He Sees Sophie Everywhere

Summary

---

West Cork, Episode: "He Sees Sophie Everywhere"

Host: yarn fm (Jennifer Forde and Sam Bungey)
Date: May 14, 2021

---

Episode Overview

This episode revisits the haunting 1996 murder of French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier in West Cork, Ireland, focusing on the 2019 Paris murder trial held in absentia for Ian Bailey, the man long suspected but never convicted in Ireland. The episode shifts attention from the notorious suspect to Sophie herself—her life, her art, her family, and the impact of her loss—while interrogating the fraught legal and investigative journey between Ireland and France. With intimate interviews, courtroom reportage, and vivid recollections, the episode illuminates a decades-long search for justice shadowed by pain, missed opportunities, and differing cultural lenses on guilt, victimhood, and closure.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Sophie’s Family & Their Ordeal

• Pierre Louis’s Address: Sophie’s son opens and closes the episode, reminding listeners of his mother's humanity and the toll her murder has taken.

  "My mother, Sophie, is not a ghost. She is the victim of human cruelty and violence, of a man who lives among you." (Pierre Louis, 00:18, also repeated at 11:48)

• Pierre Louis and Sophie's French relatives travel to Paris and West Cork, rallying support and confronting the pain of public testimony.

2. The Unusual French Trial

• The 2019 trial is criticized as strange and unprecedented: an Englishman on trial in France for a crime in Ireland, and crucially, in Bailey’s absence.

  "This trial wasn't like that because Ian Bailey wasn't there. And so, while Ian's fate hung in the balance, the focus shifted to Sophie, this woman so often in the shadow of her own story." (Jennifer Forde, 00:53)

• The trial allows for extensive victim testimony—rare in common law systems—placing Sophie center stage.

• Many key witnesses, particularly from Ireland, do not attend, raising questions about the legitimacy and reach of French justice.

3. Sophie: More Than a Victim

• Through family, friends, and Sophie's own unfinished documentary ("He Sees Folds Everywhere"), the episode gives a multidimensional portrait:

  "She has a lot of energy. When she come in a room, there was electricity in the air. She looks at you when you feel that you exist." (Frederic Gazot, 05:23)

• Details of her life emerge—her creativity, warmth, and quirks—as well as her sense of danger in the days before her death.

4. The Ordeal of Testifying

• Sophie's cousin Fred and best friend Agnes agonize over their courtroom testimony, feeling unable to convey the fullness of Sophie's life.

  “The emotion was too hard. And I wanted to… explain what. The joy. The joy Sophie was able to… She was really alive… But I was so sad that I couldn't say a word.” (Agnes Thomas, 27:56)

• Irish witnesses either struggle with the logistics and fraught emotions of participating or refuse altogether.

  "There's only given the summons eight days before the case, you know, so some people haven't got passports… I just want an end to this, you know." (Billy Fuller, 24:21)

5. Evidence, Investigation, and Cross-Border Blame

• The episode details the frequent missteps, lost evidence (notably, the infamous missing gate), and bureaucratic confusion between Irish and French authorities.

  "They found pages from the jobs books were missing, some apparently removed with a pair of scissors… The gate in particular has captured the public imagination in Ireland. How in the world do you lose a gate? Some people began referring to the scandal as gate gate." (Sam Bungey, 35:28)

• New DNA evidence on Sophie’s boot introduces uncertainty, as officials withhold whether it matches any known suspect.

• Testimony against Bailey includes secondhand and contradictory statements, often recounted without rigorous cross-examination.

6. Legal Arguments and Theatrical Tension

• Bailey’s lawyer, Dominique Tricot, stages a press conference denouncing the trial as a “banana republic” procedure and boycotts proceedings.

  “Tricot denounces the upcoming proceedings as the trial of a banana republic and claims the whole thing has been organized by the state as a gift to the victim's family.” (Sam Bungey, 40:34)

• Marie Dosse, the prosecution lawyer, gives an impassioned closing argument, painting a vivid narrative of Bailey’s guilt—uncontested in the courtroom.

  “She lays out her vision for the night of the murder. Ian drinks and drinks and drinks more. On the way home, he stops at the lookout point. He has a direct view of Sophie's house. He knows she's alone...there’s no one here to undercut any of it…” (Jennifer Ford, 42:24)

• The prosecution and defense never truly face off, leaving fundamental questions dangling.

7. Verdict and Its Fallout

• Judge Alleen convicts Bailey, with Sophie's son and family overwhelmingly emotional and unequivocally certain of his guilt.

  “So today, it's a victory for us. The judgment is very clear, with all the element of proof. Ian Bailey is a murderer and he killed my mother 22 years ago...Now Ireland will have to extradite Jan Bailey and we will put all the pressure everywhere to get the justice done.” (Pierre Louis, 47:43)

• Despite the conviction, extradition fails, leaving Bailey legally "guilty in France and innocent in Ireland"—a deeply unsatisfying split reality for all involved.

8. Remembering Sophie

• The episode closes intimately, with family memories and symbol-laden descriptions of Sophie's presence lingering in West Cork—her coat still hanging in her cottage, her story still unfolding in those she touched.

  “You feel that Sophie now is a part of the land. I don't know. A part of her is there. She has left traces, but she's alive somewhere, you know?” (Frederic Gazot, 50:40)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

Sophie's Humanity and Loss

• "She was the first one to be married, the first one to have a child, Pierre Louis, the first one who divorced...And when Marie made her pleading, she finished with this sentence. She said she was the first one first. And she said the last sentence was Sophie was the first one to die."

  • Frederic Gazot, 44:11

• “I miss her now because I don't have any friend like this...She was loving talking. Yes...So cool, so great. Irresistible. Irresistible, Irresistible. She was really. So nice girl, really. And so fun and so. Really. We really miss her. Yeah, we lost someone. Yeah, we can say that. We really lost someone.”

  • Agnes Thomas, 29:09

On Justice and Evidence

• "The case against Ian has never been tested in a criminal court in a way that many of us would recognize, and it's increasingly likely that it never will...”

  • Sam Bungey, 48:49

• "Some of the criticism of the guards work in those early days is a little unfair. But what seems to be missing this week at the trial is some of the criticism that's come since…”

  • Jennifer Ford, 35:55

Legal System Clashes

• "A system that would allow the victim a day in court, regardless of whether the suspect shows up."

