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I'm Sreeti. I'm Hannah. And welcome

2:43

to a episode of A Hundred.

2:46

I was trying to think about the phrase that

2:49

it is an anniversary episode. Yes.

2:51

Because this Sunday will mark

2:54

23 years to the day since

2:58

31-year-old Stuart Lubbock was

3:00

found dead in the swimming pool of

3:03

one of the UK's biggest TV

3:05

stars at the time. This

3:07

case became a story that epitomized

3:10

the very definition of tabloid sensationalism

3:12

here in this country. Along

3:15

with the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, this

3:17

case was one of the most widely

3:19

reported news stories of Naughty's Britain. And

3:22

to say that Michael Barrymore, the

3:24

TV star in question, had a

3:26

fall from grace, has to be

3:28

the understatement of the century. So

3:31

how did a meat factory worker from Essex

3:34

end up dead in the pool of British TV

3:36

royalty, having sustained some

3:38

pretty grisly injuries? Well,

3:41

it's still very much up for debate over

3:44

20 years later. But before we

3:46

can even come close to working out what may

3:48

have happened, first, we

3:50

need some context. Lots

3:52

of British. Context. In

3:58

the 90s, Michael Barrymore was... was

4:00

Saturday Night TV. In

4:02

fact, he was actually known as Mr. Saturday

4:04

Night. He was on

4:06

everything. Barrymore

4:09

hosted the biggest game shows, talk shows and

4:11

talent shows on TV from the early 80s

4:14

until the night of Stuart Lubbock's death in

4:16

2001. And

4:19

Barrymore was easily one of the

4:21

UK's highest paid stars. His

4:24

forte was crowd work. Audiences loved

4:26

Michael Barrymore and he loved them back. He

4:29

described the watching British public as his kind

4:31

of people. And he wasn't wrong. Barrymore

4:34

was brash, charming and charismatic. He

4:37

was born Michael Parker in 1952 in

4:39

Burmansey, South East London. His

4:41

father left and never came back when Michael Barrymore

4:44

was just 11. So that meant

4:46

that Michael Barrymore and his siblings were left

4:48

in the care of his devoutly Catholic mother.

4:51

What remained of the Parker family, which

4:53

is Barrymore's real second name, remember, lived

4:55

on a council estate for the first 18 years of

4:57

his life. Like

5:00

many British entertainers, Barrymore got

5:02

his start as a redcoat

5:04

at the British Holiday Park in Butlins. Now,

5:07

if you're not from the UK, then you

5:10

may not be familiar with the

5:12

British institution. That is Butlins. Have

5:15

you ever been to a Butlins, Anna? I have never been

5:17

to a Butlins. Nor have I, actually. I think

5:19

the first time I saw a Butlins advertised was

5:22

on some seaside holiday and it was like the

5:24

Butlins and Bogner Regis. And I just thought that

5:26

was very funny. That was the most famous one.

5:30

Yes, that was very funny. Butlins, Bogner Regis. It's

5:33

just dinner. The jokes are too easy.

5:36

But yeah, what you need to know is that it

5:38

is the UK's largest chain of holiday

5:40

parks. And the redcoats are

5:43

entertainment. Yeah. So Butlins was

5:45

founded in 1936 and up until the

5:47

rise of cheap flights to Benidorm

5:49

in the 70s, it was the

5:51

go-to destination for any working class

5:54

holidaymakers. And a big part

5:56

of the Butlins experience and

5:58

what made it so special was

6:00

the iconic Redcoats. Equal

6:03

parts park staff and entertainers.

6:06

It was a Redcoats job to make sure

6:08

the park ran smoothly and they

6:10

would perform every night as part

6:12

of Butland's iconic evening entertainment.

6:16

This is where Barrymore got his taste for the

6:18

stage and from there it

6:20

was up and up. By

6:23

1974, age 22, Barrymore was

6:26

appearing in supporting roles across the West

6:28

End and it was there

6:30

that he met his soon to be wife and manager with the

6:33

most fake sounding name I've ever heard. Cheryl

6:36

Sinclair. It sounds like a stage name. I

6:38

don't know if it is her real name or not

6:40

but Cheryl Sinclair. And

6:43

Cheryl Sinclair soon became the driving force

6:45

behind Barrymore's career and landed

6:48

him a gig on the TV talent show

6:50

New Faces. Did you ever watch

6:52

that? Was that your era? No. Pre?

6:54

Pre? Yeah. The only thing I remember from late

6:56

90s, early 2000s Saturday Night is Blind Date. Yes.

6:59

Yes. I think Blind

7:01

Date was probably our earliest entry.

7:04

Still doesn't arise, Blind Date. Yeah. Speaking of

7:06

a fall from grace. Oh

7:08

and Noel Evans' house party, again fall from

7:11

grace. Yeah. I also enjoyed Family Fortune. That

7:13

was great. Yeah. Les Dennis is

7:15

fine isn't it? Isn't he? Who? Les

7:17

Dennis is fine isn't he? Yeah.

7:22

I met him at the podcast show a few years ago. Do you remember? Oh

7:24

yeah. I think he's fine. Everyone's

7:26

just like, ugh, Amanda Holden. Is he married to

7:28

Amanda Holden? He's to be married to Amanda Holden, yeah. Too

7:31

much. That's the reason she's famous.

7:33

This is too much information. And

7:36

anyway, moving on before we lose all of our

7:38

non-UK listeners. So

7:41

the premise of New Faces was to find

7:43

Britain's next TV personality. And

7:46

for Michael Barrymore it was the perfect opportunity.

7:49

His strong South London accent and working class background made Barrymore

7:51

an approachable face for the public. And we love those in

7:53

this country. Look

7:55

at Jimmy Savile. And Michael

7:57

Barrymore's act was as if everyone's favourite charismatic...

8:00

Joker from the local pub had somehow found

8:02

his way onto prime-time TV. The

8:04

charming, quick-quitted and likeable Barrymore won the show and in

8:06

1975 was booked as the new

8:09

regular panellist on Blankety Blank, one

8:11

of Britain's most popular game shows, Blankety Blank I did

8:13

watch. So

8:16

from here, Michael Barrymore got booked

8:18

as the warm-up act on the

8:20

Generation game. And audiences

8:22

fell in love with his impressions of

8:24

John Cleese and Norman Wisdom. I

8:27

mean, does it get any more British light entertainment

8:29

than that? No. Still

8:31

a black only exceeds that, I think. Exactly.

8:34

So over the next few years,

8:36

Barrymore slowly became a household name

8:38

across Britain. Until

8:40

eventually in 1983 he was

8:42

offered the Michael Barrymore show on

8:44

ITV. And just in

8:46

case again, you are not a UK listener, ITV

8:49

is channel three in this country, whatever

8:51

sort of home set-up TV you've

8:53

got, everybody gets one, two, three and

8:55

four. So he's hit the big hit

8:57

in here. Now you

9:00

might think getting your own show would have been

9:02

a dream gig for Barrymore, but he actually

9:04

left the show after just one season to

9:06

take a much higher paid gig on a

9:08

new game show for the BBC no less.

9:11

Of course the BBC. The BBC were like, he looks like

9:13

he's going to end up doing something terrible in the future,

9:15

that's hiring. At

9:19

first it did seem like this was set

9:21

to backfire when Get Set Go, the show

9:23

that Barrymore had jumped ship for,

9:25

was cancelled after just one season.

9:28

However, in a move that

9:30

would be the story of his early career and

9:32

the opposite of what came after, Barrymore

9:35

landed on his feet. In

9:37

1986 Michael Barrymore was offered his big

9:39

break as the host of Strike It Lucky, ITV's

9:42

hit new game show. I

9:44

don't think you see the station hopping that you

9:46

used to get in the 80s and 90s. Oh,

9:48

like everyone's a lawyer list these days.

