a person possessed." The incident earned Sheila a trip back to St. Andrews. This time, her doctor prescribed a new antipsychotic, one he'd administer via injection once a month. That way, Sheila couldn't skip it.

That was in March of 1985, five months before the White House farm murders. Between then and August, Sheila's children spent most of their time with Colin and his new girlfriend. When they weren't with Colin, they were at White House with Neville and June. A month before the murders, Sheila somehow convinced her doctor to only give her half a dose of her medication.

It's unclear why the doctor agreed or if there were any signs that Sheila's mental health was improving. According to Jeremy and other family sources, there were talks of taking the children away from Sheila and placing them in foster care. The last conversation allegedly happened at dinner on the night of the murders.

Good things come in threes, like my three-row SUV. Mom! Coach, that's three... It gets my three kids to three sports in three different parts of town. Mom, my nuclease are so hot. Luckily, I fill up with Synergy Supreme Plus premium gas from Exxon and mobile stations. It keeps my engine three times cleaner for better gas mileage. Mom, can we get ice cream after practice?

Because as soon as this season's over, the next one begins. Find a station at Exxon.com. Synergy Supreme Plus gas compared to Synergy regular gas and port fuel injected engines. Benefits based on continuous use and may vary. Part two, the prodigal son. Neville and June were among the wealthiest people in Tolisunt, Darcy. Nobody liked to spend their parents' money more than Jeremy Bamber. They enrolled him in private prep and boarding schools, including Gresham's, one of England's most prestigious institutions.

But instead of taking his education seriously, Jeremy squandered it for punk bands and alcohol. He got in trouble for brewing beer in his room and sneaking out at night to party around town. He was a charming teenager who believed his good looks were all he needed. According to some sources, he'd maintain multiple relationships with men and women. Jeremy didn't have many friends other than his sexual partners.

Once the other kids learned of his adoption, they began calling him "the bastard" and refused to be seen with him. Jeremy left Gresham having achieved very little academically. He exemplified the saying "C's and D's get degrees." Back home, Jeremy disgraced his family by growing marijuana plants behind the cattle shed. He also had an affair with a married mother of three. He'd abandoned the farm to jet-set around the world,

For money, he dabbled in fruitless careers, including professional scuba diving and waiting tables. But let's be honest, most of Jeremy's spending cash came from the White House bank account. He lived rent-free in a small cottage his father owned about 3.5 miles from the farm. He also held an 8% stake in the family's caravan park, O.C. Road Campsites.

Jeremy would later admit to robbing the park office and stealing nearly 1,000 pounds. The prodigal son's spending habits and poor behavior drove his uncle, Robert Boutflower, insane. Robert was an uptight man who entered the Speakman family after marrying June's sister. He would describe Jeremy as a degenerate with a constant craving for money. Robert's daughter, Anne Eaton, was also skeptical of her cousin Jeremy.

After the White House murders, Anne went to Jeremy's cottage to sit and grieve with him while he talked to the police. Something about the way he talked told Anne that Jeremy was lying. She pulled a scrap of paper from her pocket and wrote down everything he said. But why be so skeptical of your cousin after somebody murdered his family? At the time, the White House murders were an open and shut case. Sheila went crazy and killed them all.

Everybody, including Anne, knew she struggled with mental illness and delusions. To better understand Anne's skepticism, let's unpack how the Bambers and the Bount Flowers are financially intertwined. Neither family was particularly fond of the other. Their businesses, though, were inseparable.

Among their most valuable shared assets was the OC Road Caravan Park. The same park Jeremy had an 8% stake in and admitted to robbing after the White House murders. Jeremy was the prime suspect in the break-in long before his family was killed. Robert, Anne, and Anne's husband, Peter Eaton, wondered if Jeremy would murder his family to seize complete control of the estate.

The Bamber estate included a 50-acre farm called Little Renters. For Anne and Peter Eaton, Little Renters was their only escape from the crushing thumb of debt. The Eatons had fallen on hard financial times in the summer of 1985. To help them, Neville purchased Little Renters, which was supposed to be an investment vehicle. Anne may have counted her chickens before they hatched,

She had her sights set on Vaulty Manor, a white-fronted mansion where her elderly grandmother was living out the rest of her days. Although Grandma Speakman lived there, she didn't fully own the property. Much of it was tied up in family trusts, which meant that Jeremy or Anne would need to buy it outright once she passed, depending on how the will was structured. This financial complexity added to the family tensions over inheritance.

