Thinking Sideways: Lord Lucan

play chicken, but you blinked. Next episode is going to be a really long. As always, we have another unsolved mystery for you this week. We're going to talk about the appearance of Richard John Bingham, also known as Lord Lucan, the seventh Earl of Lucan. Yeah, that guy. Yeah. None of his titles were actually Lord Lucan though, were they? They were all like Earl and Duke and Baron. I think Lord was kind of a common It wasn't one of his official titles. Well, somebody can write about how

ignorant I am about that. That'll be good. I don't know how that works either. I don't really understand the workings of the aristocracy. But he actually, I can I know where the Lord Lucan is. Well, why don't she say he was living in London. Eighth Earl of Lucan is his son George. So that's it. I said, we wanted the seventh Joe, Yeah, oh that guy. That's that's a good point. But there is a Lord Lucan living

in London. I'm sure there is no one in the white pages to yeah, well, before we get into the story, now that we've already gone all over the map, I do want to say that this was a listener's suggestion. This story was suggested by a whole bunch of people. Still want one of our top seven ten most requested. No, it was not, but it's got a fair number of requests over the years. Until I started looking into this, I've never even heard of the guy, and I didn't

realize how huge the story is in Britain today. This is a mainstay of the British media. They dragged this out and every six to twelve months trotted around on the paper and then put it away till next year when they need some kind of cover splash, and then they find him. But we're we're kind of giving it away. So let's let's say what the actual mystery is here. We're going to talk about the murder of a woman by the name of Sandra Rivett. Uh, the assault of

Veronica Bingham, who is the lord's wife. No, that's not a thing, right, didn't we find that out? That it's not it's not an official thing that that lord. The wives of lords are not automatically, ladies, is that a thing everybody calls lady Lucan? Did you call her that? Yes, Lady Lucan, all right? And then of course the subsequent disappearance of her husband, John Bingham, Lord Lucan, Yes, in nineteen seventy four. So we have a murder, of beating

and a disappearance all wrapped up into one story. We should probably get started. Endless decades, all right, um, So let's go ahead and start at the top, which is when he was born, well, not exactly when he was born, but don't really care about that. Bingham was born into nobility. His father, George Bingham, was the sixth Earl of Lucan, and as a young man he of course did his

National service, which I didn't realize at that time. This is the early fifties, Britain still had basically a conscription system where men had to serve eighteen months. We had any we had it here in the Stage until the late sixties. Yeah, I for some reason, it just never sunk in that everybody had to do that. And let me correct myself. I think it was actually the very early seventies when they finally did away with it here

in the stage in the state. Well, I know, I know it was in the sixties in Britain when they ended the automatic service. Um. But he went to West Germany. That's where he served at least part of his time, and then he came back to the UK. He met in nineteen sixty three Veronica, and they were married a few months later. So a really short courtship seems to be the norm does. Indeed, by nineteen seventy she had given birth to three children, so they had quite the

family going. Uh. He was lucky in some regards that a year after he got married nineteen sixty four, his father passed away. That's so lucky. Well, it's lucky because he inherited his father's TI dole and all of the money, so he got he suddenly was in control of everything, which is we're going to talk about later on is kind of important. Yeah, And he also that was his

nickname was Lucky Lucan. It was it was because he won, it was I can't remember the year, but there was this two day long poker baker at oh I thought, was he Okay, well you might be talking about a different story. Well, now that's that's the one where I really really one big like and I've heard the different amounts. One I heard twenty thousand pounds, another one I heard twenty six thousand pounds that he won in this thing, and that was actually a kind of a pivotal event

in his life and everything. The nickname of Lucky, but well, you know, he got some other names though. Well, he's the Earl of Lucan, He's Baron Lucan of Castle bar and this is the hardest, longest one. Baron Lucan of Malcolm Lucan and Baronet of Nova Scotia. He's a Baronet of Nova Scotia. Yes, yeah, yeah. This whole royal title thing is still confusing, Like you know why Prince Charles is called the Prince of Wales, you know, I mean stuff like that. I'm not we're not going to go

into that right now. He can't be charge of the United Kingdom yet. But because he can't be in charge of the United Kingdom, yes, just like a part of it. That's my theory. I'm out to just defend all of our British listens going to happen. I'm sorry, folks that we don't understand this whole thing. Yeah, well we've We've had British listeners right and say they understand how difficult it is to understand it. So yeah, um, so, like

I said, his father passed away. You know, he gets all the titles, he gets all the money, he's got a full he's got a family. Everything seems hunky dory from the outside. It really did seem that way. But once you got inside and you got saw the underbelly of everything, you really kind of saw how tenuous and not so good a lot of things work. Well, yeah, for one thing, he quit his job. He was a banker.

You're right. But but before we get to that, let's talk about his school because that's kind of a it plays a pivotal bit in his gambling. He did um. He attended Eton College, which is a boy's boarding school. Apparently he was quite creative while he was there because he made his side money being a bookie and also racing on horse racing, so he was gambling. He was

making enough money to have plenty of spending cash. When he went to Germany during his national service days, that's where he learned to play poker and evidently was quite good at it. And of course then he wanted to gamble on everything, so he was playing poker and um, backgammon was the other one. Backammon's the other one that he liked to play a lot. Those are games of skill, which he was good at. But he also liked games of chance, which is a problem because he played things

like baccarat, which is complete and total luck. It's too long to explain. Um, but he was also good at bridge. I understand he was. He was good at gambling. He was good at cards and games of strategy, and especially when they had money writing on him. I'm sure that. I'm sure that was more fun than you know, we're just working for a living. Oh, I'm sure it was, because as you said, he uh, he did quit his job eventually, but he when he got out of the service,

he came back to London. He got a job working at a merchant as a merchant banker or at a merchant bank I should say he was earning five pounds a year, which at that time is not bad money, but for a guy who likes to gamble, that's not enough money. And then after what you were talking about, when he won some obscene some in a single night, that's when he decided he was going to be a

professional gambler, exactly said. The gambling also didn't really mesh well with having a day job because most of this gambling stuff was all kind of all night stuff or at least two or three or four in the more. Yeah, it was a late night activity. Yeah, which the gambling though, that's where we start to see some of the problem because even before he inherited all the money, he wasn't winning all the time. You never do well, you never

do when you're gambling. But it was more apparent what his winning streaks were because he would go into debt for it. Family would have to bail him out sometimes, and he honored his debts. You know, the family would come in and pay it all up, and then he would take a couple of years to pay that person back. It wasn't like he was filching on him, but he was losing decent sums of money. Yeah, it just it seems like his his game plan wasn't that good. Yeah, No,

