RedHanded - Episode 17 - Who Killed Billie-Jo Jenkins?

Episode Date: October 19, 2017

One afternoon 13 year old Billie-Jo Jenkins was bludgeoned to death with an 18 inch tent spike whilst doing chores “home alone”. Suspicion immediately grew around her foster father Sion Jenkins - but 3 trials and 20 years later he is a free man. Did Sion Jenkins really murder Billie? And if so, then why? Join the girls this episode as they explore the truth behind the disturbing murder of Billie-Jo Jenkins.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah.

I'm Saruti. And welcome to Red Handed. And before we get going, we're going to be featured on the Two Pods a Day campaign, which is a Twitter campaign run by Our Americana. And they feature, for the whole of October, they're going to be featuring two indie podcasts a day. So you should just check them out on Twitter. And there's some really, really great stuff out there. It's really interesting.

That's what I think is so fantastic about podcasts. There's a podcast about literally anything. It's a really good thing to discover new podcasts, which is one of my favourite things when you find a new one. Today we're covering a case with no absolution and absolutely no justice. Today we look at the case of 13-year-old Billie Jo Jenkins, who was bludgeoned to death in her own home in 1997. Her foster father, whom she was living with at the time,

would go on to be charged with murder but after appealing the conviction he was granted two subsequent retrials and is now a free man. Did he kill Billy Joe or was he the victim of a huge miscarriage of justice, spending six years in jail for a crime that he didn't commit? Is he guilty or were the police so blinkered in their hunt for Sean Jenkins, Billy Joe's foster father, that they made huge errors that allowed her true killer to escape. Billy Joe Jenkins was born in East London in 1983. She was confident, energetic and fun-loving. And you can see some videos of her, really pretty actually, really pretty and very engaging. She wanted to be an actor when she grew up and you can absolutely

tell from these videos. But sadly, Billy Jo's biological parents were troubled and her mother was an alcoholic. Her father, Baynard Jenkins, was imprisoned when Billie was nine. Her mother was unable to cope on her own, so Billie Jo was placed in foster care with Sean and Lois Jenkins, who just by total coincidence had the same surname. There was no relation. Now the Jenkins, the new Jenkins, Sean and Lois, seemed the perfect family to take Billy Joe in. Sean was a deputy head teacher and Lois was a social worker and they said that when Billy Joe was placed with them in their family home in West Ham, East London, everything seemed perfect. Billy Joe was even already friends with the couple's eldest daughter Annie through school and in a clear demonstration of how happy Billy

Joe and the Jenkinses were that in 1992 Sean Sean got a new job as a deputy headteacher at William Parker Boys School in Hastings, an hour and a half from where they were currently living. And as the family made plans to move, Billy Joe pleaded to go with them. They easily agreed and everything seemed perfect. And it was a perfect fresh start for Billy Joe. She had become part of a large family. Sean and Lois had four daughters of their own. And after the move to Hastings, which is on the east coast of England, I feel

like it's very, very common for people, especially who live in East London, to move to Hastings. It's like a thing. Why is that? What's in Hastings? I think it's because it's pretty, it's like, and it's just really not that far away from East London. I've never been to Hastings, actually. I think I went on a school trip. There isn't that much there. Yeah, you seem flush with excitement about talking about your school trip to Hastings. Is it like the Battle of Hastings? Is that where you went?

That's like the only thing I know about it. 1066. Yeah, same. That we do. Tick. History GCSE. So yeah, after they'd moved to Hastingsings it was felt that Billie Joe had coped well with the transition into her new life and just days before her murder the Jenkinses

obtained a residence order for her taking them one more step closer towards adoption so from the outside it seemed stable and happy now this is exactly what you would hope for for any child in the care system. But on the 15th of February 1997 a 999 call was placed by Sean Jenkins saying that he had just found his daughter Billie Jo and that she was injured. He tells the operator you need to come now it's an emergency there's blood everywhere I think she's fallen over. But Billie Jo hadn't fallen over. The 13 year old had been beaten to death with an 18-inch metal tent spike as she sat in her family garden, apparently home alone, painting the back patio doors. And an autopsy determined that Billie Joe had been struck nine times in the head and the hits were random but grouped close together. There was some bruising

and a few abrasions on her forearms, likely defensive wounds, but there was no evidence of sexual assault. And some weak old bruising was found around her wrists and forearms. And one other piece of evidence was allegedly found. A small piece of black bin liner was supposedly forced down into Billy Joe's nostril. This becomes important later, but there is kind of huge amounts of controversy over this bit of evidence. So let's just come back to it. So, who killed billy joe despite the huge amounts of media attention this case got the police had little to work with in the way of leads so the foster parents sean and lois made a televised

appeal for information now many can watch this footage and say he's so unemotional and cold sean jenkins did it but we do see this time and again i's so unemotional and cold, Sean Jenkins did it. But we do see this time and again. I'm not saying that the behaviour does or does not indicate guilt or innocence for that matter. I'm saying that we often identify the wrong things and come to the wrong conclusions. I mean, we do, like, we say it a lot. What would the perfect reaction be? Exactly. How would you expect someone to act in that situation? have to say out of all of the interviews i've watched the interview i felt like that's how a parent who just lost their child it sort of fell into my box of how i thought they would react is lucy blackman's parents yes

