• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Split Thread David Gilroy: murder conviction goes to Scottish Review Commission

I hiked to the picnic bench at Allt Broighleachan today and thoroughly searched in the area marked on this map. I planned to search further all the way up to the bridge but the ground was too marshy - will try again in the spring.

Search area across river.jpg

I could only find this - which looks like an animal bone.

Bone.jpgBridge gate open.jpg

The gate at the bridge over the river orchy was open as was the gate further up on the track.

1st gate sign.jpg
2nd gate open.jpg
2nd open gate 2.jpg

All of the trees on the other side of the river beyond this gate up to the bridge near the picnic place have been felled

Tree felling.jpg

Tree felling 2.jpg
 
Last edited:
novaphile said:
Hmm...

Regarding body disposal.

There are many places where a body could be left, and it would not be found again, and require no tools.

Examples include: disused wells, mine shafts, pits (that are full of water), tanks that are used for disposal of cow manure, pig manure, etc.

Given the size of the area you are discussing, I'd guess there are hundreds of places like that out there.

The only way that would come to light, would be if the person that disposed of a body, talked about it.
Click to expand...

Yeah, here's the only mine working in the area. There's absolutely no chance of getting near it from the A85. The railway line cuts it off completely, there's no access road, it's on a slope of about 20%, and it's forested on the lower slopes.

1763132205497.png

This is what he was up against. He was driving an ordinary saloon car, and he could not afford to take that car anywhere it might get stuck or he was toast. As it was, he seems to have damaged the suspension. But he could only take that car on made roads or reasonably passable forest tracks. My own thought was that he was unlikely to have been able to get the body more than about 100 yards from wherever he'd stopped the car, but maybe we should consider 200 yards to be on the safe side. Then when I spoke to Stuart Houston he said exactly the same thing. They never move the body more than 100 yards but we searched 200 yards from the roads just in case. (Louise Tiffney was found EIGHT METRES from the side of a busy public road, fifteen years after she disappeared.)

We're working on the assumption that the disposal place is near a road or track accessible from the triangle made by the A85, the A82 and the B8074, plus the A85 west to Dalmally. We've examined every turning off these main roads, and it's surprising how very few are actually practical given the time of day, traffic, gates and the terrain. There are really only three serious possibilities, of which the stand-out leader is the track up the side of the Allt Broighleachan.

There is another wrinkle, which is that we're pretty damn certain he knew where he was going. That he was going somewhere he had been before. (The cops also think that, as regards the R&BT, which makes their theory that he drove around for hours in a panic of indecision even more surprising.) As Alduma pointed out earlier, that changes the parameters a bit. It doesn't matter if the Allt Broighleachan picnic place is the best place in Scotland to conceal a corpse, if the place he had actually been to was one of the other possibilities. But having said that, the Allt Broighleachan is also the most likely place for him to have visited. Although it's not at all busy, in fact it's very quiet, there is a picnic place, a somewhat interesting patch of ancient forest, a mountain bike trail and access for climbers up to Beinn Mhic Mhonaidh. There was a sign by the bridge welcoming visitors. (At first I discounted it because I thought that meant it would be too much frequented, until I realised how quiet it actually is, especially on a weekday.) It's almost perfect. Quiet enough to be unobserved, but open to the public so that the "what on earth is that car doing there?" question wouldn't arise the way it would anywhere else.

If he had been there before that is. But he went somewhere, and nowhere else is nearly as promising as that.
 
NightOfTheDemon said:
I hiked to the picnic bench at Allt Broighleachan today and thoroughly searched in the area marked on this map. I planned to search further all the way up to the bridge but the ground was too marshy - will try again in the spring.

View attachment 65953

I could only find this - which looks like an animal bone.

View attachment 65954View attachment 65955

The gate at the bridge over the river orchy was open as was the gate further up on the track.

View attachment 65956
View attachment 65957
View attachment 65958

All of the trees on the other side of the river beyond this gate up to the bridge near the picnic place have been felled

View attachment 65959

View attachment 65960
Click to expand...

Good for you. I hope you didn't freeze, it was a cold day.

I see you went for the area across the burn. I have been thinking about this. Although Hugh Venables said the burn was low on the day he took his photos, a month after Suzanne disappeared, I still doubt very much that Gilroy could have got a body to the other side of the burn. The almost-imperceptible ford to the north of the picnic place is not passable for a saloon car and dragging the body over that would be insane - particularly when the terrain on the same side of the burn is no worse for disposal.