Upon grandma's death, Anne planned to sell Little Renters and purchase Vaulty Manor for her family. She could almost taste it as grandma's speakman grew increasingly frail. Then, a few weeks before the White House murders, Jeremy told Anne that his family planned to sell Little Renters and use the money to buy Vaulty Manor for themselves. Anne was so furious that she allegedly went home and tore down the wallpaper in her bathroom.

With June dead, Jeremy stood to inherit everything upon his grandmother's passing. Alarmed, Robert went to Grandma Speakman on her deathbed and convinced her to write Jeremy out of the will. It worked, but Jeremy still inherited everything in June in Neville's name. It was only a matter of time before the rest of the White House farm and all its associated properties were his. Robert wasn't about to let this degenerate ruin his daughter's life.

Part 3: The Boutflower Theory Detective Chief Inspector Taff Jones led the investigation into the White House murders. Upon examining the windows and doors, he concluded that all of them were locked from the inside when the murders occurred. Meanwhile, the medical examiner determined that, based on her injuries, Sheila likely killed her parents and children before turning the gun on herself and firing twice. Both bullets passed under her chin,

with one significantly higher up on her throat. According to the medical examiner, the lower injury could have killed her, but not straight away. Meanwhile, the higher bullet wound would have caused instant death. All told, the Bamber case had a simple solution: murder-suicide at the hands of Sheila Caffell. At the Boutflower farmhouse, Anne and Robert came to a different conclusion, one that seemed just as obvious to them.

Robert always called Sheila a feather-brained girl. He'd never seen her hold a gun, and he didn't think she could fire one properly. Let's consider the murder weapon for a moment. According to police, Sheila, or Jeremy, used a .22 caliber Anschutz 525 rifle. The Anschutz 525 is a semi-automatic rifle with a 10-round magazine.

According to police reports, a total of 25 shots were fired on the night of the murders. There's no indication that Neville had a 30-round magazine on his gun. Therefore, the shooter had to reload twice to fire 25 bullets with five remaining in the third clip. And that's assuming they didn't miss. According to Ann, Sheila was so uncoordinated that she'd miss the cup when pouring tea.

How, then, could she fire 25 times without missing and reload twice, all while in the throes of a psychotic episode? Furthermore, how did she overpower Neville, who was about 100 pounds heavier and a foot taller than her? According to the police theory, Neville and the shooter engaged in a struggle upstairs.

He was shot multiple times and severely weakened by the time he made it to the kitchen, likely on his way to grab the phone to call for help. That's when the shooter put the final bullets through his head. Then there was the silencer Neville always kept attached to his rifle. It was missing when police found the gun across Sheila's body. Had it been attached, it would have made the barrel too long for Sheila to hold it under her chin and pull the trigger.

That simple fact led Anne and Robert to believe Jeremy had unscrewed the silencer before planting the gun on Sheila's body. If they could find it, they could prove Sheila's innocence. They brought their theory to Taff Jones at the local police station. He didn't want to hear it. The case was closed. They had already cleaned the crime scene and burned the bodies.

Blood-stained carpets and mattresses had been thrown from the windows, and police ordered farm workers to round everything up and burn it. Whatever evidence that may have been left behind was gone. If they wanted to prove Jeremy's guilt, they'd have to do it themselves. They figured the best place to start was with Jeremy himself. Anne and Robert went to Jeremy's cottage later that morning. He was crying, so Anne went over to console him.

She used the opportunity to examine his arms for any scratches, bruises or signs of a struggle. To her dismay, Jeremy was clean. A doctor arrived moments later with a Valium prescription. The drug, along with copious amounts of alcohol, became Jeremy's best friend over the next several weeks. But all the booze and Valium in the world couldn't get Jeremy back in his parents' house. Their murders still haunted him.

So Anne volunteered to be the crime scene key holder until Jeremy recovered. They could search the house with impunity, and nobody would ever ask why they were there. Anne stood in the kitchen the next day and said, "Give us a clue, Uncle Neville." That's when she saw a pair of blood-stained women's underpants discarded in a bucket. They were Sheila's. She must have been menstruating before she died. Anne took them, knowing they might come in handy later on.

