Jodi Jones - Evidence that the search trio did NOT arrive early (and other points). We've been lied to

 

Based on logic and available evidence, it's more likely they met around 11.25pm

What Sandra Lean claims 

Page 146/147 of the book Innocents Betrayed

One of the most glaring anomalies in the search trio going to the path story is that of the timing. If Luke was, indeed, at the Newbattle entrance at 10.59pm (as all of the known evidence suggests) and if he made his way directly up the path after that phone call, he would be expected to have reached the junction of the paths, where the search trio was waiting, at around 11.10pm.

The trio spotted Luke’s torch when he was between half and two-thirds of the way up the path and waited for him to reach them, therefore, they must have been there before 11.10pm. There was a short discussion before the decision was taken to “double check” the path and they all started walking slowly back down. Janine and Steven reported having to slow down to allow Alice to catch up on a few occasions. 

If the search trio arrived at the other end of the path at 11.23pm to be waiting for him, (which, if they left Alice’s house at 11.03pm, is the earliest they could have been there), then Luke must have taken at least 24 minutes to travel the path to the point where the search trio saw his torch approaching. That would be nearly 4 times longer than the police timings suggested, which is a suspiciously long time. 

Stating that the search party must have met Luke prior to 11.10pm is misleading and simply unfounded. 

Sandra acknowledges that it would be a suspiciously long time if Luke had not met the search trio until 11.23pm after only being at the Newbattle entrance to the path at 10.59pm - as according to her, he said he was during a call with Judith. She attempts to convince the reader of all of the reasons that Luke's timing is the correct one. There is absolutely nothing to confirm that 11.10pm is the time they met. Nothing. 

As documented in Steven Kelly's transcript, the walking time from the meeting point back to the V break is around 5 minutes 26 seconds. If they'd met at around 11.23pm/11.25pm, this would see the search party arrive at the V break at around 11.30pm, which is tight, but still arguably enough time for the events that unfolded there before Luke's alleged 'approximate' 11.35pm call to Police - this timing is taken from Innocents Betrayed.  Sandra tries to claim that it would have taken them longer than 5 minutes 26 seconds to walk back to the break, making it seem as if they had to have met earlier - and consequently, making Jodi's family look as if they had left early or from a different location - inferring guilty knowledge. 

If Luke was at the Newbattle entrance to the path at 11.59 and they met at 11.23/11.25pm, it does suggest that he took around 15 minutes extra - why? What was he doing? 

He told Police in a statements that he "bombed" it up the path.

 Or is there another explanation, such as Luke left later than Sandra believed? She doesn't seem willing to consider any possibilities other than that Jodi's family got there early, which is just not evidenced.

The information supports that Luke actually left later than what Sandra Lean claims - further information is noted in this blog: https://lukemitchelltrial.blogspot.com/2024/08/the-search-party-timeline-sandra-leans.html

They didn't know Luke was coming up the path?

Page 145/146

What Sandra claims:

The search trio tried, in various statements, to explain that their decision to go directly to the path was because they knew Luke was coming up the path. This would, of course, still not explain why they headed directly there – if they knew Luke was searching there, the obvious thing would have been for them to search elsewhere, especially since Jodi was not expected (by them) to be in Newbattle that evening. But the information they gave in this regard was also incorrect.

But Alice Walker provided reasons for checking the path - as noted below from her court transcript. It is implied here that trust in Luke's account of not seeing Jodi on the path should have been enough for them not to feel the need to check themselves. This is Sandra Lean's opinion. 

 Alice thought Janine either spoke with Luke or texted him and that was how they knew Luke would be on the path. Janine thought she contacted Luke to ask what way he would travel if he was coming from Newbattle to Easthouses or Mayfield (not, as was later claimed, what route Jodi would have taken to go to Newbattle). Kelly was a little more vague – he said that “somehow” the search trio found out that Luke was making his way from Newbattle via the path – he could not remember how or when but was sure it was after the search trio left Alice’s house. Although he could not be precise about an arrangement to meet Luke, he said, “I certainly wasn’t surprised to see him, although I wouldn’t have been surprised to see anyone that night.”

