THE SEARCH PARTY TIMELINE & SANDRA LEAN'S FUNDAMENTAL ERROR
The source referenced is Sandra Lean's book, 'Innocence Betrayed' (2018), extracts regarded as 'fair use' under copyright and author's remarks in italics.
Sandra Lean writes:
Another ten minutes later, at 10.59, Judith called Luke again.
He told her he had just arrived at the Newbattle entrance to Roan’s Dyke Path with his dog and was about to make his way up to Easthouses, looking for Jodi on the way.
Did Luke actually say that he had just arrived...
The only related quote from Judith Jones, Jodi's mother, seems to be:
In Judith’s first recorded statement to police, at 2.45am on July 1st, she said Luke told her, in the 10.59pm phone call, he was coming up the path “on his bike.”
Continuing:
The explanation seems obvious, at first glance. Luke’s timings must be wrong. The 10.59pm call placed Luke at the Newbattle entrance to the path at that point, so it is worth noting at this stage that police timed the walk from Luke’s house to the entrance to the path at seven minutes at a “brisk pace.”
Luke arrived at the Newbattle entrance exactly 10 minutes after picking up Judith’s 10.49 call, leaving him just 3 minutes to have the phone conversation with Judith and the short conversation with his mother, get the torch from his brother, put the dog back on the lead and set off.
The timing for this part of Luke’s journey to the path, therefore, is confirmed".
Except that Sandra Lean would appear to make a significant error here - Luke was not at home, when he received the 10:49 p.m. phone call.
Luke was outdoors, taking Mia for a walk.
Quoting from Luke Mitchell's interview with DC Alan Towers, in the early hours of 1 July, at Dalkeith police station, directly after the horrific events, of 30 June:
I got home about twenty five to ten. David High phoned me part of the way home. When I was in my room about twenty past, half past ten", in brackets, 2220, 2230 hours, "and got a text message from her mum's phone saying, 'Right, Jodi, you're in big trouble for being late.'
Her mum (inaudible). I phoned Jodi's mum right back and told her Jodi wasn't with me. Her mum sounded shocked and I said, 'Where is she?' As far as she knew, she was on her way to see me.
Her mum said she would phone her gran and her sister to check up. She hung up.
I took Mia, my Alsatian dog, out for walk round the field. When I was out, I got another call from Jodi's mum. She was crying and saying that Jodi hadn't been seen since she left the house about six o'clock. She said that she was going to phone the police to report her missing. I went back to the house.
I'd only been out ten minutes.
When I got in, I told my mum what was happening and that Jodi was missing.
She said that I better go out and look for her.
The evident mistake, originates here:
At 10:38pm, while he was taking his dog, Mia, out for her last walk of the evening, Luke received a text from Judith’s phone, clearly intended for Jodi - “Right Toad, 2 weeks grounding, say bye to Luke”.
Luke immediately called Judith to tell her he had not seen Jodi all evening.
Luke was at home, when Judith's text was received and his return call made.
Seven minutes later, at 10.49, Judith called back in tears to say Jodi was nowhere to be found and she was calling the police.
This is the call received, when he was in the fields, walking Mia.
Sandra Lean has this the wrong way around and that has a catastrophic, knock-on effect.
Note that Luke says, "I went back to the house", possibly indicating he was not already heading back from his walk with Mia, when Judith's call came through.
If Luke came back home, straight after the 10:49 p.m. phone call and had been out for a total of 10 minutes, then did he receive the call after being out walking for a 5 minutes distance and it therefore took him 5 minutes to return?
If so, he would have arrived back at the house, around 10:54 p.m.
As Sandra Lean notes, we also have to account for the time taken discussing the situation with Corinne and deciding how they should proceed.
Accepting Sandra Lean's suggested 3 minutes and if Luke was at the Newbatttle path entrance for 10:59 p.m., he made that 7 minutes journey in 2 minutes, a patently untenable scenario.
What this does now allow for, is a situation whereby, if Luke simply advised that he was 'coming up the path', it could be misconstrued as meaning either:
I am coming up the path, right now.
or..
I am coming up the path, soon as.
There would seemingly be no timeline anomaly, if Luke did not leave home until, say, 11:09 p.m.
He would reach the entrance to Roan's Dyke Path, 7 minutes later at 11:16 p.m.
A further 7 minutes and Luke would meet up with the search party, at approximately 11:23 p.m., which equates with the approximate duration, their journey would have taken.
It was a later timed by a police reconstruction, that it was a 5 minutes walk back down the path, with Luke, to our 'V-shaped' wall, so arriving around 11:28 p.m.
This permits sufficient time for all encompassed therein, to have occurred, prior to the police being called.
However, this is entirely speculation and we can only evidence that Sandra Lean's timeline is factually compromised and now rendered inadmissible by her own elemental 'faux pas'.
It is assuredly no basis for the past near 15 years of publicly insinuating that it was Jodi's own grandmother and sister... for goodness sakes... who were amongst others, involved in a nefarious, murderous, deception, as they searched for Jodi.
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