I don't think that it was that great. Now, I talked about the fact that when his father passed away, he inherited a whole bunch of money. He smartly used some of that money to pay off his debts. So he at least started from that point forward with not oh, not in the hole, which is a good thing. But then he kept gambling. But then he kept gambling, exactly right, That's absolutely the problem. He was a member, or one of the early members of a place called the Claremont Club,

which is a gambling club. It was a club in London and it served two high titled people. That's that's the way I'm going to say that. It had quite the clientele there was. There was dukes, marquees, Earl's cabinet ministers, I mean we're talking the upper echelon came to this club and gambled. It wasn't like the Indian casino down the street where anybody could just walk in and drop their their nickels in the machine. You've got to be a member. You gotta be a member, and it wasn't

cheap to be a member. And I wondered about this too, because naturally, you know me, I went to Google Maps and looked at looked at where it was in London and where he lived in London he lived he lived just a mile south. So I wonder if he bought his house specifically to be close to the club. I was just a coincidence. I think that was a coincidence. I really think that had to be a coincidence. Um, there's some really interesting history on the Claremont Club. If

anybody wants to get into it. We won't go into it now, but if you want to read on it. They were scamming their customers and it's really kind of interesting how they were doing it. Yeah, they were. They were totally skimming and scamming. It was really interesting. And that's that's This club was founded by James aspen All correct, correct, Yeah, correct, it was who will come up later on and we'll

be talking about him, I guess. Yeah. Let's uh, let's keep moving on though, with the lifestyles of the rich and famous here, which is the things that that Bingham would do. He he had the life. He had the perfect life for you know, a guy with money. He could do what he wants. He had, He had a an Aston Martin. He liked to raise speed modes. He would drink expensive booze if you know it struck him. He and his friends would go down and rent a plane and go wherever it was they decided that day

they wanted to go. I mean, he could do what he wanted because he had all the money. There's a There's another fun fact though, and I know this one is there's a little bit of discussion on it, which is, if you've seen some of the photos of him when he's i'd say about thirty or thirty five years old, several years before he disappears, he's quite the dashing figure. He's got. You know, he's got his collared shirt on, his hair is greased back or kind of slicked back.

He's got that typical English mustache. I mean, he's just, yes, the the the English gentleman. Yeah. And it was kind of a handsome guy he was. And he was actually approached to play the part, to try out to play the part of James Bond because his description fits so perfectly. Now. He turned down the because Sean Connery had found out about it and kicked his ass. No, he had. Evidently he tried out for a movie once before and never even made it past the initial screening, So that turned

him off of movies. I guess, I guess. I don't know. Well, I probably thought that it was beneath his dignity attemption, have to audition. Yeah, just said you're the next James Bond. That's right. Yeah, maybe, but and I have but written in all capitals. Not everything was that great at home besides the money part. His family, like you know, playing and gambling and flying anywhere and probably like you know, believing the kids and theeping with a lot of different

ladies didn't pan out for him. Evidently not. Actually, according to Lady Lucan's website, he was not an adulter. She says, I never got the impression that he was used playing the field. He liked to play the cards, not the ladies. Yeah. Yeah, he might have been a cheater too, according to Lady Lucan, and she had every reason to not like him. Yeah, she has every reason, she says. Yeah. She says that

he was not an adulterer. All right, Well let's let's talk about Lady Lukenwell we're at it because, like I said, between nineteen sixty three and nineteen seven, sixty four and seventy she gave birth to three children. Well, it turns out that she had some problems with with being a parent. And it's not that they're not being a parent, but she experienced something that a lot of women experience, which

is they call it postpartum or postnatal depression. We've only ever heard that postpartum, but yes, so if you don't know what that is, it's a depression that a lot of parents experience once the child is born. Women only, women only, because I'd heard that men get it, but I don't understand. I think that childbirth the whole process, and afterwards you your hormones are doing all kinds of

crazy stuff. So yeah, it's pretty common. I wouldn't say pretty common, but it's it's common enough that we know about it. That doesn't mean that, you know, all women are going to go through hypercentage, but some women do. I'm just saying that it's not like common. I guess what I'm saying is it's not rare at all. Okay, you probably know somebody in your You probably do know somebody that that experienced it, even if it was for a short time or like a very mild case. Yes,

she did not have a mild case. She was extremely depressed to the point that I believe it was in nineteen seventy one. Being a basically John Beingham basically spent a lot of time taking her around, trying to get help for her, and you know, trying to help figure out what's wrong with his wife. I mean, I have to guess that he cared enough to do that if you're going to spend all that time. He then allegedly tried to have her committed, which which was not that

back in those days. It was not considered as heinous of a deed somebody committed, no, but she fought it, and so he didn't. I believe at the time it was supposed to be a voluntary committal. Is what he was trying to get her to go for while they were at the sanitarium? Is that what it would have been? I guess, okay, but she wasn't down for it. Well, the thing about it is too I I appreciate your

point of view, because if you're already depressed. Can you imagine how much more depressing it's going to be to be in one of those places. Yes, we've and we've had this conversation before. So especially if it's you know, wrapped up in your your feelings for your children, to be told basically like hey listen, no you can't actually be near them. Yeah, that's got to be a pretty big glow. Yeah, she was actually her problems. I think I went beyond just postpartum depression. I'm sure that she

that there was more there than that. At a later, much a later stage in her life, she was diagnosed as bipolar. She had some issues, She had some issues, But the point is it didn't do good things for their marriage, you know, I believe it was. Yeah, it was the Chris of nineteen seventy two. The family spent Christmas together. Uh, that didn't go well, and in January of seventy three, John moved out of the house. So now they're they're basically they're on the skids and they're

kind of separated. She was interested in trying to reconcile, and she did try to reconcile the marriage, but at that point he had no interest in it. He was basically done with the marriage. Yeah, it sounds you know, it sounds to me like she was kind of kind of hard to get along with. But you probably know this that her kids, none of her kids speak to

