A Dream of Death Read online

  Should the documentary feature in the Cannes programme, it will in many ways represent the closing of a circle. Sophie Toscan du Plantier first came to her isolated Toormore holiday home in west Cork to escape the pressures of the French film industry in her life and to seek the private time she craved. For Sophie, Cannes and its world-renowned film festival was an object of both fascination and dread – she adored the professional opportunities it offered but came to be very wary of its celebrity-obsessed social circuit.

  Yet, since 1996, Sophie has been the focus of greater publicity than at any time during her all-too-short life. Her death is now the focus of a TV documentary, a Netflix special, an Internet podcast series, multiple books, newspaper crime specials and numerous online conspiracy theories.

  For her family, the publicity serves as a constant painful reminder of what they lost. Each December, Georges and Marguerite and their family attend a Mass to remember Sophie and to seek comfort from their deep faith. For years, that Mass was in Goleen parish church and the family would faithfully stay in Sophie’s old cottage. Each year, a simple yet beautiful wreath of white lilies, Sophie’s favourite flowers, are lovingly placed at the stone Celtic cross that marked the spot where her body was found.

  In recent years, Georges and Marguerite are no longer able, for health reasons, to make the long and tiring trek to west Cork in the depths of winter. But each year they attend a Mass for their daughter’s memory in Paris. The memorial Mass is now private. But Sophie is remembered by so many.

  Having attended the memorial Masses for Sophie in west Cork over the years and got to know Sophie’s parents, I found it upsetting that such obviously kind, warm-hearted and decent people should have to endure such a never-ending and painful cycle of hope, disappointment and frustration in Ireland. I felt that they deserved so much better.

  It is a truism of the world we live in that bad things can happen to good people. But it doesn’t make it any easier to accept when you witness the appalling cost inflicted by violent crime on the families of victims. I remember watching Georges and Marguerite and realising that her death causes them as much pain today as it did on 23 December 1996, when they first learned that their only daughter had been killed.

  Sophie’s ‘Dream of Death’ had truly proved a nightmare.

  TIMELINE

  June 1991

  Ian Bailey relocates from his native UK to Ireland to start a new life.

  September 1992

  Sophie views house at Toormore which boasts dominating views over the Schull–Goleen countryside. Fastnet lighthouse is visible from the upstairs bedroom windows.

  January 1993

  Sophie purchases the Toormore property.

  1993–1996

  Sophie enjoys regular weekend breaks and annual summer holidays in Toormore, often bringing her family to share in her Irish vacation.

  20 December 1996

  Sophie flies into Cork Airport for a brief pre-Christmas break alone at Toormore. She intends to fly back to Paris on 23 December for Christmas and then to Dakar for a New Year’s holiday with her husband, film executive Daniel Toscan du Plantier.

  23 December 1996

  Sophie’s battered body is discovered at the foot of the laneway leading from her Toormore home. She had apparently tried to flee from an assailant at her home but was caught near a gateway after her clothing apparently snagged on barbed wire. She died from horrific head injuries.

  11 January 1997

  Gardaí at Bandon receive the first in a series of calls from a woman identified as ‘Fíona’ about a suspicious man she claimed she saw at Kealfadda Bridge, not far from the Toormore murder scene.

  20 January 1997

  A special RTÉ Crimeline appeal about the Sophie Toscan du Plantier murder is broadcast on behalf of Bandon gardaí.

  10 February 1997

  Ian Bailey, a Manchester-born freelance journalist now living in Schull, is arrested by gardaí for questioning in relation to the killing. He is released without charge after almost 12 hours. He is identified by the Irish Sun the following day.

  12–14 February 1997

  Mr Bailey gives an interview to both the Irish Mirror and the Irish Star before agreeing to a radio interview with Pat Kenny on RTÉ Radio One. Afterwards, he is widely referred to as a self-described suspect in the case.

  17 April 1997

  West Cork coroner opens and closes the inquest into the death of Ms du Plantier. State Pathologist Professor John Harbison confirms the French woman died from a fractured skull and brain laceration.