  • Jennifer Ford, 14:21

• "Putting Ian Bailey on trial without Ian Bailey is something that his lawyer, Frank Buttimer has described as Hamlet without the Prince.”

  • Jennifer Ford, 15:27

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:07 — Pierre Louis’s opening statement in Ireland
• 00:53 — Context: French trial in absentia and its unusual nature
• 03:24 – 07:15 — Sophie's cousin Fred remembers her as a person
• 08:33 — Sophie’s artistic ambition and the presence of violence as a theme in her work
• 11:14 – 13:12 — Pierre Louis’s emotionally charged address in West Cork church
• 14:01 – 16:24 — Discussion on the legal oddity of holding a trial without the defendant
• 18:10 — Courtroom scenes and issues with witness attendance
• 24:07 – 24:56 — Billy Fuller on the burden and consequences of testifying
• 27:56 — Fred and Agnes on the emotional challenge of courtroom testimony
• 35:28 — Mishandling and loss of crucial evidence, "Gate-gate"
• 37:08 — Discovery of unknown male DNA on Sophie’s boot
• 40:34 — Dominique Tricot, Bailey’s lawyer, denounces the French legal process
• 42:24 — Marie Dosse’s emotional prosecution closing
• 44:11 — The poignant close to Dosse’s speech highlighting Sophie’s lost potential
• 47:43 — Pierre Louis’s reaction to Bailey's conviction
• 50:34 – 52:06 — West Cork community memory and Sophie’s coat hanging in her cottage

---

Final Reflection & Tone

The episode is both elegiac and journalistic, balancing procedural detail and emotional catharsis. It lingers on memory, loss, and cultural schism—between Ireland and France, between family and institution, between truth and proof. The hosts let the family’s words, the voices of Sophie’s friends, and courtroom testimony tell the story, gently but insistently advocating that we remember the woman at the heart of "the murder," not just the unsolved case.

---

For listeners, this episode foregrounds Sophie as a living presence, not just a crime statistic—while dissecting the limitations and bitter ironies of the legal systems meant to deliver her justice.

Transcript

[Pierre Louis]

Dear friends, families and dear people of Ireland. I was eight years old the first time I came here and 15 years old when my mother was brutally killed. My mother, Sophie, is not a ghost. She is the victim of human cruelty and violence, of a man who lives among you. In few days time, the trial will begin at last.

[Jennifer Ford]

A lot has happened since the French charged Ian Baillie with the murder of Sophie Toscan du plantier back in 2016. The French tried to extradite Ian, but they were blocked by Ireland. Ian contested the charge, but France denied his appeals. And so a date was set for an unusual trial. An Englishman on trial in a French court for a murder committed in Ireland. We went to Paris for the trial in May of 2019, and lots was different about it. Evidence that you wouldn't have heard in Ireland, arguments that weren't made in France. But it was strange in one respect. Most of all, at every other point in this 25 year saga, Ian Bailey has loomed large. But this trial wasn't like that because Ian Bailey wasn't there. And so, while Ian's fate hung in the balance, the focus shifted to Sophie, this woman so often in the shadow of her own story. To us that week was about her.

[Sam Bunge]

Sophie Toscon de Planier came late to her career as a documentary maker, but she was full of ideas for films about art and philosophy. Her final project was a film called He Sees Folds Everywhere. A fold, as in a fold of a napkin or a piece of paper. Sophie never got to finish the project herself. Editing was yet to begin when she flew to Cork that Christmas of 1996. But her director, Guy Girard, did finish it and released it a year after her death. I recently tracked down a copy. In the opening scenes, the director is walking the streets of Paris, wearing black, smoking, so far, so French. But he's playing with an origami fortune teller. Kids sometimes call them cootie catchers or a chatterbox, a game with directions or fortunes hidden under the different folds. Each time Gujarrard unfolds a corner, it sends him off to explore the fold in a new and surprising way. He meets a brain surgeon, a performance artist, the fashion designer Issey Miyake. He's saying that if you look in the right way, folds are all around us. He reads from the work of an abstract philosopher, explaining how folds shape our very existence, unfolding in the embryo and shriveling up in death. Through an endless procession of examples, Guy is trying to animate an intangible idea. And as I sit here watching the film on My laptop during lockdown. It reminds me of a day I spent in Paris with a guy called Fred. Can you say something to someone?

[Frederic Gazot]

Ello, ello. C' est bon, c' est bon, c' est bonfe.

[Sam Bunge]

I'm Sam Bunge.

[Jennifer Ford]

I'm Jennifer Ford. And this is. He sees Sophie everywhere.

[Sam Bunge]

Introduce yourself. Say your name.

[Frederic Gazot]

Okay.

[Pierre Louis]

Okay.

[Frederic Gazot]

I'm Frederic Gazot and I'm Sophie's cousin. And it's impossible.

[Sam Bunge]

It's a Sunday. Fred and I are in a busy cafe in central Paris the morning before Sophie's murder trial.

[Frederic Gazot]

Strange that I choose this place to talk with you because I didn't realize. I come here and say, ah, yes, this is a place where I learned that my cousin was dead.

[Agnes Thomas]

Yes.

[Sam Bunge]

He says that this is the cafe he was in when he heard about Sophie's murder. Fred was a student then. He was just hanging out reading a football magazine when he started getting messages through on his pager. Messages saying things like, fred, I'm so sorry for your loss.

[Frederic Gazot]

It was very stressful moments because I know that somebody was dead and I don't know who.

[Sam Bunge]

He went looking for a place to make a call. He remembered there was a payphone in the basement of this cafe.

[Frederic Gazot]

I phoned to my friend in this cafe. In this cafe, yes. My friend say, oh, no, I don't want to say this to you. I don't want to say. I said, come on, come on, say me what happened. And at this moment I was thinking it was my mother or my father. And she said, no, it's your cousin. I said, what? My cousin Sophie? And she says, yes, she's dead. And I say, how? How? And she says, she. She has been murdered.

[Jennifer Ford]

Fred has an official role to play at the trial. This week in France, as part of a murder trial, the court hears from personality witnesses who will talk about the victim. The thinking is that to understand the crime, you first have to understand who was lost. As a kid. Fred was starry eyed about his older cousin.

[Frederic Gazot]

I was very amazed by her. I was very proud to have a cousin like her. She has a lot of energy. When she come in a room, there was electricity in the air. She looks at you when you feel that you exist.

[Sam Bunge]

We wander out of the cafe into the first district of Paris where Sophie spent most of her life. Fred has chosen this place to organize his thoughts for the trial. And I'm tagging along.