Next, Anne went to the sink, where she examined the overhead window. She wondered if Jeremy could have escaped through it and locked the window from the outside. Robert and Anne's brother, David, joined her later that day. They rummaged through Bamber family valuables, searching June's drawers for jewelry and Neville's clothes for loose cash. That's when David made the discovery of a lifetime.

While looking through Uncle Neville's gun cupboard under the stairs, David found the long-lost silencer. He said it was protruding from a cardboard box among hundreds of rounds of ammo. It was only later, back at Anne's house, that they discovered blood inside the silencer's barrel. All three went to June, Neville, and Sheila's funerals armed with this knowledge. They watched as Jeremy cried and buckled at the knees. They watched people hug and console him.

And they cringed when the pastor asked, "God's mercy for Sheila! Sadly and tragically deranged little bugger," Peter Eaton said. "He thinks he's got away with it." Part 4: Breadcrumbs Jeremy Bamber existed in his own little world before and after the funerals. Many questioned his behavior in a way reminiscent of Scott Peterson. He wasn't acting like someone who just lost his family.

He was acting like someone who was finally off the hook. Anne asked Jeremy to come to White House to collect some personal items a few days before the funeral. She really just wanted to observe his reaction to the crime scene, as Jeremy hadn't been back inside the home since the murders. He was pale, and he trembled as he walked around the home. Due to a heavy dose of Valium, he was hardly able to walk or talk, according to Robert Boutflower, who was there with Anne.

Soon, Jeremy noticed that certain valuable items were missing around the house. He flew into a rage and ordered Anne and Uncle Robert not to take anything else. A few days later, Anne returned to White House to find Jeremy loading his car with family treasures. Jeremy spent little to no time in Talishant, Darcy after the funeral.

Like a post-burial honeymoon, he and his girlfriend, Julie Mugford, left the reception to get drunk with friends at a local Caribbean restaurant. From there, they went on a windsurfing vacation and sailed to Amsterdam. With Jeremy gone, Anne and Robert could dig deeper into their theory.

They found an alley in Detective Sergeant Stan Jones, who was willing to explore the "Jeremy did it" angle, as he'd had the same sneaking suspicions. Jones was over the moon when they showed him the silencer. He agreed that there was blood on the inside. But that wasn't all. There looked to be red paint chips, similar to the paint found on the White House kitchen mantelpiece.

That's when Anne recalled the scratch marks on the mantelpiece, suggesting a struggle between Neville and the shooter. The shooter, either Sheila or Jeremy, must have hit the mantelpiece with the barrel, causing the damage. Detective Jones sent the silencer away for testing and ordered his men to take paint samples from the mantelpiece. Among the hardest points to prove was how Jeremy locked the doors from the inside and fled the scene to call the police.

while he was out of town. Anne and Robert returned to White House to see if Jeremy could have used any secret exits or weaknesses. According to Anne, one could easily climb through the kitchen window and close it from the outside. Next, Anne discovered a brand new bicycle leaning against Jeremy's cottage.

After several tests, they determined that Jeremy could have used the bike to escape the scene and return to his cottage in time to call the police shortly before 4 AM. Anne and Robert brought their findings to Stan Jones. But when Jones rented up the totem pole, he was shouted back down by his superiors. Everything pointed to Sheila, and police and Tolleson Darcy weren't going to waste another minute on crazy conspiracy theories.

Then, exactly one month after the murders at White House Farm, Jeremy's girlfriend came forward, accusing him of plotting to kill his family. Part 5: A Woman Scorned Jeremy met Julie Mugford in 1983 when she was a student at Goldsmith College in London. They began dating, but things fizzled out shortly after the White House murders.

According to Julie, Jeremy called her the morning of the murders, saying, "There's something wrong at home." He sounded disjointed and worried, but the phone call woke Julie up, so she went back to bed, not truly processing it. Julie changed her story on September 7th. She claimed Jeremy had wanted to kill his family since the day she met him. He always resented his parents, claiming they were trying to "run his life."