  27 January 1998

  Ian Bailey is arrested a second time by gardaí for questioning. He is again released without charge.

  27 June 1998

  Daniel Toscan du Plantier (57) marries Melita Nikolic (30), his fourth wife.

  7 July 2000

  Daniel du Plantier, accompanied by Pierre-Louis Baudey-Vignaud, makes his first and only trip to west Cork after the killing to be briefed by detectives at Bandon Garda Station on the ongoing murder investigation.

  January 2002

  Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne orders a review of the du Plantier case file by Detective Chief Superintendent Austin McNally.

  11 February 2003

  Daniel Toscan du Plantier dies at the age of 61 while attending the Berlin Film Festival. He is survived by his fourth wife, Melita Nikolic, and their two young children. He also had three children by his first two marriages.

  8–19 December 2003

  Ian Bailey sues eight Irish and British newspapers in Cork Circuit Civil Court for libel arising from their coverage of his arrests. He insists he is an innocent man and claims sinister attempts are being made to frame him for the crime.

  19 January 2004

  Ian Bailey loses his claims against six of the eight newspapers. Total damages of €8,000 are awarded to him against the Irish Sun and the Irish Mirror. However, Mr Bailey faces estimated legal costs of €200,000.

  13 October 2005

  Marie Farrell, a west Cork shopkeeper who gave dramatic evidence at the Circuit Court libel action, retracts her evidence after claiming she was put under pressure to make the claims by gardaí.

  14 October 2005

  Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy orders an inquiry into the matter under Assistant Commissioner Ray McAndrew.

  13–16 February 2007

  Ian Bailey appeals the libel defeats to the High Court but the action collapses dramatically. He is not awarded damages but does receive a contribution towards his legal costs from the newspapers. He confirms he is now to sue the State for alleged wrongful arrest.

  May 2007

  Assistant Commissioner McAndrew advises that, having investigated the allegations of Mr Bailey and others in respect of garda operations in west Cork, there is a lack of evidence.

  July 2007

  Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) James Hamilton, having studied the McAndrew Report, decides against any prosecutions.

  October 2007

  Sophie’s family press the French authorities to launch their own probe into her killing. Friends set up the Association for the Truth about the Murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier. Paris-based Magistrate Patrick Gachon is appointed to lead a new inquiry.

  1 July 2008

  Sophie’s body is exhumed from a French cemetery for a fresh post-mortem examination and a battery of forensic tests.

  June 2009

  Magistrate Gachon and a colleague, Nathalie Dutartre, travel to west Cork as part of their probe. They have already received the garda murder file.

  19 October 2009

  Two senior west Cork-based gardaí fly to Paris to testify to the French inquiry team.

  February–April 2010

  Magistrate Gachon issues a European Arrest Warrant (EAW) for Ian Bailey. The legal team for Mr Bailey confirm he will vigorously contest the extradition request.

  23 April 2010

  High Court endorses the EAW and Ian Bailey is arrested at his home at The Prairi
e, Liscaha, by Dublin-based detectives. He is taken to Bandon Garda Station before being transferred to Dublin.

  24 April 2010

  High Court releases Mr Bailey on bail after hearing that he told arresting gardaí he believed the detention to be illegal and based on false information.

  7 December 2010

  Ian Bailey graduates with a law degree from University College Cork.

  18 March 2011

  Mr Justice Michael Peart delivers a 54-page judgment in the High Court in which he affirms the French extradition application.

  13 April 2011

  High Court allows Mr Bailey to appeal the extradition ruling to the Supreme Court.

  3 October 2011

  Team of French detectives and forensic scientists arrive in Ireland to interview key potential witnesses for a likely Paris trial.

  10 November 2011

  Planned Supreme Court hearing of Ian Bailey’s extradition appeal is postponed after dramatic release of new material to the defence team by the State. Mr Bailey’s solicitor, Frank Buttimer, says the material hints at ‘breathtaking wrongdoing’ by State officials.