9:52

By contract obviously. across

10:00

the UK. The population of

10:02

the UK during that time was about 57 million

10:05

so that means almost one in three

10:07

people in the UK had nothing better

10:09

to do on a Saturday night than

10:11

watch Strike It Lucky. Yeah,

10:14

I think it would be hard to be

10:17

as hugely successful and have

10:19

that level of celebrity now just being

10:21

a game show host. I agree. Like

10:23

Barrymore was because at the time the reason one in

10:26

three people in Britain were watching it is because there

10:28

was fuck all else to watch. It's not like you

10:30

had endless streaming services like you do now which completely

10:32

splinters the audience and therefore for

10:34

one person to capture that level

10:36

of viewership would be next to impossible.

10:39

Barrymore is very much a product of

10:41

his time in that regard as an

10:43

entertainer. So

10:45

Barrymore also became a mainstay of the

10:48

Royal Variety Show, another British institution. I

10:50

feel like that's what I remember him for

10:52

the most. I feel like

10:54

this all predates me a

10:56

little bit. I feel

10:58

like I know Barrymore from… I don't

11:01

know, maybe Strike It Lucky? I don't know.

11:03

I don't know. I can't confirm. So

11:07

yeah, he is absolutely integral to

11:10

the Royal Variety Show and in

11:12

case you don't know what that is, the show has a

11:14

very simple business. It's a variety

11:16

show performed for the Royal Family and

11:18

it's been running since 1912 with

11:21

performances from the likes of The

11:23

Beatles, Cher and Cliff Richard. In

11:26

1993 it was headlined for the third

11:28

time by none other than Michael Barrymore.

11:30

So this tells you the

11:32

sort of levels that he's playing

11:34

in already by the 90s. And

11:38

it was here that Michael Barrymore stole the show with

11:40

his rendition of Will You Still Love

11:42

Me Tomorrow? accompanied by serving

11:44

members of the King's Regiment performing

11:46

a choreographed drill routine. Not

11:49

exactly Cher but it was the jewel

11:52

in Barrymore's King of TV crown.

12:00

top five most hated songs of all time. I

12:02

was going to say handing over to our cultural

12:05

correspondent on all things British in the 80s. I

12:10

just find it such an insipid fucking... Well,

12:16

the royals loved it and the

12:18

performance was considered a masterpiece of

12:21

emotion, humour and British pride. And

12:24

this cemented Michael Barrymore as the

12:26

pinnacle of British entertainment. And

12:29

it was at this time, the

12:31

peak of Barrymore's career, that things started

12:33

to look a little bit shaky. In

12:36

1994, like many a star before and

12:38

since, Michael Barrymore checked himself

12:41

into rehab. His time at the top

12:43

had taken his toll and Barrymore had developed

12:45

a pretty serious dependency on

12:47

alcohol and cocaine. Again

12:50

though, Barrymore came out on top. In

12:53

the eyes of the British public, this made

12:55

him more relatable and more likeable. Barrymore

12:57

had always been one of them. He wasn't squeaky

13:00

clean, he was brash and inappropriate, whilst

13:02

also being charming and talented. He

13:04

was flawed, but also brilliant. In

13:08

other words, Michael Barrymore, temporarily,

13:10

joined the ranks of Britain's most

13:12

loveable rogues. People looked at

13:14

him like they now look at Paul Gascoigne or perhaps

13:16

Amy Winehouse or I would argue Anne

13:19

MacParlane. Who? Anne

13:21

Dech. Oh right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

13:23

Is he lovable though? I don't know. He

13:26

got away with fucking drink driving, no one

13:28

cared. That's true. They were right back on

13:30

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Michael Barrymore. Although he

16:09

had fallen slightly from grace and

16:11

had admitted to having addiction and

16:13

substance abuse issues, he

16:15

still remained a British national treasure. So

16:19

off the back of his stint in rehab, Barrymore

16:21

published a book and launched a stage show,

16:24

both called Fucking Business. They

16:27

landed well with the public and his book actually

16:29

became a national bestseller. All

16:31

the while Barrymore's TV schedule continued. He

16:34

was still the face of Striket Licky, which

16:36

actually rebranded to Michael Barrymore's

16:38

Striket Rich. So

16:41

yeah, it like, he becomes that integral to

16:43

the show that they actually give it

16:45

to him as his own show. Like

16:47

he is now irreplaceable. He

16:49

even got his own show, Barrymore and

16:51

various other gigs, like Kids Say the

16:53

Funniest Things. However,

16:56

while his stint in rehab hadn't damaged his TV

16:59

ratings, it had put him

17:01

on the radar of our final

17:03

British institution for this episode. Like

17:06

Blood in the Water, rehab

17:08

had given the British tabloids a

17:10

taste of Michael Barrymore. Whether

17:12

it was cocaine benders or questions about

17:15

his sexuality, Barrymore sold stories and

17:17

the press couldn't get enough. And

17:20

in 1995, the tabloids got the scoop that

17:22

they had been dreaming of. When

17:25

I drunk Michael Barrymore jumped on

17:27

a stage at a well-known London gay

17:29

club, threw his wedding ring from

17:31

Cheryl St. Clair on the floor and announced

17:33

that he was in fact gay.

17:37

The story was headline news and cameras

17:39

followed Barrymore day and night. A year

17:41

later, Barrymore and Cheryl St. Clair, his

17:43

manager and wife of 20 years, officially

17:46

separated, although they remained very close.

17:49

Again, Michael Barrymore managed to ride the

17:51

media frenzy. His ratings stayed

17:53

high and the British public seemed to

17:55

love him even more. He won Britain's

17:58

most popular presenter at the national television. awards

18:00

five out of six years in a row.

18:03

And then in 1997 he got the biggest honour

18:07

of them all, appearing as Mr.

18:09

Stepp in the iconic Spice

18:11

Girls feature film Snowy's World,

18:14

which I saw in the cinema in Watford. By

18:19

the year 2000 Michael Barrymore

18:21

was truly British TV royalty.

18:24

Not a day went by that he wasn't

18:26

either on the nation's screens or on the

18:28

front pages of our newspapers. His

18:31

now openly gay lifestyle was the gift that

18:33

kept on giving for the tabloids, who

18:35

loved nothing more than to follow him around

18:37

the London gay scene, snapping pictures of him

18:39

falling out of clubs at 3 a.m. with

18:41

his latest boyfriend. A

18:44

butter then, on the 31st of March

18:46

2001, Michael Barrymore's life went

18:48

from this... It won't be

18:50

a second, what's that? Her

18:52

tissues lost. Down here, sir. What?

18:58

A rabbit down

19:00

there as well.

19:07

I don't know, I don't know. There

19:10

it is. Yeah. What did you

19:12

put it down there for? I can't put it anywhere

19:15

I want to. To this.

19:19

What, yeah? A friend in the fold. A

19:22

friend in the fold. Are they

19:24

still in the ward, yeah? We've got

19:27

them out. There's a party going

19:29

on, and so much is going on.