As for Sheila, they didn't get along as adopted brother and sister. He talked about reading his parents' wills and wishing he could just get rid of them all. Then, between October and December of 1984, killing his parents was all Jeremy could talk about. His first alleged plan was to drug his family with sleeping pills during dinner. Then, he'd return to White House via car or bicycle and burn the place down with them inside.

He didn't go through with that plan, because burning the house down would destroy all their valuables. His next plan was to shoot his family and escape through the kitchen window. He knew the catch had never worked, and anybody could easily slip in and out if they wanted to. Finally, he'd plant the gun on Sheila, making it look like she went crazy and killed everyone, then herself.

around 9:50 PM on the night of the murders. Jeremy allegedly called Julie and said "It's tonight or never." He sounded pissed off and high-strung. She claimed Jeremy had grown increasingly violent in the weeks before the murders. To toughen himself up, he tried strangling rats with his bare hands. But when he couldn't stomach that, he realized he'd never be able to shoot his parents and sister.

So, Jeremy allegedly hired a hitman to do it for him, a local plumber named Matthew McDonald. Jeremy allegedly paid McDonald £2,000 to execute his family and then call from White House when the job was done. Jeremy told Julie there was a fight in the kitchen between McDonald and Neville Bamber. Out of anger, McDonald shot the man seven times before moving on to June, Sheila, and the kids.

When police explored the McDonald angle, they learned that the plumber had a rock-solid alibi: he couldn't have been at White House that night, thus disproving the hitman theory. The rest of Julie's story was so compelling that police assumed Jeremy lied to her about the hitman. Upon hearing Julie's statement, Taft-Jones' jaw hit the floor. He pulled his feet from the Sheila cement and listed Jeremy Bamber as the prime suspect.

Taff went to London, where Jeremy was living in Sheila's old apartment. He pounded on the door and demanded that Jeremy answer. When he did, Taff arrested him on suspicion of murdering his mother, father, sister, and her two children. Jeremy stared and said, I don't believe what I am hearing. It must be something else you want me for, not murder. At the police station, Jeremy claimed that he and Julie had recently broken up.

She fabricated the story to get back at him. He told the police: "If she could put me behind bars, then nobody else could have me." After Jeremy's arrest, news broke that he had tried to sell his life story and nude photographs of Sheila to The Sun magazine for £20,000. Jeremy admitted it was true but claimed he was drinking and hopped up on Valium when he did it. He was still mad at Sheila for killing their parents and ruining his life.

In the interrogation room, Jeremy acknowledged that his relationship with June was both rough and smooth. Still, he loved his mother and would never do anything to hurt her. Regarding Sheila, Jeremy said the same thing. He knew she was dealing with mental illness and, at times, didn't know how to cope or help. So, he distanced himself.

While he denied any involvement in the murders, Jeremy confessed to robbing the office at the OC Road Vacation Park. In fact, Julie helped him pull it off. She was her own kind of career criminal. While talking to the police, she admitted to the robbery and a check fraud scheme she ran with her flatmate. The admissions made her an imperfect witness. Her testimony alone wasn't enough to hold Jeremy in custody, let alone charge him with murder.

After five long days, officers let Jeremy go. He left the station in a friend's Jaguar. Police tailed him as he spent the night drinking and bouncing between strip clubs. As of now, he was free. But he wouldn't remain free much longer. Part 6: Blood and Paint Chips The White House murders occurred during the earliest stages of DNA evidence and genetic fingerprinting.

The first man tried and convicted based on DNA evidence was Colin Pitchfork in 1987. He was found guilty of raping and murdering two teenage girls in Leicestershire, England. More importantly, DNA evidence helped prove the initial suspect, Richard Buckland, a disabled 17-year-old boy, was innocent. In 1985, police had to rely on crude reforms of forensic testing to back their theories.

For example, swabs of Sheila's hands revealed little residue for someone who had just fired a rifle 25 times. Her bare feet were also alarmingly clean. You'd think they'd be covered in blood. When examined under a microscope, paint chips from the kitchen mantle matched those found inside the silencer. Furthermore, the scratch marks on the mantle were consistent with someone hitting it with the barrel.

Rudimentary DNA evidence proved that the blood found inside the silencer matched Sheila's. According to one expert, the blood was likely backspatter from the close-range shot to Sheila's throat. Remember, if the silencer was attached, Sheila couldn't have shot herself. The blood and paint chips strengthened the case against Jeremy Bamber.

