Original subtitles

REPORTER:14-year-old schoolgirl killed in broad daylight.

Jodi Jones had everything to live for,

but her life was cut truly short when she was brutally attacked.

Jodi had been beaten.

Her throat was cut between 12 and 20 times.

That is the most brutal murder that I've came across.

Whoever committed this murder was a total psychopath.

There's a maniac roaming among us.

Suspicion pretty quickly fell on her boyfriend, Luke.

He was a dope-smoking, kind of feral youth,

scary Gothic character.

Luke Mitchell was a devil worshipper.

This stuff was being gobbled up insatiably

in broadsheets as well as tabloids.

A 15-year-old boy has been charged with the murder of Jodi Jones.

There's something wrong with this conviction.

There is no forensic evidence to link him to the crime.

The person that carried out this brutal murder would've

definitely had blood on him.

If we found something that could exonerate Luke Mitchell

or implicate someone else, it would be massive.

There was DNA, male DNA on the body,

but it wasn't Luke's.

We've only been here a short space of time.

Straight away, I spoke about another two potential suspects.

We've got another person of interest that absolutely shocked me.

It was a guy by the name of Mark Kane.

He's turned up with scratches on his face.

If Luke Mitchell didn't kill Jodi,

somebody else did.

I can't be more clear.

I absolutely did not kill Jodi.

I want to clear my name.

NEWSREADER:The boyfriend of 14-year-old Dalkeith schoolgirl

Jodi Jones has gone on trial accused of her murder.

The jury are being asked to decide if a 14-year-old girl was murdered

by her 14-year-old boyfriend.

Luke Mitchell's trial began in a blaze of publicity in November 2004,

18 months after the murder of Jodi Jones.

This was in the media across the whole of Scotland.

This was a massive story.

This case became monstrous.

It wasn't just an issue that obsessed the police

and the prosecution services and, you know,

the legal world and the press.

This obsessed everybody. Everyone was talking about this.

And this emphasis on the evil,

on the occult, on the Satanist.

Inside, I was screaming like a lunatic.

On the outside, I was relatively calm because,

in my head, I thought, "Right, OK, this has happened,

"but the lawyers knew the truth and it'll all come right."

With no murder weapon, no confession and no forensic evidence,

the Crown's case against Luke Mitchell

was entirely circumstantial.

Circumstantial evidence is a number of different circumstances,

which, taken on the own, might mean little or sometimes nothing

but, when put together in a particular way,

point the finger towards the accused.

The prosecution case depended on three central planks.

Firstly, that he found the body.

And the assumption was that since he found the body,

he must have known where it was.

Secondly, that he was seen by an independent witness.

A local woman had seen a young couple just before the murder.

She later identified Luke Mitchell as the male she saw.

The alibi that he claimed to have was not accepted.

The final plank in the prosecution's case against Luke Mitchell

was that his mother gave him a false alibi

and burned evidence to protect him.

Luke's alibi was that he was at home cooking dinner and having dinner

with his mum and his brother.

Having heard all the evidence

and being cautioned not to rush to judgment,

the jury retired on 20 January 2005.

24 hours later, they found Luke Mitchell...

...guilty.

Lord Nimmo Smith told him,

"You can rightly be regarded as wicked."

DIAL TONE

I have no recollection of him being led down.

You know.

Some things, you have to blot out.

REPORTER: Luke Mitchell was then led away without a flicker of emotion.

Like so many families that I've met in the same circumstances,

the belief it'll all come out in court,

it is not until the foreman of the jury stands up and says guilty

that these people realise that truth's not coming out.

Lord Nimmo Smith told Luke Mitchell

he'd serve at least 20 years in prison.

The press made a huge, huge thing about

"Oh, the beast showed no emotion."

When I saw him immediately afterwards...

SHE SIGHS

That'll be etched on my brain forever.

He was deathly white, his eyes were like saucers

and his lips were blue.

You want emotion?

Come and see my son right now. You'll see emotion.

If Mitchell's guilty, then he deserves to rot in prison

for the rest of his life.

But equally, if he's not guilty,

then society has done something dreadful

and we need to look at ourselves.