19:32

I'll tell you what, mate, the first time I've been

19:34

out here for f***ing years, I have been here every

19:36

weekend. And...what? That

19:40

Sunday morning Britain woke to the news

19:42

that a 31-year-old man called Stuart Lubbock

19:44

had been found dead in Michael Barrymore's

19:47

swimming pool. Immediately the

19:49

press swarmed the small village of Royden

19:51

and Essex and began running

19:53

headlines like, Gay Orgy, Gay

19:56

Comics Lover Has HIV, and

19:58

even one suggesting that Barrymore might have been a victim of this. star

20:00

in a reboot of the classic

20:02

British comedy Only Fools and Horses

20:04

instead titled Only Pools and

20:06

Corpses. Somebody

20:11

in a newsroom was like I don't

20:13

care how we work it in. I

20:17

need to write this down

20:19

somewhere. Only Pools

20:21

and Corpses. I

20:24

mean it was

20:26

there. I mean it works as a

20:29

joke. It does. It does work as a joke. You are

20:31

right. It does work as a joke. The

20:34

case of Stuart Lubbock's death was enormous

20:36

news here in the United Kingdom and

20:39

when the shocking details of Stuart's post-mortem

20:41

were revealed the situation went from

20:43

bad to worse. But

20:46

we're gonna blue ball you with that and

20:48

deal with it later on. Yeah because I

20:50

think this is a story that I

20:52

am definitely guilty of this. As I think we are

20:54

often when there are like really big cases that involve

20:56

celebrities everyone's kind of like I kind of know that.

20:58

I kind of know that story and then

21:00

you dig into it and you're like I did

21:03

not know this story and that is very much

21:05

the case here.

21:07

It is initially despite all of the sensationalism.

21:10

It seemed as though Stuart Lubbock's strange death

21:12

would be a scandal that Michael Barrymore, King

21:14

of TV, can't just slip away

21:16

from him. The British public

21:18

wanted to believe that the lovable Barrymore was

21:20

just an innocent bystander to a tragic accident.

21:23

There's been more and at first

21:26

everything about the incident seemed to

21:28

fit this narrative. But

21:30

before we get into that let's

21:32

talk about Stuart Lubbock. Stuart

21:35

was a 31 year old manager at a meat

21:37

factory in Harlow in Essex but

21:39

we have to admit he does

21:41

look a lot younger than that. So much younger.

21:43

When I read that he was 31 I was

21:46

like what? That does not compute

21:48

with the image that I have in my

21:50

head of Stuart Lubbock. Now I would ID him.

21:53

Yeah. Oh yeah. Because he

21:55

could pass for 18 or perhaps

21:57

even a bit younger and Stuart Lubbock wasn't. very

22:00

handsome. Stuart had an

22:02

ex-wife and two children aged four and

22:04

one and the night he

22:06

died which is Saturday the 30th of

22:08

March 2001. Stuart had been out with his brother

22:10

Kevin. Stuart had recently

22:13

broken up with his long-term partner and the

22:15

brothers were out for a good time and

22:17

that same night Michael Barrymore and his

22:19

boyfriend Jonathan Kenny were also out in

22:21

Harlow. The couple started

22:23

off their night at a local Indian restaurant where

22:25

they ate, shared a few glasses of wine and

22:28

in classic Saturday night curry house behavior,

22:30

three books and shots of Sambukkah. I

22:33

mean I think that when we said that

22:35

the press were going to be the last

22:37

British institution to be discussed

22:39

in this episode we have grossly

22:41

told a lie because I think the

22:44

Saturday night curry plus the

22:46

shots of Sambukkah is in fact the

22:49

final British institution in this episode.

22:52

Yes, my Sambukkah

22:54

haunt was called the newer cash in

22:57

birth and birth. Lovely, lovely, lovely. It's

22:59

changed over the years in Lecheris. I think

23:01

one we used to go to was Dine

23:04

Bangla so there you go.

23:06

Lovely. Well not

23:08

as lovely as the Chinese takeaway called Lots of Rice

23:10

which was shut down for being a brothel. Oh

23:12

well there was an aroma in Stevenage that got shut

23:14

down when they found dog meat. I win.

23:22

Anyway from the restaurant

23:24

the brothers headed into town and ended

23:26

up at the Millennium, one

23:29

of the few late-night venues in Harlow and I think

23:31

that is the only time I have ever said that

23:33

word correctly. And it was

23:35

at the Millennium that the pair

23:37

bumped into brothers Kevin and Stuart Lecher.

23:40

Kevin says that his brother Stuart came out of

23:42

the lures of the club saying oh my god

23:44

Michael Barrymore is here and at the time

23:46

Michael Barrymore absolutely had the level of fame that if you

23:48

had seen him in a club you would be like oh

23:50

my god Michael Barrymore is here. And

23:53

when Michael Barrymore did indeed come out of the lures

23:55

the men hung out with him. They

23:57

chatted to him for a bit. Throwing around the

23:59

TV stars catch. and joking about.

24:02

Kevin now looks back at their run-in with Barrymore in

24:05

that club, with disdain. From

24:08

Kevin's description, Barrymore didn't seem that interested

24:10

in their jokes, and couldn't

24:12

really be bothered with Kevin whatsoever, giving him

24:14

the cold shoulder. He

24:17

did, however, take more of a liking to

24:19

Stewart, and eventually Barrymore invited

24:21

Stewart downstairs to the VIP area,

24:24

which 31-year-old Stewart, who

24:26

was out for a good time, of course eagerly

24:28

accepted. Kevin says he joked

24:30

with his brother, saying, Oh, so you're going down

24:32

there then, are you? And then

24:35

watched as his brother followed the UK's

24:37

biggest TV st- Downstairs.

24:40

Kevin would never see his brother, Stewart, alive

24:42

again. I do have

24:45

to say that a downstairs VIP area

24:47

in Harlow Essex in 2001 probably is

24:49

equivalent to the

24:52

mouth of hell. Like, I can't think of

24:54

much worse things. I just

24:56

think the VIP area of any

24:58

club- Yeah, I agree. Any club full

25:01

stop is just the most

25:03

sinister place you could end up.

25:06

There's one thing you're going to tell your kids, if anyone

25:08

invites you to VIP, just say no thank you. I'll

25:10

be. Roughly

25:12

an hour later, around 2.15am,

25:14

Stewart and a few others stumbled out of

25:17

the club with Barrymore, and got a

25:19

taxi back to his house in Royden to carry on

25:21

the party. According

25:23

to the taxi driver who was

25:25

later interviewed, Barrymore was absolutely hammered,

25:28

and he leaned into the front of the car whilst he

25:30

was driving to announce that

25:32

he could do with a good f**k. At

25:35

around 2.30, the group arrived at Barrymore's

25:37

house, and then three hours

25:39

later, roughly, someone would make that

25:41

999 call that we heard earlier.

25:44

What happened within those three hours is

25:47

where things get complicated, as

25:49

various other people continue to turn up at

25:51

Barrymore's home. Yeah, so we

25:53

like don't even know exactly who the

25:56

cost is of this weird

25:58

evening. By the time

26:00

that call was made, there were nine people at

26:03

the house, including Stuart Lubbock and Michael Barrymore. The

26:06

others were Barrymore's boyfriend Jonathan Kenny, a

26:08

local bin man called Justin Merritt, his sister

26:11

Kylie Merritt, and her two young friends Claire

26:13

Jones and Kavi Campbell, as

26:15

well as two men who knew Barrymore

26:17

locally, called James Footers and Salomon Shaw.

26:21

According to Barrymore, when he and his guests first

26:23

arrived at the house, he showed them all the

26:25

kitchen where they could pour themselves a drink. He

26:28

then began to give various guests tours

26:30

of his large house and garden, before

26:33

he and some of the guests smoked to join.