her anymore. It also sounds like he was maybe a little like hardheaded because he was convinced that he could do a better job, and he did everything he could to prove that. Yeah, I mean, he he was kind of a big jerk about this whole thing. And then but then during the whole are you going to talk about the child custody, Well just just a little bit, but go ahead, yeah, yeah, no please, Yeah. Well, he she did something in the in the custody battle to

that that really incensed him. Apparently, she she brought out a few accusations thinks that would not be considered really really heinous today, But she told the court that he was into some certain kinky sexual practices that again that would not be considered and but you know, considering the time and a proper, proper lady does not do those things. Yeah, and he considered that to be a huge active betrayal and uh yeah, so that that kind of hardened his

heart towards her. I think Yeah. You know, there's a bunch of dirty laundry that we could air about their custody battle, but I'm not going to do it because that's exactly what it is. It's it's dirty laundry. Here's what you need to know. A judge ruled he lost, she kept custody of the children, and he had to he had to pay her, you know, he um, it was a stipend is the only word I can think of. An allowance or alimony, Yeah, an allowance, alimony, whatever the

official title was. He had to pay. But that would have been expensive because not only the household and their living expenses and everything, but also they didn't have a nanny. The judge ordered to nanny Anti because plus he had to maintain his own household around the corner. And and he did some things like, you know, he played games with her as much as I'm sure she played games

with him. When you read about the story, sometimes you hear that after he lost the custody battle, he spiraled downhill, except that when I've read the stuff about him, his actions don't really support that. He basically went on about his life. I mean, he's still trying to do things to talk to the kids and spend time with them. But he was still going to the club, he was still gambling, he was still hanging out with his friends.

There was no huge market change in him all of the sudden, nothing, nothing that would indicate to me that he was spiraling downhill. So I discredit that a little bit. But you will come across that when you read the story. It does seem that he had some pretty serious problems. So he it. Yeah, let's at this point move forward in time a little bit. We're gonna go to the

night of Thursday, November seven night Lord Lucan himself. Specifically, he had met a friend that day at for some conversation impossible business dealings, and then he gave that person a ride home and then he went home himself. He had plans later that evening to meet his friends at the Claremont Club at eleven o'clock that night, so it appears from the outside that it was just a normal Thursday night for him. Oh and by the way, there are there there were witnesses who saw him at the

Claremont Club at nine pm that night too. Yes, he had been there once. I believe he was meeting a friend m who it was they were going to have dinner. He decided to decline dinner and then suggested meeting again at at the eleven o'clock time. So evidently he was just gonna walk home, do whatever he was gonna do, and then come back. Yeah, there's there's some serious confusion in the time line in this hole. We're gonna talk about this whole timeline. It is. It's wonky. That's the

only way I can describe it as wonky. But we're gonna keep moving forward as much as we can. Here. We're gonna go over to Veronica's house where things are normal as well. Kind of a normal Thursday night. Uh. Sandra the nanny, she normally didn't work on Thursdays, but she for some reason was there that Thursday, so she was at the house. I think she she took one night a week off and it's usually Thursday, but apparently

this this week it was Wednesday instead of Thursday. Okay, yeah, I mean it's hard to say exactly I've seen, because I've seen it several times. She was always gone on Thursdays, or this particular one was a weird case. I don't know. Indeed, indeed, really shouldn't have changed her plants. This literature, this is called foreshadowing. So just before nine o'clock that night, she went down to the basement kitchen. She was gonna get

Veronica some tea and some for herself. While she was in the kitchen at the basement kitchen, or maybe possibly just when she walked into it, someone beat her to death with a lead pipe and then stuffed her body into a sack, sack of all things. But I disagree. I think it was the professor with you would do it. You knew it was going to him. Yeah, kind of when you see the lead pipe thing, you can't help but think of it. You're right. Okay, So she's beaten.

She's now in the U S mail sack. Veronica, who is expecting her to come back upstairs, is kind of wonder what's going on, so she goes to check on her. And actually, I want to pause here for a second. I want to talk about Yes, I want I know. That's why I want to talk about this before we keep going, because it's just gonna get more and more intense. When you read about this, it this what we're about to cover. It reads like who done it? Or a murder mystery kind of you know, it's a Sue Grafton

or somebody like that. And I was really curious why everything you read told it exactly the same. The details always had this real big build up to them, And then I figured it out. There's four authors who have written quite extensively on this, one of whom happens to have been one of the lead investigators on the case. And everybody is then taking their information from those four sources. If you trace those four sources backwards, do you know

who their main sources? Veronica, Okay, she is going to tell the story in one way because she's probably got a reason to whether good, bad or indifferent, She's gonna paint it in a certain light. So I want to say that now because it does come across in one very direct way, and one side really seems to hold all the cards in this. So just be aware of that as we're going through. What's about to happen next? Okay, okay,

what happens down the stairs? So Veronica goes to the stairs to the basement and calls to Sandra, and at that point someone attacks her. Officially, we aren't sure. She starts screaming her attacker tells her to shut up. It's at that point she says that she recognized the voices that of her husband. Here's the thing you need to keep in mind, is that the basement kitchen, it was dark, so she couldn't see anything down the stairs, so she

couldn't really see who her attacker was. Um, but they were not in the basement, and said they were on the first floor. They were on this just she had on the stairs and then in the first floor. Yes, at the top of the stairs. Yes, top of the stairs. She had never gone down the stairs. And apparently he was hiding in a closet, like hiding in the coat closet.