Former detectives John Sallens and Mick Neill

have agreed to re-examine the case against Luke Mitchell

for this documentary.

John and I will be looking for something that somebody's missed.

It may be simple as that -

somebody's maybe missed something.

Scientists at the Forensic Institute in Glasgow

specialise in criminal casework in the UK and internationally.

Obviously, Michael and I have been up at the crime scene

and we're looking for your sort of overview on this.

First time I heard about the case was when I was approached

by the defence to give a view on the scientific evidence.

At that time, there was no scientific evidence

specifically against Mr Mitchell.

And that was quite curious, given that it was a very bloody event.

Normally, we would expect to find some evidence at the scene

or on the supposed perpetrator.

Luke's clothing was not only seized, but it was forensically examined

and there was no traces of forensic evidence found on Luke

to link him to Jodi.

There was dirt found under his fingernails

and his hair was described as being dirty, I believe.

What lengths would you have to go off to get rid of every trace

of forensic evidence?

I'm basically asking,

jumping in the shower and using standard shower gel,

would that do it?

Well, the fact that his hair was messy and his nails still had dirt

would suggest he hadn't showered.

- Would suggest. - Suggest, yeah.

If the assumption is this person's got a lot of blood on them...

Well, first of all, even if you wipe your hands on your clothes...

Well, he clearly never did that if they've seized the clothes early on.

And then he's got to go home, he's got to go in the front door,

he's got to turn on the taps to wash.

And there's all of these things that are potential sources of evidence.

Finding Jodi Jones blood on that door handle or that tap,

that begins to mean something in the context of the case.

For Luke to have escaped, he would have had to come up this street.

Now, just have a look. Look how wide open it is.

The houses loop right out onto the road.

There's no fences.

And the idea that a killer covered in blood would have managed to

come up this street, unseen, in broad daylight,

on a beautiful summer evening...

...is ridiculous.

Police raided and searched Luke Mitchell's home three times

before he was finally arrested in April 2004.

No traces of Jodi Jones' blood was ever found.

17 years after the murder of Jodi Jones,

the quiet town of Dalkeith remains in the public spotlight,

as Luke Mitchell continues to maintain his innocence.

Why do you still live in this area?

Because we've done nothing wrong - and it's my home.

Just...

If we were to leave, people would think, "Hm, they're running away."

And we're not running away. We're not running away from anything

because we haven't done anything to run away from.

When he got convicted in 2005 until now,

he's had the opportunity to plead guilty to this and he's refused.

Part of the parole board hearings, I think,

is "Would you accept your guilt?"

And if people can come to terms and accept their guilt,

it's a good mark for them for getting parole,

but Luke's determined not to do that.

He will never, ever say he's guilty for something he's not guilty of.

Why would you do that?

You would have to live with that for the rest of your life.

So, he wants out acquitted...

...which is what I'm fighting for - an acquittal.

With no forensic evidence against Luke Mitchell,

police turned their attention to eyewitness evidence

linking him to Jodi just before she was murdered.

Identification.

That's the crux of things.

If someone's been identified,

you can't get any better evidence than identification.

Local woman Andrina Bryson came forward during the investigation.

She had driven past a young couple at the entrance to the path

just before the murder.

She said she was driving through Easthouses

towards Newtongrange and came around a sharp bend.

There was a girl standing on the pavement and a guy

in the entrance track as she drove around this sharp bend.

She identified Luke Mitchell as the male from a photographic line-up

shown to her by police.

Andrina Bryson's evidence is probably the most critical,

in terms of the conviction.

The former detectives will now recreate Andrina Bryson's journey

and re-examine her eyewitness evidence.

Right, John, so that's us. We've confirmed the route.

And that's the same route as Andrina Bryson drove.

It's basically a test to see what you would actually see

driving at 30 mile per hour.

They place a young couple to stand in the exact position on the path

as described by Andrina Bryson in her statement.

Put your back to the cars

and I want you to look over your right shoulder.

We've got a young a female member of my family who's similar in age

to Andrina Bryson was at the time.

Neve's totally unaware of the whole inquiry,

the whole Jodi Jones murder.

