Hello and welcome to another episode of Evolving Prisons with me, Keegan.

Carrie.

Before we jump into today's episode, I'd be really grateful if you'd please rate the podcast on whatever platform you listen as more ratings mean more people will discover the show.

My guest today is Naomi Channel.

Naomi is a TV producer and hosts Real a True Crime Podcast.

One of the cases Naomi looked into was the individual convicted of murdering Jodi Jones.

His name is Luke Mitchell.

Luke is 20 years into a prison sentence in Scotland, but maintains he is innocent of this crime.

I chat to Naomi about what prison is like for Luke with him maintaining his innocence, the media's portrayal of Luke's case and the impact on Jodi's family and the impact researching such cases has on Naomi.

I hope you find this conversation informative.

Let's just start by can you briefly tell us a little bit about the Luke Mitchell case?

I mean, why is it so popular?

Why do so many people seem to know about it and talk about it?

I'm still figuring that out.

So when I did the podcast on Luke, I wasn't actually doing it to cover the case, which sounds a bit strange.

I was actually wanting to cover the movement behind Luke and what was going on because I found it so bizarre, unique.

At times I thought everyone was mad and then at other times I thought, wow, these are people that really care.

And I met some really interesting and insightful characters when I was doing this.

But basically to kind of sum up the case, Luke was 14 years old in June 2003 and he lived in Dalkeith, which is in Scotland.

And his 14 year old girlfriend, Jodi Jones had been with him for a few months.

They'd known each other for a while, it was very small town, Scotland, and they were due to meet each other and she left the house and he went to wait for her and she never showed up.

So he went over to a field with some of his friends, very 14 year old thing to do, and Jody never, never turned up.

And he thought that was strange, but sort of didn't think much more of it until he got a call, sorry, a text message on his phone from Jodie's mother.

And she had said, can you come home?

It's past your bedtime or your curfew, you're going to be grounded to say goodbye to Luke.

And then Luke has sort of realized that, you know, Jodie must be missing then because if she's not at home, where is she?

So he lets her mum know that Jodi never showed up and then they Start to look for her.

And there are two villages.

So Luke is from one end of this path, and Jody is from the other end.

And this path is called Roan Dyke's path.

And it's gonna be really, really important in this case because just through a wall that runs alongside that path, Jodi's body was found by Luke and some of Jodi's family members.

Jodi had been murdered in one of the most brutal ways that I've ever had.

The unfortunate task of seeing and researching the crime scene was horrendous.

She had been stabbed, she'd been choked, she'd been stripped, she was almost decapitated.

This was an extremely brutal murder of a child.

And very quickly, Luke was the prime suspect.

Now, the police thought that Luke was the one who killed her.

There was no forensic evidence that linked Luke to Jodi's murder.

There were other DNA profiles of men on Jody's body, but none of them were pinpointed to anyone in particular.

So Luke was arrested the next year, and he was tried as an adult, and he was sentenced when he was 16 years old, and he's still in prison today.

So that murder occurred in 2003, and we're now in 2024.

Luke was due to be up for parole this year.

He did go in front of the board, and he was declared still a sexual risk to women.

Luke hasn't been outside of a prison since 2005, so he hasn't actually been a free man as an adult.

He was in there as a child.

And the police and the prosecution and the parole board, they have not managed to kind of give any more information publicly about why they reached that decision.

So Luke has spent all of his adult life in prison, and there is a very strong community of people who believe that Luke is innocent.

Thank you so much for that.

And how did you then become aware of it?

Because, as you said, it was more about the following and the community behind him that interested you.

So how did you even become aware of this case?

So my first case that I ever covered was the Stuart Lubbock and Michael Barrymore case, which is pretty infamous in the uk.

And I was looking for other cases to cover, and I was looking for, like, you know, I always like to try and give back to the community.

So if there is, like, you know, someone wants justice for someone, I will type in search words justice for and see what comes up.

Are there parents of a murdered loved one trying to get justice for them?

Can I help them in any way by sharing their story or giving them a platform to speak.

But I kept coming across this hashtag, justice for Luke.

And Jody.

My immediate thought was, oh, okay, it's a double murder.

This is horrific.

Who are they?

Oh, my goodness, they're 14.

Why have I never heard of this?

Then I see they're in Scotland.

Okay, now I'm.

I'm really baffled.

Why have I not heard of a double child killing in the uk?