Just like that, he went from a helpless victim to a calculated killer who murdered his family for the vast wealth he stood to gain. Upon returning from a trip to Saint-Tropez, France, police arrested Jeremy and charged him with the murders of June, Neville, Sheila, Nicholas, and Daniel. Jeremy pleaded not guilty to all five charges. While in jail, he wrote a confident letter to a friend saying:

Why should they convict an innocent man of such a terrible charge? The prosecution painted Jeremy Bamber as a cold, calculated killer. Multiple witnesses said that he despised his parents and had talked about killing them numerous times. As for Sheila, some witnesses testified to her inexperience with firearms. Her psychiatrist talked openly about her mental health struggles but insisted that she would never take things to such an extreme.

Julie Mugford was the prosecution's star witness. She regaled her story about Jeremy calling her, hiring a hitman, and planning his family's murder for months. When asked why she kept it a secret for so long, she said, "I was scared of what Jeremy might do." The prosecution's version of events is as follows: Jeremy left his parents' home around 10 p.m. on August 6th after a late dinner.

Then, in the early hours of August 7th, he rode his bike back to White House and slipped in through a downstairs window. He grabbed his father's rifle, attached the silencer, and walked upstairs to June and Neville's bedroom. He opened fire, June crawled from the bed and died on the threshold. Meanwhile, Neville fought back, and their struggle carried downstairs and into the kitchen.

During the fight, the rifle struck the mantelpiece and chipped the paint. Jeremy regained control and shot his weakened father to death. Finally, Jeremy killed Sheila and the children. As he planted the gun on Sheila, he realized the silencer would make it impossible for her to shoot herself. So, he unscrewed it and hid it among Neville's other firearms. Before leaving, Jeremy took the kitchen phone off the hook.

Thus, leaving the line open. He slipped into the night and called Julie from his cottage saying, "There's something wrong at home." At exactly 3:26 AM on August 7th, Jeremy called the Chelmsford Police Station's direct line instead of 999 Emergency Services. He told them about a call he'd just received from his father in which Neville said, "Please come over. Your sister has gone crazy and has got the gun."

The prosecution suggested that Jeremy never received such a phone call. If Sheila had truly gone crazy, Neville would have dialed 999 first, then his son. When pressed on why he didn't call 999, Jeremy said that people didn't understand Sheila and her schizophrenic episodes. She was clearly in the thralls of a bad episode, but Jeremy didn't think it was that serious. "She had never grabbed a gun before," he said.

Instead of involving 999 services, Jeremy called the local police station to avoid blowing things out of proportion. The prosecution's case rested on the silencer and the evidence collected inside the barrel. It also relied on Sheila's reported inability to wield a firearm. Even though multiple witnesses for the defense said Sheila knew how to use Neville's guns and would go shooting regularly.

In fact, she'd gone on a three-day shooting trip with her cousin, David Boutflower, long before the White House murders. The judge left this fact out, claiming there was no evidence at all that Sheila knew how to load and fire weapons. In the end, he gave the prosecution a favorable summary. In English courts, it's customary for the judge to summarize the case for the jury. In his summary,

Judge Maurice Drake said Sheila was quite clearly a disturbed woman, but there was certainly no evidence to suggest she was in a psychotic state on the night of the murders. She was small and thin, making it very unlikely indeed that she won a struggle against her robust father.

Her feet and hands were so clean that it was inconceivable that she committed this crime. And, according to experts, the blood inside the silencer was overwhelmingly likely to be Sheila's. During deliberations, the jury asked the judge to clarify whether or not the blood was a perfect match for Sheila. Judge Drake said it did not match anyone else. About 20 minutes later, they returned with a 10 to 2 verdict: guilty. The room fell silent.

Two jurors quietly sobbed, likely the two who voted in favor of Jeremy. Jeremy sank in his chair as five guilty verdicts were read aloud. The judge then looked down on him and said, "Your conduct in planning and carrying out the killing of five members of your family was evil, almost beyond belief." He sentenced Jeremy to the rest of his life in prison. And that's where he remains as of 2024.