Is that what it was. I don't know exactly where. Again, this is another part of that story where it's a little wonky here and there, and I'm not sure where he was hiding. I got the impression that he rushed up the stairs as possible. Yeah, I I heard somewhere that he was actually hiding in a closet or could have been maybe just hiding around the corner in the hallway. I don't know. Yeah, Well, the point is they struggled. The two struggled. Um, she bit him, he knocked her

to the ground. Um, and then, of course this attacker, who she says is her husband, then tries to strangle her. I heard he also he was he was wearing gloves, and I heard he also jamped some fingers down her mouth just to have a quieter down. I don't know, it could be, you know, the strangling part. I can get fingers down the mouth seems like a dumb thing to do because someone's gonna bite. Yeah, I heard that

from a few sources. Yeah. Well, the battle ensues, at which point she grabs his testicles, guessing not in the nice way, squeeze and uh that's what they teach us that it takes the fight out of him. Not surprising, weird. Yeah, and he stops trying to kill her once they calmed down. Uh. They go upstairs and Veronica I get that she was trying to buy time. At this point, she figured she was dead. She figured he was gonna kill her, even though he had stopped fighting at that point. So they

go upstairs. She says, listen, I won't tell anybody. You can hide out at the house for a couple of days and then escape the country. And he's like, okay, Yeah, that sounds like a great idea, and I think, well, and didn't he say that essentially you have sleeping pills, right, and he's basically he was he was saying that, well, I won't I won't bludge and you to death, but you can just take a whole bottle of sleeping pills.

I'm sure there was a lot of threats. Yeah, and you can just do that, and so I'll stop bledgening. You can just kill yourself another way, and that's it'll all be okay with me, which is a little weird. Yes, So he takes her upstairs and he and he's he goes off into the bathroom, well not before putting one of the children to bed, because one of the girls had gotten up and he put her to bed. And then, yes, they're in the bedroom. She's you know, he goes I've

heard it described. Either he was looking through the medicine cabinet or he was getting towels to clean her up with. He turned when he turned the water taps on to that's when she made her breath, because the sound of the water would cover her escape. She realized that she beat feet out of the house. She ran down the street and into the Plumber's Arms, which is a pub. Yeah, not the plumber, but the actual actually yam and told

everybody what was going on. So, needless to say, somebody the cops, cop showed up, They searched the house, They find Saunder's body, but of course Lord Lucan is nowhere to be found. And by the way, the finding of Saunder's body was kind of a classics and something out of Agatha Christie because they didn't actually immediately realize that there was even a body down there. And somebody sees this big mail bag and somebody like gave it, gave it a kick or something in this arm flops out

of it. It really does read like a book. Yeah, yeah, I thought you were gonna say they saw blood trail straight to them. Again, somebody kicked in an arm flopped. They were immediately they didn't really immediately realize. The investigation here wasn't exactly bulletproof. There was possibly some contamination of

the scene. Well unless be fair right, if anybody had been following the news at the time, if the police had been following the news, if Lord Lucan had at any point called the cops or talked to his friends that were cops or whatever and said, listen, my wife's kind of crazy. I'm gonna try and get committed. And then, you know, a couple of weeks later, she comes screaming hysterical and says, oh, that was a man in my house. And they're like, okay, crazy, let's go check it out. Okay.

Well she was beat up. Yeah, she did have size. She'd been hit like four times with a lead pipe on the forehead something like that, and she was still conscious. That's incredible. Well, the lead pipe was wrapped in a bandage, which is I'm not sure that the entire pipe was i just basically part of it, the part that he wanted to use for for like a gripe. That's that's kind of like you were on. I'm not entirely sure

that's that's what I'm thinking. Then I'm thinking, yeah, okay, because yeah, as like a grip, that would make sense. But we were talking about the kind of contamination. Yeah, there was blood all over the house. I mean there's blood on the stairs, there's blood on the carpon. They then find blood in the back garden, and of course there's blood in the basement, but they don't know if

the blood in the back garden. Wasn't necessarily accidentally transferred there by one of the police officers, because yeah, and obviously they had to go back there and check it. They did. So there's there's some things that maybe not exactly right just because the way it was handled, at least initially, that initial burst of people on the scene. Well also, you know she's saying, I've been attacked, have been attacked. Your initial reaction is going to be, well,

let's make sure that dude's not here anymore. Not Oh, it's a crime scene. Better preserve it. I mean, that's what cops do already. I mean they do that today. Is we will secure the scene and then we will lock it down so that we can take a look at everything. But yeah, you've got to make sure that the guy's not still there. Well, and you gotta remember too that there were three children in the house, and yeah,

obviously that was a high priority. It was well, you know what the thing is that it was a high priority to them, and as it turns out, still a high priority to Lord Luken because like I said, he was nowhere to be found. Um, and he does a little bit give his side of the story. He called Uh. He called his mother that night somewhere between ten thirty and eleven o'clock and said he was driving by the house and saw Veronica fighting with the man in the

basement kitchen and went in to help. And that's, uh, it's a little hard to believe. I mean, the window you can see into the basement. Did check that out? They did, and you have. They said you had to be crouching down to see it or kneeling down, which makes me wonder if sitting in a car is too high of an angle. And also, don't forget it was

there were no lights on because the light bulb. We haven't talked about this, but the lightbulb in the basement kitchen had been taken out of the socket, so there's absolutely no way he could have seen it. But this is one of the things about his story is like he couldn't have planned this very long because his story is so weak. Yes, I agree, he said that he

went in, the attacker ran away. He then took her upstairs to help clean her up, and that's when she quote unquote came to and snapped out of it and ran out of the house, screaming that it was him, and he had done it, and he seems to believe, or at least he seems to convey I should say that he was worried that she was gonna say it was him, and you know, this was gonna damage his ability to see his children and so getting arrested years which I'm sorry, but if her children are in the

house and your wife has just been attacked and you saw it happen, why are you leaving the house? Yeah,

there's that. Huh, it doesn't make sense. I mean, he did ask his mother to go by and pick up the children because he knew that his wife was going to get carted off to the hospital to get checked out, so he at least did that right, But it's just he doesn't his story doesn't quite add up based on what we know from that phone call to his mother, and well, the other thing about his story is this, he said he was was driving by, saw saw her being attacked in the basement, rushed into the house, ran

down the stairs, slipped in some blood, and his his loss of balance enabled the tailor, the killer to get away. And then she apparently accused him of hiring a hitman to murder her. That is one of the virgins. Yep, yeah, but it doesn't really doesn't really fit with the physical evidence. Though it doesn't it really doesn't. Um of course you know that they don't necessarily, I mean, cops do this. They got to take what the what the victim says with a grain of salt. They don't believe her right

away entirely, so they get some other suspects. They then rule out those suspects. But lo and behole, Lord Lucan still know where to be found. He did do a few other things to try to add to his side of the story. He wrote a letter to his brother in law basically reiterating what he had said to his mother. One page was the story and the other page was financial things that I needed to take care of off a bunch of stuff. And by the way, that his

