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Suzy Lamplugh - 33 years since she went missing

291 replies

MarathonMo · 30/07/2019 14:14

33 years since she went missing and all evidence seemed to point to John Canaan as the man responsible.

David Videcette states he has compelling evidence that Canaan wasn't responsible & claims he now has the proof after a 3 year private investigation.

He believes the 'Mr Kipper' appointment was a red herring and Suzy left the office to go on a personal errand (?). Allegedly, the police missed a lot in their initial investigations.

He claims the police focused on the wrong man as they did in the Rachel Nickell case (Colin Stagg).

Perhaps one day this will be solved and her family will get closure.

new twist?

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DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 14:08

If this chap is right about knowing who is responsible for her disappearance and probable murder then the killer is aware that he could face justice and therefore make plans to evade it.

It would be interesting to speculate what forensic evidence could be assembled at 33 years distance to convince a jury.

BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 14:10

So worrying about whether a live suspect might be raping and killing people as we speak is quite important, no??? confused You can't just accuse people willy-nilly to the police and the Telegraph as being murderers in order just to get a book or TV deal?? Otherwise everyone would be doing it!

@CrimeThrillerGirl - obviously finding a murderer who's been at large for 33 years is important, I didn't say it wasn't.

However, claiming before his meeting with the Met that he knew who the killer was and so on will have put the putative murderer on their guard. Not publicising it and telling the police quietly so that his suspicions could be followed up would be have been more sensible, no??? But I suspect that his desire for publicity will have sent the killer into hiding.

Videcette is someone with the credibility that the police would agree to the meeting and that the press would print this news. But he's not a detective any more, he's a writer and I can't imagine that he's self-funded this investigation of his as he claims without expectation of some personally advantageous outcome. And good on him - if he's got the evidence that someone can be convicted of her murder then I'll be delighted. If the cops can still find this suspect, that is.

DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 14:26

I have to say, the notion that someone managed to commit a perfect murder on their first go, and then happily went around their business free as a bird for the next 33 years is probably the least likely scenario of all. Obviously not impossible, but more the stuff of fiction.

On that basis, then anyone (including myself) who lived in London around then is a suspect ...

Funny, I'd forgotten the detail about the car seat being moved.

CrimeThrillerGirl · 31/07/2019 14:27

The Telegraph says he went to the police on 24th June with his self-funded investigation as a private investigator, yet because the police are still dragging their heels after five/six weeks, and this suspect is a danger to society, he's had to highlight this story in the media.

He's clearly tried the softly, softly approach with the police and they aren't doing anything? I can understand his frustrations. I've had the same difficulties with them taking action over stuff. The police haven't caught this suspect in 33 years or found a body. Surely they need a rocket up their backsides?

I would be worried if this suspect might be working with kids and the police are ignoring it. If this suspect runs off into hiding after one article in the media after 33 years - then all well and good - at least he/she's not a danger to others.

feellikeanalien · 31/07/2019 14:32

I was working with Paul Lamplugh at the time this happened. It was an awful time but he was a very dignified man who simply got on with things. He must have been going through hell.

I always admired the way the Suzy Lamplugh Trust was set up. Trying to ensure that something positive came out of such an awful thing.

I can't believe it was 33 years ago.

DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 14:42

He's clearly tried the softly, softly approach with the police and they aren't doing anything?

Who says so ? DV is not an honest actor here. And at the risk of making it even more drama worthy, we know about arsonists that turn up at the fires they start Hmm

#justsayin'

The police could be mounting a major investigation as we speak. If they have any sense (and I will admit that can be an if at times) the last person they would tell is (a) the person that keeps telling them to investigate, and (b) the Great British Press.

Zaphodsotherhead · 31/07/2019 14:45

I would have thought that the problem with 'naming a suspect' is going to be - how the hell would the police prove anything at this remove?

Suspect may have had an alibi who is now dead, or simply not be able to remember where he or she was on that day. They may have an impairment (alzheimers?) which means that they are no longer able to be prosecuted. Without any hard evidence, it's purely hearsay, isn't it? Circumstantial evidence won't be much use after thirty odd years.

BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 14:51

The Telegraph says he went to the police on 24th June with his self-funded investigation as a private investigator, yet because the police are still dragging their heels after five/six weeks, and this suspect is a danger to society, he's had to highlight this story in the media.

@CrimeThrillerGirl Both the Telegraph and the Mail articles linked to the at the beginning of this thread are from circa 24th June. DV went to the press ahead of his meeting with the Met. And then went back to the media when the police didn't act as quickly, or as publicly, as he felt they should.

I can't imagine that they discussed how they planned to use his new evidence with him so how would he know that his claims are not being followed up? As @DGRosetti says, the police won't be discussing their plans with him, always assuming that his claims have any credibility.