Then I.

Then I realized that Luke is not dead.

Luke is very much alive, but he's in prison.

And then so I go down a rabbit hole because this is really.

This feels very unique.

And honestly, the amount of people that had used this hashtag and the amount of accounts, social media accounts on X or Twitter or whatever want to call it, on Facebook, on YouTube, and people were all saying, luke is innocent.

Luke is innocent.

And, you know, at the time, the serial podcast had been really, really successful.

So that's the story of Adnan Saeed, who has had his conviction quashed.

A very similar circumstance.

Teenage boy convicted of killing his teenage girlfriend.

That was an American case.

And I thought, oh, my God, is this the.

Is this the UK's serial?

So I started to look into it, and I got in touch with his team.

And I say team because they weren't his official lawyers.

There was a criminologist who was working alongside Luke, who now no longer is.

And then there was a team of supporters, many of them just civilians, who had never worked in police or the prosecution system or even, you know, were attorneys or anything like that.

They were just normal, everyday people.

But they had a real strong belief that Luke was innocent.

And so my podcast actually, really at the start, was following that movement.

I was fascinated by it.

And when I say, like, they were tweeting about it and whatever, I'm not talking about once every few months, there were.

They were dedicating all of their free time to this cause.

So there were people who were running this Facebook group, which had about 30,000 members in it, this Facebook group.

And I saw that they had a team of admins who were literally on hand to answer questions 24 hours a day, literally taking it in shifts.

Most of these people were having contact with Luke through the prison.

And I did get an interview with Luke from prison.

We had to go around that in a bit of a dodgy way because they weren't letting him speak to the press.

So we pretended that we were a legal team and it was all fine.

And Luke did have his say all the while, actually, whilst I did feel.

And when I think if anyone listens to the podcast, it's seven episodes and it's a real deep dive into a lot of the forensic evidence and the circumstantial evidence and the other potential suspects that were in the case that weren't necessarily investigated properly.

So many people on their social media posts and their Twitter and on this Facebook group, they just kept talking about how unsafe the conviction was.

And actually whilst there were, there was a handful of people who were saying, Luke is innocent.

100%.

I know this.

I mean, I took that with a pinch of salt because how can any of us really know that?

We don't know and I still don't know.

And it's, you know, it's naturally a question that people who have listened to the series will ask and say, what do you think?

And I don't give my opinion because, you know, I'm trying to come at this balanced and I don't, I actually don't know.

I've got no idea.

What I will say though is that the conviction feels very flimsy and I feel like there was trial by media way before there was trial by a proper jury.

And he was a child and some of his rights as a child were violated, for example, being interviewed without an appropriate adult present at first, you know, and then when there was one there, that adult didn't intervene any time.

So there's a lot to the case and there's a lot of the reason for why I felt so passionately about it and wanted to cover it.

But my heart has always remained with Jodie and I think once you hear the things that have been done to Jodie and how she was taken as a 14 year old girl, it's abhorrent.

And I think many people that do want justice for Luke, they're not saying they, you know, they want justice for Jodie as well and they just want to make sure that the right person is in prison for her for that crime.

Yeah, absolutely.

Because I feel like sometimes we can get lost where when we use the perpetrator's name so much, it's almost like the victim gets put behind.

And I know that you are really passionate about being victim focused as well, which is so good.

I want to ask a personal question though.

How do you deal with the emotional toll of looking into all these cases?

Because this is a very horrific case and you look into a lot of cases, so how do you manage that for yourself?

The effect of that is probably still to come.

I think I'm still riding high on the sort of putting stuff together and as a journalist and I've been a TV producer for nearly 20 years, so you sort of get ingrained in the production process and you do learn to disassociate a little bit.

And I used to work in maternity services as well.

I did a stint there.

And obviously things can go very wrong.

You know, we like to think childbirth is lovely and beautiful, but sometimes things happen.

And so you do have to sort of disassociate a little bit to be able to carry on and to do your work.

And my brother's a doctor, my sister's a nurse.

They both have to do that as well.

There is an element of that, but I'm not as robust as they are.

And I do think that one day this probably will come back and be quite detrimental.

So I am trying to be better at sort of looking after myself.

But I also really worry about listeners as well.

And I try to make the podcast even though they are really, really horrific and some of the details have to be said in order to paint an accurate picture.

And also you don't want to take away from what's happened to someone something, you know, you don't want to just say half of what they did.