She was too young at the time to know anything about it.

And all she's aware of today is that she's going to be driving that car.

That's all she's been asked to do.

Right, and we're off.

So you've never been to this area of Edinburgh before, Neve?

- No. - No. Right.

I want you to stand with your hands like that, OK?

The car will come down the hill past Zoe.

And I want you to look as if you're having a conversation with her, OK?

We're going to drive our route that Andrina Bryson drove.

And at the end of that, John's going to ask Neve questions

in relation to what happened during the drive on that route.

You're going left at the bottom here.

Right. Neve, you've been on that route.

Is there anything you've seen? - Did anything stand out? - Erm...

- Not really. - OK, that's fine. We're going to do it again.

- Yeah? - Right.

She's obviously aware now that she's got to be looking for something,

so we'll see if she sees anything this time.

Turn left. Next left, Neve.

- Hi, Neve. - Hello. That's your second run.

This time, did you see anything out of the ordinary?

I don't think so.

That's fine.

Third time. OK? thank you.

We've sort of proven here that there's nothing that's particularly drawn Neve's attention

to the couple, so we're going to do it a third time and I'm going to point them out to her.

Right, so we'll do the same again. OK.

Let's run number three, Neve.

And for this one, I'm going to sit in the front with you. OK? OK.

Same as before, just...

Same directions.

All right, Neve. Have a wee chat with your pal.

That's the experiment finished.

Third time lucky.

Was there anything that stood out for you? Erm...

Probably in the middle of the drive, I've seen two people

looking like they had an argument or something.

- Can you describe them? - The girl, I think, had blonde hair,

and she had her back to the road, she had jeans on.

And I think she had a jacket on.

And the male who was... He had his arms out like this.

And he had... I think he had a grey jumper on

and his hair was quite short.

Quite short. What colour hair? I think it was light.

Did you get a look at the man's face?

Slightly.

What can you remember about it?

He wasn't happy. He wasn't happy.

Any features of his face you can remember?

He was clean-shaven. He didn't have a beard.

He was clean-shaven, didn't have a beard. Describe her again.

She had light-coloured jeans on with kind of long brown hair,

and a dark jacket with red bits on it.

And they were having a discussion?

A heated one, I would say. Heated discussion? Right, OK.

When you first described the female... Yes.

...you said she had blonde hair and then you said you had brown.

So was it blonde or brown? I don't know.

Thanks, Neve.

Having carried out this experiment today,

I think it adds a wee bit of doubt to Andrina Bryson's statement

and how much she's actually seen.

The bottom line is she's drove by the first time

and there's nothing that's thrown her attention to the couple

standing up the lane.

So whatever's drawn Andrina Bryson's attention to it,

considering there was not much going on other than a couple talking,

I really don't know.

The problem with eyewitness statements is, good as they are,

some of the best evidence you can get,

eyewitnesses are influenced.

The moment I leaned forward and became agitated and suggested

that the couple were having an argument,

that coloured Neve's perception of that version of events,

which then affects her statement to John.

18 months after identifying Luke Mitchell

as the male on the path,

the prosecution called Andrina Bryson to testify at his trial.

Andrina Bryson's asked,

"Is the person you saw that day in this courtroom? Can you see him?"

She says... She can't identify him.

LUKE: That was a big moment for me.

There's been pictures of this guy in the media

for the best part of 19 months.

And when he's standing there in front of her,

in court, she can't identify him.

And she was the prosecution's star witness.

The present day re-examination has now uncovered

another line of inquiry and more potential suspects.

There's a great deal of irony here that Luke was the only suspect.

He was only ever the only suspect.

There was nobody else treated as a suspect

or considered as a suspect.

And yet...

...you didn't have to look very far back then for other people

that should at least have been persons of interest.

I think we need to take a look at these two -

the Moped Boys.

Gordon Dickie and John Ferris?

Aye. The moped... Apparently it's a home-made moped.

It's not got a silencer fitted.

There's numerous witnesses speak to hearing this moped

running about the area of the path between the two,

Newburgh and Easthouses.

Just a short time later, we've got a witness who sees the moped

against the wall, right at the V in the wall in the crime scene, right?