  January–February 2012

  Dramatic new revelations in papers including the Irish Independent, the Irish Times and the Irish Daily Mail about aspects of the original garda murder probe, including that there were other suspects than Mr Bailey, are published.

  1 March 2012

  Supreme Court unanimously upholds Ian Bailey’s appeal against extradition. Mr Bailey – in a dramatic interview – claims he has been through ‘hell’ over the allegations. The family of Sophie du Toscan du Plantier react with fury to the decision. Mr Bailey indicates he is now to fast-track a civil action against the State for wrongful arrest. He also affirms an earlier formal complaint to the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, which had been stalled due to the High Court and Supreme Court cases. Complaints are also made by his partner, Jules Thomas, and former west Cork shopkeeper Marie Farrell.

  12 April 2012

  French authorities indicate that their probe continues – amid widespread predictions that Ian Bailey is likely to be tried in absentia in France.

  December 2013

  It emerges that telephone calls at some Irish garda stations, including Bandon, where the Sophie Toscan du Plantier probe was based, were recorded by the telephone system in place.

  February–April 2014

  It is confirmed that telephone calls between gardaí, between gardaí and witnesses and between gardaí and journalists were recorded in respect of the du Plantier investigation.

  June 2014

  Sophie’s son, Pierre-Louis Baudey-Vignaud, appeals to Ireland via the Sunday Independent to continue to cooperate with the Gachon probe despite recent controversies.

  July 2014

  A planned final trip to Ireland by an elite French detective team is quietly postponed.

  4 November 2014

  Ian Bailey’s High Court action for wrongful arrest against the State opens in Dublin. It is estimated to last six to eight weeks. It ultimately takes five months, including more than 90 witnesses and 63 days at hearing.

  30 March 2015

  High Court jury finds against Ian Bailey on the two garda conspiracy charges they were asked to consider. The jury was not asked to consider any wrongful arrest issue because it was not taken within a specified legal period.

  12 May 2015

  High Court orders Ian Bailey to pay full costs of the five-month hearing. The costs are estimated at between €2 million and €5 million. Mr Bailey signals he will challenge the High Court ruling to the Court of Appeal.

  27 March 2017

  Court of Appeal hears challenge to High Court ruling.

  July 2017

  Court of Appeal rejects 16 of Mr Bailey’s 17 grounds of appeal. But one ruling in his favour could trigger a new High Court trial.

  24 July 2017

  French authorities have a second extradition bid for Ian Bailey rejected by Irish courts. This application is dismissed by the High Court, which rules that the Supreme Court has already ruled on the issue.

  1 February 2018

  Three-judge Chambre de l’instruction in France rules that there are ‘sufficient grounds’ for Ian Bailey to face a prosecution in Paris.

  8 February 2018

  Amazon-owned media firm Audible releases a 13-part podcast series on the Sophie Toscan du Plantier case entitled West Cork.

  14 March 2018

  Court of Appeal dramatically re-opens its decision and rejects Mr Bailey’s sole success in his 2017 wrongful arrest challenge, meaning he has now lost his entire appeal.

  3 May 2018

  Ian Bailey loses his last legal challenge before France’s Supreme Court in a bid to prevent the Paris murder trial over Sophie Toscan du Plantier’s death. He immediately flags a European Court of Human Rights challenge to the French prosecution.

  2 August 2018

  GSOC finds ‘no evidence’ of high-level corruption within the force over the Sophie Toscan du Plantier investigation on foot of complaints from Ian Bailey. The GSOC report does, however, raise grave concerns over aspects of the garda investigation including apparent changes to key garda reports and the manner in which evidence was lost from storage.

  27 May 2019

  Paris murder trial of Ian Bailey opens in his absence.

  31 May 2019

  French magistrates convict the journalist of killing Sophie and impose a sentence of 25 years. He is later fined €225,000.

  1 November 2019

  Ian Bailey publishes his second book of poetry, entitled A John Wayne State of Mind.

  16 December 2019

  Mr Justice Donald Binchy endorses a third warrant issued by the French for the extradition of Ian Bailey.