brother in law was not was not Lady Lucan's brother. Yes, that is correct. Yeah, but he had married her sister. Wait, let me let me make sure. So it was Lady Lucan's sister's husband. Yeah, okay, okay. I was like this basically thinking that Spaceball's moment. Okay, when I when I first read about these, I thought, when he's they referred to his brother in law. I thought it was Lady Lucan's brother. I thought, that's really weird to be writing

a letter and expecting sympathy from her brother. Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's not true. Yeah, it's not true. Lord Lucan did call his mother one more time. He called her later that night, um, sometime after midnight. Now she had gone to pick up the children, so of course the cops sent a man home with her. They're not stupid. When he made that call to his mother, the police

officer was there. Officer asked to speak to him. He didn't decline to speak to the officer said he had to think about it, but that he'd be in contact with the police in the morning. That, of course didn't happen, As we all know, he didn't ever actually speak to the police. At the time. He was driving a borrowed Forward Corsair. He drove from London to East Sussex, where he went to a friend's house. Those friends were the

Maxwell Scott's. Susan Maxwell Scott answered the door. Her husband evidently wasn't home, and apparently her husband was one of his lot gamblers. Correct, yes he was, but her husband wasn't there and maybe what have you got a better idea of this. I never got a clear understanding of if he hung out for a while or if he just said oh okay and then turned around and left. I could never get a clear beat on it. I'm

not totally sure. I thought it was that he told him he told her the story, and I thought he made a phone call and I thought maybe that was I thought he maybe he might might have even written those letters to his brother in law. Then well, but the letters were at his house, his house, if I remember correctly, the letters were at his home. I think he had told her that he had done it, that he had written the letters to his brother in law.

But again, this is one of those things like because of the way that it's told and it's been regurgitated, him a little bit unsure. All I know is that they found the letters and they were in London, So take from that, which will Yeah, I had heard that he wrote the letters, mailed him and then called his brother in law to hold him. He bailed these letters to him and he wasn't in London, so that caused a brother in law to go to London to get

the letters, and that would make more sense. That would totally make more sense, and the versions that I kept coming across that just confused to crap out of me. Yeah, so he might have made that phone call from there, that was under the impression that he made a phone call from there and told her. I don't know if he told her much of anything. I mean, obviously he

told her there was a crisis, and YadA, YadA. I mean, right his mother, Yeah, no, no, no, Susan Maxwell Scott, yes, yeah, yeah, And well, and he would have had blood on his clothes yea, if he slipped and fell in the blood. If he's telling the truth and he's trying to clean up his wife, he would have blood on his clothes. No, not, if he went home and wrote letters, he would have changed his clothes, you would think by the way there were there was blood on the envelopes, so, but not

on the stationary itself. Correct, And it was like blood smears, like a little bits of blood. So Okay. The reason that that's troubling to me is that blood dry is pretty quick on your skin, right, So for it to be blood smears, it would mean that he would have had to have been actively bleeding probably or maybe he had gotten his hands wet and was trying to wash him off and grabbed it and that would have you know, that would have transferred blood. I guess, yeah, it would

have been like really watered down. I mean, like blood doesn't it hangs around, you know, on you dry for a while, but like reconstituting blood on your hand like that doesn't really know, it doesn't work out well, it doesn't work super great. I mean, I mean, we're kind of going down there, rabbit. But I mean, you know, I think that that that does present a problem for me,

especially since it wasn't on the stationary. It was on the envelope, being honest, being honest, being on the envelope only in the case to me that he wrote the letters before it does. Yeah, all right, let's let's move forward a little bit more in time. We're gonna move from that night, which is Thursday, to Sunday, which is the tent that four Corsair that he was driving was found sixteen miles away from the Maxwell Scott's home. Uh

in the car they found blood. It was both it was I never could tell because it was I saw it listed or written as believed to be Sandra and Veronica's blood. I don't know if the technology was good enough for the time to be able to exact match it. I'm guessing that they couldn't. They could match by type, at least I know that, but they didn't do so

that would explain why it was written that way. So they found the blood, They found another lead pipe in the boot, which was also, by the way, partially wrapped in tape. Surgical tape. Yep, it was. There was a bottle of vodka. I don't know how much was in it. Uh. And the witnesses in the area has said they had seen the car park there early on Friday morning, which

means it would have sat for several days. But that also I guess that it's a problem for me too, because the timing of it seems really weird and quick, because when did he attack? When did the attack happen? Nine o'clock at night on Thursday, Okay, so it would have presumably been what an hour, I don't know how long it was attacks probably would have been under fifteen minutes. There was a whole drama upstairs, you know, and I still max okay, And then he lived how far away

from the house, oh, from his house to live. It was around the corner of the corner, so we had to go home. That wasn't actually around the corner, it was it was not far about a mile south. We're saying like he's leaving town at like ten thirty. It's about an hour and a half drive to the Maxwell, Scots Okay, I guess. So he could have parked the car any time in the wee hours of Friday morning and that would totally lead line up with what the

witnesses said. That's a that's helpful. And actually the car was found in new Haven about a mile from the harbor and new Haven is of course on the English Channel. Yes, uh, they were about six am. There were a couple of fishermen. I saw this in a documentary and this is this is uh the words of an author who research and

wrote a book about this whole. Yeah, and a couple of fishermen were loading up their boat preparing to for the day's work and they saw they testified to having seen Lord Lucan at the harbor and new Haven at about six am. There you go. What he did from there, We're not sure. The lead investigator, one of the guys who wrote the books Roy Ransom. Yeah, great name. It is. He Uh, he's convinced that Lord Lucan uh committed the murders of Sandra and the attack on his wife. And

then from there he thinks that Lucan committed suicide. Yeah, somehow he doesn't. He didn't speculate exactly how whereas some others have. But he for a long time. He since changed his theory, but for a long long time he was sure that he had done himself in. There was, of course, a inquest later on, and he not shockingly was found guilty of the murder of Sandra. And because

well there was really no defense prosecution. That's that's That's the thing about it is he really incriminated himself because I disappearing. Well not just that, but he told people, he said I and he basically placed himself at the scene of the crime by telling people, oh, I was there, because he told people I was going by and I rushed into Savor, you know, and and so he placed himself there and I and we're going to talk about maybe one of the reasons why in the theory section.