[Frederic Gazot]

We're going to Sophie's place now, near rambuto.

[Sam Bunge]

Sophie was 15 years older than Fred and she was the eldest of the cousins.

[Frederic Gazot]

We have to walk five minutes.

[Sam Bunge]

It's something Fred returns to often. She occupied that place that the eldest in the group of young relatives often does. The smart, thoughtful, cool one.

[Frederic Gazot]

You see, there is a window.

[Sam Bunge]

We're outside a modern apartment building where Sophie lived with her young son Pierre Louis, after she divorced her first husband.

[Frederic Gazot]

Pierre Louis room. And the other one was Sophie room.

[Sam Bunge]

Fred often came by to babysit Pierre

[Frederic Gazot]

Louis here, and it was very, very simple, like her character, you know, only one couch and her desk for writing.

[Sam Bunge]

Fred sifting through detail after detail about Sophie's life, that she read gothic novels that she couldn't hold a tune but loved to sing. About the time she confronted the homeless guy she realized had been sleeping in her car.

[Frederic Gazot]

She says, come on, you can sleep in my car, but in the morning, you have to clean up.

[Sam Bunge]

She was like, that's fine.

[Frederic Gazot]

Oh, yeah, that's what. But please clean in the morning. She was always gentle.

[Sam Bunge]

Fred's talking to me, but I get the impression he's thinking about the courtroom, searching for the perfect detail that might explain what his cousin was really like. It's amazing what you remember, though.

[Michael Sheridan]

You remember?

[Frederic Gazot]

I remember a lot of things. You know, I can speak for hours.

[Sam Bunge]

Fred feels a certain pressure speaking about Sophie in front of her family, the pressure to sum up a person who meant different things to different people. But Sophie and Fred really bonded over their love of culture. She inspired him to become a documentary screenwriter himself. In court, he's going to focus on what he knows best. So you want to give a portrait of her, but by talking about her

[Frederic Gazot]

taste in music and poetry, it's very important.

[Sam Bunge]

Sophie wanted to make documentaries about African art and Greek dance. For a project about the old belief in the four humors of the body, she had Fred read up in medical texts while she spent hours in a museum filled with gruesome specimens and preserving jars.

[Frederic Gazot]

She was always interested by the thing, but she was a little bit afraid. But she wants to see, but she was afraid. A child. A child. You know, you see the monster or you see the wave. You want to approach, but when the wave come to you, you run in the other way. She was like this.

[Jennifer Ford]

For her documentary on the Fold, Sophie and her director, Guy Girard, would meet to share their research. Guy told Sophie a story about a man who'd murdered his wife and told police that things had taken a mauvais pli. Like a bad turn. The literal translation is a bad fold. Sophie told Guy that if they were going to pursue violence as a Theme they should make sure to speak to a particular writer she knew in Ireland. And she mentioned the man's name. They never did interview him. Shortly after this conversation, Sophie flew alone to Ireland that week before Christmas. But when Guy read Ian Bailey's name in the paper in connection to Sophie's murder, he was sure that that was the writer she talked about that day in the office. He even got on a plane to Ireland to meet with a detective. But by that time, more than two years had passed. Who could be sure his memory hadn't been colored by all the media coverage of the case? Sophie hadn't wanted to go alone to West Cork that weekend. It's something that many in her family have struggled with over the years. She asked lots of friends and family to come with her, but no one could. Fred got a call from Sophie that he never got round to returning.

[Frederic Gazot]

She has sent to my cousin a fax to ask her. Come with me. Please come with me. I don't know why she goes in Ireland if she doesn't want to go alone. And maybe she was afraid of something. I don't know.

[Sam Bunge]

The trial this week probably wouldn't be happening without Fred's father, Sophie's uncle, Jean Pierre. He started a pressure group pushing for an investigation in France when it seemed Sophie's case had been all but forgotten. But now, faced with the reality of a trial, Fred is thinking of Sophie's elderly parents.

[Frederic Gazot]

There is a lot of tension. You know, they are waiting for this moment, but I think very terrible things will be revealed during the trial, you know, the autopsy, a lot of things, and I'm worried. I don't know how they deal with it.

[Sam Bunge]

It's well into the evening by the time Fred and I finally part ways.

[Frederic Gazot]

Tom and I am going to. To sleep, to be. To be with my children for. For the next hours and tomorrow. It would be very stressful, you know,

[Sam Bunge]

I know Fred feels anxious not to let anyone down this week, most especially Sophie's son, Pierre Louis. The week before the trial, Pierre Louis had travelled to West Cork to stand before the congregation at Sunday Mass.

[Pierre Louis]

Dear friends, families and dear people of Ireland. I have been coming to Ireland for 30 years now. I was eight years old the first time I came here and 15 years old when my mother was brutally killed.

[Jennifer Ford]

Pierre Louis has come to this church in the village of Golline to make a direct plea.

[Pierre Louis]

My mother, Sophie, is not a ghost. She is a victim of human cruelty and violence which has no place here because humans are sometimes capable of the worst. This man was capable of the worst because my mother defended herself from the worst up to her last breath to escape the savage and brutal violence of a man who lives among you.

[Jennifer Ford]

Pierre Louis didn't say the name of the man accused of killing his mother, but everyone knew who he was talking about. Ian Bailey's lawyer, Frank Buttimer, would later blame the church for allowing his client to be read from the pulpit. He said, like back in the days when priests would shame people during Mass.

[Pierre Louis]

You know as well as I know who killed my mother. In few days time, the trial will begin at last.

[Jennifer Ford]

That weekend, people across West Cork were receiving summons letters from France. The French can't force witnesses to come to this trial. They don't have that power. But the letters explained that the court would reimburse them for expenses. They just had to get themselves to Paris. And Pierre Louis was in church that day. To strengthen the appeal.

[Pierre Louis]

It's time today to turn one of the saddest pages of the your history, the darkest page of mine. Don't betray me. Don't betray yourself.

[Jennifer Ford]

It's Monday morning, three hours before the trial starts, and something that for so long has just seemed like a wild idea is really about to happen. Ian Bailey is about to go on trial for murder. But Ian Bailey isn't coming. Can we record this? The foreign press are gathered by a cafe opposite the courthouse debating the whole idea of a trial in absentia.

[Michael Sheridan]

The thing you've got to take on board. Most people in Ireland are a bit blind to this.