If this media attention does alert SL's murderer and he flees then it will be largely down to Videcette's desire for publicity. And it may be that they become a threat to others then, desperate people often do.

DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 14:53

Suspect may have had an alibi who is now dead, or simply not be able to remember where he or she was on that day.

Indeed.

One reason for police "inaction" is that they know what they would need to take to the CPS in order to secure a trial. A pile of bones alone isn't going to cut it, even if they could physically connect them at this age to a suspect, and especially if they are unable to determine a cause of death.

We had a date. She choked on a cocktail cherry and before I knew it she was dead. I panicked. Buried the body. And tried to put it behind me.

Hardly Crippen-esque, but certainly a long way from "beyond reasonable doubt".

BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 14:59

@DGRossetti - It would be interesting to speculate what forensic evidence could be assembled at 33 years distance to convince a jury.

This article shows that forensic evidence from the World's End Murders in Edinburgh in the mid 70s was used to convict Angus Sinclair a few years ago.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-29744552

I went to a talk about this at a writers' conference and the detective who investigated said it was all down to a very careful forensic scientist who put one of the victims' coat away in the hope that the science would one day catch up. And it did. So there is hope that forensic data collected from SL's car etc might be able to prove guilt. It comes down to an unbroken chain of custody etc - if that's okay, and they collected the right material 33 years ago) then you've got a chance

CrimeThrillerGirl · 31/07/2019 15:01

I can see the original Daily Mail/Telegraph pieces are dated 24th June - the same day Videcette says he went to the police - but the newspapers aren't talking about a "live named suspect" until this week - that's a whole six weeks later. My question is why haven't the police made an arrest in six weeks?

BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 15:06

Because you need some grounds to arrest someone, not just the word of an ex copper. Even to question someone you're going to need some justification. It's not like in books, you can't just be a bit of a renegade and kick a door in when you feel like it.

CrimeThrillerGirl · 31/07/2019 15:06

Someone mentioned "we know about arsonists that turn up at the fires they start hmm."

I am fascinated by this. Does that suggest it was actually Videcette killed Suzy Lamplugh?

BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 15:07

Although - pressed post too soon - I agree that 5 or 6 weeks does seem long enough for the Met to have done enough to issue some sort of statement re progress. Even if it's just that they've checked DV's claims and there's nothing in them.

DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 15:16

If this media attention does alert SL's murderer and he flees then it will be largely down to Videcette's desire for publicity.

As things stand, we wouldn't know, would we ?

And it may be that they become a threat to others then, desperate people often do

Hmm

I'm still struggling to create a picture of someone who can criminally kill once - to all intents and purposes perfectly - and then carry on as if nothing had happened for 33 years. I am one of these persons who enjoys a bit of true crime - and it's not a recurring motif.

CrimeThrillerGirl · 31/07/2019 15:19

How do we know they haven't killed more than once? What if they have killed again (or numerous times) and we won't know until they check the DNA against this new suspect and/or the national DNA database?

MarathonMo · 31/07/2019 15:19

The volume of evidence that links to Canaan, albeit some of it a bit tenuous, seems to point to him being responsible:

Suzy had apparently been on recent dates with a Bristol businessman who took her motor racing and had to end dates early.

JC had to get back to the bail hostel and had lived in Bristol.

JC apparently liked motor racing.

SL had asked her sister to borrow 'sloaney' clothes for a date, JC liked girls in pleated skirts, preppy/public school types.

JC was apparently known as Kipper in prison.

JC was on day release from Wormwood Scrubs when SL went missing.

His colleagues said he often went to the Fulham bars that SL went to.

JC told Gilly Paige, a former girlfriend and professional ice skater, he had buried Suzy, Gilly later retracted the statement. Former girlfriends were very frightened of him and what he was capable of when spurned.

JC was good looking and charming and seemed to turn nasty when he was rejected. SL had told her parents she was going to finish with someone she'd initially liked. Did she do that at lunch on the day she disappeared, not at Shorrolds Rd but somewhere else nearby? Had she invented the Shorrolds Rd appointment as she didn't want to let the office know her plans? Had she finished with him previously and the lunch date was his attempt at winning her back?

Numerous eyewitness accounts of JC in the area of Fulham on the day. Including a cab driver that saw a man in a left hand drive dark BMW, JC allegedly had one that was later traced. Also the photofits before JC was named as a suspect, they look like him.

Someone in Fulham paying for a bottle of expensive champagne and leaving without getting change and someone else later seeing a man answering his description in Fulham holding a beribboned bottle of champagne. His sort of OTT gesture (?).

