Jeremy Bamber, the White House Farm murderer who has maintained his innocence for more than 30 years, stated that the committee that looks into cases of justification errors received “100% proof” that he did not kill his family.
After being found guilty of killing his adoptive parents Nevill and June, both 61, his sister Sheila, 26, and her six-year-old twins Nicholas and Daniel at their family home, Bamber was sentenced to life in prison in October 1986.
He has consistently proclaimed his innocence and asserted that his sister Sheila Caffell, who had schizophrenia, had shot her family before shooting herself.
And in recently discovered letters, he claimed that after more than 400 days of waiting for a decision on a second appeal, the Criminal Cases Review Commission now has “100% proof” that he did not murder his family.
Bamber started his most recent appeal in March 2021, and the commission last provided an update in June, according to the Mirror.
At Bamber’s trial in 1986, the prosecution said that if the silencer had been fitted to the murder weapon, Ms. Caffell would not have been able to pull the trigger to kill herself.
The CCRC has had proof of my innocence on their desk since Christmas, 100% proof, Bamber stated in letters from Wakefield prison to Rory Everett, proprietor of the memorabilia company Dark Crime Collectables.
“It has been more than 400 days since we submitted our appeal application and six months since the CCRC has spoken to us. The CCRC seems to lack empathy.
After waiting for an update on my case for the past six or seven months, “Our case manager is departing.”
Investigations have produced no results. It was all a lie to say, “I’ll give you an update in a few weeks.”
He continued by saying that he is still fighting and that in the past, case managers had not made an effort to handle his case.
The CCRC stated: “We continue to perform an exhaustive, completely independent review and have regularly updated his legal counsel, the most recent of which was on June 24.
This is a complicated case with ongoing arguments from Mr. Bamber’s legal team. However, this extends the time needed for the review.
In October 2020, Bamber tried unsuccessfully to have his status reduced from maximum security.
In March 2020, the director of the long-term and high security estate, which is a division of the prisons and probation service, decided not to lower him from a Category A prisoner or to order that an oral hearing on the matter take place.
He was seeking a High Court challenge to that decision.
The most dangerous inmates, or those in Category A, are kept in the highest levels of security.
Bamber’s attorneys argued that the judgement was “unreasonable” at a remote hearing and requested Mr. Justice Julian Knowles to allow a full hearing of Bamber’s case.
Bamber’s attorney Matthew Stanbury claimed in written submissions to the court that a report by a private psychologist, hired by Bamber’s attorneys, found that the conditions were “no longer necessary” to manage Bamber since he had passed the standard for lowering a Category A prisoner.
He stated that because the independent psychologist’s assessment was “significantly distorted,” the decision to keep Bamber in Category A was “unreasonable.”
He said that, among other reasons, Bamber “had served 35 years without ever having an oral hearing, and the passage of time means that a risk assessment is more difficult without a face-to-face evaluation,” “fairness necessitated an oral hearing” regarding whether Bamber should be demoted.
In June 2020, the High Court denied another request by Bamber to make Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) evidence public.
He argued that this request would have revealed the existence of a second silencer and that its denial would have hampered the CCRC inquiry.
“If ever there was a situation where the CCRC should be consulted to make a determination on what is alleged to be fresh evidence, it is this one,” remarked Mr. Justice Knowles.
“Over the course of around 35 years, more than one police force has investigated and re-investigated this extremely complex case.”
The body of knowledge is enormous. The CCRC is unquestionably the entity most positioned to assess the claimant’s arguments after so many years and legal battles.
In 2002, the Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal against his convictions, and in 2012, the High Court dismissed his appeal against the Criminal Cases Review Commission’s (CCRC) decision to not refer his case for another appeal.