yes the way they spoke about it was how i would expect someone people react to things in different ways but I think specifically with this case there's only so far that argument can take you really I know I do think though it's really hard to say because again you look at some of these cases where it will be the person that's hysterically crying and you'll look at them they'll be sat next to someone who's cold and calm and you'll think that's the person that did it but how often it turns out to be the person that is being hysterical it's really really hard to know because it's not only that we project onto them how we think we would behave even though we have no idea how we would behave in that situation but also because people come at this

through a lens of their own experiences and what their natural personality and inclination is so it's really hard to say and we talked about a couple of cases didn't we things like do you remember what was the name of the lady the dingo baby case what she was camping with her baby and the family and then the baby went missing and they and there was blood found and they said that she had killed the baby and she said no a dingo came into the tent and took the baby who was going to believe that she was so cold and so like prim in the way she presented herself she never cried she was never hysterical then everybody said this woman that's not how a mother behaves this woman killed her baby and

then what she spent like years and years in prison until they found that dingo's nest nest den and it had the dead the skeleton of the baby and like the bloody blanket and things and then the peter falconio case they go to the outback him and his british girlfriend he goes missing and then they say she did it because she's so cold you watch the interview she is so cold but she didn't do it it's really hard to say whether it's crocodile tears or whether someone being cold is being weird because you do see both of that you know like i think mick philpot is the prime example of someone giving a huge show. For people who don't know that particular case, he, um, didn't he burn his family alive? Yeah, so he was, he wanted to set fire to the house with all of his, like, ten children inside

so that he could frame his ex-wife for it. What happened is that the house just burnt down and killed all the kids. And he was in, like, a huge amount of debt or something. Like, it was a purely financial gain he was making from this act. It wasn't passion. It was economic. It was like to frame her for this so that they,

because he was living in some weird situation. We're totally going off on a tangent. He was living in a weird situation with him and his two wives and all of their kids. One of them was like, I'm out of here and I'm taking my kids with me. But he was getting what benefits. So like welfare payments for all of their kids. One of them was like, I'm out of here and I'm taking my kids with me. But he was getting what benefits. So like welfare payments for each of the kids.

So he didn't want her to take her five kids with us because that's like losing five kids worth of welfare payments. So it was, let's frame her. She'll go to jail. We'll keep the kids and keep getting the money for them. If you haven't, there's so many documentaries on YouTube about Mick Philpott.

Maybe we'll cover him in a future case. Absolute monster and absolutely perfect example of someone crying crocodile tears. But anyway, anyway, we've gone off. We've digressed. So very soon after this TV appeal, suspicion fell very quickly on Sean Jenkins. But he told the police that he had been out on a shopping trip with two of his four daughters, Annie and Lottie, whilst Billy Joe was home alone.

And they came home to find her dead in a pool of blood. Now, we watched the interview. There's a very extensive, in-depth interview with Sean Jenkins that we'll post on the Facebook group. And he's being interviewed by Sir Trevor MacDonald. Love Trev. Love Trevor. And if you aren't British, I don't know how wide his appeal is in other places. If you're British, you know who Sir Trevor Macdonald is. He's a national treasure, as Hannah and I decided. If you don't watch this interview when we post it, it is really

interesting and you can tell exactly what Trevor thinks of Sean. It's such a fascinating interview and we will be citing it quite a bit in this episode because Sean is given free reign to tell his story, proclaim his innocence and I think it's really smartly done because he's given just enough rope to hang himself with and he does in my opinion. He comes across glib, arrogant, self-centered and whilst none of this means that he killed his foster daughter it does give us such an interesting insight into how his mind works. I do think that it is probably one of the most arrogant things I can think of. So hypothetically saying he did it, how arrogant do you have to be to be like, I am going to go on national television with Trevor McDonald and I'm still getting away with it. That is insanity. Like if anyone's going

to catch you out, it's Trevor McDonald. Absolutely. And I think that's what it does. They can't try him again because of double jeopardy. That's it now. He's free. But I think everybody knows that he's guilty, but he's so arrogant and so sure of himself that in this interview, he comes across so articulate and intelligent and reasonable, but it's when you scratch the surface and listen to what he's really saying that you realise how much he's lying, that he thinks that he's convinced everybody of his innocence. So in this interview, he starts saying, the thing that shocked me more than anything was that anyone could think I was capable of murdering Billy. That's what shocked you the most. Yeah, not the fact that your daughter, your foster daughter is dead. Like, that's what shocked him the most. And he said that it never even occurred to him for a second that the police would turn on him as a

suspect but they did the police found evidence that they found compelling enough to arrest sean jenkins and charge him with billy's murder so what did they have forensically they had sean's jacket which was covered in 158 microscopic spots of bill's blood. And crucially, his accounts of his movements on the day of Billy's murder were highly inconsistent. Sean was bringing two of his daughters, Annie and Lottie, home from a clarinet lesson. Do any adults play the clarinet? I feel like it's an instrument you play in year five. Oh, my best friend plays the clarinet. Oh, really?