26:36

Again, according to Barrymore, he then went back

26:38

to his room to get some

26:40

swimming shorts, before turning on his outside

26:42

lights and heading towards the jacuzzi. It

26:45

was then that he walked outside

26:47

with James Footers and Simon Shaw

26:49

to see 31-year-old Stuart Lubbock laying

26:52

dead in his boxer shorts in

26:54

the pool. And it was at

26:56

this point that someone called 999. There

26:59

is some debate about who exactly made

27:02

this call, as the caller has never

27:04

actually been officially identified by the police, but

27:06

it is widely reported to have been Justin

27:09

Merritt. Stuart Lubbock was

27:11

rushed to Princess Alexandra Hospital, where

27:13

he was pronounced dead at 8.23am

27:15

that morning, and at

27:17

first it looked like it had just been

27:19

a tragic accident. The

27:22

police on the scene hadn't felt that there was

27:24

any reason to suggest foul play, which

27:26

we most certainly will come back to later. And

27:29

even the press seemed more focused on

27:31

using Stuart's death as just an excuse

27:33

to delve into Michael Barrymore's private life,

27:36

rather than expose this as

27:38

having been some sort of murder. However,

27:41

over the next few weeks, information slowly

27:43

came to light that cast doubt on

27:45

the entire situation. First

27:47

and foremost, people began to question why Michael

27:49

Barrymore hadn't been at the scene when the

27:52

police arrived. He

27:54

was there when Stuart's body was found, and

27:56

it was found at his house, so what happened? According

28:01

to Barrymore, he phoned his PA David Brown who

28:03

told him that if an ambulance was on its

28:05

way, then he had done all he could and

28:07

that he should get out of the house before the

28:09

media arrived. And then

28:12

people started to ask the question why

28:14

Barrymore hadn't jumped into the swimming pool

28:16

to help Stuart Lubbock. He'd

28:18

left that to futures and shore. Barrymore

28:21

claimed that he couldn't swim and

28:23

he knew that his partner Jonathan Kenny had

28:25

first aid training so he'd rushed inside to

28:27

get him instead. Maybe I am

28:29

being stupid. If you can't

28:32

swim, why do you have a

28:34

swimming pool at your house? That's not what I

28:36

thought you were going to say but that's a good question.

28:39

Flex. Flex, flex, flex, flex, flex.

28:44

Look at me just stand in my swimming pool. In

28:47

the shallow end. Crouching. But

28:50

no, I thought you were going to say like, of all

28:52

of the things that are sort of thrown at Michael

28:54

Barrymore in this case, the

28:57

why didn't he jump in the pool is the

28:59

weakest attack on him. Everyone

29:03

jumping in the pool is not

29:05

the solution to someone who was in there. No,

29:07

that's true. And why did it need to be Michael Barrymore,

29:09

as long as someone jumped in the pool. But

29:12

that is pretty much

29:14

the most like benefit

29:16

of the doubt I'm going to give him on this. Well,

29:18

and you're quite right too because

29:20

this explanation seemed reasonable

29:22

to some people, not me, but some people did think

29:25

it was reasonable. But then various people came

29:27

out in the press, including Barrymore's ex-wife

29:29

of 20 years, saying that Michael Barrymore

29:31

absolutely, definitely 100% could swim. There

29:35

was also some debate about how long it

29:38

took to call 999. This

29:40

is the big issue. According

29:43

to the guests at the house that night, Stuart's body was

29:45

found between 4.15 and 4.45am. However,

29:48

the call wasn't made until an hour

29:51

later at 5.46am. Was

29:54

this discrepancy just down to the guests losing track

29:56

of time in the chaos of finding a dead

29:58

body? Or was there

30:00

an hour-long window in which they

30:03

knew Stuart had died but they did

30:05

not call for help? These

30:07

questions were picking up speed, but

30:10

the real stinger came with the

30:12

post-mortem. Or post-mortems,

30:14

plural, to be precise. The

30:17

first post-mortem of Stuart Loebich was

30:19

conducted by pathologist Dr. Michael Heath.

30:22

Heath found no signs of any kind of struggle,

30:25

other than a few injuries which he attributed to Stuart

30:27

having been pulled out of the pole. Dr.

30:30

Heath also found fluid in Stuart's air

30:32

passages and lungs, all of

30:34

which brought him to the same conclusion as the police.

30:37

Stuart had drank. But,

30:40

it bothers more. Because while

30:42

Dr. Michael Heath couldn't find any

30:44

injuries that directly contributed to Stuart's death,

30:47

he did find something deeply below. As

30:50

Heath examined Stuart, he noticed a

30:52

large amount of blood which

30:54

had stained the cloth the young man had been

30:56

wrapped in. And this

30:58

blood seemed to be focused around

31:01

Stuart's groin. Upon

31:03

closer inspection, it was found that

31:05

Stuart had serious injuries to his

31:07

anus, which had

31:09

caused extreme dilation, as

31:13

well as tearing and lacerations to the

31:15

inner wall. But despite these three

31:17

things, Michael Heath still advised

31:19

Essex police that Stuart had

31:22

likely died as a result of drowning,

31:24

believing that while his injuries were serious,

31:27

they hadn't caused his death. But

31:29

to just ignore that those

31:32

injuries were there, is

31:34

the problem. And when

31:37

this information found its way to the

31:39

press, as information usually does, it

31:41

understandably caused uproar. The

31:44

tabloids had, by this point, started pushing

31:46

the narrative of a secret out-of-control gay

31:48

orgy. And now a dead

31:50

man with injuries to his anus only

31:53

found the flames. And

31:55

the situation turned into a rampant

31:57

circus of speculation, as Stuart

31:59

Lubbock's sex... sexuality became the key

32:01

focus. In the Channel 4

32:03

documentary on this case called The Body in the Pool, stereotypically

32:06

sleazy journalist Paul McMullen happily admits on

32:09

camera that he approached Stuart Lubbock's mother

32:11

at her home just days after Stuart's

32:13

death, claiming to be an

32:15

investigator and probed her on her son's

32:17

sexuality. During their brief

32:19

conversation, Stuart's mum told him that

32:22

her son was absolutely not gay and that

32:24

she couldn't understand why the papers

32:26

were saying otherwise. McMullen told her that

32:29

he couldn't understand either before

32:31

running several headlines, all of which stated

32:33

that Stuart was gay. And

32:35

we have no way to know if Stuart

32:37

was gay or by or not. I would

32:39

say though, asking someone's mum is probably

32:42

the least likely person to

32:44

know arguably. But

32:46

having said that, Stuart's family still deny

32:48

it to this day. His ex-wife also

32:50

and his brother are still adamant that

32:52

Stuart was a ladies man. Some

32:55

people imply that Stuart must have been gay or why else

32:57

would he have gone back to Barrymore's house? That's

33:00

an extremely weak argument because you know what

33:02

else was there? Loads of fucking drugs. And

33:05

also, women were there too. So it doesn't

33:07

really prove anything. Yeah, like there are so

33:09

many reasons. Michael Barrymore is a celebrity. When

33:11

else are you going to get a chance

33:13

to go back to a celebrity's house for

33:16

a VIP party? And

33:18

yes, he was there after a break up

33:20

for a good time. I'm sure

33:22

Michael Barrymore was bankrolling that entire night.

33:25

And again, as Hannah said, there were lots of young

33:27

women. It is an important part

33:29

of this story. I think you can't

33:31

just dismiss Stuart Lubbock's sexuality as

33:33

part of this because I think it's

33:35

a crucial part of like what happens, but it's something we're

33:37

going to have to come back to. I just think the

33:40

argument that he must have been gay to go there is

33:43

not accurate. And

33:46

as for those injuries, tough luck. We've got other

33:48

stuff to get through first. So

33:50

with the tabloids now firmly stuck into

33:52

this case, various outlets paid

33:54

huge sums of money to

33:57

those party guests to get their side

33:59

of war. Janis

34:02

Paul McMullen admits that none of

34:04

the people who were there. Their

34:07

stories didn't really add up and

34:09

they'd all just kind of painted themselves as the hero.