 As previously stated, there was no phone contact between Luke and any of the search trio that night, so none of the above claims can be correct. Is it possible that Judith told the trio that Luke would be on the path? Technically, yes, but none of them gave that as the reason they headed straight to the path, even when they were asked directly, in court. Alice Walker, for example, said, “We just did.” Janine said, at one point, they went straight to the path because “that was the route Jodi would have taken” if she was going to Luke’s. 

 Walker never said "We just did". That can be easily confirmed by reading her trial transcripts, her full evidence can be read here: https://lukemitchelltrialtranscripts.blogspot.com/2023/11/alice-walker-full-transcript-131204.html

But, once again, according to all of the information which was available to them, none of them should have known, or even thought that Jodi was heading to Newbattle at that stage. The only point at which Judith could have told the search trio that Luke was heading up the path was in the 11.03pm call, since she, herself, only found out that Luke was at the entrance to the path in her 10.59pm call to him. None of the family’s statements ever said this information was passed to them in the 11.03 call. 

But we don't know that it wasn't.

There was also a call at 11.17pm from Judith to Luke's mobile. Sandra Lean is unable to confirm the duration or contents of the call. Judith then called Janine at 11.20pm, 3 minutes later. Sandra's book claims that the time of this call was 11:18pm but during the testimony of Janine, Alan Turnbull states the time of the call was 11.20pm.

Let's look at what Sandra says first:

Page 141: 11:18pm: A call from Judith connected to Janine’s mobile. Janine said the search trio were in “the complex” at this time, but Alice said they were on Roan’s Dyke Path. It was in this call that Judith told Janine the police were in her house in response to the missing person call, according to Janine’s account. Alice said she did not receive the information about the arrival of the police directly from Judith, but rather, Janine passed it on to her. All three of the family searchers stated that this call was the point at which all of them knew the police had arrived. Alice would claim, much later, that Judith also told Janine that Luke was making his way up Roan’s Dyke Path, although none of Judith or Janine’s statements support that claim. 

Janine's transcript, page 782

AT QC: D'you see that immediately before she called you at 23:20, your mum has made a call at 23:17 to Luke's mobile number? Does that help you to remember what it was your mum said to you during the course of this call to your mobile? 

Janine: It could have been the point she said Luke was going to meet us

AT QC She said Luke was going to meet you?

Janine: Yes

https://lukemitchelltrialtranscripts.blogspot.com/2023/12/blog-post.html Page 782

Also, what does Sandra mean by "none of Judith or Janine's statements support that claim?". Does she mean they disagreed with Alice Walker? Or just that they didn't mention this call as being one where they were informed of Luke coming up the path?  Because obviously, those are two different things.

 Sandra goes on to claim:

It was in this call (10:49) that Luke told Judith he would set off for Roan’s Dyke path to look for Jodi, either keeping Judith updated if he found Jodi on the way or making his way to Judith’s house if he didn’t find her. Although no times were discussed, both Luke and Judith knew the journey, end to end, would take less than half an hour if Luke did not find Jodi on the way

So Judith was aware from the 10.49pm call that Luke would be heading for Roan's Dyke path (page 49 IB "Luke offered to walk up Roan’s Dyke Path"), it also can not be ruled out that she did mention this to Alice Walker during the 11.03pm call, whether they remembered it or not. Either way, further phone calls between Judith and Luke and Judith and the search party, are evident.

Let's go back to the highlighted section though 11:18pm: A call from Judith connected to Janine’s mobile. Janine said the search trio were in “the complex” at this time, but Alice said they were on Roan’s Dyke Path.

Alice said at the trial, that they were at the 'complex' when this call was received and not at the path yet. Sandra implies here that Alice said in an earlier statement that they were on the path at that point, and later changed it to the complex, like Janine had said. However, at no point has anyone - not even Sandra herself - stated that the search party said they were with Luke by the 11.20pm call. There is no mention of anyone's statements confirming that Luke was with them by the time of this call.