Those fighting in his corner believe he'll be a free man soon. Part 7: Unraveling. String by string, the case against Jeremy Bamber slowly unraveled as he rotted away in prison. Independent investigations learned that those who played significant roles in getting him convicted profited handsomely because of it.

For example, the Boutflower family inherited Neville and June's fortune, as murderers aren't allowed to inherit anything from their victims. Anne and Peter Eaton moved into the home on White House Farm, and their money problems vanished overnight. After the trial, Julie Mugford sold her story to News of the World for £25,000.

The article, titled "I Tried to Smother the Sleeping Bambi Beast" dove into Julie and Jeremy's sex life, among other salacious details about their relationship. In one of Jeremy's first appeals, he pointed out the conflict of interest. Julie made money off the story, but would have made far less if Jeremy had won the case. Therefore, her testimony could have been motivated by profit. Julie has always insisted that her testimony was not based on money.

When asked what she did with the $25,000, she said, "I bought a flat." It's also worth noting that Julie was never charged for committing check fraud. Her bank dropped the charges during the Bamber case. According to the bank manager, Detective Stan Jones came with Julie when she begged for leniency. Jones claims he did no such thing. If he had, it would spoil our case.

This wasn't the only he said, she said situation Jones found himself in. According to Sheila's ex, Colin Caffell, he submitted a statement that Jones mishandled and misconstrued. In his statement, Colin was speaking to Jeremy's sense of sympathy. He said, "I'd had a rough deal all along in respect of Sheila's illness." However, when Jones typed the statement, he wrote, "He'd had a rough deal all along

The simple pronoun mistake changes the meaning of Colin's statement, thus making it sound like Jeremy struggled to deal with Sheila's mental illness, not Colin. Colin claims Jones told him not to mention the mix-up on the stand, as it would cause all sorts of trouble. Again, Jones denies making this statement. The next string to unravel was the testimony of Dr. Hugh Ferguson. He claimed that Sheila was sick, but unlikely to hurt her parents or children.

The jury took his word as gospel and leaned on it to convict Jeremy. But the Bamber case wasn't the only high-profile murder Dr. Ferguson was involved in. A former patient of his, a teacher named Paul Padgett Lewis, was allowed to keep his job thanks to Ferguson's diagnosis. This was after Paul had been stalking one of his male students and shattered the boy's window with a brick. Paul later shot and killed four people, including the boy's father.

When police arrested him, he allegedly said: "Why didn't you stop me before I did it? I gave all the warning signs." The most tightly woven piece of string, the blood in the silencer, unraveled in 2001 when DNA tests could not find Sheila's profile in the sample. In 2001, further DNA testing on the silencer contradicted earlier findings.

Initial blood tests had suggested the blood type matched Sheila's, supporting the theory she couldn't have shot herself. However, new DNA analysis found that the blood didn't match Sheila's DNA, but instead could match another individual, potentially her uncle, Robert Boutflower, whose blood type was similar to Sheila's. This finding raised questions about evidence contamination and the reliability of the original blood analysis.

The judge in charge dismissed the new DNA evidence, claiming the sample could have degraded after all this time. So many people had handled the silencer, between doctors, police officers, and jurors, that it was likely contaminated. James Cleary, one of England's leading DNA experts, called BS. "Blood is a rich source of DNA," he told the New Yorker. There wasn't an ounce of science in anything the judge said.

Quite frankly, the judge had no idea what he was talking about. It's more likely that he was trying to protect the sanctity of the English court system rather than admit Jeremy Bamber might be innocent. And he's not the only one. England has a long and dark history of keeping wrongfully convicted people in jail. Look no further than the Birmingham Six, a group of Northern Irishmen jailed for bombing two pubs in 1974.

In 1991, they were released from prison when news broke that the police fabricated and suppressed crucial evidence in their case. Lord Tom Denning is among England's most celebrated judges. He's also among the most controversial. While speaking on the Birmingham Six, he said:

In other words, he'd rather keep an innocent person in jail than admit he was wrong. Denning threw himself out of the allegations of police corruption in the Birmingham Six case, which turned out to be true. Afterward, he said things would have been better off if the men were simply hanged. They'd have been forgotten, and the whole community would be satisfied.