His ex girlfriend, Daphne Sargent said:

'As soon as I heard about Suzy, I knew it was John, it had all the hallmarks, right down the to champagne'.

Shirley Banks murder

He would likely have got away with that if the police hadn't found her tax disc screwed up in JC's belongings/& her car.

He was clever and told the police he had bought the car at auction.

He had changed the number plates on Shirley Banks's car to:

SLP 386S - he initially responded to police, when questioned, that this number plate change was linked to SL only to change his mind saying 'no, no, no'.

SLP - being SL's initials and 86 being the year she was abducted.

I would have thought that was a coincidence only he had left Sandra's body in 'Dead Woman's Ditch' - a certain mindset? Sick sense of humour? Someone that did that might also change a number plate as above, referencing an earlier crime?

He kept Shirley alive overnight and she called in sick to work. Did he get more artful re: abductions/murders as time went on? His crimes seemed to get increasingly violent.

I read that when the police asked why JC just didn't confess to SL murder he said 'it isn't as simple as that, she's got company'. A joke at police's expense?

Sandra Court was found dead in a ditch in May 1986. JC denied ever being there but a pay-and-diplay ticket proves he was in Bournemouth on day she was murdered.

These sort of abductions or attempted abductions and murders of women who fitted the SL profile seem to stop after JC was convicted and sent to prison. He tried to abduct businesswoman Julia Holman just before Shirley and there were other similar crimes he committed.

While living in Bristol JC had an affair with his solicitor helping him get custody of his child in 1987, despite previous rape convictions etc she wanted a relationship with him. Clearly he was charming and convincing.

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BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 15:20

Maybe they didn't kill just once? Videcette describes them as "at large" which implies they're not in prison so have they continued to get away with their crimes, or been caught and served a sentence for another murder? Being out on licence could count as "at large", couldn't it?

DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 15:21

I am fascinated by this. Does that suggest it was actually Videcette killed Suzy Lamplugh?

Isn't there a saying about "doth protest too much" ?

Just noting that someone who has been at liberty these past 33 years has suggested that someone who has been at liberty these past 33 years is the SLs killer. Just for the avoidance of doubt, I too have been at liberty (and taking liberties Grin) these past 33 years. Except for sojourns to the US, Europe, and Africa.

MarathonMo · 31/07/2019 15:25

@DGRossetti

[[www.abcnews.go.com/US/golden-state-killer-suspect-accused-earliest-murder-allegedly/story?id=57150355 Golden State Killer Was a Policeman

No one suspected the Golden State Killer, he was a policeman.

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DGRossetti · 31/07/2019 15:26

How do we know they haven't killed more than once? What if they have killed again (or numerous times) and we won't know until they check the DNA against this new suspect and/or the national DNA database?

Because - as I noted upthread - people don't just go missing ... patterns emerge quite quickly - especially now forces are sharing information in much more detail than ever before. Look at how quickly subsequent murders that turned out to be connected are picked up and investigated. And even in the 70s, across three forces, the Yorkshire Ripper was identified as a serial killer.

Not quite sure where DNA does - or does not - fit into that ? But police have been quietly putting older and older cases onto the NDNAd where possible. With occasional success.

MarathonMo · 31/07/2019 15:27

Golden State Killer a Cop

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MarathonMo · 31/07/2019 15:29

@DGRossetti you're right re: patterns.

JC was in Bournemouth on the day Sandra Court went missing, he had form, Shirley Banks, Julia Holman etc, did these abductions/killers stop when he was imprisoned?

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BurningTheToast · 31/07/2019 15:30

I read that when the police asked why JC just didn't confess to SL murder he said 'it isn't as simple as that, she's got company'. A joke at police's expense?

@MarathonMo - I read that as Canaan saying that he wasn't going to confess to SL's muder because there were other remains with hers and he didn't want to find himself facing other charges.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 31/07/2019 15:31

I have to say, the notion that someone managed to commit a perfect murder on their first go, and then happily went around their business free as a bird for the next 33 years is probably the least likely scenario of all. Obviously not impossible, but more the stuff of fiction.

Jeffrey Gafoor, who murdered Lynette White in Cardiff in 1988, had apparently committed only that one murder. I'm sure the police tried hard to clear some other unsolved crimes by pinning them on him, but as far as I know he's not been charged with any other murders.

He avoided detection at the time because of the appalling incompetence of the police investigation (it resulted in a major miscarriage of justice when three black/mixed race men were convicted in spite of eyewitness evidence that a white man had been seen outside the flat where she was killed). He wasn't finally found until a cold case review using DNA evidence (which to be fair wasn't available in 1988) in 2002-3.

Fascinating podcast on this on the BBC website. It's called Shreds. Long, detailed, pretty harrowing. Very well done.