MI6 man found locked in a bag!

[BenBurch]

Is locking oneself inside a bag a popular thing among people who like to tie themselves up in strange places?

Not unheard of. Like catsmate, I know a sub who wants to be an object, so they pack her into a footlocker and put a glass slab on it and she is the table when they have parties. Sometimes she does it without the box (I think as punishment.)

 

[Marduk]

A bit of breath-play self-bondage play gone wrong, perhaps?

being locked into a bag isn't breath play, breathplay is where breathing is prohibited directly, such as with Stephen Milligan MP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Milligan
the correct term for when that happens to a lone victim is "auto-erotic asphysia"

Is locking oneself inside a bag a popular thing among people who like to tie themselves up in strange places?

no, in my experience of this subject bags are something you need to be placed in by someone else, its not unusual for people to enjoy being left in situations like this in bags, wardrobes, suitcases, or the occaisonal restraint fitted bodybag or sleep sack which are designed for this very purpose, as it reinforces the control of the Dominant. But its all too common for the inexperienced to think that when someone is contained they are safe to be left. In my practice I have often left someone contained like this and if desired created the illusion that I have gone out and abandoned them, while monitoring them, walking loudly downstairs and slamming the front door before creeping back up stylee.

I would suggest that the police look for his fetish partner, who was supposed to be present but wasn't when the poor guy suffered a fatal asthma attack. I also wouldn't put it past the ministry to cover up in some way, ensuring things don't reflect badly on themselves is what they do best.

 

[Rolfe]

I would imagine the police have sought for just such a person. Probably quite diligently. I wonder how said bondage partner managed to carry out his or her part without leaving any fingerprints on the bath or tiling?

Your suggestion would have carried more weight if there had been the slightest suggestion that Williams "suffered a fatal asthma attack". The conclusion was that he either asphyxiated or succumbed to a poison that couldn't be detected.

The conclusions made me re-evaluate my thoughts a bit. Why would anyone committing a murder lock the body in a bag like that? It's a bit red flag that this wasn't a suicide or some sort of bizarre auto-erotica. But there may be method to the protocol.

If the killing occurred in the flat, it would be much the safest thing not to remove it from there. So what do you do with it? The bag was probably put in the bath so that the bath drain would take care of liquor of decomposition. Folding the body in a bag and leaving it in the bathroom with the door shut would have minimised the smell of decomposition wafting to surrounding areas. And leaving the heating turned on would have accelerated decomposition. This worked, and the body was so decomposed they couldn't be sure about the cause of death.

The oddity is though, surely anyone would have expected Williams to be missed at work, and the flat searched much earlier. Would it have been better to have concealed the body, in a cupboard or behind the bath surround? Why the complicated lock?

The coroner seems to suspect it might have been some sort of bondage accident, but clearly attempts to find any lead on that one have drawn a blank. And then again, there's the absence of fingerprints. Did the guilty party come back, find Williams dead, and clean up their traces at that point?

Rolfe.

 

[Marduk]

I would imagine the police have sought for just such a person.

Your suggestion would have carried more weight if there had been the slightest suggestion that Williams "suffered a fatal asthma attack". The conclusion was that he either asphyxiated or succumbed to a poison that couldn't be detected.

Rolfe.

Asthma attacks kill by asphyxsia, but either way, I don't think this is a method of assasination, more a sex game that backfired

I've missed the details of the "complicated lock" any more info on that.

Baths are a favourite for fetish activity, the victim can't struggle too much as the walls of the bath control the environment

 

[Rolfe]

Am I the only person who keeps thinking about Stephen Milligan?


Rolfe.

 

[Marduk]

Am I the only person who keeps thinking about Stephen Milligan?

Rolfe.

well no, someone else already posted a wiki link to him in post 42

 

[jargon buster]

I am always at a loss as to how these breath depravation games get started.

'Tell me dear, do you fancy a bit of 'hows your father' tonight?'
'Go on then darling, Im game'
'Right, wait there I will just nip downstairs for a large orange the kettle lead and a bin liner'

 

[Rolfe]

I've missed the details of the "complicated lock" any more info on that.

There were photographs. If you're disposing of a body, why add a lock that makes it pretty clear that he didn't climb in and zip the thing up after him? If it hadn't been for the lock, there's a chance the inquest would have gone with the Milligan explanation.

Rolfe.

 

[Rolfe]

well no, someone else already posted a wiki link to him in post 42

OK, clever-clogs. But I got the Mitch Benn song.

Rolfe.

 

[Marduk]

I am always at a loss as to how these breath depravation games get started.

ask David Carradine

 

[Marduk]

There were photographs. If you're disposing of a body, why add a lock that makes it pretty clear that he didn't climb in and zip the thing up after him? If it hadn't been for the lock, there's a chance the inquest would have gone with the Milligan explanation.

Rolfe.

thats the flaw in my scenario too, if there was a partner who he consensually allowed to lock him in there, then he accidentally died, I can see how the partner might panic, but I can't see how the guy determined he was dead without opening the bag and why when he had done so he would relock the bag
maybe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Ireland
or perhaps the lock is itself evidence of a cover up, what better way to not make it look like one of their officers was kinky and died because of his own bad judgement than to make it look like someone locked him in.

where was the key ?

 

[jargon buster]

a phone call somewhere in the UK
Hey John , have you seen the news?
Yes, I thought you said you went back and let him out?
No, I thought you did.
Never mind just lets not get that drunk again.

 

[Aoidoi]

where was the key ?

According to the articles, inside the bag with him. Also several spares in the apartment. Which makes it seem unlikely he was put in there against his will.

 

[angrysoba]

There were photographs. If you're disposing of a body, why add a lock that makes it pretty clear that he didn't climb in and zip the thing up after him? If it hadn't been for the lock, there's a chance the inquest would have gone with the Milligan explanation.

Rolfe.

Who knows? But if someone drugged him, placed him in the bag, and put a lock on the bag to stop him getting out again, the perpetrator may not have known or cared whether the coroner eventually concluded that he was murdered.

I know that we often talk about Ockham's Razor, but it seems to me that some explanations, such as "why would someone put a lock on the outside and make it look too obvious that it wasn't suicide?" violate this. I think an obvious answer to this could be that the murderer made a mistake. Or, if they were doing the double-bluff thing, it would make it look so obvious that it couldn't be suicide that everyone would think it must have been suicide.

 

[angrysoba]

No that common in my experience, I'd say it's more a being locked in by someone else thing. I know a sub who likes been wheeled around the city in a carry on bag.

What does his team think when he comes on to the pitch like that?

 

[angrysoba]

It seems odd that the coroner has "ruled out" the bondage connection:

Dr Fiona Wilcox criticised the 21-month investigation as she said it was "unlikely" the riddle "will ever be satisfactorily explained".

Dr Wilcox said it remained a "legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services were involved in Mr Williams's death.

She ruled "it would appear that many agencies fell short" during the inquiries into his death.

But she said "there was no evidence to support that he died at the hands of" spies as the inquest drew to a close.

Despite a 21-month police inquiry and seven days of evidence, "most of the fundamental questions in relation to how Gareth died remain unanswered", she added.

She questioned why details of Mr Williams's private life were leaked to the press.

The coroner ruled out Mr Williams's interest in bondage and drag queens in having any bearing on his death, before adding: "I wonder if this was an attempt by some third party to manipulate the evidence."

Press Association via Guardian

 

[Multivac]

Randi's case-notes are full of "experts" who were convinced that something extremely weird couldn't be done without an external force. Usually in his case the external force was supposed to be ESP or something, rather than MI6 agents, but still.

That's why I put experts in quotes, to show that experts can be, and often are, wrong. Also because I wondered how you become an expert in locking yourself into sports bags.

The thing that makes me think it might have been an own goal is that comment from one of his old landladies, who said they'd found that he'd tied himself to his bed "to see if he could escape". So he's got a history of this sort of thing.

Didn't know about this, and agree that it certainly changes things. Maybe he was just an idiot. On the other hand, if you wanted to kill someone that had a history of tying themselves to beds, this might be a good way to make it look like an accident.

 

[Andrew Wiggin]

That had ocurred to me too.





Two "experts" tried to replicate getting in the bag and locking it from the inside but failed on each of the 300 attempts.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17865736

Now there's masochism in action...

 

[Information Analyst]

I guess this is one of the cases that will fascinate/feed conspiracy theorists for many years, because it has all the ingredients they dream about.

Ultimately, I think his actual death was either self-inflicted, or part of a consensual act that went wrong. I don't buy the idea that his colleagues did nothing about his absence for a week, but really see it as being fairly reasonable in the circumstances that someone would have been tasked to covertly a) check up on him, and b) make sure there was nothing in his flat that shouldn't have been there. If a another party was inadvertently involved in the death, especially if it was someone in the same sensitive line of work, it would make sense if they cleaned up after themselves, or had someone else do it for them.

If it was actually murder, then it's either totally unconnected to his work, or else it wasn't an "inside job," for the simple reason that it's just too damn weird and obvious a way to kill someone.

The denialism about the bondage/fetish angle just seems to be to placate the feelings of the family/friends, who have been highly outspoken about Williams being "straight" and "normal."

 

[Rolfe]

The point about nobody raising the alarm was more of a "duty of care" thing. Also, anomalous for MI6. A retired agent told the BBC how in his time (cold war days) they would come looking for you if you were an hour late for work.

Rolfe.