Another thing I only realised recently, and that is that the path to Beinn Mhic Mhonaidh runs the other side of the burn. It's marked wrongly on the OS map. The right turn before the picnic place leads to both the mountain bike trail and the Beinn Mhic Mhonaidh access, with the mountain path turning left almost as soon as you're over the burn and following the burn on the opposite side from the picnic place up as far as the bend where the rudimentary vehicle ford is. You probably saw the path where you were searching, but I think your search area was the part between the path and the burn. So getting her over the burn would simply put her in the path of climbers heading up in to the hills.

I'm more interested in the side of the burn with the vehicle access - the picnic place and the adjacent forest. There's the pond of course, although I have my doubts about how he'd have got the body to stay under the water. Although it's entirely possible nobody looked there during the period of time when a body would float (not sure how long that is though). Other than that, I was very struck by the terrain under the commercial planting. It wasn't like most of these forests, just bare ground with pine needles and tree trunks, there were all these little watercourses and enough sphagnum moss to have supplied the Florence Nightingale. Pull her in there, identify a hollow where there won't be visible interference with drainage, get her into it and cover with (maybe) soil and a lot of moss? We were in there, you know where I mean.

I don't suppose you thought of bringing that bone away with you? I agree it looks like an animal bone and it would be surprising if there weren't a few of these, but a closer look wouldn't hurt.
 
Last edited:
Twas a cold wind but I was prepared for the cold weather. I left the bone undisturbed.

I agree that DG would probably not cross the river carrying a body because even if the river level was low on 5th May 2010 it is still quite a slippery crossing. However, after watching the Channel 5 programme about Sinead Healy I figured that Suzanne's bones could be dispersed by wild animals anywhere within a 200 metre radius of the picnic bench. Today's search across the river was just the first search, I will go back in the spring and thoroughly search all areas within 200 metres of the picnic bench just like the MRT's did in Ardgartan. The police are not going to authorise a search at the picnic bench so someone has to do it. If nothing is found, it is a good hike.

The circumstances surrounding Sinead Healy's murder are quite gruesome. Sinead Healy disappeared in October 2000 and her skeletal remains were found in a a shallow grave in March 2001 just off a lay by on the A40. However, her body had been eaten by wildlife and her skull was missing from the disposal site. The police found her skull and other bones on the other side of the A40 as foxes and badgers had moved the remains.
 
Last edited:
If he didn't manage to bury her deeply, and it seems very unlikely that he did, it's possible, and worth a try. But Sinead was only missing for five months. Suzanne has been missing for over fifteen years now. How dispersed might her remains be? Do you think the metal detector is still worth a try? I haven't seen police using these in searches, but given that most people have metal on their persons and we don't have any reason to believe that Gilroy stripped Suzanne, you'd have thought they might be employed. Remember how yours went bananas over that tiny silver ring I was wearing.

I still wonder about that pond, and how sure we can be that you'd have found something if she was there. It's well within the radius of the possible from the picnic place. Getting her in there, either by lifting her and throwing her in bodily, or (if he'd thought of it and had a bit of rope) by dumping her on the far side then pulling the body into the deepest part by towing it with the car, would have been perfectly feasible. My only caveat is, would he have been concerned that she might float up and be seen, would he have done anything to prevent that, and if she had floated up for a time, would it have been at all likely someone would have passed by and noticed?

That pond needs professional searching, maybe by someone with the right gear actually swimming down into it.
 
The pond didn't look deep today and I could see the reeds through the water (although this photo from today does not not show the reeds) My metal detector is not the best, however a fishing magnet would be able to find zips, mobile phones and coins in the pond. I did not take my metal detector today as I was focussing on finding bones below the undergrowth but I will take it next time. I will look into getting a fishing magnet by the spring. The pond has to be searched and ruled out.

Pond 14th Nov.jpg
 
Magnet. That's an idea.

OT story. Many years ago I was doing weekend duty while the boss went sailing on the Norfolk Broads. I got a phone call late on Sunday evening to say he'd lost his car keys overboard while tied up at a mooring. His plan was to get a strong magnet in the morning and retrieve them. He got the magnet and people were standing around laughing at him. One cast, and the magnet came up with the keys.