There is just one other little bit here about about Lord Lucan, because he disappeared he wasn't for a long time not declared dead. Yeah, they have a standard set of time, right, I don't. I think the family was, especially Lady Lucan, they delayed having him declared legally dead because comparently they would have had to pay death taxes and they really couldn't afford at the time, and so they actually waited a long long time and then everything

went into probate and now they have it. There's some crazy things though. There's there's towns in and parts of England and Ireland that officially the nobility his family owned. So people were still having to pay to the Lucan family rent, yeah, because they were nine hundred nine nine

year leases. Yeah, now they I had heard that the family owns about twelve hundred properties in Ireland and but the other thing I heard is they're having a lot of trouble collecting rents in those properties they are, and people are also just buying them out. Some people are saying, you know what, to to heck with it, I'm just gonna buy it out. So they they are. They finally probably have caught up on what they owed in the past. Took a long time, but that that really is the

the end of the story. Um, and it leaves us with the two questions of a did he really kill Sandra and then attack his wife? And then after that, what happened to it? Where'd you goilities there? Yep, So we we have a couple of who done it theories and who done it? Theory Number one is obvious that he's guilty that he did it. Well, if we look at it from the perspective of what is his motive, Well, he's he's been jilted by the courts, he's lost custody

of his children. He probably feels like everybody is screwed him out of all these things that he's entitled to, which, when you think about it, through the course of his life he got what he thought he was in title too, so when suddenly somebody tells him no, it doesn't sit well. Yeah, when I talked about his behavior before everything happened, I said, it didn't really seem like he spiraled downhill. He just seemed to be okay, And maybe that was some form

of emotional shutdown. People do that. You can't tell that they're a boiling cauldron of emotions because they're just acting normal until eventually it does overflow. Yeah, he had a lot to be stressed about. And besides being massively in debt and not being able to pay his bills and losing his kids and everything. And then there was that one little thing. Yes, yes, there was that one little thing which came out last year. That's when that little

thing that Joe keeps hinting at happened. There's a guy by the name of George Weiss, and he was evidently a member of the Claremount Club and he played He played with John Bingham there, Yeah, because everybody did. And he was quoted in an article in the Mirror last year as saying he knew why Lord Lucan had snapped.

And the reason was, according to him, is that Lord Lucan had sent a kitten to his children as a gift, and the kitten was set back through his mail letterbox, which is the slot in the door, you know, you get your mail through with its throat cut. Oh my god, that's hours after he had had it sent. Yeah. Seriously, even if you were angry at this guy, you don't kill the kitten. I actually, you know, if this is true, If this is true, then I say Lady Lucan deserved

to get beaten. Well that's my question though, is it okay? So who who did the kitten in? Was it Lady Lucan, was it Sandra, was it one of the maybe one of the children, or was it some other man that we don't know about. There's a whole host of people. We have another murder mystery of who who did the kitten? Really, because that could really impact what happened later on. Yeah, of course that's you know. I mean, I don't know if Wise is lying or perhaps Lord Lucan lied to him.

I mean, it's possible that none of this happened. And yeah, it's yeah, keep in mind and sat on this since nine and just suddenly comes out with it's like, oh I remember that thing. Yeah, I remember the family of the Lucan family. They had a cat who lived in their house on Laura Belgrade Street. And uh, generally, in my experience, the kind of people who own cats usually are not the kind of people who slit kitten's throats. Yes, usually, Yeah, that's what dog people do. Yeah, I'm a dog person

and I would not know. But it does make me one question this bit about the kitten, because as we talked about before and we'll probably talk about again. The British media trots this story out every year. Yeah, I don't. Yeah, and again you're right, and this time why did this guy sit in the dead kittens story for so and every time it's somebody with a new revelation. Take that with a grain of salt. Well, and in strong favor of the he did it is? The question would be

what motive did he have to kill the nanny? But it's totally possible. They look I mean they didn't look really the same. They were the same height, right, nanny I think was just a little bit more thick set than dark in the dark and you know, if it's pitch black downstairs and you think you've got you know, your wife who you are hating right now, and beat her up and then realize, oh oops, that was a nanny.

What do we do in the mail sack? And we'll wait? Yeah, I mean that your your plan has gone to gone pear shape? Right. That The other part is the what what motivated him to kill the nanny? And I believe it was a complete total accident. I think she was the wrong place, wrong time. Well, let's not forget though he was paying her salary man. That might have been his way of cutting expenses. Yeah, I think it was.

And again this is this is another one of those things that's totally out of out of one of the detective novels. Who is I know, it really is. I can't wait for the twist of like, oh, yeah, by the way, this is actually just a novel. Now, by the way, yeah, that the twist is going to be in the end that actually she murdered him and then self bludgeoned. She murdered him, murdered the nanny, and then self bludgeon and then ran down the street and ran

into the pub. And you know, yeah, I know I feel connected to all of our listeners because they were doing the same thing as I'm sure as I was just doing, which is just shaking my head. No, you gotta love those those kinds of devious twists. So our next theory of who done it, it wasn't him. That's the next theory. There are people who say this, There is a lot of people who say that. I mean, there's he left those letters and talked to his mother

and attested his innocence. Um, and some of his friends have stood by him. I mean, initially a lot of people said, yeah, he's probably innocent. Some of those guys changed their tune, but some of them have said he was innocent for twenty five plus years, so they're really standing there. What What is my hard part about his not having done it is there was no signs of forced entry into the house. So you're saying that's uh

that essentially it was an entirely random thing. Somebody broke into the house maybe too well, no, no, I'm saying it's hard to believe that he didn't do it because there's no signs of forced entry. The basement doors were locked. I don't think that a fleeing attacker would stop and locked the doors behind themselves. And the back garden was walled. Um, there was no signs of anybody, you know, climbing the

vegetation and breaking the branches to get out. Um. Like we talked about the fact that, you know, when the police recreated the scene, it's very hard to see in the window from the street unless you're bending down, which I still think is kind of hinky. His theory does not hold water, or excuse me, his alibi does not hold water. Yeah, yeah, it doesn't. And I think we talked about this a little bit in terms of the

blood that was around. My other problem with him not being involved or guilty of doing it is that Veronica's blood was everywhere else but the basement kitchen well precisely, and so down the stairs. Yes, she didn't so the attack on her it took place. But we've talked about the snow lights, no blood. This doesn't work. So let's move on to the next two done it, which is a hit man. And there is theories out here that a hit man did it, and it says that, you know,

he didn't. He wasn't the one that committed the entire act. He just hired someone. He hired somebody and probably, like we said before, Sandra was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and then everything went sideways. I'm guessing that he must have been at the house if this is true. He probably was sitting outside watching it, you know, kind of reveling in the whole thing and maybe got cold feet, or maybe he was in there with the hit man to see it all happen and that's when

it kind of went. All that I heard, too, is that he had hired a hit man and then at the last minute he realized what an incredibly horrible thing he was doing, and he rushed down there to try to try to head it off. Well, if he wrote those a lot of years before, right, it's possible he hired a hit man to to stage the exact situation that he said happened. If he was if he may be realized, oh I want Veronica back, or oh I want to be a hero, or you know, oh I

just want to scare her. Whatever, whatever his motivation was, he had hired this hit man. It did go a little south, right. He expected it to be Veronica that he was that was attacked because the nanny was supposed to be off and he went in to save her and then realized this person is dead. This person, this did not go to plan at all, and then ran away.

I don't know. I mean, the only problem with that is that he he went ahead and mailed the letter's bloody and all when it was really kind of time for him to come up with a new story at this point in time. And so really why would he go ahead? And I mean maybe he wasn't thinking straight, but yeah, because I mean, obviously the right thing to do at this point is to not mail those letters starting start cooking up a new alibi, or like, don't leave the house, hang out, knowing she's going to go

get the cops. Hang out there, and you know, played the innocent card and say I was like, I wasn't here, you guys, I'm sorry. How can I help in this? You know, because that at the very least, it's it's way less suspicious if you're still sitting there when the cops come back and you're like, oh my gosh, thank thank god, here help us versus disappearance. Oh I better get out of here, because I was just helping her.

I think, I think at this point, so I think he he came to realize the hopelessness of the situation. I also think that this though there isn't a lot of support for this theory, I think there are some signs that it might be the right one. And that's the car. Yeah, because think about it this way. He sends the guy in, the guy MUCKs the whole thing up and kills the nanny. He goes in, he discovers it, He sends the guy outside, and the guy goes and

sits in the car and waits. You know, okay, boss, I'll be waiting for you, because there's blood in the car, and the hitman is gonna have blood all over him from beating Veronica and then from beating the nanny. Well, I think both, you know, I mean, I think it's gonna be both of them. He's gonna blood all over him, and that would explain why there was blood and hair in the car, and then of course there was you know,

some of the stuff. So I really I think that he was trying to break it up and, as Devin put it, be the hero of the situation. And then he screwed it up. He takes off, he drops the guy off wherever he's going to drop him off for his final bit of of time with him, and maybe he pays him, maybe he doesn't. I don't know, and the wrong person. I don't. I don't think he deserves. I don't think you deserve to get paid. But on the other hand, you know, do you really look at

the him and say, hey, screw you, I'm not paying. Yeah, you probably don't, probably don't checks in the mail, Yeah yeah, yeah, But that's personally, I kind of think that's probably the most likely scene because I don't think he had the stones to do well. The thing about it that The reason I don't like the hitman theory is is that Lord Luca and whatever his faults, did, love his children did. And the problem. The problem was sending a hitman by that to kill your wife. It's one of your kids

stumbles upon the scene. Well, and that's why I don't get. I don't think that it was the hitman was supposed to kill anybody. I think he's supposed to rough her up, and then he would run in as the hero and chase the bad guy away, and she would realize how much she loved and needed him and welcome him back. Generally using a lead pipe to rus somebody that's not a good strategy. I mean, somebody hitting somebody on the ribs and breaking a few ribs, but you don't hit

him on the head. Yeah. Although again the big question then is like she did try to reconcile with him. Maybe it was too make the house seemed like a dangerous place for the kids, so he would get custody. Yeah. Maybe, I mean there's a thousand ways that he made that somebody may have thought that should play out in their favor, but but yeah, I don't think the hitman was trying to just rougher up because the lead pipe that he is it's a serious tool. Well it's not just serious tool.

It was bent. The lead pipe was bent, but some seriously hard whacking. Yeah that was okay. Let's smack and whack. Let's let's move forward to where did he go? Because we're done with who done it? Now, let's find out what happened to him? Yeah, what did happen to Yeah? Well, the most popular theory is that he committed suicide. Um, it's uh, let's see his his his friend John aspen All, who's a really wealthy guy on his own by the way,

by the way, owns a couple of zoos. He does, but I mean, he had nothing to get from standing by Lucky Luke in all these years. But he said he probably didn't do it, but he probably did take the gentleman's out, probably took a boat out, got out into the channel, pulled the plug in the middle of the boat, and sank with it. Did they actually come with plugs? Yeah, some boats drain plug It's a real thing.

It's not just in looney Dunes. Another theory that he put out there is that then this would be a little easier to do. Um, there's a ferry that leaves New Haven a couple of times a day and goes to France, and so you could have either boarded the ferry or more likely maybe he snuck on board and stowed away, which was plain why nobody on the ferry remember seeing it. But he could just basically out in

the middle of the channel jumped overboard. Yeah, I mean, that's the that's the primary way that everybody thinks that if he did commit suicide, he did it drowning himself in the English Channel. Yeah, and apparently got I think he got these from Susan Maxwell Scott. Yes, I think he. I believe he got us set of really strong sleeping pills from Susan Maxwell Scott. I do remember something about that.

