White House Farm (ITV mini series about Jeremy Bamber and the murders)

[XelaM]

Has anyone seen this? I only recently started watching and I think it's very well-made. The acting is brilliant (especially the actors playing Jeremy and Sheila). I think it's bases on Sheila's ex-husband's book.

Spoilers in the unlikely event someone doesn't know the true story

I have always been interested in this case and have in the past thought that the actual evidence against him was very weak and mainly based on the fact that he was behaving badly after/before the murders.

I didn't realise how close the police came to closing the case. Although Jeremy comes off like a total arsehole in the series (and in real life) I can't say his girlfriend Julie fares much better. She kept completely quiet until Jeremy dumped her and let the bodies be cremated and only came forward over a month later once they had broken up.

The way the police handled the evidence was shocking and there are still quite a few holes in the police version of events. The main evidence against him - the silencer - wasn't even found by police, but by the beneficiaries of the estate if he was imprisoned. The house was locked from the inside and even with the faulty latch window it was not possible to get inside the house through that window, only to exit. Julie's initial hitman account proved to be wrong. There was no forensic evidence linking him to the scene and I believe he wouldn't have had time to kill them all and then leave/return in time for the police.

It appears that his behaviour made him a suspect and then they found evidence to fit that theory. He may very well be guilty, but this case was really badly mishandled by the police and he could just as easily have been acquitted based on the flimsy circumstantial evidence.

I was also wondering why he would kill the kids? They weren't going to inherit the estate anyway as long as he was alive.

Was Jeremy Bamber truly "evil almost beyond belief" as the sentencing judge put it or was this a massive miscarriage of justice?

The burning of the evidence, the mattresses etc shocked me. I don’t think the bodies were even cold when the police did that.

It was a good series except for the awful Welsh accent of the detective.
I had very vague memories of the case from childhood.
The police were obviously wrong to burn the evidence, but I suppose DNA, Forensics etc. was only starting to be commonly used at that time.

Yes, absolutely shocking!

There's also still confusion about whether the police saw someone alive in the house through the window when they first responded and Jeremy was waiting with them outside. Pretty important detail to just brush over.

Had he not behaved like a complete money-grabbing arsehole after the murders even trying to sell his sister's nude photos, he would definitely have walked free. He was just too arrogant/stupid to lay low and wait for the inheritance to come through.

One thing I don't understand is how Sheila has been shot. She was lying down on the floor shot under her chin. She wasn't drugged (no drugs in her system) so how did Jeremy manage to get her to lie down in the perfect position on the floor amid the whole chaos of his parents being shot to stage the suicide? She must have voluntarily laid down on the floor in her parents' bedroom to be shot under her chin. It's very odd.

It’s a great series! I’ve always been fascinated by this case. It’s all very odd and I’m amazed they actually convicted him with so little evidence. I really don’t know what I think about it.

Carol Ann Lee's book on the case is interesting but pretty conclusive that Bamber was guilty. His ex girlfriend's testimony formed the basis of the prosecution's evidence. He discussed the murder with her beforehand and he was behaving pretty bizarrely afterwards - casual, laughing. People also commented on how hammy his 'grief' appeared at the funeral.

He also changed his story, from his sister being the killer - first said his father rang him to say she had gone berserk - to this 'shadowy figure' standing in the house after the police arrived. If they were standing outside when she killed herself, and the silence was found in a cupboard, then they would have heard the shot. At no point does Bamber's early evidence suggest anyone but the sister - he was trying to frame her. She was apparently on heavy anti psychotic drugs -shuffling rather than walking in her last few days - and there is no way she could have overpowered a big strong man like the dad. Only at a later point, once this had been proved impossible, Bamber tried to suggest it was a relative who didn't live there. So I'd be pretty convinced of his guilt.

But I do agree that the police handling of the case and evidence was mind bogglingly incompetent, at least some things have changed for the better.

@gemstoneju I get what you're saying, but in fairness if he really didn't kill them, he couldn't have been sure who did. It certainly looked like it was Sheila at first glance, so he may have been led by that until it started looking unlikely that she could have beaten her dad. So he offered another explanation. I thought the police initially said they saw someone moving in the house when they first arrived at the scene and Bamber was outside?

I think his behaviour and generally awful arrogant demeanour was what made people think he did it rather than any of the actual evidence. He was highly unpleasant and money-grabbing and he didn't like his family and was glad he got the inheritance. But that doesn't mean he killed them.

i can't say I'm a big fan of Julie Mugford or that he evidence on its own should have convicted him given that she had good reason to lie and the account she initially told the police didn't actually match what happened.

But Bamber called the police himself that night to say his sister was going crazy with a gun,, so if there was a living person in the house (not Sheila) when police arrived, how did they manage to get out when the house was surrounded by cops? Also only the immediate family were aware of the dodgy kitchen window by which the killer obtained access.

If JM lied she might have been scared, I would be of a person who I knew had killed his family, incl two little boys, in cold blood.

Would a woman, however deranged, be likely to blast her sleeping seven year old sons to death? It seems very male offending, the actions of a psychopath, though I'm not saying impossible actions by a woman.