[Jennifer Ford]

That's Michael Sheridan. He's written two books on the case

[Michael Sheridan]

that it's his decision not to defend himself. You cannot blame the French authorities for legislation allowing for in absentia. It was his decision.

[Jennifer Ford]

The French would like to have him

[Michael Sheridan]

here very much so.

[Jennifer Ford]

There is something kind of fascinating about a system that would allow the victim a day in court, regardless of whether the suspect shows up. Under the common law system, which is what's used in Ireland and lots of other places like the UK and the us, holding a trial without a defendant present would be considered a violation of that person's right to a fair hearing, which is all about two sides duking it out. But that's not going to happen here this week. Not only is Ian not coming, nor are his lawyers, so a murder trial without a defendant present and without a defence. Mick Clifford from the Irish examiner jumps into the argument.

[Michael Sheridan]

The point, Michael, about our system is based not on someone having to defend an innocence. The point that the system is based on having to prove somebody's Guilt. It's nearly turned on its head. He says constantly in newspaper interviews over recent times that he's an innocent man. Now, why isn't he coming? Why isn't his lawyer? Well, I. I haven't a clue, but certainly if I was in his shoes, on the basis of the way I've seen progress through the French system, I'd be very slow to come myself.

[Jennifer Ford]

Instead, this week, Ian's at home in his new writing shed, composing poems. The French are preparing a bonfire on a bed of lies, he says, better they burn an effigy. But putting Ian Bailey on trial without Ian Bailey is something that his lawyer, Frank Buttimer has described as Hamlet without the Prince. It's a saying that supposedly refers back to the summer of 1775, when a theatre company was putting on a production of Hamlet above a pub in London's West End. One night, the actor playing the hero absconded with the innkeeper's daughter. But the tickets were sold, the other thespians all in place. So one of the troupe went out before the curtain call to warm up the crowd. Ladies and gentlemen, he announced the tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, with the part of Hamlet left out for the night.

[Sam Bunge]

A lot of modern courthouses can be fairly functional looking. Slabs of concrete with low ceilings and strip lighting. The Palais de Justice is not that kind of place. This building has been a symbol of French justice for nearly 800 years. It's where Marie Antoinette was imprisoned, awaiting the guillotine. We clear security, walk along a marble hallway and up a worn stone staircase to the Victor Hugo court. Outside, a two armed policeman and a sign saying Bailey Trial. A trial in absentia is like a stepping stone. If Ian is convicted, the French will try to bring him to France to face a new trial in person. But inside the courtroom, it doesn't feel like anyone thinks this is just a dress rehearsal. The lead lawyer for the prosecution is Marie Dauze. She's stylish and has a high profile here in Paris. She cracks a can of Perrier and begins laying out weighty files, 17 separate folders. They'll be stacked here all week, perhaps as a physical reminder of the heft of their case against Ian. Sophie's family and friends occupy the benches behind the legal team and even spill over onto the other side of the central aisle, where Ian's lawyers would, had they come, be laying out files of their own. The dock where Ian would be sitting under police guard is empty. A little after 2pm, the presiding judge, Judge Frederic Alleen, enters the court and With a glance over at the doc, she asks, is Ian Bailey in the room? Silence. Judge Eileen says, we consider that Ian Bailey is absent without a valid excuse. And so the trial begins.

[Jennifer Ford]

The judge reads out a roll call of witnesses who've been asked but not ordered to attend. And it's here where the challenges of the trial begin to sink in. Different languages, different jurisdictions, the Corroding passage of 23 years.

[Lara Marlowe]

I think the way they've handled the witnesses has been quite sloppy.

[Jennifer Ford]

That's Lara Marlowe from the Irish Times.

[Lara Marlowe]

As far as I can tell, they just sent summonsers to whatever old address was somewhere in the file and more than half of them came back saying no reply or unknown at this address or person unknown.

[Jennifer Ford]

The list even included Martin Graham, the Garda informant who sadly died just a couple of months before the trial. Another witness called had died a few years earlier.

[Lara Marlowe]

If they really wanted people to come and testify, they needed to have someone in charge of it.

[Jennifer Ford]

Perhaps the biggest name on this list is Marie Farrell, the witness who said she saw Ian near the crime scene on the night of the murder and then changed her story. We contacted Marie a week or so before the trial. She told us she never had any intention of going to Paris.

[Sam Bunge]

Back in court, the first person to testify is an expert witness who talks about Sophie. Occasionally he speaks directly to the case, but overall it seems more about opening with a portrait of the victim. We move on to photos of the crime scene, at which point most of Sophie's family step outside. The photos are presented here to court by a fast talking French detective. He's the first of two French detectives who will testify today. Both were part of a team assigned to the case back in 2008 when France launched its own investigation. They travelled to Cork multiple times to meet Irish detectives and re interview witnesses. Though they did their own police work, most of what they're presenting here is directly from the Irish Garda file. When it comes to the crime scene photos, the French detective isn't always sure what he's looking at. The prosecution lawyers step forward to help clarify a few points Judge Arlene is understanding. I realise these aren't your photos, she says, but by midway through the second detective, it's pretty clear the French aren't just going through the motions here. He and his partner have been on their feet, testifying for hours. By the time the courtroom empties out, it's past 11 o' clock at night and the rest of the Palais de Justice is deserted. The trial will resume at 9:30 tomorrow morning. There is a schedule Fuller might show.

[Pierre Louis]

Amend the read.

[Sam Bunge]

Yeah, but it all hinges on who turns up. Anyway.

[Lara Marlowe]

Okay.

[Jennifer Ford]

See you later.

[Michael Sheridan]

See you tomorrow.

[Lara Marlowe]

Bye. Thanks. Take care.

[Jennifer Ford]

By late morning on day two, word had gone around that of the West Court witnesses called, just two have made it to Paris. They're about to meet the court translator.

[Lara Marlowe]

My name is.

[Jennifer Ford]

I'll do the short version because I have an extra long African name, so my name is Eunice and I've been working as a translator for 17 years. Eunice likes to meet witnesses before they come into the courtroom because usually they're very nervous. They're in a foreign country, they don't speak the language, they're terrified. And so I explain what's going to happen once they enter the room so that they're prepared. First up is Irene Reid. Irene is here to testify on behalf of her son, Malachi. Remember, Malachi got a lift home from Skull with Ian Bailey one evening and Ian told him that things hadn't been going well for him since he went up there and bashed that woman's brains in with a rock. Or words to that effect. Ian doesn't deny saying something like that. He just says it was a dark joke. Malachi was just 14 back then and doesn't want anything to do with the case anymore, so his mum has come instead.

