Silence in court! Discuss The Archers and shout from the gallery here. Send him down.

[PseudoBadger]

What day is it again?

Rob insinuated to Ian that the whole village knew about Adam's gallivanting and that Helen had spread the gossip.

As ever with Rob he takes a fact and twists it so it's always going to wrong-foot his victim.

SingingA - I think you have things the wrong way round. Helen told Rob she would like Ian to be Godfather and he said not on my nelly (that ghastly homo - just imagine the twisted moral guidance he'd offer etc.).

Avocado - Helen wanted Ian to be the godfather. I cant remember the details, she might have even gone ahead and asked him without having consulted Rob first, and just casually mentioned it - anyway, obviously Rob was having none of that. I can't remember exactly when that would have been (is there a way to search lowfield if you don't have a clue as to the date?)

I think R was pressurising Helen not to have Ian as a godfather. Until he'd scuppered the relationship between H and I completely, when he then did a volte face. Thereby rubbing Helen's nose in the wreckage of her friendship.

Vango, I am rubbish with timelines. I thought they were married by then.

As for Shula, can someone remind me if there was any mileage in the case of the hunt sab being reopened? Or would she be an unreliable witness as she'd already lied?

Actually I think Rob did say to someone that they were considering Ian then later expressed his revulsion at the idea? I thought at the time that he was playing games. Early on. When the gaslighting had properly started. I think I remember Helen's confusion.

Yes, I am sure there was a point where Rob kept asking Helen if she'd asked Ian to be godfather, putting on an appearance that he thought it was a good idea, presumably enjoying the control over Helen and goading Helen to admit that her friendship with Ian had gone sour.

Toomuch I think you're right about the Godfather order of events.

SingingAvocado I think it was the other way around. Helen wanted Ian to be godfather and Rob thought he wasn't suitable.

Hello I would like to join too please. :)

Anna dismissed Shula as being of any use in Helen's trial as both irrelevant (punching a bloke in a confrontational situation not the same situation) and unreliable. I doubt the police would want to reopen the case because the one witness had changed her story in this situation (where it might be of tangential help to a relative). I suppose the sab might start kicking up a fuss 'thats the bastard who punched me' on social media and maybe local press ... ah, wouldn't it be nice for the Echo to interview Shula?

After all she knows about the perjury wouldn't she have to declare what she knew to the CPS in the interests of fairness? They are then very unlikely to use Shula.

I doubt that the defence has to be fair to the prosecution - it's up to the prosecution to check out their own witnesses. Though Anna might tell them anyway.

Establishing that Ian didn't like Rob even before he got together with Helen and independently of R's behaviour towards her, is extremely relevant.

Didn't he? Was Rob showing his homophobia even at that stage?

But in any event the information about Adam snogging Charlie came to Ian's attention long after Rob got together with Helen.

I do remember Rob pressurising Helen about asking Ian to be godfather. It was a bit puzzling at the time, but maybe he did it because he knew by that stage that Ian would probably refuse.

After having thoroughly rejected the idea of Ian as a godfather didn't he then start pressurising Helen for an acceptance from Ian - because by then he'd dropped all the poison in Ian's head. So he knew that Ian would want nothing to do with her.

It was either Mephistophelian cunning or a continuity slip-up between different SWs. (At least, as I remember it.)

Wasn't it actually when Helen went to ask Ian to be godfather that it blew up between them, because that's the first time they'd spoken since Rob had been at Ian - Helen had been trying to call him but he wasn't getting back to her?

Ian had identified Rob as a bully right back in March 2014! He warned Rob that he was Helen's friend so R had better watch himself, which is when R's campaign against Ian really began.

I don't recall Ian having much contact with Rob before Rob and Helen got together. The first time I recall a meeting between them was the awful dinner party when Rob told Helen that what she was cooking wasn't suitable for men and dashed off to get steak instead. I do recall that Ian said to Adam when they were on their way there that he wasn't looking forward to it, so he must have met Rob a few times before, but I can't see how they could have got to know each other independently of Helen. Adam saw a fair bit of Rob through work and then cricket, but Ian and Rob have nothing in common except Helen and living in Ambridge.

Toomuchtea - no a phone tracker can't register whether you've rung or texted someone. ( well not as far as I know anyway!). I always assumed Rob tracked Helen's phone to know where she was & then checked her phone for messages whenever he could.

You're right Gasp0. But it's fair to say that Ian never, ever liked Rob and their long-standing feud might make Ian lack credibility.

OK - here are some extracts from Lowfields:

7th Dec
◦As Ursula leaves, she suggests Rob should ask his brother to be a godparent which Rob hastily brushes aside and Helen says she was thinking of Adam and Ian. Rob brushes that away too. Once Ursula leaves Rob is clearly angry at the mention of Adam and Ian. They are immoral and not the sort of influence they want on his son. She should have consulted him first ... well shouldn't she?

30th Dec
◦Rob is amazed at how much the baby has grown since the last scan; what are they going to call him? Learning that Helen has not yet been able to contact Ian, he is scathing about his implied enthusiasm to be a godparent.

6th Jan
◦Since Ian has not replied to any of her calls, Helen goes to Grey Gables where Ian very reluctantly agrees to a coffee. When Helen asks him to be godfather to the baby, Ian coldly tells her that he wants neither to be her friend nor godfather to her baby. A true friend would have told him about what she saw between Adam and Charlie; Helen told Rob.

So, I think there was some element of mind-games, Rob not wanting Ian to be godfather, but then making Helen suffer for it by constantly asking her why she hasn't asked Ian or why Ian is ignoring her calls. Mind-games - because surely if he were consistent he'd say "I've already said I don't want us to ask Ian to be g/father, so don't contact him."

Judy and whoever asked originally - I don't think Anna would have a duty to tell the CPS about Shula or the police, but if barristers are like solicitors their first duty is to the court, not the client. So for example if a solicitor knows his client is lying, he either has to persuade him out of it or cease to act. I don't think Anna could professionally stand for Shula lying...

I wonder is Shula will unburden herself to Alan soon? If she's in need of moral guidance and support it would seem the natural person for her to seek it from. Surely she'll do something now?

Maybe a big row with Alastair in the offing too.

The Rob/Hel/Adam/Ian dinner party, with 'little miss giggly' and Ian noticing everything, may have been the start of Ian's dislike. But the point is that Ian could be shown in court to have had a dislike of Rob independent of R's behaviour towards Helen, at least well enough to plant doubt in the minds of the jury. Punching R in public, for example. Then R being 'the messenger' about Adam's affairs.

It doesn't even have to be shown that Ian agreed to be a character witness in order to further his grudge, only suggested that he'd always viewed R through a lens of his own dislike and this coloured his opinion, generally.

It's all about how is appears to the jury, not the true motivations or order of events as we understand them.

I really want to know what the backstory between Rob and Miles is - there's got to be one, hasn't there?

Thanks for checking DadDadDad – I had a feeling that I remembered Rob asking Helen if Ian had got back to her about becoming a Godfather and that seemed odd to me seeing how much he loathed him. But it makes sense that it was part of the mind games.

spiker something must be in the offing with Shula and Alistair, surely, as they had all that build up a while ago with him always at conferences leaving Shula home alone. I wondered if he was having an affair then, but now I think it may have been setting up for Shula having an affair with Dr Locke . Or trying and failing.