The 'complex' is around a 5 minute walk from where they met Luke.

Page 141 11:17pm: Judith called Luke’s mobile. There was no call duration available to the defence and Luke does not remember talking to Judith once he was on the path, so it’s most likely that this call simply rang out or was cancelled immediately by Judith (perhaps because she intended to call Janine and speed dialled Luke’s number by mistake). None of the others mentioned Luke’s phone ringing on the walk back down the path.

How could they have heard his phone ringing, if they weren't with them, and if this is the call where Judith was informed he was coming up the path?

What did Alice Walker say in court?

AT QC: Were you expecting to meet anyone as you made your way down the path?

AW: Yes because as we were walking down the complex before we got to the path, Judith had either text Janine or phoned her, to say that Luke was at the other end, his end of the path and would still meet us. 

To interject here, there was a call, as we've read already, made from Judith to Janine, as they were heading towards the meeting point with Luke. It was at 11:20pm, as we know. This seems to further evidence that the search party had not yet met with Luke by this call, again undermining Sandra's 11.10pm meeting time. Depending on where in the complex they were, it would take us closer to a meeting time of 11.25pm and then the 5 or so minute return journey to the path. Luke's call to Police was according to Sandra, 'approximately 11.35pm'.

AT QC: And what did you decide that you should do?

AW: Just to go out and look, look for her (p1070)

AT QC: Where had you in mind going?

AW: Well the only place I could think was to be down to the path because that was the last place Jodi was going (incomprehensible) look that way. I don't know what I was going to look for but just something ken to do with check (incomprehensible) phoned and she wasn't at any of her friends that I'd phoned. 

Alice Walker's statements were read out to the jury: 

"I was aware that Luke would meet Jodi at the school (close to the path) and come to her house or take her back to him" 

"And if Luke was with her they would...if they could go back to his house they would walk back the path themselves or maybe just stay up this end..."

"When she didn't come home, we just assumed that...well we didn't ken where she was so that was the only place we could think of looking"

She also says, in court "Aye, she did used to go down and meet Luke"

If the implication is that the search party already knew something had happened to Jodi, why did Alice Walker not know to look where Jodi's body lay? She said she only wanted to check the path - and Jodi's body was not on the path. It lay behind a wall that Alice Walker didn't have any intention of checking - and she was the one who made the decision to go back down the path to see for herself after Luke had walked up. 

"I was only concentrating on going down the path that I knew. For a start, I never thought of looking in the weeds because if Jodi had went that way, she wouldn't have gone in the weeds, she would have been walking along the path. She wouldn't have gone in to the weeds."

They didn't call round Jodi's friends?

Page 138/139 of IB:

10:49pm: Two minutes forty seconds after hanging up from Alice Judith called Luke back saying that Jodi was not with any of her friends and that she (Judith) was calling the police. Aside from one call to Yvonne Walker’s number at 10:47pm which was unanswered, no call was recorded from Judith’s phone (landline or mobile)to any of Jodi’s known friends in the seven minutes between the end of her last call to Luke and the beginning of this one. There is no phone data suggesting Judith had information that others made these calls in those seven minutes – there was no call back from Alice, Janine or anyone else between 10.44pm, when Judith called Alice and 10.49pm when Judith called Luke back. 

There may have been no data suggesting this, but that doesn't mean that no one called, or had tried to call friends.

At trial, Janine said she had tried to call round Jodi's friends but didn't have their numbers. She said her mum hadn't said she would call round friends, it was she herself who had said she would try to do that. Either way, there is evidence of Janine having the intention to call round friends but not having numbers.

But - according to Corinne, Luke was heading to Jodi's mum's to help her call round friends. 

What did Luke's mum say on the matter?