34:12

McMullen also admits that he didn't really care

34:14

though, he didn't really care who was telling the truth because

34:16

whatever they printed about Michael Barrymore's party

34:18

and Stuart Lubbock's death, they sold

34:21

a shit ton of papers. Publicly

34:24

Barrymore maintained that he was as concerned

34:26

as anybody with what had happened to

34:29

Stuart Lubbock and the public

34:31

was still mostly on his side. Believing

34:34

that Barrymore had simply been dragged into

34:36

a horrible chain of events which

34:38

he'd had nothing to do with. And

34:41

you can see how that narrative

34:43

could work right? There's a lot

34:45

of people there drinking, doing all sorts of

34:47

things, somebody drowns, that's

34:50

what they're told. So is

34:53

it enough to bring Michael Barrymore down? People don't really

34:55

think so at the time. But

34:58

Barrymore was far from out of the woods. On

35:01

September the 9th 2001,

35:04

Essex Police launched an inquest

35:06

into Stuart's death. Although it would

35:09

somewhat be overshadowed by a

35:11

much larger story that would come just two days

35:13

later. Despite

35:15

a world-stoppingly large terror

35:18

attack that dominated the headlines, the

35:20

inquest did push on and a

35:22

second post-mortem was carried out. And

35:25

this time the injuries to Stuart's anus

35:27

were examined more closely and it

35:30

was found that a large object had

35:32

been forcefully inserted into Stuart's body. It

35:36

was also decided that because the injuries

35:38

were so severe, there's absolutely no way

35:40

that this was a consensual sex act.

35:43

A forensic pathologist who specialised in cases

35:45

of drowning was also brought in and

35:47

suspicions were raised further. Dr

35:50

Ian Calder, who had examined countless victims of

35:52

drowning in his decades-long career,

35:54

did not come to the same conclusions as

35:57

Dr Michael Heath and the Essex Police. And

36:00

look, before we go into what

36:02

Calder finds in the second post-mortem,

36:05

of course, if you get multiple people to look at

36:07

the same thing, they might come to different conclusions, being

36:10

pathologists. But I do want to point out that

36:12

Dr Michael Heath has not covered himself

36:14

in glory since this

36:16

case happened. There

36:18

are multiple cases against

36:21

him of families of people that

36:23

he has carried out post-mortems on, basically

36:25

saying how incredibly botched a job

36:27

he did. So I

36:30

can't go into all of them because there are many, but

36:32

there is one in particular, one

36:34

set of cases in particular that

36:36

came out in 2021 where basically

36:39

it looks like people cremated

36:41

the wrong bodies and

36:43

were given the ashes of

36:45

the incorrect people. I remember that.

36:48

Based on Dr Michael Heath's post-mortems.

36:51

And it sort of came to light

36:53

when there was one case in particular

36:55

of a woman named Anne House whose

36:58

post-mortem examination mentioned a gallbladder, a post-mortem

37:00

examination carried out by Dr Michael Heath.

37:03

And it had her gallbladder taken out five years before

37:05

that. So this obviously started to

37:07

raise a lot of questions from family members about

37:09

who exactly they had

37:11

received. So yes, Michael

37:14

Heath, maybe not the best

37:16

post-mortem carrier router in the world. But

37:20

anyway, let's get into what

37:22

Calder found. Calder said

37:24

the shoe's body did not show any

37:26

of the classic signs of drowning. His

37:28

lungs were far too heavy and they

37:31

were not overlapping. And they

37:33

also did not contain any

37:35

stomach contents. To add

37:37

to this, the second post-mortem also found

37:39

particular hemorrhaging in Stewart's face

37:42

and eyes. Particular hemorrhaging or

37:44

pinpoint hemorrhaging, as the name

37:46

suggests, shows its teeth as

37:48

tiny red pinpoint marks. And

37:51

this is due to blood leaking from the tiny

37:53

capillaries in the eyes which

37:55

can rupture due to increased pressure

37:57

on the veins in the head when the airways are

37:59

obstructed. And so it's

38:01

an important sign of asphyxia caused by

38:04

some external means of obstructing airways. So

38:07

particular hemorrhaging is a strong indication of

38:09

a death caused by manual strangulation, hanging

38:12

or smothering. It's apparently

38:14

incredibly rarely seen in drowning. And

38:18

most stamingly, Calder also examined

38:20

the photographs taken at the scene of

38:22

Stuart's death. And notice

38:24

there were two objects present at that scene which

38:26

had not been taken in as evidence. A

38:29

large pool thermometer that looks a bit like

38:31

a plunger with a square handle, and

38:34

the handle from a cupboard door that had

38:36

been broken off. Calder

38:38

believes that both of these objects could

38:40

have inflicted the damage to Stuart Lubbock,

38:43

and neither one of them have ever been found.

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Your journey begins at the

40:51

University of Florida. With

40:56

the news dominated by the attack on the World Trade

40:58

Center and the following war in the Middle East, you

41:01

might think that these findings would be small fry in

41:03

the papers. However, it

41:06

is a testament to quite how famous Michael Barrymore

41:08

was at the time, that despite all

41:10

of this, the inquest into Stuart Lubbock's

41:12

death was still making headlines. In

41:16

an effort to get some control back over

41:18

the situation, on the 30th of October 2001,

41:20

Michael Barrymore sat down for an interview with

41:23

now disgraced BBC journalist Martin

41:26

Bashir. Boo! Yeah, sorry.

41:28

Prison. Yeah, actually, no, I'm

41:30

not sorry. I hate you, Martin Bashir. Ugh. Did

41:33

you offer cocaine to

41:36

anybody? No. You

41:39

didn't? No, not at all. You,

41:43

I'm sure you'll be aware that there

41:46

are now effectively two

41:49

descriptions of what happened on that night,

41:52

and both of them appear to tally. Well,

41:55

what descriptions of that? Well, Justin

41:58

Merritt, for example, has said that... that

42:02

you offered cocaine to all of the

42:04

people in the kitchen. Yeah. And

42:07

he says that you dabbed your

42:09

finger in cocaine and

42:11

forcibly rubbed it on Stuart

42:14

Lubbock's gum. That

42:17

never took place. The

42:20

only time I had anything was with a couple of

42:22

guys down the other end of the house. And

42:25

at that time, they all went out to the pool. So

42:28

is Justin Merritt lying when he says

42:30

that that was what you did and he saw you

42:32

do it? Is he lying? Yes.

42:34

Yes, he is. He's lying. Yes. Is

42:37

it not possible that you had cocaine in the

42:40

house that evening? It's

42:43

possible that cocaine, I mean, a trace of cocaine was

42:45

found in the house. Is

42:48

it not possible that you gave cocaine the guest?

42:51

No, it is impossible. Why

42:53

are you so categoric on that? Because

42:56

actually, for that evening, I know the sequence

42:58

of events. I wasn't so off it that

43:00

I didn't know what was going on. Came

43:03

into the house, showed them

43:05

where everything was, went down the other end,

43:07

had a smoke with the lads, came back, went

43:09

to go out to the kuzia, and that's

43:12

when I discovered Stuart. What

43:14

did you do? I just

43:16

freaked out. I ran back in and

43:18

got Jonathan. I was

43:21

a lifesaver. And

43:25

Simon and James jumped in and pulled his body out. Did

43:32

you call the police? No.

43:36

Why not? Somebody was

43:38

doing it. Justin Merritt says he called

43:40

999. Yeah,

43:43

I called, well, Justin

43:47

and Jonathan came out to the body. What did you

43:50

do next? I was standing on

43:52

the other side and I just lost

43:54

it. I panicked.