There have been many cases of women killing their kids over the years and one very recently. However, I agree that the father's alleged phone call to Bamber about Sheila having gone crazy with a gun throws things off.

I thought the dodgy window was used to exist, not enter? In any event, the dodgy window only becomes significant if the police version of events is correct. It just went to explain away the fact that the house and all its windows were locked from the inside. I think there was also a timeline issue of it being very difficult to have time to kill everyone and then return to his place, call the police and go back without a single trace of blood on him or any injuries. The father appears to have put up a fight.

Perhaps the story he allegedly told Julie Mugford about hiring someone to kill them all was the truth? It was very stupid of him to confide in her if that was indeed the case. Or she lied about it to get revenge of him for cheating on her and dumping her (also a very stupid thing to do to someone you had confessed to have committed 5 murders to). Plus, there was the £25,000 press deal and the agreement with the prosecution to drop the charges against her.

I just think there was little actual evidence against him (thanks to the terrible police work) and the prosecution's star witness was unreliable, changed her story and had things to gain from his conviction (as did the people who found the silencer). He was very unlucky to not have been acquitted.

Bearing in mind that David Bain is walking the streets having so obviously murdered his entire family, I think there was at least doubt in Jeremy Bamber's case.

There might have been a hitman involved, that never occurred to me.

Horrible, horrible case.

I'm fascinate by this case and genuinely believe JB is guilty.

But I would never watch a TV dramatisation of a criminal case like this. There's no way it could include all the facts and not give too much weight to some aspects.

Same with that Red Riding trilogy. More loosely based but some viewers are bound to come away thinking they know what really happened. But they don't.

There are three motives for murder-money, sex or power.

JB inherited the money. He didn't care for his family, they were simply obstacles to his inheritance.

It's quite likely the boys could have inherited their mother's share if he didn't finish them off too.

His girlfriend at the time wouldn't have believed him capable of murder. That's how psychopaths operate. When she started having doubts, he ended their relationship and she went to the Police.

It was a premeditated murder and I am glad he is locked up and unable to harm anyone else.

The TV series is ridiculous, you need to read the actual Court scripts to understand it.

I've read quite a bit about the case over the years and the series is based on two books that both conclude that JB is guilty (one of them written by the boys' father who had an input into the series). So the series is actually very unfavourable to both JB and Julie.

He definitely had motive, but his relatives who found the silencer also had a direct financial interest in sending him to prison. He may well be guilty, but the actual evidence against him was very flimsy. He could have just as well been acquitted.

And Julie only went to the police once JB cheated on her and broke up with her and afterwards she was quite keen to sell stories about their sex life to the papers. She was hardly a very upstanding character herself.

Haven't seen the series. But live a few miles away from Tolleshunt D'arcy and have a few friends with close connections to the village. Pretty much everyone I've spoken to is convinced of Bamber's guilt.

I don't normally enjoy 'based on a true crime' tv dramas but found this a cut above the usual fare. Thought Freddie Fox gave a great performance as Bamber.

Ohhh very interesting! If he did do it, how incredibly close he was to getting away with quintuple murder! If he had only treated Julie better and not behaved like such an arrogant twat he would have inherited it all. Instead he has spent the majority of his life in prison.

It is however quite shocking when comparing his case to that of David Bain that Bain's conviction was quashed and JB's wasn't, even though the evidence against David Bain was absolutely overwhelming compared to JB. I still find it very scary that David Bain is allowed to walk the streets.

Yes Freddie Fox was absolutely brilliant as Jeremy Bamber. I also thought the actress playing Sheila was very believable. Colin Caffell said that those two actors captured Jeremy and Sheila perfectly.

JB did it. He has had several appeals since it happened. None of which have been upheld. It's a fictionalised account.

Just to be clear, the series in no way claims that he's innocent. As I said, it's based on two books that paint him in a very bad light, so the series actually portrays him as an absolutely horrible person. It even shows him putting down the family dog who survived the killings. In reality there were two dogs - one was rehomed and one was indeed put to sleep, but apparently on the advice of the vet, whereas the series show JB getting the dog PTS against the vet's advice.

OP, I just looked up the Bain family murders that you mentioned!

Appalling and a case I had never heard of before.

It's beyond belief that David Bain's conviction was overturned!

I posted about this case awhile ago (after I saw a C4 series about it). David was the sole survivor of the massacre of his whole family - father, mother, two sisters aged 19 and 18 and younger brother aged 14. There was so much evidence that he was the one who killed his whole family.

The younger brother put up a huge fight and David could never explain the fresh injuries he sustained that morning; David's bloodied gloves were used on the gun (why would the father use gloves if he wanted to commit suicide?); David's broken glasses were found in the brother's room; the brother had fibres from David's sweater under his finger nails; David claimed to have heard his youngest sister gurgle up blood which scientifically would only have been possible if he was the killer; the way the father allegedly killed himself was almost an impossible position to recreate (and why would he use a silencer to make it even more awkward to kill himself?); he washed his clothes before calling the police and there was a bloodied finger print on the washing machine etc etc etc.

In a way, there were a lot of similarities between JB's case and David Bain's as both tried to stage a murder-suicide of their families allegedly committed by one of the victims, but one of them got away with it and the other is in jail.