One zipper. One D-ring. One of these wee metal slider things from a bra strap. Just something to provide evidence that there might be something in there, and we could go back to Stuart Houston. He'd probably authorise a proper search of the pond on that basis.

I don't know what to think about sinking the body. If he knew enough that he hurried to get her in the car before rigor mortis set in (and he did), he probably knew that bodies will float. He could risk it and hope nobody looked at the pond for a week or two, but even though it wasn't a huge risk I don't think it's one he would have wanted to take. The reason bodies float is that gases build up in the body cavities, turning the corpse into a bit of a balloon. The body will sink once the skin bursts, releasing the gas. The thing to do is to puncture the body cavities in advance so that the gases will escape as they form. You could do this with a reasonably big sharp-pointed knife, most kitchens would have one. You could probably do it through the clothes. Puncture both the abdomen and the chest in a few places and it would probably sink and stay down. Would he know to do this, and would he have been prepared to do it? It could have been done without contaminating him forensically if he had gloves and protective clothing on. (I know I go backwards and forwards on this one, I can't read his mind.)

I think water levels have been gradually dropping over the past few years. The level of water in that ford above the picnic place on the way to the deer fence was a lot lower when I went up in 2019 compared to Hugh Venables' photo from 2010, and he said that the burn was unusually low that day. I've never seen the pond as low as it is in your photo from today. It can't be that deep, but I think it would have been deep enough to conceal her back in 2010, reliably, and what would be left now anyway?
 
NightOfTheDemon said:
The circumstances surrounding Sinead Healy's murder are quite gruesome. Sinead Healy disappeared in October 2000 and her skeletal remains were found in a a shallow grave in March 2001 just off a lay by on the A40. However, her body had been eaten by wildlife and her skull was missing from the disposal site. The police found her skull and other bones on the other side of the A40 as foxes and badgers had moved the remains.
Click to expand...

I was thinking about the difference between Sinead Healy, scattered bones after only five months, and Louise Tiffney, a recognisable body after fifteen years, with nothing in the news about bones being found scattered all over the place, as far as I remember. As far as I can make out, Louise was found here.

1763213363135.png

The road (travelling left to right) runs along a long stretch where it's bounded on the right by the wall of Gosford House and on the left by the open shoreline. This is the first place a cyclist needing a pee would come to where decent screening was available. Beyond this point there is a wall on the left as well. The cyclist seems to have walked into these bushes beyond the wooden footbridge, and stumbled on the body. I don't know why Louise wouldn't have been scattered around the landscape by scavenging wildlife, including birds, in fifteen years. I know studies have been done on this, but it all seems very variable and there's a lot of chance involved.
 
After looking at online photos of Louise Tiffney's deposition site, I think she was found in this area.

Deposition site.jpg

Which is here on Google maps.

These are photos of the deposition site

Louise Tiffney 2.webp
Louise Tiffney 3.jpg

which match with Google Streetview

Photo matches.jpg
 
Last edited:
I don't know why Louise wouldn't have been scattered around the landscape by scavenging wildlife, including birds, in fifteen years.

Louise Tiffney was found in a shallow grave in 2017 and Sinead Healy was found in a shallow grave here in 2001. Badgers and foxes probably dug at both shallow graves, which were situated beside a main road, exposing their remains above ground.

The badgers and foxes would not even have to dig into a shallow grave to get to Suzanne according to the police.
 
Last edited:
I wonder what exactly they mean by "shallow grave". According to the BBC article, Sinead (who was tiny) was only covered over by leaves to prevent her being seen by passing motorists.
 
Sinead was found in a shallow grave, covered in soil and covered in leaves. William Hedges, who stopped his van on a verge to urinate, saw a human-sized rib cage sticking out of the ground on March 22 last year. (2001)

I would guess the shallow grave was just deep enough to cover her as badgers and foxes have been at the disposal site pulling the rib cage from the soil and have taken her skull (which was found in a neighbouring field)

Louise was found in a shallow grave, the remains were found by a cyclist about 8 metres from the roadside and all of the remains had now been fully recovered from the site.

I can't see any reports about animals digging at Louise's shallow grave, however she may have been buried in a grave just deep enough to cover her body and the cyclist has spotted the bones because animals have dug at the shallow grave exposing her bones above ground.
 