I remember the exact details at this moment, but yeah, that that that the thing is is that he took himself a huge dose of sleeping pills and then when those were starting to kick, and flung himself overboard. And if you if you went over the side of the ferry, then I'm I'm lucky for him. He probably got sucked into the screws. Yeah. Bah, let's uh, let's move forward to our next theory of where did he go, which is he left the country. Yeah, could have actually had

a fake passport. He hopped on the ferry in New Haven. Think about it, Lord Lucan. He comes from money, He's got wealthy friends. He can do whatever he wanted when he was basically being a playboy almost, I mean, he just he did what he wanted he could. And so it's quite possible that he got ahold of some of his friends and they said, whoa mate, that's screwed up. We'll get you out of town. And so they got

him out of town. And you can pick your favorite country right now, and chances are good he was cited in that country. I swear he's been sited more than Elvis, Yes, thousands of sightings there. There are two people who are the favorites for if we're going to say that he got spirited out of the country. The two people that our favorites are John aspen all As who said and James Goldsmith, Sir James Goldsmith, Sir James Goldsmith, who was

also a very rich man. Actually, the lady on Lady Lucan's website, she has something to say about that, believe it or not. She says. She actually says in her website that those guys didn't like him all that much at all. Really, she said, yeah, she said, she quotes somebody else. There is a there's a guy who and I've actually read this guy's stuff before. He writes a lot about politics, which he used to, but he's also a little bit about gambling. And apparently he knew the

guy that the whole Claremont Club gang. So his name is Talkie and last name I pronounceable. He actually wrote in the Sunday Times quote this is regarding Sir James Goldsmith, He wrote, Goldsmith was not particularly fond of Lucan unquote. He wrote that. She also says on her website John Aspinall was not one of the late Lord Lucan's best friends.

Both James Goldsmith and John Aspinall have supported my version of events, namely that my late husband murdered Mrs Rivet by mistake instead of me, and shortly there afterwards committed suicide. They did not want their integrity damaged by a murderer. That that is really funny because she's the only one who really puts that out there, and I love that that says that she says my version of events, but I don't know. I mean, I wasn't there at the time. I don't know how much they did or did not

like him. But those two guys are the prime candidates. They are that that's what everybody else says. But according to her, they didn't much care for him. And according to Talkie unpronounceable, yeah, yeah, buddies either. Well, according to the theory, what those two did is they helped spirit him out of the UK and get him to Kenya, and then years later they organized trips for his children to Kenya so that he could see them unbeknownst to them.

And another one of these yeah, well yeah, there's a whole bunch of these, but this this one where it says that they went to that he went to Kenya, That is from Aspinall's secretary. She said that she did all these transfers and all this funny stuff and years later figured out and then yeah, figured out who was for Or there's another version that says that he was flown he went to a small airfield in Kent and then got on a plane heading to France. The person

who helped him in this version is Susan Maxwell. Scott. She's the one who organized the whole thing. Now, I will say that the source for this bulatantly admits that he was told the story while in a pub, which really makes me question how much truth there is to it. But the guy who's telling the story says that then he was his father who drove them to the airport, and then he himself went and picked up the Corsair

and then drove it away and and dumped it. I mean, there's so many sightings I want to say about the whole thing about transporting the kids to Africa where you know, and and of course they didn't meet with him. According to that story, he's watching them. He watched them from a distance. I saw it in view that his son George did the eighth Thorold, and and actually he was he was. He was quite intelligent and articulate. And I

love the way he put this. He said, he said, I've never ever been to Gabon, and I hope I'm announcing that correctly. Maybe it's Gable owner, but anyway, he says, I had never ever been to Gabon, and I guess I was supposedly transported down there with my with my sister then they're from my father could watch us or view us from some creepy distance. Yes, but yeah, he

was very dismissive of that entire story. So the whole family has been dismissive of most of these theories that are out there, short of he would and did himself in the channel. Yeah, but here's some of my favorite sightings. Yeah, I want to hear them all right. He was cited in Martin, New Zealand. There was an Englishman who was investigated as possibly being Lord Lucan, even though it turned out that he was just some English guy living in

his land rover with his pet possum. The picture of him with this possum a little different in New Zealand. They do. They're they're different color and not nearly as ugly. Yeah, never mind, Now this is the best part. Everybody said it was Lord Lucan because it was a brit even though this guy was ten years younger and half a foot shorter. But he was in a land rover. Well, there you go, there go, yeah, let's see what. Oh,

this is awesome. He lived in go oh where he was living the hippie lifestyle as Barry Helping until his death in and he had the awesomest nickname ever, jungly Berry. Yeah. Yeah, that was pretty conclusively disproven. Yeah, he worked as a waiter in a San Francisco restaurant. And then, because the IRA have to get involved in everything, the last one says that he was held hostage by the IRA, and presumably they were responsible for the tack on his family,

I guess. And then before they killed him, or before he killed himself, he asked to be fed to the tigers at the zoo in Kent, of course. Yeah, which, by the way, it was. Yeah, I've heard that one too. The another theory that I've heard is that the the Underworld contacts, the shady Underworld contacts that hooked him up with the hitman realized that he was kind of a liability after the whole thing went out and knocked him

and knocked him off. Yeah, so that's another theory. Sure, it's entirely possible at this point with all the other craziness we've had going on. Yeah, but I'm inclined to believe he killed himself with a lead pipe on the ferry in the English channel Candlestick. Yeah, I I think that most likely he did himself in and I, like I said, I personally think that the he sent somebody into the house and then the whole and then realized what a dumb idea it was probably what happened, But

that's my opinion. I'm in client to believe that he didn't hire a hit man. He just wanted to himself to do it. But and you know, kind of bungled the whole thing. Yeah, if he didn't himself, he really did. He really didn't think his crying too too carefully. He should have really put a lot more thought into you. Yeah. Well, one one last thing is that that in that that that Mirror interview with George the eight thorough he talked about how sick the family is of hearing of all

these sightings. We were so tired of this. Yeah, yeah, he's not alive. He died. You know, please everybody accepted. Well, if you have any thoughts on this particular story or any other stories that you would like us to take a look at, you are more than welcome to send those to us. You can send that to our email address, which is Thinking Sideways Podcast at gmail dot com. We of course have our website where this and all previous episodes are and as well as some of our research.

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If I think all right, well, we're gonna go ahead and wrap this one up, get ready, guys. The next episode comes out in the month of October, a big month. It's a listener's suggestion our top stories. We're calling it thinking sideways, most wanted, Yes, because these are most suggested or highest voted stories to cover. So we're going to do that for the entire month of October. We're not going to tell you what what what Next week is a surprise, all right, everybody, We'll talk to you next week.

So it was choppy in the kitchen with a lead pipe. It's just so wrong all the time. I had to mention chupy, I have an accused chuopy of anything for a while