[Lara Marlowe]

Obviously, their system's very different.

[Jennifer Ford]

AP journalist Testella Maire is new to this case, but has covered legal proceedings for years in the uk. She's not used to hearing evidence secondhand like this, especially not without some healthy cross examination.

[Lara Marlowe]

We're saying, oh, the Garda took me to one side. And this interview with the Garda that he had before he told his mother about what had happened, how did they know that he'd got in Bailey's car? How did they know all of this? And that just didn't seem. That wasn't picked apart at all.

[Jennifer Ford]

In fact, a detective had got word that Ian had driven Malachi home that night. So the detective went to see Malachi the following day in school. But Tess has concerns about that too, about the way this evidence was gathered.

[Lara Marlowe]

Why were they talking to a 14 year old? Where were they talking to her? And she, the mother, clearly knew this story very well, so they might have been questions she could have answered.

[Sam Bunge]

The second witness, Billy Fuller, is here to testify, among other things, about a strange encounter he says he had with Ian Bailey before his first arrest. When, if you don't remember, he says that he and Ian were having a few drinks one evening when Ian accused Billy of killing Sophie. The accusation had a lot of detail that made Billy feel that Ian had incriminated himself. When he came out of court, Billy repeated his testimony for reporters on the stairway.

[Agnes Thomas]

He said that you went up there to see what you could get. You frightened her. She ran away screaming. So you chased her calmer down, Realized you stove something in the back of her head. Realize you went too far not to finish her off. That's what he said to me through himself. I think it was a confession, just some way of saying it, you know,

[Sam Bunge]

this is just one of the many claims Billy Fuller has made about Ian to the guards. One other story was that he saw Ian trying to dispose of a big stick down near the beach one day. This claim was disproved by the guards themselves, who established that Billy had actually seen a local farmer. Billy knows the guards found this, and yet he told us he still struggles to accept that he really didn't see Ian that day. The way the DPP in Ireland saw it back then. Billy was in the grip of a community wide hysteria about Ian that had been stirred up by the investigation. Ian would claim that you were coached into saying the scenario, that he said this by the guard. You spoke to you. What do you say about that?

[Agnes Thomas]

I'd say it's absolute rubbish. The guards never put fear into anybody. The fear was there. As people have said to you before, the fear was already there. Guards were just helping out, reacting on that, really, you know.

And why do you think there is

[Jennifer Ford]

so few Irish people coming here?

[Agnes Thomas]

There's only given the summons eight days before the case, you know, so some people haven't got passports. They haven't, you know, I managed to get a loan to do this. Yeah. It took a lot of energy, a lot of effort, a lot of stress. And it's worth it for me because I've been gone for 22 years and I just want. I just want an end to this, you know.

[Jennifer Ford]

So how does it feel now to have stood up in court and have said. Said what you.

[Agnes Thomas]

It's a relief. It's just on the next stage, we've got to deal with now, haven't we? We still got to live with the guy. Look, and I'm out of two people who stood here now out of me. And I ruined, you know, then he knows what I've said against him. Now again, you know, you got to live around that. You got to live around the ripples that causes.

[Sam Bunge]

Eventually, Billy breaks free and flees down the stairs practically two at a time, and that's it. During Ian's civil case against the Irish state, more than 80 witnesses appeared in a case that's rarely been out of Irish newspapers in over 20 years. This is all we're going to hear from anyone in Ireland,

[Frederic Gazot]

but at least

[Sam Bunge]

these people have saved the owner of a skull village. That's Thierry Levesque, the French reporter who first began covering the case for Reuters back when the murder happened. He doesn't think much of the witnesses who hadn't given up a day or two of their time to come to Paris. Perhaps it is the illustration of the

[Frederic Gazot]

Ireland is not really comfortable with this case.

[Sam Bunge]

All the people know there that they have missed something. And of course, it is a bit

[Frederic Gazot]

shameful to go to Paris to admit

[Sam Bunge]

that the French are doing their job, but I think they should put this

[Frederic Gazot]

apart and help people here to finish with this story.

[Jennifer Ford]

One Irish witness seems to have anticipated this kind of a reaction from the French, and she is determined to shut it down. Helen Callanan has been called to testify about another of Ian's alleged confessions. She was one of the newspaper editors taking Ian's reporting on the murder investigation, and when she confronted him about being a suspect, he said he killed Sophie to resurrect his career. Another joke, Ian says. Callanan is now a prominent barrister in Dublin and she's written an email to the court, read out by the prosecutor, explaining that she can't possibly come on such short notice. If they can wait until next week, she says she can arrange to testify by video link, but the judge says the trial will be over by then. Callanan is scathing of the witness handling. She wonders why the French authorities had waited until the last minute, when the facts have been known for more than two decades, and worries that the lack of verbal testimony will undermine the credibility of the trial. It's not the people of West Cork that are betraying Sophie's family, she writes. It's the fragility of the process to be found in Paris.

[Michael Sheridan]

One thing I will say what I noticed in the last few days.

[Jennifer Ford]

This is Michael Clifford from the Irish Examiner.

[Michael Sheridan]

The place given to the victim's family in French law, I think is very commendable.

[Jennifer Ford]

He says that one of the criticisms of the common law system is that the victim is forgotten about. It's just between the state and the suspect.

[Michael Sheridan]

In the last few days, through two witnesses in particular, we've been given a picture of a life that this woman had and the type of person she was and everything about her. So to some extent, she came alive and her life is there in the courtroom.

[Jennifer Ford]

The two witnesses Clifford is praising here are Fred, Sophie's cousin, who you heard from back at the start, and her best friend, Agnes Thomas. But when we found Fred and Agnes outside later, they were beating themselves up, convinced they'd done a terrible job.

[Agnes Thomas]

It was really hard to explain because we. The emotion was too hard. And I wanted to. To do a very lovely testimony and explain what. The joy. The joy Sophie was able to, you know, the joys, the energy, the. The life. She was really alive. She was a place, a great girl with a lot of. I mean, her, you know. So I wanted to explain this, but I was so sad that I couldn't say a word. You know, this is this. This is it.

[Frederic Gazot]

Five pages of notes she was writing in the witness room.

[Agnes Thomas]

Yes, I prepared the story of Sophie, but impossible it was too.