  Bibliography

  Bailey, Ian, The West Cork Way (CreateSpace, 2017)

  Bailey, Ian, A John Wayne State of Mind (Seanachaí Productions, 2019)

  Collins, Liam, Irish Crimes of Passion (Mentor, 2005)

  Cros, Julien & Bloc, Jean-Antoine, L’Affaire Sophie Toscan du Plantier (Max Milo, 2014)

  Cummins, Barry, The Cold Case Files (Gill Books, 2012)

  DiMaio, Dominick & DiMaio, Vincent, Forensic Pathology (CRC Press, 2001)

  Marry, Pat, The Making of a Detective (Penguin, 2019)

  Riegel, Ralph, Shattered (Collins Press, 2011)

  Sheridan, Michael, Death in December (O’Brien Press, 2002)

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  This book would have been impossible without the support, cooperation and generosity of a large number of people over many years.

  I am particularly grateful to the Bouniol and du Plantier families for their kindness and openness over almost twenty-three years of covering developments of the investigation into Sophie Toscan du Plantier’s death. Despite the horrific loss they suffered, they have been astonishingly generous with their time since I first began reporting on this tragedy in 1997. I will never forget how, in the midst of their grief, Georges and Marguerite Bouniol, as well as Marie-Madeleine Opalka, Pierre-Louis Baudey-Vignaud, Bertrand Bouniol and Jean-Pierre Gazeau, displayed unfailing kindness and patience.

  Similarly, I’d like to thank Ian Bailey and his solicitor, Frank Buttimer, for taking phone calls and queries at the most inopportune times over the years. When on many occasions they were not able to formally comment on matters, they were both unstintingly helpful and understanding.

  Author and playwright Michael Sheridan wrote Death in December in 2002 and was the first to bring much of the Sophie Toscan du Plantier story into the public domain. My work on the 2003 libel hearing for the updated edition of Death in December was my first publishing project and I remain forever grateful to Michael for that.

  Special thanks to both Barry Roche, Southern Correspondent for the Irish Times, and Paul Byrne, Southern Editor for Virgin Media (formerly TV3). Barry has worked on this story since the very beginning in 1996/1997, and I am deeply grateful for all his help and
expert advice. Paul is also a fount of knowledge on the case and has been incredibly generous with his expertise.

  Similar thanks for all their help and advice to Irish Sun Southern Correspondent Ann Mooney; 96FM Chief News Reporter Fiona Donnelly; Cork freelance extraordinaire Olivia Kelleher; the Irish Examiner journalists Eoin English, Noel Baker, Eddie Cassidy and Michael Clifford; my predecessor at the Irish Independent, Dick Cross; Tom MacSweeney, former Southern Editor of RTÉ; both Mike and Daragh McSweeney of Provision; and Castletownbere photographer Niall Duffy.

  Much of the material in this book I have covered over the years as part of my work for the Irish Independent. For those parts I was not directly involved in covering, I am indebted to the following: Shane Phelan, Dearbhail McDonald, Sarah Collins, Maeve Sheehan, Nicola Anderson, Mark Condren, Tom Brady, Tim Healy and Olga Cronin at the Irish Independent and the Sunday Independent; Barry Roche, Lara Marlowe, Mary Carolan and Ruadhán Mac Cormaic at the Irish Times; Eddie Cassidy, Eoin English, Michael Clifford and Noel Baker at the Irish Examiner; and Siobhan Gaffney, Paschal Sheehy, Tom MacSweeney, Jennie O’Sullivan, Philip Boucher-Hayes, Órla O’Donnell and Geraldine Harney at RTÉ.

  Thanks to Gill Books for first suggesting this project. I am very grateful to Sarah Liddy and Catherine Gough for all their support. Special mention to Aoibheann Molumby for her incredible work on editing and strengthening the manuscript, to Seán Hayes for fine-tuning my grammar and to Ellen Monnelly, Laura King and Teresa Daly for all their work in supporting the project. It was a great honour to work with you all again.

  Special thanks to Kieran Kelly for his expert legal advice and suggestions on the manuscript.