James English podcast May 2019 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6ysPeri0O4&t=458s (9 minutes)

 "The plan was, he had arranged with Judy that he would meet Judy at their house to go over friend's phone numbers that Judy probably wouldn't have. You know yourself as a parent, you don't know all your kid's friends and you don't have their phone numbers, so Luke said he'd go and meet Judy at her house and go and go through all the friends. But what confuses us is that the phone records show she never phoned any of her friends, she phoned the granny and that was all she phoned"

If Corinne is making the point here that Judith wouldn't have had all of Jodi's friend's phone numbers, and that the purpose of Luke making his way to their house was to assist with this - why would it be surprising that no calls were made by Judith, when Jodi's body was to be found before Luke even reached their house? 

She may not have called round any friends at the point she told Luke she had, but if what Corinne said it accurate, it would appear that Judith did intend to call round Jodi's friends in an effort to search, while others went to look in the place they knew she frequented. Janine did also say she had attempted to call friends. 

They were only searching the path

Page 146: In her evidence in court, Janine said, “We were only going to the path; we weren’t going all the way to Newbattle.” So, as well as the search trio not looking for Jodi in all of the places she was supposed to be, they also had no intention of checking the entire route she would have taken to go to Luke’s – the path and only the path was their single area of interest. The question, of course, is why?

Janine did say this, but Alice Walker didn't. She explains in her testimony that they would have gone to Newbattle. She was asked in court, if Luke hadn't found Jodi, whether she would have walked past Jodi's body and right down to Newbattle road. She replied:

"Yes, I would have walked straight down because I would never have for one minute have looked over the wall".

So it isn't accurate or fair to say that the search trio had no intention of checking the entire route. 

This blog is not about whether Luke Mitchell is guilty, it's to demonstrate how information can be twisted to paint a desired picture - in this case, Sandra Lean's desire to make the victim's family look guilty.

There is no evidence that Luke 'doubled back' to the V after his dog reacted

Page 38 A couple of times, the dog appeared to follow a scent into the crop field to the left and Luke followed her accordingly, again finding nothing. Further down the path, a few meters past the V-shaped break in the wall towards the Newbattle end of the path, Mia darted over to the wall and stood up on her hind legs, scrabbling at the wall and ‘air sniffing’. Luke recognised the dog’s behaviour as an ‘alert’ and doubled back to the V-shaped break. He handed the dog’s lead to Alice, who had fallen a little behind the others, and climbed through the break in the wall into the woodland strip on the other side, turning left towards the area where Mia alerted on the path side of the wall. Steven and Janine continued down the path. They were brought running back to the V-shaped break by the sound of Luke’s voice from the other side of the wall.

Only Luke said that he doubled back to the V, there is no evidence that the others said this. 

Page 63 The changed stories of the search trio all claimed, by the time of trial, that Luke had always been at the front of the search party and had not gone past the V point then doubled back, but, instead went straight to it. Their earlier police statements indicated that Steven and Janine had overtaken Luke a couple of times and that they carried on walking down the path after Luke doubled back to the V point - the implication being that they were with him, past the V, when the dog reacted.

This post is a screen shot forum from Sandra Lean's own 'Luke is innocent' website from February 2011:

https://web.archive.org/web/20110207164921/http://caseblog.wronglyaccusedperson.org.uk/luke-mitchell-is-innocent/the-finding-of-the-body/how-the-stories-changed/

Sandra claims that evidence of Alice Walker being past the V break comes from a mark she drew on a map, of her and the dog. Alice does clarify however, that she thought she was more in front of the V break - as in parallel with it.

Sandra asks "back from where?" in response to Alice stating she took the dog back from the wall and stood in front of the V. 

Back from where? Well, clearly she means back from the wall - this does not mean that she took the dog back from a point past the V break, but from the wall at the V break itself? 

In court, Alice also said: 

"But I thought I was more actually facing straight on to the V"

Janine was asked in court if she had said at any point, that Luke had walked past the V break. She replied "no".

There is no evidence of Steven Kelly mentioning Luke doubling back.