But I think it's about how you package it.

So I'm treading this really fine line between being extremely respectful to the victims and their families, but also to the listeners.

And then I guess I put myself last, which is probably quite normal in this game, I think.

Yeah.

And at least you acknowledge that it is difficult work.

So I know it's a massive case with a lot of intricacies, but what are the main arguments for against Luke being the perpetrator in this case?

So the main one that I think so many people sort of use as a headline is that there was no forensic evidence to link him.

If you think about the crime scene and how brutal it was, it seems almost impossible that a 14 year old boy would be able to commit such a barbaric murder.

And just to kind of say as well, Luke had no prior convictions for anything.

He was a massive animal lover.

He looked a bit like a skater boy, you know, he used to wear bandanas in his hair.

He had quite long hair.

He describes himself as the village weirdo, but I think now, looking at teenagers, I mean, he would fit right in, you know, so that for me has always been a massive point.

And the fact that when the police arrested him that night or took him in for questioning, sorry, they didn't arrest him at first, but they took him in for questioning.

His nails were dirty, his hair was dirty, so he hadn't washed or anything.

And yet there was no trace of her on him and vice versa.

So that's a big one.

There are also.

There's an eyewitness account as well that is not wholly reliable.

So they're kind of main star eyewitness who put Luke at the top of the path when he was supposed to meet Jody.

When they got to court, she looked at Luke in the box and said that she didn't recognize him as the person that she saw.

Now, to balance that up, there had been just under two years between the murder and then the trial.

But that for me, blew the case kind of wide open circumstantially, which is what the case is built on.

It's a purely circumstantial case that, okay, the boyfriend.

The boyfriend is often a.

Is someone that we need to look at, and we know that.

But apart from that and the fact that he found her body is another thing that people.

Now, he was walking his dogs.

He had a dog that he trained.

She was like a gun dog.

She was called Mia.

And he had tried to say, fetch Jodie, find Jodie, find Jodie.

And he was walking along, he bumped into some of Jodie's family.

It was Jodie's sister, Jodie's sister's boyfriend, and Jodie's grandmother.

And they were walking up the path, this roan dyke path where she was found.

And he was walking down and they called out to him and was like, luke, is that you?

Yes, it's me.

Me and the dog.

Okay, should we band together and search for Jodie?

And there was this V shaped hole in the wall.

And this is what my podcast is called, through the Wall, the Case against Luke Mitchell.

And it's because they kind of walk past this hole in the wall and the dog then sort of doubles back and starts sniffing at the V shaped hole in the wall.

And so then they go back and Luke and Jodie's sister's boyfriend sort of climb over this V shaped hole in the wall.

And it's on the other side of that wall where there's like a strip of woodland, and that's where Jody was found.

So the people that are adamant Luke is guilty, and there are plenty of those as well, by the way, they use that as a big factor.

You know, he found the body.

I guess my question then would be, you know, why would you climb through that wall?

Why would you want to find the body?

Surely that would make things more Suspicious.

So that's another thing.

And then there are lots and lots of other things that are important and I sort of go through them all in the podcast piece by piece, because, I mean, it took me months to sort of get my head around them.

A lot of it relies on either eyewitness testimony, timelines, alibis.

Luke said he had an alibi.

He said he was at home.

So the predicted time of her death.

He said he was at home making dinner for his brother and his mum.

His brother was there.

And then at one point he said, oh, no, actually, I don't think Luke was there.

And then he said he was.

So that also caused a lot of suspicion as well.

And I understand that.

Of course, I understand that.

There was a condom found very close to Jody's body and it had fresh semen in it.

And that was from a man, a local man, who had apparently gone into the woods that day, and I'm very sorry to be so graphic, had masturbated into a condom, discarded it and then gone home.

Now, the time he said he would have done it, there's a strong possibility that Jody's body was lying just feet away from him.

He's saying he didn't see one.

So that again raises so many questions.

And on top of that, the next day that same man went back and did it again.

He went.

So after the body had been cleared, he went back again.

And there were all these other DNA profiles and there was also.

She was wearing a T shirt.

Jodie was wearing a T shirt.

It was actually her sister's and she had borrowed it.

And there was some DNA from Jodi's sister's boyfriend, and obviously that causes a bit of concern.

And then he was also in the search party that found her, so.

But he was never really investigated.