[Jennifer Ford]

Before they testified, Fred and Agnes were in a room together, going over what they were planning to say and trying to calm each other down. Fred says he ended up forgetting to mention members of Sophie's family and his testimony. For her part, Agnes spoke the first few lines of the speech she prepared and then just petered out. But over our time with Agnes and Fred this week, just shooting the breeze about Sophie, we find they're able to recall their old friend so vividly that sometimes she seems to hang in the air with us.

[Lara Marlowe]

Really.

[Agnes Thomas]

I miss her now because I don't have any friend like this. She was calling me very often and sometimes. Oh, please, Sophie, don't call me. I don't have anything to say. We talk already yesterday and we spent two hours. It's okay. Today I don't know what to say, but, you know, she said, oh, please. And yes, we can talk of everything. She was loving talking. Yes. And if I don't call him back so quickly, she called me. Hi, Hanni. I said, sophie, please call me back. Come on. You didn't call me back. Please call me, Sophie. Sophie, please call me back.

[Sam Bunge]

She was so cute.

[Agnes Thomas]

Please, come on. And yes, please call me. I have no things to say. She was so funny. Absolutely. Sophie.

[Lara Marlowe]

Yes.

[Agnes Thomas]

So cool, so great. Irresistible. I don't know how they say that. Irresistible. Irresistible, Irresistible. She was really. So nice girl, really. And so fun and so. Really. We really miss her. Yeah, we lost someone. Yeah, we can say that. We really lost someone.

[Sam Bunge]

Day three begins with a reading of a personality assessment of Ian Bailey prepared by two French psychologists. They conclude that Ian is particularly complex and intelligent, but bears the traits of someone with a borderline personality. He's self Obsessed and has a tendency towards extreme violence. The psychologist looked at Garda interrogation notes and Ian's personal diaries, which feature long passages of graphic sexual fantasies and horrifying accounts of his violence against his partner Jules. In places they seem to depict a man on the verge of some kind of breakdown. But the psychologists here didn't evaluate Ian in person. They didn't correspond with him at all. And in fact, from here on out, any testimony from people with first hand knowledge of the accused will be delivered in written statements from from the investigation file, read in by the judge herself. Names that have circled the case for years. Neighbors, guards. For Marie Farrell alone, there are hundreds of pages of statements. A lot of Marie's statements contradict one another in multiple ways. But back in the original indictment against Ian, the French prosecution made it clear that they assumed Marie was telling the truth about seeing Ian out on the road that night, until Ian menaced her into changing her story. Ian contests all this and his lawyer, Frank Buttimer, even says that on one date when Ian was supposed to be in West Cork harassing Marie, he was actually with Ian himself in Cork City. On and on. Judge Allean goes for hours working through a big stack of printouts. Lara Marlowe from the Irish Times finds it kind of hypnotic.

[Lara Marlowe]

It's funny because at the end of the day, one almost gets confused between the witnesses who came and the witnesses who. Whose testimony was read aloud in court. It was more effective than I would have thought it could be. The judge read them very well. In the beginning I thought she was speaking much too fast, but as it went on, one was able to take it in. And also because this story is so familiar to everyone,

[Sam Bunge]

some of the material that hasn't been through the mill in Ireland concerns the allegation that Ian had an existing relationship with Sophie. Remember, Sophie's cousin Alexandre Louis gave a statement to French police that a few days before that final trip to West Cork, Sophie got a call to her office in Paris from a man who lived near her holiday home in West Cork. He told her that he was an independent journalist and writer and was requesting a meeting for cultural reasons. According to the statement, Sophie had been surprised by the call and the fact the man wouldn't say how he got her number. The court in Paris also hears the statement of Guy Girard, Sophie's director, who remembered her talking about a writer in Ireland named Owen Bailey, Ian's pen name at the time. This chimes with something else we hear at the trial, a story Sophie's best friend Agnes Thomas tells About a phone call Sophie had received shortly before her final trip from someone who was bizarre and made her feel uneasy. She'd met this man before and was now unsure about meeting him again. Agnes only recalled this several years after Sophie's murder and she couldn't remember the man's name or or even whether he was meant to have been in Ireland. But she did recall that this man was a poet. As Lara Marlow points out, it's a detail that stands out to people.

[Lara Marlowe]

Obviously one thinks of Ian Baillie, but

[Sam Bunge]

overall, most of what's being presented here in France has been covered extensively in newspapers in Ireland over the years.

[Jennifer Ford]

Something you hear a lot about this case is that the guards messed up in those early days. It's come up here at the trial more than once. Talk of the crime scene being poorly preserved. The suggestion that the guards were simply overwhelmed by the scale of the task. Sophie's son, Pierre Louis, once complained to us that no one from the Irish investigation bothered to interview him. It spoke to him of a half assed job. This struck us as strange too. The idea that the guards had never wanted to speak to the son of the victim, one of the few people who'd regularly been to the house with Sophie. In fact, Pierre Louis is mistaken. The guards had wanted to speak to him, but it was complicated in the way things have been complicated here this week. It turns out that the challenges of working across international borders have plagued this case from the start. Back in 1996, the guards weren't allowed to directly investigate in France. Instead, they would draw up a list of questions and people in France they wanted to speak to. This list would then run a gauntlet of red tape. And at the other end, supposedly there would be a French police officer who would ideally work through that list. But too often it seems a French cop never got to such assignments. The guards put Pierre Louis on their list, but never got a statement back. The same goes for Guy Girard, the director who worked with Sophie on her final film. Naturally, the guards had wanted to meet Sophie's husband Daniel in the weeks after her murder, but had to settle for a single statement taken by a Paris detective. So it feels like some of the criticism of the guards work in those early days is a little unfair. But what seems to be missing this week at the trial is some of the criticism that's come since.