43:57

I didn't know what to do. I couldn't believe what was

43:59

going on. So what did you think

44:01

as you looked at him? That he'd been under the

44:03

water a while, than

44:06

the way he was. But

44:08

that made you panic? No,

44:10

panic. When I said panic I just like, I was freaking out,

44:14

seeing him under there and it just

44:16

seemed that their efforts to do anything, it

44:18

wasn't coming round. So

44:20

what did you do? I didn't

44:23

do anything at that point. Simon and James

44:25

had come down to work, and I was

44:27

like, well there's nothing you can do, and

44:30

leave the place, because it's going

44:32

to be swarming with police and

44:34

press. And I just went along with that. So

44:37

you're saying that it was suggested to you

44:39

that you should get out of the house?

44:42

Yes. Do you think that was the most

44:44

responsible behaviour? No. I

44:46

mean he is a total stranger who's

44:49

clearly injured in some way, in

44:51

the pool, and you leave

44:53

the house. Yeah. It's

44:56

almost tantamount to a criminal offence, isn't it? He looked like

44:58

leaving the scene of an accident. Can you see? It's

45:02

only tantamount to that if you're leaving the scene of the

45:04

accident, if you caused it. Now

45:06

as you just heard in those clips, Barrymore's

45:08

aim with this interview was clear.

45:11

He wanted to discredit the stories put forward

45:13

by both the Merritt siblings, who

45:15

claimed to have seen him take cocaine

45:18

and give cocaine to Stuart Lubbock that

45:20

night. And he wanted to

45:22

give some sort of explanation for his

45:24

actions, with regards to A, not jumping

45:26

in the pool to help, and B,

45:28

leaving before the police arrive. This

45:31

interview set the tone for Michael Barrymore's attitude

45:33

towards the investigation, one

45:35

that would have a long-standing effect on the opinion

45:37

of the British public. While

45:40

Barrymore talks about wanting to uncover the truth

45:42

for the sake of Stuart's family, his

45:45

combative and defensive responses to Bashir's

45:47

questions told a very different story.

45:51

However, the true watershed

45:53

moment would come a few months into

45:55

the inquiry, when it came

45:57

time for Barrymore and his party guests. to

46:00

testify in court. As

46:02

the various guests told their stories, it

46:05

became increasingly clear that what

46:07

they were saying did not tell the full

46:10

picture. And what they

46:12

did tell the court seemed only

46:14

to maybe the already clarity water.

46:17

Everyone except Kylie merits two

46:19

young female sins, both

46:22

of whom were under 18 at the time

46:24

of the inquest, testified to

46:26

a very different chain of events. And

46:29

I just want to point out something

46:32

here that I think is kind of

46:34

consistently overlooked is that the

46:36

fact that both of Kylie Merritt's friends

46:38

had been under 18 at the time

46:41

of the inquiry means they were well under the

46:43

age of 18 at the time of Michael Barrymore's

46:45

party, where adult men were

46:47

getting hammered and all sorts of high.

46:50

So yes, again the people that want

46:52

to kind of defend Michael Barrymore and

46:55

Michael Barrymore himself, I'm like, okay, you

46:57

might not have caused Stuart Lubbock's death again. I don't

47:00

know. We'll get to that. What were

47:02

you doing having children at

47:04

a drug-fueled party at your house?

47:07

So the argument that he kind of takes

47:10

this call from his PA who's like, get out of the

47:12

house. You want to get out before the media are there.

47:14

Why are you putting yourself in such a position in the

47:16

first place? But

47:18

let's stick with the testimonies of the

47:21

guests for now. Like

47:23

we said, many of the guests had already

47:25

sold their accounts of that night to the

47:27

papers for enormous sums of money. And

47:30

every single one of them had essentially painted

47:32

themselves as heroic victims who'd just been caught

47:34

up in a tragedy beyond their control. And

47:37

since these stories were out already, now that

47:40

these witnesses were in court testifying under

47:42

oath, they didn't really feel like they

47:44

could change the narrative, which made

47:46

it very difficult to get to the reality of

47:48

the matter because they just couldn't

47:50

all be telling the truth. And

47:53

the public did still want to believe

47:55

that Michael Barrymore was innocent. In

47:57

the lead up to his appearance at the inquest, the general

47:59

belief amongst the British public was that

48:01

Barrymore would arrive and clear everything up.

48:04

His persona was that of a straight talking man

48:06

of the people. Surely he would give the courts

48:09

everything he could remember and try and get to

48:11

the bottom of Stuart Lubbock's death. Their

48:14

whole. It came as

48:16

an enormous shock when Michael Barrymore

48:18

arrived at the inquest and

48:20

went all no comment. Barrymore

48:23

had been advised by his legal team that

48:26

as this was an inquest into Stuart's

48:28

death and not an official investigation into

48:30

him personally, he was not

48:33

legally required to answer any questions that he

48:35

didn't want to. And this was

48:37

true and he was well within his

48:39

rights to no comment his way through the majority of

48:41

this inquest. Just

48:44

because something is allowed, whether

48:46

it's a good idea or not, is

48:48

a separate question because for the British public it

48:51

became the straw that broke the Colonel's back.

48:53

That day Barrymore refused to answer numerous

48:56

questions and seemed solely focused on clarifying

48:58

that he wasn't responsible for Stuart's death.

49:01

Barrymore told the court how he'd seen Stuart

49:04

in the Jacuzzi with his boyfriend, Jonathan Kenny

49:06

and Justin Merritt, the bin man. Barrymore

49:09

then said that his boyfriend came inside,

49:11

leaving Stuart alone in the Jacuzzi with

49:13

Justin. Barrymore told the

49:15

court that he last saw Stuart alone in

49:17

the Jacuzzi playing with a baseball club. One

49:20

asked if he saw Stuart taking cocaine on

49:22

the night of his death. Barrymore replied, I'm

49:25

not prepared to answer that question. One

49:28

asked if he had rubbed cocaine

49:30

into Stuart's gums. He replied,

49:33

no I did not. The

49:35

truth was that the public didn't care if Michael

49:37

Barrymore did coke but not answering

49:39

questions about a suspicious death on his

49:41

property in their eyes did make

49:44

him look guilty as hell. On

49:46

top of this, the Merritt siblings had both

49:49

publicly accused Barrymore of forcing Stuart to take

49:51

cocaine. But in Barrymore's testimony,

49:53

Justin Merritt was the last person to

49:55

be seen with Stuart before he died

49:58

and that felt a little bit too convenient. In

50:02

September 2002, coroner Caroline Beasley

50:05

Murray felt that she had no

50:07

choice but to return an open verdict, although

50:09

she clearly did so with a heavy heart. She

50:12

ended the inquest with the following statement, None

50:15

of these witnesses, who were party guests

50:17

for three hours, have given to this

50:19

court an explanation of how Stuart Lubbock,

50:21

a previously fit 31-year-old, should be found

50:24

floating in a swimming pool at

50:26

the premises with a significant level of alcohol

50:28

and drugs in his system and

50:30

have serious anal injuries. Now

50:34

of course, this did not land at all

50:36

well with the British public, but at

50:39

the time, Team Barrymore took it as a

50:41

win. An open verdict left

50:43

the case open to interpretation, and

50:45

Barrymore himself thought that he might just be

50:48

able to salvage his career. This

50:50

was until the 21st of September

50:52

2002, when ITV announced that

50:55

they wouldn't be making any more shows with

50:57

him. Barrymore spent

50:59

the next year doing interviews in which he talked

51:01

about how the case had affected him personally, and

51:04

how he desperately wanted the Lubbock family to

51:06

find some peace. He

51:08

also began talking about some quote-unquote

51:10

new evidence that had been uncovered

51:12

by his legal team, and

51:14

he thought that this would blow the whole case wide open.