The police had a very strong feeling, I guess, about Luke from the get go.

And even on the night when they found her, Luke was the only one taken off in a police car on his own.

The rest of the family were left to kind of console each other, to give statements to police in a car park instead of inside of a police station.

So there's a lot to this case and it's a really, really tough one to summarise, and I really hope that's made some sense.

No, absolutely.

That's great, Naomi.

And it is a tough one because when I looked into it myself, there is so much stuff.

I mean, there's.

Apparently his jacket he wore all the time was missing.

There was a knife that he had that nobody's Found.

There's so much into it.

So if people want to look at the specifics of the case, I highly recommend they listen to your podcast, because it does go into such great detail about it.

But let's look at Luke in prison, then.

So you said that you spoke to him.

Was it the once that you spoke to him?

Yeah.

So we did, like, a remote interview where he had his supporter at the time, Dr.

Sandra Lean.

She was the voice, but of the interview.

And I would feed her questions that then she would feed to Luke.

It seems like his life in prison.

Well, he doesn't know any different as an adult.

And I think that obviously, if he did murder Jodie, then.

Okay, then, you know, that's the consequences for your actions.

If he didn't, then he's never had an adult life.

He's been a child, and then that's it.

There's been no opportunity to free him, flourish into an adult.

So when we were talking about the prison, I think he has people that he gets on with very well.

He found solace in being able to study.

He's quite an intelligent man.

So I know how important books and learning resources have been.

And I guess if you're put in prison at the age of 16, you are still growing, your brain is still developing, and you're still kind of thirsty for knowledge, and you want to explore the world.

But he couldn't, for obvious reasons.

So I think that has been a kind of really big part of his life in prison.

I spoke to quite a few other people who were supporting him, and I said, you know, how do you know Luke?

Or why did you become interested in this case?

And actually, there was a fair few of them that had had relatives or friends who had been in prison with Luke, and they had come out and said, oh, you know, he's a really nice guy.

You know, I can't believe he's in there.

I think he's innocent, and that's filtered through to them, and that's where their belief has come from.

So it's funny, he's a very articulate man, and I wasn't expecting him to be so.

And I think that's because I was thinking, okay, 16 years old.

I was trying to go back to when I was 16.

What was I doing?

I thought I knew it all.

Of course, we all did at 16, but we don't.

There was so much growing to be done, especially between the ages of sort of 16 and 25.

They're so pivotal for us, and it's where we sort of find our place in the world.

We find out what our purpose is going to be.

You know, it wasn't lost on me that he was in a place where he may never find that purpose.

He also.

There's some really interesting factors in this case specifically, and that is the.

The connections between the police, the prosecution and the prison staff are very tight.

So, for example, Luke has had an appeal rejected.

I think it's four or five times.

The lord advocate in Scotland, Dorothy Bain, is married to the prosecutor in Luke's case.

So the lord advocate is ultimately the one who can say, we can push this through for an appeal.

We can do a retrial, or we can at least re examine the trial and the evidence that was put forward.

And the fact that, I mean, it's laughable, really.

The fact that she was married to Alan Turnbull, who was the prosecutor in Lig's trial, I mean, that's a massive conflict of interest.

And he pointed out that that's not, you know, it runs deeper than that.

It runs into the prison systems.

I've had some conversations off the record with some former police detectives in Scotland, not ones that were related to investigating Jody's murder, but ones from Glasgow and other ones from Edinburgh.

And they have echoed those sentiments and said, you know, actually police Scotland is very, very small and the prison guards, the prison officers, are very often very well connected to the police and the prosecution.

So that's an allegation that I don't know anything more about other than what I've been told.

But it's.

It's interesting.

It's definitely interesting.

So I would love to.

For there to be a bit more transparency on why they are keeping Luke in prison now, because he has served 20 years and it's such a long time, especially when the perpetrator is a child.

And that actually really hurts me to sort of say, because that kind of goes against everything that I sort of feel like I stand for.

I stand for the victims and I always will do.

But there's something about this case that is troubling and it could well be that Luke is guilty.

But the way the police have handled the case and the way the media as well, who need to take some responsibility because they were printing pictures of Luke at the age of 14, calling him a suspect.

So he was being tried, you know, tried by the media way before he was tried by the courts.

And that was a real collective of people that have potentially failed, not only Luke, but Jodie's family as well.

And I would love to know why he's still in prison now because I think, you know, they said he's a sexual risk to women, but I have a hard time sort of thinking about how they come to that because actually Jodi's murder was not classed as sexually motivated, which to me was bizarre because the poor girl had had one of her breasts cut.

You know, she was naked from below and there was a condom of fresh semen near her.

I struggle to think what other motivation there would have been for that murder.

If it was a revenge, if it was someone who'd lost it in a moment of madness, surely that would have been.

You know, we see them all the time, sadly, and it's awful to say where someone is strangled or someone is stabbed and then they are left and the perpetrator runs and that moment of madness catches up with them and it's horrific.

This was so brutal.

This was prolonged.

This wasn't something that happened quickly.

So for whoever did it, to have done it with such, you know, ferociousness and then for it not to be cast as a sexualized murder, I just find it so bizarre.

So I would.

Yes, sorry, I hope that's made sense.

But I would love to sort of understand how they've managed to get to that conclusion when Luke has been in a male prison for 20 years.

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I found that interesting that they explicitly said that he was a sexual risk to women when he's been in prison since he was a child.

And I wonder, I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but in other cases where it's been proven that people were wrongfully convicted, I'm thinking of Andrew Malkinson.

And the reason this case comes to mind is because, correct me if I'm wrong, but in Luke's case, the Police destroyed evidence that they should still have until 2026.

And the same thing happened in Andrew's case.

And it just made me think about Luke should get a parole hearing, which I think he got this year and was denied it.

I wonder how much of it comes down to the fact that if he maintains his innocence, is there an argument there that he's not showing remorse?

And I find it really difficult in cases of wrongful conviction because if somebody is innocent then how can they pretend or take responsibility for something that they did if they absolutely didn't do it?

For me, that would speak volumes because if I was in prison and I'd done these 20 years stint, Luke's mother is very, very unwell and now he wants to get out and see her.

Obviously I'm trying to think how I would and I can never know because I haven't been in that position.

My immediate thought would be, okay, well, I'll just say I did it then and get out.

But he's always said from day dot that he won't admit to something that he hasn't done.

That was very much the same for Adnan Saeed as well.

And I do respect that.

It could all be a massive gameplay or it could be the truth.

And if it is, then oh my God, what have we done as a society?

And he's still there.

Yeah.

And am I right in thinking that he has been told that his engagement in the media highlights a risk for further offending, but he says, well, the media is the only way I can kind of get traction around the fact I'm innocent.

Is that right?

Exactly right, yes.

Yes.

And I think it must be really frustrating if you playing devil's advocate, if he is innocent and nobody has been listening to him and then someone is saying, I can put a podcast out there for you or I can write a news article for you.

He did do some interviews with some of his supporters and they put it on YouTube and that did not go down well at all.

There's a few reasons for that, of course.

You know, protecting Jody Jones's family is something that the police system needs to do and the parole board need to do.

Protecting the wider public.

Absolutely.

But also on the flip side, I can see if there was an issue where we are talking about some sort of corruption or we are talking about some sort of COVID up, their media exposure is so damaging for them and potentially could unravel this big house of cards that's been stacking for so long.

So it's really hard.

I mean, it's worth saying that Luke did do a lie detector test.

Now, I don't know.

I know some people absolutely do not buy into them and some people do.

And I'm not on either side of the fence.

I'm just saying it as a fact.

But he did pass the lie detector test.

So that was just another interesting, interesting thing that just there's all these tiny pieces of information.

And I think it's funny because it's actually the reason that he's in prison, but also potentially the reason that he needs a retrial as well, because there's no one big thing that's screaming, Luke's a killer or Luke's innocent.

It's actually lots of different little bits and pieces that are making up both the circumstantial case against him, but then also the case that would encourage a retrial, I think, for a lot of people.

Yeah.

And did he say to you how it impacts him?

I'm just thinking if he is innocent, as he told you, how prison's impacting him or how he's coping with it.

He didn't show too much of that side.

He feels more.

I mean, I know with prison, he had been moved a few times and, you know, there was talks of him having day release and open prison and things he did sort of say, you know, his life has been put on hold for him completely.

He's aware that he may never become, you know, a father.

He may not get married because of his time in prison.

It sounds like he does have some good friends there and that there are some officers that he has become friendly with and they have treated him as a human being.

He said, rather than just another prisoner, he said that there are some that feel sorry for him and he knows they feel sorry for him.

But, you know, they're doing their job, aren't they?

They're going into prison and they just need to everybody safe whilst they're in there.

So I don't think he looks too deeply into it.

I also wonder how emotionally he's probably not developed in the way that we have outside of a prison.

So I do wonder if the full impact of his time in prison will ever really show itself until maybe he, you know, if and when he does come out, I do wonder how that will go.

I wonder how much support he will need in the community.

And I know that parole officers.

I recently did an episode on my podcast about a man who had sort of gone to prison for killing his wife.

He was let out early.

He had a probation officer who said oh, you know, you're not a risk.

And then he went on to kill his second partner.

And I know that just by looking at that and the statistics for probation officers and how low we are on them in the UK at the moment, we have got so many positions that need to be filled, but it's such an integral and important job for our society that it's.

I don't think it pays well enough for the.

For the responsibility that you have, because not only have you got to manage them in the community, but there is an element of safeguarding them as well and how they're going to adjust to life on the outside.

And if you've been in prison since you were a child, that's a big burden to bear for somebody, isn't it?

Definitely.

It's a long time to be in prison.

And you brought up a great point there about emotionally, how much has he matured?

And simple things.

The world has changed a lot in 20 years.

What is the state of affairs for him?

So right now, how does he progress?

Is it just a case of waiting for the next parole hearing now?

But I suppose if he does maintain his innocence, and that is one of the reasons that they're not letting him out, it's.

I wonder how we see him potentially coming out in the future.

It's something that I get asked all the time, have you got an update on Luke?

And I think people are quite invested in the case.

They're very much, and I just want to say this as well, they're very much invested in Jodie and justice for her.

So I think a lot of people listen to the podcast and most came away saying to me, I think Luke's innocent.

And I will always reply with, don't be so hasty to say that because we don't know that, but to kind of think a retrial or re examination of the case would be good.

The fact is there are no other.

Well, there were other suspects, but none of them have been investigated.

A couple of them have now passed away.

The case, like we say, we've talked about the evidence as well, that's been sort of half destroyed.

So if there was a reexamination of the case, that's going to be really difficult as well.

So for Luke, I think he has had quite an interesting year.

So since his parole was denied, he has stepped away from some of the supporters that are featured in the podcast.

I don't know the ins and outs.

Some of them have put their own videos onto YouTube.

Dr.

Sandra Lean was the criminologist who had basically kind of stood for him since his time, before even he was arrested actually, because she had daughters who were Jody's age in the same area.

And she had kind of become quite obsessed with the case and she wanted to kind of help and she trained as a criminologist and to try and help Luke.

That support has now been sort of withdrawn.

That was sort of enforced by Luke.

He does have a team of supporters and he does have a legal team.

But things have gone a bit quieter now.

Sandra was quite public in her YouTube videos, podcasts.

She was on quite a few big podcasts, like the James English podcast, talking about the case.

And it does seem to have gone a bit quieter.

The Facebook group is still running.

There are still plenty of people who are talking about Luke's innocence.

What's also interesting is that there are some people who were his supporters who are now kind of questioning a lot of what they were told by other supporters.

And it's a funny time because I feel like Luke's support has dwindled from a few people, but more people are still finding the case through my podcast and through James English's podcast and quite a few other people who have covered it.

There was also a documentary on Channel 5 called Murder in a Small Town, which was actually where it was sort of the first bit of major press that was done after the height of the case.

It was put out early 2000 and 20s, maybe 20, 21.

And that was on Channel 5.

It was a two parter and in all honesty, it was more on Luke's side.

It was very much, I wouldn't say it was completely balanced piece of journalism.

I'd say it was quite heavily focused on the fact that this could be a big miscarriage of justice.

And a lot of the support came from watching that documentary.

And that documentary was re aired recently this year.

And because of that I noticed a massive influx because people had obviously watched the documentary and then they've maybe thought, oh, is there a podcast about this case?

They've come across mine.

There's been quite a lot of people that have done one offs, but I think, you know, I had quite a lot of information and I think the fact that I did have Luke directly speaking from prison in a couple of the episodes just offered something a bit different.

And it's really, really hard as humans to hear someone speak so fluently and intelligently.

And like I said to you, I was really shocked at how articulate he was for someone who has been in prison since he was a Child.

So I think they've looked at, listen to the podcast and stuff, but maybe they haven't gone as deep as some others.

So some of his supporters are now saying maybe he did do it or oh, actually I thought this, but now this is happening.

I wish I could sum it up for you because.

But it's like the inches of the web that this takes over is pages and pages.

If you were going to put all the forums, all the social media posts together for this, you know, it would cover a great area because so many people were talking about it.

And like I said to you before, not only are they talking about it once, they're talking about it over and over again.

So it's not like, it's not like this is not in the media because it, it's in social media for sure.

But I don't think that's gonna make any difference to Luke's case.

I think like you said, his future probably is going to be.

If he did admit it, what would that look like?

Would they then let him go?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Because then he could always retract.

I mean, I mean, obviously officially it would be sort of said, but he could say, you know, I've said that to get out of prison and now I'm gonna give you my side of the story.

I have had conversations with big TV networks about this case and I know for a fact that if Luke gets out, they want me to try and get access to him to do a documentary.

My job is to, is to make TV shows for lots of different networks, but they won't touch it whilst he's in prison.

And these are the big ones.

And I'm sure I don't need to say the names of these platforms, but I'm sure you can guess they would be interested in getting his story in a very kind of Amanda Knox sort of way.

I find she did a documentary.

It's bizarre.

I wish this was a case that I could sum up.

And I always come onto if it's a podcast like this or I speak to a listener or something.

And I always feel like I can never really sum up this case coherently because it is so complex and there are so many different strings to this.

You know, you could probably do a, do a 12 part documentary on it even, you know, because there is so much to uncover.

But hopefully the podcast will give your listeners some answers and it will be really interesting to follow this.

I would love to see Luke if and when he comes out and I would Love to see a phone call has been great, but actually to really understand what life has been like for him.

Yeah.

And how, I mean, you'll be great.

Please to answer this with your experience working in TV and media, but how do you think we can discuss people who might be innocent while being respectful to the family?

Because I'm thinking about this case in particular Jodi's family.

Some supporters of Luke have targeted them and they've said it's been soul destroying and I'm trying to put myself in their position.

If somebody I loved was murdered and then the perpetrator was getting a lot of exposure and the case was getting dragged up and 20 years later it's still not put to rest, how do you think we can, can balance both sides of it where being open to the fact that the perpetrator might be innocent while remembering that there is a family whose lives have been destroyed by this.

Yeah.

So I would say that it's all in the presentation, the tone and delivery and the research that you do.

Even if I had felt one way or the other about Luke, which I genuinely don't, I would never say it because it's not my place to say.

That's for the legal, the justice system to sort out.

I think by always remembering the victim and putting them first and foremost, using Jodie's name just as much as you use Luke's name.

Obviously it should be more when I do sort of media for this, people have asked me, oh, have you got any pictures that, you know, you think would be good for cover work?

And I still feel bad actually.

Cause I did.

The podcast was called through the Wal, the case against Luke Mitchell.

And it was about the case against him.

And it wasn't necessarily about.

It was more about the investigation and the supporters.

But now as a human, I will hold my hands up and say, actually I wish I'd done.

I wish I'd put Jodie's name first now.

And I try and write that by, when we talk about this, I try and remember Jodie and who she was and actually that, you know, she has the legacy of her own and don't want that to get lost.

And that is someone was violent to a young child, essentially she was murdered.

We must remember her.

Her family don't do a lot with the media.

They've remained very, very quiet.

If there had been any sort of organization or kind of memorial for Jodie, I would have loved to have got involved in that.

So I think really there was a lot for me to learn as a producer on this, and it definitely didn't go without.

It was not perfect.

But I hope that the empathy that I still have for Jodi and her family comes through.

And I know that with my listeners, actually so many of them, they do mention Jodi's name when they come in.

I feel so sorry for Jodi.

I feel bad for Jodi's family because they've said they've spoken about her.

And this was very similar in the Adnan Said in the Hae Min Lee case, because so many people know Adnan Said's name, but they don't know Hae Min Lee, who was the victim.

And I actually went to a talk recently where Sarah Koenig was talking about making that, and I actually asked her a question, and would you believe it was exactly the question that you just asked?

And I said, you know, did you ever feel bad for giving him a platform?

And she read out about Luke and Jody.

This was at the South Bank Center.

It was really surreal.

And she said no, because I always spoke fondly of Hay.

I always respected her family, and I always respected the fact that she was the victim in this and she needed to be remembered.