During one of their many failed appeal attempts, Jeremy's lawyers presented evidence that police mishandled the crime scene by knocking over furniture and moving certain items. The appeals court rejected that claim because disturbing a crime scene would be a mortal sin. In other words, our cops are better than that and would never mess with a crime scene. Photos of Sheila's body and the Bible beside it begged to differ.

The prosecution used the Bible's unnatural position on Sheila's shoulder to suggest Jeremy planted it there. However, red smudges between the pages suggest somebody opened and closed the Bible at least once. One officer testified that the Bible on Sheila's body was not in the same position as when I saw it. He claims the book was originally against her waist, not her shoulder. If that's true, then who moved it?

According to officers present on the scene, Inspector Ron Cook, the lead crime scene officer at White House Farm, lifted the Bible up and had a look at it. Cook realized his mistake and fumbled the Bible, causing it to close. He opened it again and frantically asked what page it was on before placing it back on Sheila's body.

According to his fellow officers, this incident, and similar incidents, earned Ron Cook the nickname "Bumbling Ron." Chaos reigned wherever he trod. Bumbling Ron also oversaw crime scene cleanup. They had already burned all the bloodstained carpets and bedding when Jeremy was named the primary suspect. Cook allegedly scrambled to find scraps of evidence. At that point, he was already in trouble after the Bible fiasco.

While speaking on the chaos of White House Farm, one of Ron's fellow officers told the New Yorker: "I would not be surprised if, one day, someone comes along and says, 'Here's definitive proof that Jeremy didn't do it.' That proof might be in the very silencer used to convict him." The timeline for how and when Ann Eaton found the silencer doesn't make sense.

Police had searched inside Neville Bamber's gun cupboard and never saw it. Despite David Boutflower's claims that the silencer was protruding from the box and in plain sight, some pro-Jeremy folks believe Ann and David found the silencer much earlier than they claim. Remember how Ann was taking notes next to Jeremy while he was talking to the police? Buried in those notes is a reminder to look at silencer. Blood? That note was written on August 9th.

According to Anne, they didn't find the silencer until the 10th. So, if Anne hadn't seen it yet, how would she have known there was blood inside? The Bamber family secretary, Barbara Wilson, has always suspected foul play. Anne, David, and Robert called her to the farm on the 10th. Shortly after she arrived, David miraculously found the silencer. According to Barbara, the discovery was likely staged. She said,

I would say that they'd already found it, but they wanted someone to prove that they'd found it." The silencer stayed in the Boutflower home for two days before they gave it to police. Then, Stan Jones drove over to collect it in a paper towel tube. Before he left, he shared a healthy glass of whiskey with Peter Eaton and drove back to the police station, allegedly drunk. From there, Jones failed to log the silencer into evidence.

Instead, he locked it in his desk drawer, where it sat until morning. Bumbling Ron took it from there. For 17 days, the silencer changed hands without any proper records. Meanwhile, Ron, Stan Jones, and Ann Eaton returned to White House Farm in secret to take paint samples from the kitchen mantle. Here is where many believe the trio used the silencer to scrape the mantle, thus fabricating evidence.

they have always denied this claim. During Jeremy's trial, the jury saw photographs of the scratch marks on the kitchen mantle. As Neville and Jeremy struggled, the silencer must have struck the woodwork, causing the damage. Peter Southerst, a photographic expert with more than 50 years of experience, believed those pictures were staged.

The scratch marks do not appear in the original crime scene photos. They do appear, however, in images taken 34 days after the murders. In his expert opinion, the marks occurred something like a month later. It was only after our trio's secret trip to White House Farm that lab techs found paint chips inside the silencer barrel.

The initial tests had been limited, and while no paint chips were noted in those early exams, further, more detailed tests later revealed the presence of the chips. This raised suspicions that the evidence had been tampered with or improperly handled. Buried within those records is another astonishing fact. New DNA tests in 2001 revealed that the blood on the silencer did not match Sheila's DNA.

Instead, it showed evidence of contamination from at least one other person, potentially Robert Boutflower, who shares Sheila's blood type. This revelation cast doubt on the integrity of the original blood analysis. While he denies touching the silencer, Robert was never cross-examined about how his blood could have gotten into the barrel. Then there's the matter of Sheila's bloody underpants.

and admitted to having them, though she claims she got rid of the panties immediately after. She has always denied planting Sheila's blood on the silencer. Clues to what really happened that night at White House Farm may lie in the timeline, from when Jeremy's father allegedly called him to when police kicked in the front door.