51:18

What was this evidence? Well,

51:21

Barrymore began telling any interviewer who

51:23

would listen that Stuart Lubbock's body

51:25

had not sustained those anal injuries

51:28

at his party, but

51:30

rather they had happened when

51:32

Stuart arrived at hospital.

51:35

And this suggestion happened after a

51:37

nurse who was on the scene

51:39

when Stuart Lubbock's body arrived told

51:42

Barrymore's legal team that they had not seen

51:44

any blood or injuries when he came through

51:46

the door. And this

51:48

nurse says that she didn't even see the

51:50

scuff marks found at the first post-mortem

51:53

which were attributed to Stuart's body being dragged

51:55

from the pool. And

51:57

also, she said she didn't see any

51:59

injuries. to his rectum, which I

52:01

would argue, he's been dead in

52:03

the pool for minimum an hour. Is

52:06

there going to be gushing blood? I don't think so. Again,

52:09

it's so... Let's

52:11

just get into it. Let's just keep going. It's

52:14

so confusing. And

52:17

then Barrymore's legal team announced that

52:19

they actually had hospital reports showing

52:21

that a rectal thermometer had been

52:24

inserted into Stuart's body 14 times.

52:28

The difference in size between a

52:30

pool thermometer and a thermometer that

52:32

is actually designed for a butthole

52:34

is quite different. So

52:38

I think maybe to

52:41

a un-medically trained ear,

52:43

14 times a thermometer being

52:45

inserted into a somebody might

52:47

sound pretty outrageous. But is

52:49

it possible that a rectal thermometer was

52:52

ever inserted into Stuart, let

52:54

alone that many times? And if

52:56

so, why? And even if

52:58

it had, could a rectal thermometer in

53:00

a hospital have caused the kind of

53:02

damage found by Dr Ian Calder during

53:04

the second post-mortem or very important questions

53:07

that we need to talk about? And

53:09

us being non-medical professionals were a little

53:12

bit dubious about some of these questions

53:14

and everything you read on the internet and in the press

53:16

is a tough tool. So

53:18

we did actually speak to a relative of a

53:20

member of the Red Handed team who has experienced

53:22

working in intensive care and they

53:24

told us the following. In A&E there

53:27

is apparently a scene. Someone's not

53:29

dead until they're warm indeed. This

53:32

is especially true apparently when someone has

53:34

been in cold water as Stuart Lubbock

53:36

had. Why? Because

53:38

there have actually been some very notable

53:40

cases in which people have fallen into

53:42

cold water and almost completely

53:44

shut down to the point that

53:46

their vital signs are virtually undetectable.

53:49

And in these very very rare

53:51

circumstances, there have been occasions

53:53

where these people have returned to normal

53:55

body temperature and then come back to

53:57

life. In some cases going on to

54:00

make a full recovery. Now I have to explain

54:05

why Stuart Lubbock 999 is called at like

54:07

5.30 in the morning and Stuart Lubbock is

54:21

not pronounced dead until gone 8 o'clock

54:23

in the morning, hours later. And

54:26

in these cases where the body has

54:28

become that cold, one of

54:31

the only places to take a core body temperature is

54:33

via a rectal thermometer or probe.

54:37

So that means Stuart

54:40

Lubbock who was found in an

54:42

outdoor swimming pool in March, it's

54:45

pretty conceivable that a rectal probe would have

54:47

been inserted to keep an eye on his

54:49

core temperature in A&E. And

54:51

as for the number of times, according to

54:54

our source it is more likely that the

54:56

probe was inserted fully and then partially removed

54:58

or checked a number of times during the

55:00

hours before Stuart was pronounced dead. Well duh,

55:02

like they're waiting for him to hit a

55:04

certain temperature. And I

55:06

don't think it takes a genius to figure this

55:08

out but both forensic pathologists on this case and

55:11

the source that we spoke to who works in

55:13

intensive care, a rectal thermometer would

55:16

not cause anywhere near the level of

55:18

damage that Stuart Lubbock had sustained to

55:20

his rectum. It doesn't matter how many

55:22

times it was inserted and pulled out or checked

55:24

or whatever because as

55:26

I alluded to earlier, rectal

55:29

thermometers are designed to be inserted into a

55:31

person when they're still alive. Yeah

55:33

and like even if you're like, well Stuart Lubbock was dead

55:35

so maybe they were just not as

55:37

careful as they needed to be, it's

55:40

designed to be inserted to check if somebody

55:42

is alive. So they're not like, oh

55:44

he's dead, they're like, we don't know if he's dead, let's put

55:46

this thermometer in, he might still be alive, I'm not just going

55:48

to jam it in and do whatever and cause a load

55:51

of internal injuries. and

56:00

actually caused Stuart's death. According

56:03

to Dr. Ian Calder, one of

56:05

four forensic pathologists who examined Stuart's

56:07

body, he believed that Stuart

56:09

was a victim of a vicious sexual assault,

56:12

which resulted in Stuart going into

56:14

shock or suffering cardiac arrest. Yeah, because like

56:16

all we've figured out so far is that

56:18

he didn't drown. That's

56:21

what Calder says. He says that the first post-mortem

56:23

is completely wrong. There is no evidence that Stuart

56:26

loved to drown. So Calder

56:28

believes that whoever attacked Stuart, then watched

56:30

him stumble into the pool or

56:32

put him in the pool themselves in order to

56:34

cover up the attack. It's important

56:37

to note that of the four pathologists

56:39

who examined Stuart's body, three of them

56:41

would conclude that his death was suspicious.

56:44

The only pathologist who did not come to that

56:46

conclusion was the first one, Dr. Michael Heath. Heath

56:49

went on to voluntarily retire

56:51

after several high-profile incidents in

56:53

which he came to extremely

56:56

contradictory conclusions to his peers, and

56:58

also the one that I mentioned earlier where they don't

57:00

even know if he was labeling people correctly.

57:04

And the idea that Stuart may have

57:06

suffered some kind of enormous reaction or

57:08

episode as the result of a sexual

57:11

assault, he'll have legs. A

57:13

quick Google search into fainting responses

57:15

after anal penetration brings up countless

57:18

articles on the vasovagal response. So

57:21

apparently, stimulation to the vasovagal nerve is the

57:23

same reason that some people faint when

57:25

they are exposed to blood. Stimulation

57:28

to this nerve, which tracks its way

57:30

across the body, including the heart, can

57:32

cause rapid drops in both pulse and

57:34

blood pressure. And there have

57:36

been some very severe cases in which

57:38

the vasovagal response has been triggered during a

57:41

surgery, for example, and the response

57:43

has been so intense that the patient has actually

57:45

appeared to be dead. And

57:47

apparently, the same response can be

57:49

caused to a smaller degree by

57:51

anal penetration. And we've

57:54

read countless Reddit threads where

57:56

people report feeling incredibly faint during

57:58

anal So it's

58:00

not impossible that a vicious sexual

58:02

assault on Stuart could have caused

58:04

a vasovagal response so intense that

58:06

he appeared to be dead. So

58:09

perhaps a would-be attacker thought that they'd

58:12

killed Stuart and therefore they needed

58:14

to find a way to explain his death in

58:16

the middle of a party. However,

58:20

the general public were not as informed

58:22

as we are today and the suggestion

58:24

that Stuart's injuries had been caused

58:27

by a post-mortem thermometer was

58:29

enough to explain away the situation for some

58:31

people. And so in September

58:33

2003, Michael Barrymore attempted the first

58:35

of his many attempts to relaunch his

58:38

career with a seven-week one-man

58:40

show in London. However,

58:45

as you probably could have guessed, this did

58:47

not end well. Despite

58:49

not having officially been convicted of any

58:51

crime, Michael Barrymore's rapport with

58:53

the audience was damaged. I

58:56

also think that

58:59

if you're trying to reverse a fall from

59:01

grace, a one-man

59:03

show is the opposite

59:05

of what you should be doing. You

59:07

should be showing that you can get along

59:10

with other people is what you should be doing. Yep.