I sort of sat back and I thought, okay, actually, I do feel like I did that.

I was always.

You know, Jodie was always at the forefront, and she always will be.

So I hope.

I hope that comes across.

And I just aim to kind of get better all the time, every new case.

You do.

But also, I have nothing but respect for Jodi and her family, and I hope that comes across too.

Yeah, I find it really interesting where people are in prison and they do claim that they're innocent, because it makes me then wonder what the purpose of imprisonment is in their case.

As in, for most people, it's to try and rehabilitate them.

But with somebody who maintains their innocence, I wonder how prison looks for them.

And you might.

I'm not saying you're able to answer this.

I'm just giving you my thoughts that how does 20 years in prison look, apart from maybe trying to help him grow as an individual and prepare him as best they can for life outside, if he ever gets to see outside again?

I just find it very fascinating where people are maintaining innocence.

I wonder how their sentence and the purpose of their sentence looks compared to somebody who has admitted guilt and is really trying to change their life.

I think I do know the answer to this from Luke's perspective, and that is that it's punishment.

So this is straight punishment.

And there have been other things that have been done that he says have been done in prison.

You know, things getting taken off him, phone calls being canceled, that kind of thing as a punishment.

I think he felt like from the very beginning he was being punished by the media, then he was being punished by peers.

And some of the newspaper headlines are pretty dark when you look back at them now and you think, God, that, you know, as a journalist, you know, we have a code of ethics that we have to adhere to and they were completely and utterly just trampled over.

So I think it's all been punishment and potentially him still being in the system and like you say, we have no idea what's been going on.

If he's been talking to a psychologist and has there is really genuine concerns and worries for women on the outside of society.

And then absolutely, you know, we need to keep him inside and rehabilitate and keep everybody else safe.

If that's not the case, and I have no idea, then it's punishment, isn't it?

I guess.

And I think it's a nod to how powerful the media is because as you say, it's a very high profile case.

He's probably a very high profile prisoner, as you say.

There may be some people who want to get revenge on that in some way.

So media are very powerful in justice matters, I think.

Absolutely, Absolutely.

I mean, we like to think we don't believe everything we read, but a lot of the time, if the same publication is saying things time and time again and one newspaper will pick something up and then all of a sudden it's in five, six other papers and there's power in numbers, isn't there?

So if all of those people are saying it, then of course.

But again, just to go back to why I wanted to cover it, it was those powerful numbers, all those people that were saying the same thing.

Justice for Luke and Jody.

I mean, it still kind of blows my mind, really.

It really does.

But it's a very interesting case.

And, you know, I'm sure your listeners, you know, I've listened to your podcast that's really engaging and insightful and intelligent, and I hope that they'll find an interesting perspective into a very unique case from the uk.

Absolutely, Naomi.

I'll pop a link to it in the show notes.

But my last question for you is, from your experience of researching this case and other cases that you've researched, what message do you think cases like this kind of tells the public about our justice system?

That it's not perfect.

It really isn't.

We've had so many cases that I've covered where someone has done something utterly barbaric like bang to rights.

It's them.

You know, we know it's them.

There's very strong evidence or they've confessed or whatever, and they've got what I would consider to be quite a short sentence.

My head doesn't quite correlate the brutality of a crime with the sentence.

And then you get other sentences that are put on people for what seems to be very, very little.

It would be interesting, wouldn't it, if the whole justice system was down to one team of people?

Jury select.

I don't know if you.

If you watch.

There was that Channel 4 show called the Jury, and they had two juries looking at the same case.

They didn't know about each other.

It was a real case, but they were reenacting it with actors and they both fought that they were the only jury and they both.

Spoiler, sorry.

They both had different verdicts.

So it just goes to show that there is a lot wrong with our justice system.

And I wish I was intelligent enough to know how to fix that, and I definitely don't.

But the one thing that I can do is if there is a story that needs to be shared and if there is some good or just a conversation starter or maybe it can get into the ears of someone who does have this intelligence or does have a position of power where they can make some sort of change or they can look into something, then absolutely incredible.

That would be amazing.

Amazing.

Thank you so much, Naomi, for coming on and sharing your wisdom with us.

And like I say, I'll pop a link to your podcast in the show notes because it is brilliant.

So thank you.

Thank you very much.

That is so kind of you.

Thank you.

I hope you found this conversation informative.

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