I don't know if she still does, but I remember when we were kids, she had like a red clarinet that she'd covered in gold stars. But I don't think I ever saw her play it. I think she was lying. I just feel like it's not an instrument you carry with you into adulthood, is what I'm saying. It's like a glorified recorder. Unless you guys play the clarinet, don't be mad at us.

Like, I'm not very musically talented, so I have no right to say any of these things. Anyway, whether they continued it onto their adult life,inet don't be mad at us like i'm not very musically talented so i have no right to say any of these things anyway whether they continued it onto their adult life i don't know but at the time annie and lottie were at clarinet lesson sean went to go and get them billy had stayed at home while he had gone to pick them up and she was painting in the back garden she was painting the the patio doors the police alleged that jenkins came home and launched into a brutal attack on Billy Joe, bludgeoning her to death with a tent spike that lay in the garden. And you can see video footage of this tent spike. When I was first reading about it, I just had in that mind, you know, those sort of bendy poles that you stick through the tent? No, no, no, friends. It's like this

fucking huge, it looks like a lead pipe for like old school tents, like for, for like pavilions. Is that a word? Yeah. Yeah. Pavilion? Gazebo. Marquee. Both. Marquee. Both. That's. Gazebo. I think gazebo is a made of wood, but it's huge. It's like the size of your arm. Yeah. It's absolutely fucking enormous. It's thick. It's metal. Yeah. If you beat someone with that, you mean to kill them. And all this time, Annie and Lottie were outside at the front of the house. This is what the police alleged, by the way. He then got back into the car and took them both, so Annie and Lottie, not Billy, to a nearby DIY store. So the police say that this trip to the DIY shop was a ploy to provide himself with an alibi.

But Sean said that this was because his two daughters wanted to join Billy and help paint the doors that she was working on and that he didn't have enough stuff like paintbrushes and white spirit. So he needed to go buy the stuff for them to do that. In the interview, he says, I didn't want to go, but we left soon

and we went to go by the white spirit but in court they bring up the fact that there was already white spirit in the house and I don't know if this is really enough for me that didn't feel like the most like poke a hole in the story no it's not for me I mean I don't know if I've got fucking white spirit in the house who the hell knows what's in the house Sean says that this a lot was made of this in court and I kind of agree it doesn't prove anything I have no idea if we have white spirit in the house? Sean says that a lot was made of this in court. And I kind of agree. It doesn't prove anything. I have no idea if we have white spirit in the house. I mean, maybe.

But if I needed it, would you go looking in your garage for it? Or would you just go buy some, like, one pound white spirit? Well, it's absolutely one of those things that you have and you use it once and then you forget about it. It's not something you're using every day, is it? It's not a pair of scissors. Exactly. So I don't care that he said that we went to go buy white spirit if there was white spirit in the house.

But there was other suspicious behaviour. Jenkins, firstly, didn't take any money with him to the store. And why did the girls have to go with him? Maybe, I guess, they wanted to. But three people to go buy some white spirit while you leave your other 13-year-old daughter alone in the house. And there's more evidence. This is particularly interesting. And it's the most shit explanation from Jenkins

of the route he took to the hardware shop. He circles round the park, which would have made the journey longer. It's literally opposite his house. Like, he can choose to turn left out of his house and go straight there, of his house and go straight there or turn right and go around the park and like flip it around again which doesn't make any sense and he goes twice around the park as well it's so exactly there is a clear straight

drive from his house to this shop why is he going around the park let alone why is he going around twice heading right past his front door before heading to the shop. When questioned in the interview, he says that's because he couldn't turn around at his house because it would have meant doing a three-point turn in the middle of the road. So I had to go around the park. Fine, but then why did you do it twice? He's got a really bullshit explanation for that as well. I feel like if you live, well, I suppose they hadn't lived there that long, but if you live in a house where turning out of the drive is difficult

you just figure out a way to do it you don't like no one is going to be going round the park every single time they want to leave the fucking house there's no way like you literally would just I was driving in Corfu last week and I did a very illegal 3.10

because I was in big trouble. Like you just do it if you have to do it. Even if he went round the park for that reason, why twice? He went round his front, he went past his front door twice. That makes no sense to me. Absolute rubbish. So the way he explains why it was twice, which just doesn't ring true with me at all, but I'll, you know, I'll say it it anyway he said that he decided it was too late to go to the shop and too late for Annie to start painting so I decided that we were just going to go home like a two second drive round the park is not enough time to make that decision but then apparently Annie said oh she was really quite keen to paint which doesn't sound like a 13 year old from East London I don't feel like a 13 yearyear-old from East London. I don't feel like a 13-year-old from West Ham.

I don't feel like that's... They're going to be their choice turn of phrase, in my opinion. But then he changed his mind and he felt bad and decided to actually just go to the shop after all. But he doesn't seem like an indecisive man and I just don't think that journey is long enough to have that conversation. Because he's a teacher.