Thanks for that. I hadn't realised that Flynn had made any attempt to bury his mother, I thought she was just dumped. I wonder how long he spent on the task?

That must have been one hell of a shock for both men who discovered the bodies. I don't suppose anyone is likely to wander to wherever Suzanne was left, for a quick pee.

This was why I wondered about somewhere adjacent to the A720 Ediburgh ring road, if Gilroy had gone out at night to dispose of the body. These areas of grass, bushes and trees are planted to be self-sustaining and not need the attentions of a gardener. There are places where, with luck, you could park on the hard shoulder and get a body in among the denser vegetation. You're not even going to have to worry about dog-walkers. Very few people are going to stop for a pee on that road, or go any distace into the bushes if they do. This sort of thing. https://maps.app.goo.gl/9Pt8uzyHZbaoakRe7

1763304107311.png

It's just a narrow line of bushes between two carriageways, who is going to go there? Litter-pickers? Even they would be very unlikely t go into the bushes unless somethig was visible.

But that's not where he went, anyway.
 
The deposition sites chosen by Lynch and Flynn were next to main roads so someone was going to stumble across the bones eventually, especially since they made it easier for animals to dig up the bones as they were buried in shallow graves.

Lynch just parked in a lay by on a busy road so could have been seen disposing of the body at any time and Flynn either drove here or here to get to the deposition site. The police were close to finding Louise, they found mud and vegetation in Flynn's car which they linked to the Gosford Estate but they looked on the wrong side of the road.

Just found this regarding Louise

Detectives believe skeletal remains disturbed by wildlife near an East Lothian stately home are hers.

Rule number one for killers when looking for a deposition site - don't dispose of the body near a main road.
 
Last edited:
I had not realised that Louise's blood was found in Flynn's car. That makes his original acquittal quite surprising.
 
Last edited:
I suppose "what were the jury thinking" might depend on what the defence advocate said, but I can't think of an innocent way to get someone's blood into the boot of my car.

As regards rule number one, I still think these low-maintenance plantations of trees and bushes by the side of motorways or freeways like the A720, where motorists are extremely unlikely to stop, have potential.
 
We know DG did not dump the body before arriving at Tyndrum (this is a picture of his car with the umbrella still on the parcel shelf when he was caught on CCTV passing the Real Food Cafe.)

Umbrella Tyndrum.jpg

He may have stopped here, just off the A819, to dump the body over the fence - a motorist/cyclist is not going to go over the fence for a pee.
However, driving into this lay by would not break his car's suspension.
 
Last edited:
We've been over this before. He could have done that, but he didn't, and what's more he wouldn't have.

If he had decided to dump the body with no attempt at concealment other than choosing a rarely-frequented place, he would not have lost over three and a half hours he couldn't account for. While the journey was somewhat suspicious in itself, he could well have got away with it as such. What did for him was the missing hours. If he had decided to go for the quick dump and scarper, he'd have made as good time as he could on the journey so that he could claim that he'd gone straight there and back without stopping anywhere.

The reason I don't think he would have contemplated that plan is that if someone stumbled over her by accident any time in the next 40 years or so, he was looking at spending the twilight of his days in prison. His journey wasn't a secret. Suzanne being found anywhere on that route would be a very fast ticket to a guilty verdict and a conviction for murder.

I think he knew all this, despite the Flynn thing not having happened at that time (Louise was still quietly decomposing by the seashore when Suzanne was murdered). I think his priority was getting the best concealment of the body he could, which involved going somewhere unexpected, finding a very quiet place, and doing some work to conceal her from anyone who might come past looking for a place to pee despite all this. I think it's quite likely that he thought that without a body he couldn't even be charged with murder, although obviously if he did think that, he was wrong.
 
Glyn Razzell was convicted of murdering his wife on 14/11/2003 and sentenced to a minimum of 16 years in prison. He was first refused parole in 2021 and has been refused parole twice since then with a fourth parole hearing due imminently. The reason parole was refused was because "The panel considered ‘Helen’s Law’" and "it believed that Mr Razzell had information about where the victim’s remains were disposed of"

In Scotland, Suzanne's law will be introduced before DG is considered for parole (when his fixed term of 18 years imprisonment ends in 2030) so this may incentivise him to point the police to the disposal site. (Michelle's law refers to Michelle Stewart whose killer was released in January 2025.)
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom