14/09/06 (UK):
Jill Dando Murder – Suspect Forensics?
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Barry George was convicted two years after the BBC presenter was shot once in the head in Fulham, West London, in 1999.
Respected Italian firearms residue expert Professor Marco Morin says the single particle taken from Barry George's coat – the only damning piece of evidence in the case - may not have even come from a gun and should not have been introduced as evidence. Professor Morin suggests that the particle may have come from an incinerator burning paint or from somebody arc welding.
Furthermore, a juror has spoken publicly for the first time of her feelings about the guilty verdict reached in July 2001. Janet Herbert says: "I just felt shocked that on that little evidence anybody could be locked away for the rest of their life." The jury was put up in a hotel during a weekend because the members were unable to reach a verdict.
A second juror who wished to remain anonymous says that some of the deadlocked jury talked about the case at the hotel. This was specifically against the judges instructions. These instructions are meant to stop subcommittees forming cliques that could influence the final decision. Janet Herbert felt excluded from these discussions.
Barry George's coat was found a year after the BBC presenter's death and was taken from its evidence bag and photographed at a police station before it was examined by forensic scientists. A witness, a retired reverend, claims that he saw police entering George's flat with guns when they took the coat away but this has been denied by the police. This may have contaminated the scene. For the past two years, the Criminal Cases Review Commission has carried out a review of the case.
It says this has involved commissioning forensic tests and interviewing a number of witnesses and expects to make a decision about whether to refer it to the Court of Appeal "in the near future."
George lost an appeal in 2002 and remains in jail.
© X-Pro 2006
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