Murder of Jodi Jones

The murder of Jodi Jones, a 14-year-old girl, took place in Easthouses, Scotland on June 30, 2003. Her 15-year-old boyfriend, Luke Mitchell, came under suspicion, but it was several months before he was arrested. Mitchell was tried for the murder and after Scotland's longest single-accused trial, Mitchell was convicted in January 2005. He was sentenced to detention without limit of time with a minimum of 20 years.

Mitchell's parents separated when he was 11, and he was brought up in relatively comfortable circumstances with hobbies that included riding horses and motorbikes. Mitchell went to St. David's RC High School in Dalkeith. He was in the same year as Jones and supplied her and his circle of friends with cannabis on the school premises. Around March 2003 when both Mitchell and Jones were 14 years old, Mitchell became her first serious boyfriend, and began having sex with her. Unknown to Jones, Mitchell was also intimate with another girl at the time. Mitchell was a good student, but a teacher became concerned about the violence in an essay he had written. In the weeks before she was murdered, Jones's social life, which largely revolved around Mitchell, was curtailed by her mother. At about 5pm on 30 June 2003 Jones went out, saying she was going to see Mitchell. Her body was found several hours later; she had been murdered in a "savage knife attack".

The body was behind a high wall in a wooded area. Mitchell found it at around 10.30pm, while he was with members of Jones's family who were out searching for her. The circumstances in which Mitchell was able to find the body were later alleged by prosecutors to indicate his guilty knowledge. The Jones family made it known that Mitchell was not welcome at the funeral. School authorities cited concern about Mitchell's safety in unsuccessfully attempting to prevent his return to school; two months after the murder he was suspended after objecting to being separated from other pupils.

After his discovery of the body, Mitchell was initially questioned as a witness; he quickly became the main focus of the investigation. There had been media speculation that he was the sole suspect, and 10 months later Mitchell was arrested and charged with the crime.

At his trial at the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh, Mitchell pleaded not guilty and lodged a special defence of alibi: that he was at home cooking dinner at the time of the murder. He did not testify at his trial, which was the longest and most expensive of a single accused in Scottish legal history.

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Wikipedia