[Sam Bunge]

Over the past decade in Ireland, there's been a public reckoning with on guard de Chekorna following a run of scandals. And this case has been in the middle of that in 2018, the body which investigates alleged Garda wrongdoing. GSOC published a report with disturbing findings about the Sophie investigation. They found pages from the jobs books were missing, some apparently removed with a pair of scissors. Two pages are missing right after where Ian is first nominated as a suspect. And the guards are missing evidence, a lot of evidence. Five suspect files were missing, the originals of 139 statements. Gsoc found 22 exhibits had either gone missing or were not held by the guards. A wine bottle recovered near Sophie's house, Ian Bailey's black coat and the big one, the four metre long blood spattered five bar gate taken from the crime scene. The gate in particular has captured the public imagination in Ireland. How in the world do you lose a gate? Some people began referring to the scandal as gate gate. We do know that gate went from a West Cork store up to Garda HQ in Dublin, where tests were done on it until around mid January of 97. In 2001, new tests were carried out on swabs from the gate. But by the time the French carried out their own tests on crime scene exhibits in 2011, there's no mention of the gate at all in their paperwork. At some point, as GSOC reported, the gate had disappeared. One of the many surprising features of this case is that there's no hard evidence. Despite the friends he'd seen. It's frustrated people over the years that the only DNA ever found has been Sophie's. Except we recently learned that that's technically no longer the case.

[Jennifer Ford]

In 2011, a French forensic scientist travelled to West Cork at the invitation of Angada Schiakorna to take fresh samples from objects recovered from the crime scene. The scientist was shown nine exhibit bags at Bantry Garda station. As she later noted in her report, all of the bags were already opened anyway. She took samples back to France and ran tests. All the blood tests showed only a female DNA profile, just as all the other UK and Irish tests had done over the years. But on a single sample, a swab of a whitish trace near the laces on Sophie's left boot, they found something else. The DNA profile of an unknown male. We took the paperwork on these results to independent experts. They told us that this was the result of a contact trace sample taken to detect DNA from skin cells, sweat or any other secretions. They stressed that this is just a single sample from among many, and there are plenty of reasons it may have no evidential value in Sophie's case case it might have already been on the boot prior to the attack. Or it might be the result of contamination after the fact. Eugene Gilligan, the retired Scenes of Crimes detective who worked on this case, remarked to us that it was a strange place for male DNA to be found. He speculated that it could have wound up there during the post mortem when the boot was pulled off. Jim Donovan, the former head of Ireland's forensic science lab, mused that saliva from a loud talker might have landed on the boot and survived for months or even years.

[Sam Bunge]

What we couldn't establish is exactly what, if any, official work was done to find out whose DNA this is. Did anyone compare the profile to those of the officers and experts who'd been at the scene or to other suspects? Did they run it through Interpol? Were any additional tests done on the boot? We've reached out to people in France and Ireland, from senior investigators to forensic officers, and they've declined to tell us either way. We assume they have Ian Bailey's DNA on file and have established it doesn't match. But they won't even tell us that the French file has no explanation for the DNA. And the French are apparently famed for their fastidious paperwork. If any record exists in Ireland about follow up investigation, it wasn't captured by discovery in Ian's civil suit in 2014. It may have been done since. The point is, there's been 25 years of seeking answers in Sophie's murder and it seems a little late in the game with missing gates and trials in absentia to be keeping secrets again. This isn't necessarily some forensic bombshell, but since no one will answer our question, we're asking it here. Did anyone check,

[Jennifer Ford]

had a defence been here at the trial this week? This is one of the many questions that might have been asked. But Ian's legal team haven't stepped foot in this courtroom all week. Today, though, they did send a letter. Dominic Tricot has been Ian Bailey's legal representative in France since the first European arrest warrant was issued back in 2010. You might remember that one of the first phone calls Ian made when he found out about the French charge was to Trico. He couldn't reach him at the time, as Trico was on a yacht off the coast of Italy, which is where he is this week. But though he's boycotted the trial, we notice that a guy from Trico's office is in the viewing gallery. It turns out that Trico is being kept abreast of events at the Palais de Justice and he has written to the court. To add to the chorus of criticism about the Lack of witnesses. This is just his latest attempt to influence proceedings from outside the courtroom. To explain, we have to go back to last Wednesday, five days before the trial started.

[Sam Bunge]

Around 30 journalists have assembled in Dominique Tricot's office and the event is being recorded for French TV and radio news. Tricot denounces the upcoming proceedings as the trial of a banana republic and claims the whole thing has been organized by the state as a gift to the victim's family. He spends time picking holes in the case against Ian and even starts putting forward alternative scenarios for what might have occurred in the crime. Trico spoke only in French at the conference, so I sat down with him. Afterwards, I asked him what the purpose of the press conference had been. Trico said he wanted to let the court know on the record that he thought they were making a mistake. He says the symbol of showing up in his lawyer's outfit would give credence to the proceedings.

[Pierre Louis]

I don't want that. A black robe worn by Tricot shows that the trial is an independent trial.

[Sam Bunge]

Tricot told me that he thought the judges were intelligent people and would understand that as Ian Bailey's defence lawyer, not showing up was really his only move. I asked him whether he thought that made Ian look guilty and he said he'd put the scenario to the journalist at back the press conference.

[Pierre Louis]

It is not a question of guilt or innocence, it's a question of chance. That was my question to the journalist yesterday. You are innocent. You have been said innocent in France. There was a new case in Ireland. Do you go, you are innocent, but do take the risk of getting through 30 years?

[Sam Bunge]

Trico asked any journalist in the room who thought they'd risk going to a trial in this and to raise their hand.

[Pierre Louis]

Nobody did it.

[Sam Bunge]

When we spoke to the prosecution lawyer, Marie Dozet, about this press conference, she dismissed the whole event as a desperate publicity stunt, a circus number. She had great respect for Trico, she said, but by sounding off at a press conference, instead of making his case in court, he turned himself into a clown.

[Jennifer Ford]

Back in court, Trico's letter is read in, but by the end of the day, no one is talking about anything much other than the prosecution lawyer Marie Dosse's thunderous performance when she delivers her final plea. D'ose later told us that while researching this case, she travelled to West Cork and stayed at Sophie's house. She even slept in her bed. She wanted to fully immerse herself. In court, d' Speaks passionately, without notes, roaming the courtroom, banging on the bench where Ian's lawyers should have been berating them for their absence. She lays out her vision for the night of the murder. Ian drinks and drinks and drinks more. On the way home, he stops at the lookout point. He has a direct view of Sophie's house. He knows she's alone. It's emphatic and theatrical and there's no one here to undercut any of it, to point out that starting with the claim he even knew the victim. Ian has denied every part of this story. Sophie's cousin Fred says that the family found it all overwhelming afterwards, they all just scattered out into the city.

[Frederic Gazot]

It's the first time you. You hear the story of. Of this case with someone who, you know, Marie, she. She put all her art in her building and we were there during the night of the murder, you know, like in a book or in a novel, you know, just. It was incredible. Incredible.