He's a deputy head teacher. He seems so authoritarian when he's talking. I think if he had decided that no one was painting, no one would be painting. No one was going to be painting that day. And again, we come back to this. When you watch the interview, we said this before,

he's so articulate. He's so well-spoken. But he stumbles. He ums and he ahs and he answers. And the answers that he gives are not satisfactory to us for many, many of the. But he stumbles. He ums and he ahs and he answers. And the answers that he gives are not satisfactory to us for many, many of the questions that he's asked. The whole interview, in my opinion, is just an exercise in arrogance. It's all just me, me, me. Again, this is not indicative of guilt, but he comes across like a psychopath to me. And we'll delve more into his

character as we go, which seems to back up this theory as well. So back to the timeline. When Jenkins and the girls arrive at the store, he realises that he has no money with him, so they turn back and head home. Now Jenkins uses this to undermine the police's argument that the trip to the store was a cover story, by saying that if that's what he'd intended, he'd have gone in, he'd have taken his time, maybe spent an hour browsing before heading home. I guess that seems reasonable. What do you you think of that i think it's quite difficult to keep two teenage girls in a hardware shop for any considerable amount of time and i feel like because they knew what they wanted they knew they needed white spirit it was just going to be in and

out like you're not going to be browsing the aisles are you that's very true that's very true i understand his in the interview he's saying you know if that's what i was doing if i was giving myself an alibi i would have taken more time which i do and i know you were saying before recording why didn't he just take them to dinner why is it this short amount of time but the drive points to the fact that he's panicking and i think that's what's happening here as well i think the reason that he doesn't stay out for an hour browsing the hardware store, I think it's because this man,

when you watch him in the interview, how controlling does he come across? How in control does this man need to be? I don't think, even if he is guilty, that he could have kept himself away from that house for an hour, not knowing what was happening there, knowing that billy joe was dead i don't think he could have done that i think he needed why else drive past

the house twice i feel like it was to check he was panicking and i think again he's panicking he knows that he has to go home at some point he's like let's just do this but again this is all coming from the angle that we think he's guilty we will discuss some other suspects at the end but watch this interview and tell me he's not. What makes it more complicated is we actually don't know where his wife and other two daughters are when this is all happening. So maybe he came home from the store so quickly to make sure he was there first and he could play the shock father and find Billy's body before his wife came home. But either way, let's just look at what he's telling us to believe.

He's telling us to believe. That Sean, Annie and Lottie. Come home from their clarinet lesson. And pretty quickly head to the DIY store. And they are gone for roughly. 10 to 15 minutes. And in this time. Someone killed Billy.

Broke into the house. Went into the garden. Found Billy. Found a murder weapon. Killed Billy. And fled fled all without anyone noticing. So let's just stop here for a second because it was something interesting actually that you brought up. We don't actually know exactly when Billy Joe was murdered. So you have the time when Annie and Lottie are at their clarinet lesson.

Sean is not at the clarinet lesson with them. The mum and the other two daughters are not in the house. So we can assume that Sean and Billy Joe are in the house by themselves. Then Sean goes to pick up the girls, Annie and Lottie, from their clarinet lesson. He brings them home and then pretty much immediately they leave to go to the DIY store. Was Billy Joe killed while the girls were at the clarinet lesson and before the trip to the DIY store, before Sean even went to go pick up the girls from the clarinet lesson, or was she killed upon his return from the clarinet lesson and between that and the trip to the DIY store? We don't know. He says that she was alive when he came home from the clarinet lesson,

but we don't know that. If he did kill her while the other girls were at the clarinet lesson why come back for that very short amount of time that doesn't seem to make sense that's the only reason i wouldn't but if the two girls are at the clarinet lesson and we don't know where the wife and the other two daughters are that does put sean jenkins alone with billy joe jenkins in the house for about an hour absolutely and why it's really hard to know this is because the girl's testimony is never really made public but all we do know is that they give contradictory stories to what sean jenkins gives sean at the start says things like he didn't go into the house at all they just got in home they came into the driveway and then they

immediately drove off and then he says that he did go. Like it's all a bit of a muddle. So aside from all of this, there's even more weird behaviour now with Sean Jenkins. So they've come home, they found Billy, they've called an ambulance. And while his two other daughters are being comforted by a neighbour and Billy Joe lay in a pool of her own blood, either dead or dying, Sean Jenkins went out to the front of his house and got in his car. The police felt that he did this to provide himself with a perfect explanation for any of Billy's blood that might have been

found in the car afterwards. Because if he had killed Billy and then driven to the shop there was bound to be blood in the car on the driver's side. Now he could explain why. But what was his explanation? Oh, it's so shit. Like, it's just like, oh, I was in shock. None of this makes any sense.

I couldn't understand it. I wasn't sure what I was doing. And if a police officer sees a horrible scene, they get comforting and counselling, and I was just questioned straight away. Me, me, me. Totally. Ugh.

And it was the shock that has led to my conflicting stories about what happened on the day. The conflicting stories are like how he told the police that on returning to the house after the clarinet lesson, he had not even entered the house. But come home, been in the driveway and then gone straight to the shop. Well, after circling the park twice, obviously. Then he told the police, oh yes, maybe I did enter the house, but just briefly and only into the hallway. Then it was, yes, I did go into the house, but only to the kitchen.

Come on. But this is basically why we can't tell, right? What exactly happened with the timeline or when exactly Billy was killed. So it's really interesting. He's also saying things again, just so me, me, me with this idea of like, I was being interviewed within an hour of finding Billy. I was in shock. Of course you were being interviewed immediately.

That's how it works. You were the person to find her. And again, he states that this is why he kept changing his stories, because he'd update the police as his memory was coming back past all the shock. And Trevor goes in here during the interview and asks, you were changing your story

because you were updating your account as your memory was returning, or was it because you realized that your children were giving police a very different account to yours? They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death.

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I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mum's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him.

This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me and it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding and this time if all goes to plan we'll be finding andy you can listen to finding andy and finding natasha exclusively and ad free on wondery plus join wondery plus in the wondery app apple podcast or spotify and this is what we don't know what the girls actually said but if we assume that he was saying oh we didn't even go into the house but the girls are saying yes we did and then he says oh I just went into the kitchen for a second the girls no you were in there for quite a while oh well you know I just went into

the hallway for a bit I had something to do and then I decided we were going to the DIY shop I think that's why his stories kept changing and I think from that we can infer what the girls had said which was yes you did go into the house and you told us to stay outside or I think from that, we can infer what the girls had said, which was, yes, you did go into the house and you told us to stay outside. Or, I think the girls did stay outside. I think so. Yeah, again, it doesn't help us, though, because if the girls stayed outside and didn't see Billy, we don't know if she was already dead or if he killed her then. I just don't believe that he would take the girls into the house if he knew she was dead. And that's if he stayed outside.

Yeah, if they stayed outside that makes sense he comes at trevor immediately though when he asked him this question saying they were just private off-the-cuff remarks what there is no such thing as an off-the-cuff remark to a police officer who's investigating the murder of your foster daughter so conversations with the police after your foster daughter is murdered in your house are not fucking off-the-cuff remarks they are police statements and then he has the nerve to say that it was basically outrageous how he was being treated that the police officers the crime scene were in jenkins words told you've done a great job you're in shock and they were given the support but when i was in shock i was guilty and no one was interested in my shock this This is literally word for word what this man says.

No one was interested in my shock. No, they weren't, Sean, because your daughter is dead. It is just an unbelievable level of entitlement and self-absorption. Like, it makes my skin crawl, honestly. He never even seems angry. The entire interview he alleges that someone broke into his house and killed his daughter. But he's the most angry when it's something that's happened to him. Like he's being accused of it, not being believed and not being supported.

But despite his denials, the police are sure that he is their man. But how could they prove it? What sort of man would lose his shit like that in minutes and beat a 13-year-old girl to death and then coolly try to cover it up. They find his CV and spot the lies. Guys, everyone lies on their CV. They expect you to lie a little bit. That's okay.

We're not saying that that's, well, no, I am going to say it's okay. It's okay to lie on your CV. It depends what you're lying about on your CV. That's true. We've all lied on our cv you shouldn't lie about your qualifications but i think it's probably okay to put coordinator instead of something assistant anyway before i incriminate myself anymore no it's fine and it's okay to say

things like i work well as part of a team even when you really find people incredibly tedious and hate working as part of a team exactly exactly when you really find people incredibly tedious and hate working as part of a team. Exactly, exactly. And you can say that, you know, oh, attention to detail. That's what everyone says in the CV. I love the head movement with that. Attention to detail.

I am so good at attention to detail. But Sean Jenkins did bad lying on his CV because he actually made up jobs that he had had. He fabricated schools and universities that he had attended. And he said this was just to ensure that he got the job in Hastings. Isn't that a little bit worrying that a school isn't doing thorough background checks on the teachers that they are hiring? That alarms me somewhat.

Anyway, it is very much a sign of grandiosity and entitlement and deceit because he's saying, you know, I deserve this job. Who cares if I have to lie about it? Obviously, lying on your CV doesn't make you a killer. Otherwise, I would certainly be fucked and so would all of us. But more dark marks against his name do begin piling up. It only gets worse for Sean because now his wife claimed that he was an abusive man who had slapped Billy Joe and had been physical and a strict disciplinarian with all of the children. She came out after the murder of Billy and gave a full account to the police. And he's so annoying. He

just keeps saying they twisted that. They twisted this. They used all of this against me. What? They used all of the things that you did against you. Fuck off. He's so annoying. The bit of the interview that made me tear my hair out the most is the bit where he's just like, oh, you know,

if they're trying to make you look guilty, they can take anything you do in your day-to-day life and twist it to make you look guilty i was like yeah if you're murdering people like that's investigation like and you can just see the trevor mcdonald just is having none of it i love trevor he's fantastic in it he's just sat there like with a uh-huh look on his face but he was right the police did use all of this against him, and rightly so. And in July 1998, after a trial by jury, he was convicted of the murder of Billy Joe Jenkins and sentenced to life imprisonment. But Jenkins' lawyer almost immediately started preparing his appeal, and they felt they had solid grounds for a retrial. Firstly, the jacket, so Sean's jacket that had the blood spots on it. The trial jury convicted him after hearing this.

It played an absolutely key role in his conviction. But now there was new forensic experts coming forward who said that a dying or even dead person could expel droplets when they were moved or supported. It's called the blood aerosol theory. So his defence claimed that the blood came from Jenkins tending to Billy. But the police state that in fact Jenkins was trying to avoid doing anything to help her at all. Jenkins' next-door neighbour had rushed over when she heard the screams of the girls when Billy was found. This is another thing I don't understand. You can see on the news programmes about this case,

their back garden is incredibly open. I am astonished that no one heard anything until after she was dead. And clearly they were in, because if they're hearing the screams of the other two girls, 15, 20 minutes later... Anyway, in court, this neighbour testified that Jenkins had delayed calling an ambulance at first, then not followed the advice from the 999 operator to check billy joe's pulse or place her in the recovery position he's a teacher he must know

they're telling you as well check her pulse put her in the recovery position they will talk you through how to put that person in the recovery position but the neighbor was he didn't do that he didn't do it he didn't check her pulse he didn't move her body even though he was being told to and this was corroborated by the ambulance crew who said that when they arrived billy joe was still lying on her front on the patio that tells me he didn't want to touch her at all how could you not he didn't want anything on him oh it makes this makes me so angry makes me so angry actually you know what i've just thought this if it like say you've got a kid and you see them lying down in a pool of blood the first thing you do would be to go and

touch them why is the only blood on him spray why isn't he covered in blood exactly why isn't he dripping with her blood but he hasn't touched her because it's a sign of a guilty mind he didn't want to get the blood on him because in his mind he thinks i'll have to explain why again classic psychopath he's mimicking behavior he doesn't understand that that is what a genuinely loving parent would do is rush over and comfort pick up their child put them in their laps he doesn't understand he's thinking self-preservation i absolutely because he he doesn't understand the genuine feelings behind that and when he was asked by the 999 operator whether billy joe was still breathing sean jenkins allegedly replied i don't know i haven't looked really oh now the neighbor

also said that she had placed a towel around billy joe's head and that was when she saw the part of a bin liner in trash bag sorry hey no we're english sorry i no we're English I didn't mean to apologise for that I was just explaining bin liner slash trash bag slash bin bag oh Hannah's very hung over and holiday weary guys I'm not hung over I'm tired

from your three hour flight from Corfu sorry I'm just bitter because i haven't been on holiday in eight months so she sees this bin liner inside billy joe's left nostril and she pulls it out and then blood pours from behind where this piece of plastic was stuck why are you touching it neighbor stop it stop touching things with your hands anyway at this point i don't think they knew billy joe was dead so you would want to help her but i don't know why you would look up her nose i guess he's lying on her back you can see it she pulls it out maybe she thinks she's choking on it i don't know yeah that i can understand if she didn't think she was there

maybe she wasn't maybe she was we don't know if billy jo Joe was dead when they arrived. But this little piece of plastic bag is a very important part of the case. We think it's a bit of a red herring. Not necessarily a plant, but a diversion that distracted the investigation because it pointed the finger at another suspect. Because around the time of the murder, a mentally ill man with a fetish for

plastic bags was seen in the street and the area and Mr Jenkins' defence alleges that the man who was believed to have been a paranoid schizophrenic could have murdered Billy Joe when Jenkins left to go to the DIY shop. So now Jenkins claims that he and his wife Lois were so worried about prowlers and break-ins in the area that they had put in security lights and window locks fitted around their home. But he was cool with just leaving Billy, who was 13, alone in his house, again. Yeah, right, shut up. But anyway, Brian Kent, who was a man who runs a guest house on the road where the Jenkins family lived, told the old Bailey that Mr. B, which is how the plastic fetishist man was referred to in court, had rung his doorbell at about 3pm on that day, on the day of the murder.

Brian said, we had a rather confused conversation, and it was obvious that he had mental health problems, and I suggested that maybe he find accommodation in the centre of town. And with that, Brian Kent said he pointed the van in the direction of the Jenkins' home towards town. And on the final day of Jenkins' defence, the jury heard from two witnesses who said they saw Mr B on a bench in a park opposite the Jenkins' house on the day of the murder.

Samantha Mott of Chelmsford, Essex, told the jury she was walking in the park with her grandparents and he stared at us as we walked by, she said. He was rubbing his nose and making a snorting noise. It made me feel uncomfortable. That would make anyone feel uncomfortable, I think. A few minutes later, she saw the ambulance for Billy Joe going past. And the other witness, a Lucy Pugh, 24, from Hastings, who was also in the same park, said she saw a man on a bench. And she said, I didn't like the look of him. He was playing with his nose and he was snorting on something. Okay, so Samantha Mott, who saw him walking past her just before she saw the ambulance go past for Billy Joe,

she just mentioned him snorting. Surely he would have been absolutely covered in blood. You smack someone in the head nine times with a metal tent spike, you are going to be covered in blood. Yeah, absolutely. DC Dawn Briggs of Sussex Police tried to arrest Mr B two days after the murder. She said, I held on to him and I was being dragged down the street. He was very strong.

He tried to get me off him by grabbing me around the throat and kicking me in the shin. Mr. B was eventually restrained with the help of a member of the public and taken to the police station. Two officers described seeing him holding part of a blue plastic bag up to his nose as he lay on the bench in the police cell in a fetal position. They later found two more pieces of plastic in his underwear during a strip search. The man was taken into custody, but eventually he was found to have a solid alibi that was corroborated, and he was not looked into further.

He was never a real suspect. So back to the Jenkins appeal. The new theory about how the blood could have got onto Jenkins was enough to now force a retrial. So that was the blood aerosol theory, that it was just spray. But when that case ended in 2005, that jury, so the retrial jury in 2005, were unable to come to a majority verdict after 39 hours of deliberating. So there was to be a second retrial, but again the jury was unable to reach a majority verdict. And at the Old Bailey in London on the 9th of February 2006 Sean Jenkins was declared in consequence not guilty. The Crown Prosecution Service indicated that no further retrials of Jenkins would be sought and he was formally acquitted. The police

investigation trials and appeals are estimated to have cost 10 million pounds. 700 witness statements were taken by the police. Jurors spent 36 days deliberating in three trials. Sean spent 11 days in the witness box giving evidence. And now he's free. This bit is really, really horrible. On the day he was acquitted, his lawyer walked in and said to him, Sean, it's all over. No, it's not all over.

Your foster daughter is still dead. Like this is, it's still this thing of it just constantly revolving around him and he just looks so smug like a genuinely just want to like cause her physical pain he's just such a smug wanker but whatever we think it was all over for sean he walked out of the courtroom that time to be divorced from his first wife? Because, believe us, Lois was fucking out of there. Meet this new woman and marry her. I'm always very interested of women who marry men who are in prison.

Like Reggie Cray. Some women love it. Married his second wife. There's a whole condition, isn't there? I've forgotten what it's called. We'll find out. It's called Bonnie and Clyde Syndrome. That's like the colloquial term for it,

but there's like a scientific name, like a psychological term for it. Oh, it's called hyperistophilia. It's the condition in which people get sexual arousal or facilitation or attainment of orgasm when they were with a man that they perceive as being cruel and powerful, such as a serial killer. How interesting. I, like, have a full-time job. We do this podcast and I haven't been on a date in months, but he had time to divorce his wife,

who accused him of domestic violence, go on trial for murder, two subsequent retires, and get remarried. What? The world's fucked. Back to the topic at hand. But now, so he's free. He thinks everything's over. But this is when the controversy really began. The jury hadn't been allowed to hear dramatic testimony from Lois, his ex-wife. Her saying that he was abusive. Sean says that he was very disappointed.

Disappointed that my wife wants, my ex-wife wants to come forward and say what a violent and abusive man I was. But Lois was very detailed about it and the children absolutely corroborated it. When Trevor questions him, he denies the physical abuse. He is not convincing at all. He said that the police made Lois say all of that so that they could paint him as a violent man to fit their narrative. But why would Lois and her children lie? He's so patronising. He's like, she didn't know what she was doing. But she maintains to this day that theirs was a violent marriage,

and she describes him as volatile. She said, we'd never argue, he'd just snap. And then after a few minutes, he'd be back to normal. And in his closing question, Trevor MacDonald asked Jenkins who he thinks killed Billy Joe and here is what he said. In your view who killed your daughter? I don't know but someone entered my home and murdered Billy. And you could never get over that? That will never go.

That will always remain with me. He's just like, yeah, next question. Like, it's so cringe. And that silence is perfect. Oh, it's just that bit just makes, ugh. It's just, ugh. But since then, Jenkins has had a few thoughts On the case Enough to write a book

In fact what a fucking surprise It's actually really another OJ Simpson Because he wrote a fucking book What a fucking bastard I hate it when they write books And in it apparently It says there was a strange man in the house Who he met during his hour of shock And confusion

Who he'd originally thought was a plainclothes policeman but now he's not so sure and he'd like the police to look into it oh get fucked like no way i'm sorry i don't believe that no way absolutely not and i felt exactly the same about you as when i when i read when i read about the fact that he had this book but i was genuinely surprised to see how many people have left reviews for this book citing their sympathy for Jenkins, saying that he was treated very unfairly by the police and that, to quote, he did not receive a fair trial,

principally because the machinations of his wife would appear to have destabilised his defence. But a fundamental issue with the trial was the fact that Lois was not able to testify to this, so it didn't affect his defence. And also he had three fucking trials, what else does he want? Exactly, no, it's rubbish. And the biggest issue I grapple with is the jacket. The blood absolutely seems to me exploration blood spray, and not the kind or the amount of blood you'd be covered in if you'd bludgeon someone to death. Again, I think that this

comes back to what we really think about the timeline. So I don't know what you think Hannah but I think he was in the home in the house with Billy Joe. The girls Annie and Lottie were at the clarinet lesson. The mum and the other two daughters are somewhere else unknown but not in the house. He loses his shit at Billy Joe. He kills her. He then goes to pick up the girls because we know from Lois's testimony he snaps and then comes back round like her. He then goes to pick up the girls because we know from Lois' testimony he snaps and then comes back round like he's normal. Goes to pick up the girls, brings them back,

keeps them outside the house and says he's just going to run in and that they'll go off to the DIY shop to get white spirit. Runs inside, checks Billy. She's still there, dead or dying.

Gets back in the car. They drive to the DIY shop and he comes back and that's when he gets covered in blood spray because one of the key questions is where are his clothes that are covered in more blood from having killed her but if he did it before the clarinet lesson pickup he has plenty of time to dispose yeah i think i agree with you i just the the sticking point for me is where are the clothes but you're right If it happened before he went to pick up the girls from the clarinet lesson, he had more than enough time. The clothes scenario makes no sense if he did it between the clarinet lesson

drop off at home and the DIY shop. Because then they have, they left almost immediately. So even if we believe he could have gone in and killed her in that time, what would he have done with the bloody clothes? He would have had to hidden them somewhere in the house. What would cause me to have reasonable doubt is if I could buy that in a timeframe of 10 to 15 minutes, because this is what he's asking you to believe. He's asking you to believe that in 10 to 15 minutes, some completely random person breaks into their house, finds a tent pole, you're not just kind of like lying next to the front door, are you? Kills Billy Joe, leaves,

no one sees a thing. I just don't believe that happened. No. If I had a more solid explanation, if I had more reason to believe that, that's the only other thing I could think of. No, but that's, I don't think that there's any that we can really entertain the fact that it was another person it doesn't make any sense to me we already know that the plastic bag fetishist man was was you know given a strong alibi he wasn't responsible and the only other thing that i could find that anybody having any suspicions about who it could be was people citing on the internet that they thought maybe it was the m25 rapist but she wasn't sexually assaulted it's a bit of a stretch it is i mean he was around in the area when this was happening but he just broke into the house beat her to death with a temple with

a tent spike and then left i don't know i just think why are we trying to find other suspects when it clearly was sean jenkins i think it's not was it or was it not sean jenkins it was when did he do it and i think pre-clarinet lesson pickup and then he comes back he gets rid of the clothes comes back in and then afterwards the whole not touching the body but he goes near enough that he gets sprayed with the microscopic blood spray because she could even done that when she was dead according to the forensic expert i I think that's what happened. What's the motive, though? That's what I... So the only thing I can think of

is that he just lost it. And if we believe his wife's testimony that he was a violent and abusive man, that does make sense. But even still, she had this bruising, we call bruising on her wrists. Even if you have a child by their wrists and you're shouting at them,

obviously that's horrible, but you're not beating them to death. Like, that seems like quite a big jump. It does. That her testimony is, you know, he smacked the girls around, he hit me. But how much would it take for somebody to escalate from that to the next step of just losing control and killing somebody? Because when Trevor McDonald asks these questions about the corporal punishment the abuse at home he denies all of it and then after the program went to air they add in a thing at the end which says that the girls got in touch with Trevor they wrote to him

and said what our father said on that show is not real he did beat us and he was violent and he was abusive so I think in that kind of situation yes it feels like a crazy big jump but isn't that just how these things go especially with a man who almost falls into like a blind rage like that but I don't know yeah I know what you mean I don't know what the actual motive is there was no instance or records or reports of like sexual abuse or she was gonna out him for anything like that but you do have to wonder why was a man who had four daughters of his own already, who was violent and abusive, according to them,

and, you know, in a corroborated way, why was he taking on another foster daughter? Especially because he says that the reason he lied on his CV to get the job in Hastings was because when they were in West Ham, that he was struggling to even pay the mortgage and having four children, why are you taking on a fifth child? He just doesn't seem

like the kind of man who is going to take on another child that he really can't afford out of the kindness of his heart that just doesn't seem to me anyway like the kind of guy that he is and after watching that interview of him just moaning and bitching

and like oh the world is so hard and woe is me like i i really don't fancy reading his book but if you do listeners at home you can buy it on amazon for the princely sum of which is about like what 60 cents american don't bother you i mean give I mean, give it to a charity. Exactly. Instead of giving it to that piece of shit. I would agree. And again, I think, absolutely, please watch the interview when we post it. It's so addictive watching. I watched it all just with my mouth open.

It's so bizarre. I think one of the fundamental things that really made me think this man did it was because in any other situation, had a parent left their child on their home alone and that child had become murdered or even if an accident had happened that parent would have blamed themselves it was my fault he never once blames himself he blames everyone else that is so true i hadn't thought of that he's a fucking piece of shit and as always please let us know what you think we love hearing

from you and you can follow us on all of the social medias at red handed the pot absolutely and we will see you next time goodbye We love hearing from you and you can follow us on all of the social medias at Red Handed The Pod. Absolutely. And we will see you next time. Goodbye. Thank you. In your view, who killed your daughter? I don't know, but someone entered my home and murdered Billy. And you could never get over that? That will never go. That will always remain with me. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal.

We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today. He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Combs. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so. Yeah, that's what's up.

But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom. But I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery+.