Sees the moped leaning against the wall but doesn't see them there.

What time is that at?5:15.

The exact time that Jodi was murdered.

According to the prosecution's case.

So we've got those two, seen at five o'clock,

their moped seen at the V at 5.15.

They're nowhere to be seen after Jodi's been murdered. Yeah.

That's kind of bizarre.

Following appeals by police,

the "Moped Boys" came forward five days after the murder.

One of the boys was Jodi's cousin, John Ferris.

This is Jodi's cousin

and he takes five days to come forward.

Why would he do that?

The police were appealing for anybody that was on the path,

or roundabout, between five and ten o'clock that night to come forward

and just be eliminated.

And these two didn't do that.

The Moped Boys were called as witnesses during the trial.

They were asked where they were

when the bike was propped against the wall without them

because the witness could only see the bike, no people -

and they said they couldn't remember.

They couldn't remember where they were.

They couldn't remember what they were doing.

Most of their evidence was they couldn't remember anything

about that day.

We then find out that one of them, John Ferris, hacked all his hair off

by himself, with scissors...

...the day after the murder.

In a dramatic moment during their testimony,

the Moped Boys both denied murdering Jodi.

Defence actually put the questions to them directly,

"Did you kill Jodi?" Directly.

And obviously, they both said no.

OK, this is Judge Nimmo Smith, names them and says it was clear

they were in the firing line but points out that neither

was actually accused outright of murder.

That's because they were just asked.

Do you know the difference with that?

They've got to say, "I put it to you that you did murder Jodi Jones,"

instead of saying, "Did you murder Jodi Jones?"

When someone's convicted and that conviction is questionable,

and you look back and say, "Oh, yeah,

"they questioned him and they put that all over the papers,

"but they didn't question these people and nobody asked why."

I didn't meet Luke until about eight weeks after Jodi was murdered.

So, let's see.

In 2003, my future was alternative health.

Never in a million years would I have believed

that I would end up taking a completely different route -

studying the law, learning about wrongful convictions

and ending up doing a PhD in criminology.

This case took me in a completely different direction.

Sandra Lean has continued to legally challenge the police treatment

of Luke Mitchell during the murder investigation

as grounds for a miscarriage of justice.

Luke had just turned 15 when he was detained on August 14th, 2003.

Detained. He wasn't arrested.

But he was taken to the police station and questioned for hours

with no lawyer present.

He asked for his mum and they wouldn't let him speak to her.

He asked for a lawyer and they told him he wasn't entitled to one.

Do you get the idea, Luke?

Everybody's speaking about you carrying knives.

We've got all these people talking to the fact

that you're a violent laddie, a violent laddie, OK?

You're a violent boy, OK?

Luke Mitchell at the age of 15, and therefore still a child,

was interviewed for a lengthy period of time.

Some, albeit not all, of that interview was then used

in the case to convict him.

Three years later, Lord Justice General Lord Hamilton

described the police officer's conduct as "outrageous".

"At times, the nature of the questioning was such

"that the questioner did not seem to be seriously interested

"in a response from the appellant,

"but rather endeavouring to break him down

"into giving some hoped-for confession

"by his overbearing and hostile interrogation."

Interrogation.

"Such conduct, particularly where the interviewee

"was a 15-year-old youth,

"can only be deplored."

The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission concluded in 2014

that Luke Mitchell's human rights had been infringed

during this interview.

Looking back now at how the police dealt with Luke Mitchell

when he was interviewed, it beggars belief.

There should have been no interview of a child

without legal advice and support.

With their re-examination of the case drawing to a close,

the former detectives review the evidence so far.

During the course of investigation,

we've uncovered what we would regard as a number of potential suspects

that are basically in the same category as Luke Mitchell.

So what we intend to do today, Mick and I,

is we're going to go through each one at a time and we'll apply things

like motive, ability, identification, etc.

It's a tool that detectives have used for a long time

and it's been very effective in some very high-profile murder cases.

Right, Mick.

- Steven Kelly. - Steven Kelly - Jodi's sister's boyfriend.

Identification. With blood found on the T-shirt that contained...