[Jennifer Ford]

Mary Doe had ended her pleading with a reference to Fred's testimony. Fred had spoken of the responsibility Sophie had felt for the younger members of the family like him because she was the eldest.

[Frederic Gazot]

When I speak in front of court, I focus my speech on the fact that Sophie was the oldest of our generation of cousins. I didn't know what it means, really, but the lawyer, Marie Dossier understand what I was saying better than me. And when I speak, I say Sophie was the first one to be married, the first one to have a child, Pierre Louis, the first one who divorced. And I didn't finish my sentence. And when Marie made her pleading, she finished with this sentence. She said she was the first one first. And she said the last sentence was Sophie was the first one to die.

[Sam Bunge]

It was very dramatic.

[Agnes Thomas]

You're sorry, it is dramatic, but it is dramatic and it's not a story.

[Sam Bunge]

I'm speaking to Marie Doze standing on the courthouse steps.

[Agnes Thomas]

So I have to speak about this horrible story and what happened exactly Minute. Four minutes. Four minutes. Four minutes. I mean, we know exactly what happened. It's in the case, it's in case, in the witnesses. We know what happened. So I just work this case and

[Sam Bunge]

I didn't lie, she says, I just worked the case and I didn't lie. But could the same be said for everyone who'd ever given a statement about this case to the guards? Statements which had then been handed to the French and led to this point? Frank Batimer told us that if he ever did defend Ian Bailey in a criminal court, he listened to the Garda evidence and then he wiped the floor with it. Even this week during the trial in Paris, the prosecution and their expert witnesses have been fairly withering of the original Irish investigation. I asked Mary Dozet about it. There's been criticism this week of the Irish police and their investigation. But you felt that the material from that investigation was enough for you?

[Agnes Thomas]

Yeah, of course it is. Of course it is. I mean, and Diane Belay knows it. That's why he's not here. And his lawyer knows it. That's why he's not here.

[Sam Bunge]

The next day is a public holiday. When court reconvenes on Friday morning, the trial is essentially over. There's just the public prosecutor's final address. He says the evidence against Ian Bailey is overwhelming. Gesturing to the empty dock, he says that Ian's lawyers had mocked and insulted the court with their unbearable contempt for French justice and his scathing of the DPP in Ireland. He says the DPP had systematically invalidated the individual pieces of evidence and had missed the bigger picture. He tells the judges that if in their hearts, they believe Ian Bailey to be guilty, they should give him the maximum 30 years. I want to see Ian Bailey here, the prosecutor says. I want to hear his defence. I want to hear and be able to condemn him face to face. The judges retire to deliberate. It takes them five hours. At 5:02pm, Judge Frederic Alleen announces her verdict. The moment Pierre Louis escapes the court, he's flooded by reporters.

[Pierre Louis]

So today, it's a victory for us. The judgment is very clear, with all the element of proof. Yan Beile is a murderer and he killed my mother 22 years ago. So it's a victory for the justice, it's a victory for the truth. And now Ireland will have to extradite Jan Beile and we will put all the pressure everywhere to get the justice done. But today, everybody must know, understand that Jan Bailey is a murderer, and we must denounce it.

[Sam Bunge]

There's never been any basis for people to say anything like this in Ireland, anything definitive about this case at all. The truth is that the case against Ian has never been tested in a criminal court in a way that many of us would recognize, and it's increasingly likely that it never will. Ian learned the result by phone from a journalist that evening. It came as no surprise. This was a week with much drama, but little suspense. A year from now, Irish authorities will once again block France's request to extradite Ian Bailey. The family will begin to mount an appeal with the European Court of Justice. But things will be moving especially slow with that during the pandemic. In the meantime, we have a reality that a member of Ian's legal team predicted years ago. Guilty in France and innocent in Ireland. It's an outcome Ian Bailey appears resigned to, but one that Sophie's family cannot accept.

[Jennifer Ford]

That evening in Paris, the family gather at an old restaurant. Sophie's aunt Marie Madeleine is hosting the evening and invites us along. It's a muted celebration, but there's a quiet energy in the room. You sense they're feeling the flesh of having come through something together. For Sophie to have collectively done something palpable. There has been media coverage here in France of the trial, but in a few weeks it will inevitably fade from the headlines as the news cycle moves on from this distant and intractable case. But we noticed more Irish journalists in the Paris court this week than French. There was even one guy, a retired doctor, who came over from Cork to follow procedure because in Ireland, the story is different.

[Frederic Gazot]

When I go to West Cork, I found some things that I didn't know.

[Jennifer Ford]

Sophie's cousin Fred was there that evening. He never went to Ireland with Sophie, but he told us about a trip he made after she died.

[Frederic Gazot]

We go in a pub to drink a beer and we were speaking in French. People in the publisher come to see us. You are French. You're coming for Sophie. It's not Sophie Toscan Duplantier. It's not the woman of a producer, it's not the victim, but it's Sophie. You feel that Sophie now is a part of the land. I don't know. A part of her is there. She has left traces, but she's alive somewhere, you know?

[Jennifer Ford]

Sophie's documentary on the Fold features an artist named Elga Heinsen who's produced dozens of paintings of clothing hung on hooks. She thinks of folds as living organisms. She's fascinated by the idea that whoever wore the clothes had left something of themselves behind. In the creases on the back of the kitchen door of Sophie's house in West Cork, where her son Pierre Louis now holidays. New items have piled up over the years. Aprons, children's jackets, umbrellas. But Sophie's coat has been deliberately left folds and all hanging underneath.

[Sam Bunge]

This episode was produced and hosted by Jennifer Ford and myself. Jesse Baker and Eric Newsome are the executive producers. Our editor is Mike Olive. Sound design and mixing by Peregrine Andrews of Moving Air. All music for this episode is by Wes Swing. Additional music help from Kelly Libby. Legal help from Simon McAleese, solicitors. Thanks to Jen Dollard, Paddy Mulcrone, Eric Eclov, Philip Boucher Hayes, Barry Roach and Frank Cottrell. Boyce and family, especially Benedict. Special thanks to Gabby Hornsby and audible. Thanks for listening to West Cork. We hope you liked it. If you're looking for another series to listen to, we have a new one. It's called Havana Helmet Club. It's a spy thriller and it's set in Havana, Cuba. It drops you into a world of paranoia and big characters with hidden motivations, like Wes Cork. It comes down to the central character and the question, what do you believe? You can find it by searching for Havana Helmet Club on Apple podcasts.