According to police logs, Jeremy called the Chelmsford station at 3:26 AM to report his father's harrowing phone call. As officers drove to White House, a British telecom operator checked to see if the White House phone line was open at 3:56. And then again at 4:30, it was open both times. All the operator could allegedly hear was a barking dog.

It's unclear when police arrived at White House. According to their logs, they passed Jeremy on the road, and likely arrived before 4 AM. Jeremy pulled in a few minutes later. Because Sheila had a gun, Chelmsford officers waited until backup arrived at 5. As they stalled, one of the officers saw a shadow move in the upstairs window.

It was enough to dive for cover and await incoming gunshots. However, at Jeremy's trial, that same officer called it a "trick of the light". Could that shadow have been Sheila finishing the job in June's bedroom? And if it was, why didn't the police hear any gunshots? Neville's .22 Anschutz rifle used low-velocity subsonic ammunition.

According to a firearms expert for Jeremy's defense team, the shots are so quiet that one could easily sleep through them. That would explain why Sheila's kids didn't wake up and why officers didn't hear any shots outside. The low-velocity ammo significantly reduces the weapon's recoil. The long barrel makes it exceptionally hard to miss at close quarters.

"If you're close enough to anybody with a rifle of that length, you're not even aiming it, you're just pointing it," the expert said. Let's assume Sheila is alive inside White House and actively killing her family by the time Jeremy arrives with the police. Officers didn't enter the house until 7:30, meaning they were stationed outside for at least three and a half hours.

During that time, Jeremy's defense team believes Sheila showered or at least cleaned her hands and feet after the ritualistic killing of her children. That explains why her body was so clean when police found her. They also argued that, based on pictures of Sheila's body and several police logs, her blood was still wet when officers entered. Those pictures were taken between 9 and 10 a.m.

if Sheila died before 3:30, as the prosecution suggested, then her blood would have congealed by then. Jeremy's team believes Sheila was alive and downstairs when police began knocking down the door. That explains why one officer reported seeing a male and a female in the kitchen area as they approached the house. That's when Sheila fled upstairs and shot herself. When they found the body, two officers reported blood leaking from both corners of her mouth.

Further evidence that someone was alive comes directly from Scotland Yard. According to their records, a 999 call was made from inside White House Farm while Jeremy was outside. After investigating the call, detectives produced a signed statement from an Essex police officer named Nicholas Milbank.

The statement never mentioned a 999 call and claimed that Milbank never heard a peep while monitoring the White House phone line that night. Milbank denies making or signing such a statement. In fact, his signature on the document is typed rather than handwritten. In the summer of 2024, investigative reporter Heidi Blake found Milbank while covering the Bamber case for The New Yorker.

He was still working for the Essex Police Department and remembered a 999 call coming in around 6:09 on the morning of the murders. While the caller didn't speak, Milbank recalled hearing a door opening and closing and a chair being moved. He remembered muffled speech, but said it could have easily been a radio. Most importantly, all these sounds occurred before police entered the home.

When asked about his signed statement, Milbank was confused. He said nobody had asked him about the Bamber case since the 1980s. If somebody was alive inside White House while Jeremy was outside with the police, then he couldn't have done it. As of 2024, Jeremy Bamber remains incarcerated at a maximum security prison in Wakefield, West Yorkshire.

He's been there for over 35 years, making him one of the longest-serving prisoners in the UK. Either he's guilty of murder or he's the victim of Agatha Christie syndrome. When the public and police need a bad guy to blame, ask yourself: which version makes a better story? A schizophrenic girl kills her parents and children before turning the gun on herself.

Or an entitled playboy murders his family and frames his mentally ill sister so he can reap the family fortune. One version is a tragedy. The other sells more newspapers.

These ads do not represent my own political viewpoint. So if you hear a political ad play on the podcast and it's not in my own voice, then it has absolutely nothing to do with me personally as a podcaster. Thank you again for being a dedicated listener of mine, and I can't wait to have another amazing year with you guys. I'll see you in the next episode.