...Steven Kelly's DNA.

There was DNA, male DNA, on the body.

But it wasn't Luke's.

And the DNA related to Steven Kelly.

Janine's boyfriend. Janine's boyfriend.

He then changed his statement, and by the time it got to court,

it was totally different from the statement

he provided at the start.

In the first statement, he said that Luke's dog, Mia,

was sniffing the air and was alerted to something.

But then in the statement he used at court,

the dog didn't sniff the air and Luke went straight to the V.

And it makes it look as if Luke knew where the body was.

The condom man.

That condom was found to have what was described as fresh semen.

He would've been as strong a suspect,

if not a stronger suspect than Luke Mitchell.

Given that it was a young female and there was a condom found with semen,

I think it should have had more significance than it apparently did.

Next, we've got Gordon Dickie and John Ferris,

the two that we've referred to as the Moped Boys.

John Ferris, a relative of Jodi's family,

puts hisself on the path at the time of the murder.

His moped's seen at the time of the murder,

near to the murder scene.

And he takes five days to come forward.

Why would he do that?

He changes his appearance after the murder. He cuts his hair.

Hacked all his hair off.

Opportunity. Both had the opportunity.

They both know the area very well.

They'd know how to get away from the locus of the murder quickly.

Most of their evidence was they couldn't remember

anything about that day.

Mark Kane.

Stays nearby the locus.

He stays in the college, which is not far from the locus.

He habitually carries a knife.

Next day, he turns up at his pal's house, Scott Forbes.

So he's left the area, he's got injuries, scratches to his face,

redness to his eyes.

He's the closest to the locus. It's just directly across a field.

It's covert. You can't... You're out of sight.

Oh, definitely.

We come to the last person we're going to speak about today,

and it's probably our biggest person of interest

from the whole re-investigation John and I have carried out.

This one... This person features massively.

He did feature at the time of the inquiry with the police,

but for whatever reason, it didn't seem to go any further

and his name never came out.

For various reasons, like I've said,

we can't name that individual just now.

We could go further, but we've got to be careful.

Let's put it this way - when we started this investigation,

he was in the periphery.

But the further we went into it, the more he came to the fore.

And he's now sitting here as our strongest potential suspect.

I believe he's right up there.

I totally believe that the police wanted a quick arrest

because they were getting pressure from the public.

A dangerous person was at large

and they were in fear for their lives, basically.

And what I'd say to them is, "You still should be -

"because that person is still at large."

Journalist Bob Smith has sparked new interest in the case

and convinced the Mail on Sunday to pick up the story.

What made you get interested in the Luke Mitchell case?

Well, I worked as a journalist for a Sunday newspaper for many years

and I did a lot of reporting on crime.

And I was interested in miscarried justice,

or alleged miscarriage of justice,

putting information out there into the public domain

that might change the narrative around the Luke Mitchell case.

So I went to the Mail on Sunday.

I said to them, "His mum is willing to do a lie detector

"if you can help to arrange to get a polygraph expert

"to come in and test her."

And I said, "This is going to be a sensational story either way."

Either she's going to fail it and that's going to underline what

the prosecution, the police

and some of the public and the media thought...

...because she had given him an alibi

for the time that Jodi was apparently murdered...

...or if she'll pass it.

Can you imagine the eyebrows that will be raised if that happens?

His alibi was me, obviously, because he was in the house with me.

Because I was working full-time,

obviously I had to get help with chores. That was his chore.

Majority of the times, he cooked the evening meal.

It was a big gamble on the part of Corrine

to put herself forward to take a lie detector test.

Here's the key witness, the key alibi witness,

and she's so determined, so convinced that her story is true

and her son is innocent that she's going to put herself

through a polygraph test in the glare of a newspaper.

We would be taking pictures and we would publish the result,

even if it went against her.

In February 2012,

Corrine Mitchell took the lie detector test

and agreed for the results to be published in the Mail on Sunday.

I faced numerous accusations -

one of them being that I actually did the murder,

another one being that Luke did the murder and I helped him clean up,

I'd burned all his bloodied clothing in my log burner.

She's passed it...

...without, you know, any hesitation,

any suggestion that her answers were in any way vague

or not 100% truthful.

So, yeah, certainly that led me to think...

..."Yeah, I've got to keep pushing on with this

"and find out what other evidence and information there is

"in this case."

Nine weeks later, from inside prison,

Luke Mitchell also took the lie detector test.

Corrine Mitchell had sensationally passed a lie detector test.

Luke Mitchell requested that he also be allowed to take the test

from inside prison.

We decided, "Right, let's see if we can get Luke to get a polygraph,"

cos that, again, would be, well, compared to his mother

passing a lie detector.

That would be an even more dramatic, sensational twist in the story

if he passed as well.

The polygraph examiner tells Luke Mitchell to close his eyes,

to block out distractions from the prison floor.

As you can imagine, it caused quite a media sensation at the time

and people obviously asking questions -

"Could this indeed be a miscarriage of justice?"

You, as a professional journalist,

you deal with people telling you the truth

and telling you lies regularly.

As a whole, right from the start,

what's your opinion on Luke Mitchell?

Looking at all the different strands of the case that cause concern

and raise question marks, like lack of forensic evidence...

...question marks over the reliability of eyewitnesses...

...some of the behaviour of the police...

...and then layer on top of that the things I was directly involved with,

there was reasonable doubt

and there was enough doubt about the conviction,

enough question marks, that we need to keep looking at this case.

Is it possible is the real murderer of Jodi Jones still out there,

walking about, while an innocent man's spent a long time in jail?

I'm going to go down and check on Corrine again.

I did speak with her last night,

but her health has deteriorated so badly over the last few months.

Every time I go down, every time she doesn't answer the phone,

every time I leave,

it terrifies me that that's going to be the last time,

and that next time...

...she's not going to be there

or I'm going to go down and find her dead.

She's been a figure of so much hate...

...in this area for so long.

How are you feeling?

Pretty crap, to be honest. Right?

Are you back at the hospital...?

Well, I was supposed to be back yesterday,

but they cancelled.

Freezing in here, Corrine.

Absolutely freezing, it is. Yes, it is.

It is, but one gets used to it, eventually.

You do what you have to do.

Well, not too many people have to do that.

Even Luke's got heat and water.

That's true. That's true.

And he has a toilet! Has a toilet, yeah.

Yes, yes, that's a wee joke we have.

I've got to slop out - and he doesn't. - Yeah.

THEY LAUGH And he's the one in prison.

I have nightmares about...

...popping my clogs before he gets released. I really, really do.

Because my mum, she...

She was determined to see her grandson out where he belonged.

Unfortunately, she was taken before her time,

and I worry that that is going to happen to me.

SHE COUGHS

But it's not in my hands, basically, now.

It's not my hands, it's in the hands of fate.

This is where we started our investigation,

and we're now at the end.

Every time you come back here, it's a horrible feeling of dread.

What happened here was beyond terrible -

a 14-year-old girl murdered.

I do believe Luke Mitchell suffered a serious miscarriage of justice

and was let down by the legal system.

And he was also, in my opinion, let down by a jury.

I can't understand how they could find him guilty

beyond reasonable doubt at that trial.

I would take it one step further.

27 years as a police officer, my gut instinct has never let me down.

I'm not based on my opinion or my assumptions on a gut instinct alone,

but on the investigation we've carried out here.

In my opinion, Luke Mitchell did not commit this crime and he's innocent.

As a scientist, I don't take a view on innocence or guilt.

We tend to work on the evidence.

In my view, in this case, there simply seemed to be

an insufficiency of evidence for a conviction.

Until we have answers to all the questions surrounding this case,

this case will never go away.

Luke Mitchell's defence team have lodged three appeals

between 2008 and 2011,

all of which have been rejected.

So many lives were destroyed here.

Jodi lost her life,

but so many others have lost so much

because the truth's just never been found.

I have a vision.

It's not a dream because I'm not asleep, but I have a vision.

I see Luke at the top of these stairs, smiling.

He's got his long hair again...

...tied back in a ponytail, wearing his sunglasses,

and he's smiling because he's been released.

It's something I just keep in there. I just keep it in there.

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