59:12

I think he thought that he could just do

59:15

it with the audience, the audience is the other

59:17

cast in this story. But it doesn't

59:19

work. Because before his straight-talking,

59:21

slightly inappropriate uncle routine had

59:23

gone down well but against

59:25

the backdrop of a potential sexual assault victim

59:27

turning up dead in his pool things

59:29

are a bit different now. The seven-week

59:32

show only lasted three days

59:34

before being cancelled. Shortly

59:37

after this, Barrymore received a £1.4 million

59:40

tax bill and promptly fled

59:42

to New Zealand, trying to kickstart a career

59:44

there. This also didn't land well

59:46

and he ended up returning to the UK a year

59:48

later in 2004 to

59:50

declare voluntary bankruptcy. And

59:53

then Barrymore was quiet for almost

59:55

a whole year, until

59:57

the 5th of January 2006. When

1:00:00

the British public witnessed this.

1:00:04

Right, my friends, this

1:00:06

is where the fun really starts.

1:00:09

You've heard Housemate number one. Please

1:00:11

welcome Housemate number two. Housemate

1:00:14

number two. I'm

1:00:19

not a bad man. When

1:00:25

I was asked to do Big Brother, I thought,

1:00:27

well, why not, you know, I'm a white people,

1:00:29

which is helpful for feeling I work with them

1:00:31

a lot. And I just want to

1:00:33

say what, you know, what it's like to work with them

1:00:36

24 hours a day. Ladies

1:00:38

and gentlemen, it's Michael Barrymore.

1:00:47

For a British person, that is instantly recognizable.

1:00:51

But if you're not familiar with who

1:00:53

that is, what you just

1:00:56

listened to was the iconic voice of

1:00:58

Davina McCall announcing Michael Barrymore as the

1:01:00

second contestant on season four of Celebrity

1:01:02

Big Brother, along with a

1:01:04

montage of clips of Barrymore set to

1:01:06

the Eminem song, Without Me. Oh,

1:01:09

no. I guess who's

1:01:11

back. And

1:01:14

I will say we had, I'm allowed to say this, we

1:01:16

had a call with Channel 4 the other day, and

1:01:19

I really, really, really, really wanted

1:01:21

to say, you're live on Channel 4, please do

1:01:24

not swear. But

1:01:26

I didn't because it was. When

1:01:29

we look back at that now, this

1:01:32

all feels like it reflects quite poorly

1:01:34

on Michael Barrymore. For a start,

1:01:36

he cried whilst walking through the crowd into the

1:01:38

Big Brother house, clearly overwhelmed at finally having people

1:01:40

cheer for him again. Secondly, his

1:01:42

impressions of Adolf Hitler and Jimmy Savile that

1:01:45

he did in the house did not age

1:01:47

well. I don't think Adolf Hitler would have

1:01:49

aged well at the time. I know. I

1:01:51

love that. It's like, oh, there was a

1:01:53

point in like the mid 2000s where

1:01:56

like Adolf Hitler Impressions were

1:01:58

all the rage. If

1:02:01

Hitler impression not particularly striking,

1:02:03

accord. His appearance on Celebrity Big

1:02:05

Brother did actually proves to be Michael Barry

1:02:08

most most successful attempt to revive in his

1:02:10

career. He came second in the

1:02:12

A Celebrity Big Brother and just days after

1:02:14

leaving the show he would sit down for

1:02:16

a high profile meeting with Terry Lubbock Suis

1:02:18

dad. In. The

1:02:21

documentary the Body in the Pool. Carry.

1:02:23

Law but clearly feels that he was played

1:02:25

by Barry most Pr team. When.

1:02:27

They approached him about a meeting carry

1:02:29

hostile that he might get some. Answers

1:02:31

about his sons. But. Instead

1:02:34

or he got with him smalltalk.

1:02:36

And has. The

1:02:39

Bomb. Although it was exactly what he needed to

1:02:41

get his career back on track, and over the

1:02:43

next few months he appeared all over Britain screens.

1:02:46

From. Being on Graham Norton to appearing on

1:02:48

the was to sneak. Preview.

1:02:50

Months he really did look by. Bible

1:02:52

was back. But. Then

1:02:55

on the nineteenth of April, two thousand and

1:02:57

six just months after making has come back.

1:02:59

Essex Police announced that they were reviewing Stewart

1:03:01

Love Access as part of a. Routine

1:03:04

procedure. And once

1:03:06

again Barrymore, Korea was put on ice.

1:03:09

And when in December that year. The

1:03:11

police announced that they will reopening the

1:03:13

investigation based on their review. The.

1:03:16

Writing was on the wall. The

1:03:18

following: Jane, Michael Barrymore, Jonathan Kenny,

1:03:20

and Just in Marriage were all

1:03:22

arrested on suspicion of serious sexual

1:03:24

assault. And murder. All

1:03:26

three were eventually released without charge days

1:03:29

after, but. This. Was the

1:03:31

final nail in Michael Barrymore coffin. The

1:03:34

same year, the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

1:03:36

Launched an investigation into the original handling

1:03:38

of the case. And

1:03:41

this revealed as we mentioned earlier. That.

1:03:43

To key pieces of evidence: the pool

1:03:45

thermometer in the door handle. Had

1:03:47

never been recovered. And.

1:03:50

That David Brown, Michael by most hey

1:03:52

I had actually been allowed on to

1:03:54

the crime scene. To. Quote Unquote.

1:03:56

Tidy. Up. What?

1:03:59

the fuck What's going on?

1:04:03

So the investigation into Stuart Lubbock's death

1:04:05

is still open to this day, over

1:04:07

20 years later. And

1:04:10

the police honestly seem no closer to solving the case. In

1:04:13

2017, Barrymore was awarded nominal

1:04:15

damages after taking Essex Police

1:04:17

to court, looking for £2.5m

1:04:20

in lost income after his

1:04:22

arrest and release in 2017. In

1:04:25

November 17th of March 2021, Essex

1:04:27

Police did arrest a 50-year-old man in

1:04:29

connection with Stuart Lubbock's death and

1:04:32

indecent assault. However,

1:04:34

nothing has come of this almost three years. The

1:04:37

last announcement on this case was in November

1:04:39

of last year, when the Essex Police

1:04:41

vowed to never stop, and

1:04:43

they were, quote, motivated by a desire

1:04:45

to deliver justice to Mr Lubbock's family.

1:04:49

As for Michael Barrymore, his last attempt at a

1:04:51

comeback was on ITV's Dancing on Ice in 2019.

1:04:55

However, he fell over during training before

1:04:57

the first show was broadcast, breaking his hand, forcing

1:05:00

him to leave the competition. This

1:05:03

has been the last in a long line-up

1:05:05

of attempts to revive his career, none

1:05:07

of which have landed. So,

1:05:10

on the 23-year anniversary

1:05:12

of Stuart Lubbock's death, what do

1:05:14

we think? The injuries

1:05:16

that Stuart sustained really do make it look as

1:05:19

the second post-mortem's incand drugs, but

1:05:21

it was actually a sexual assault that turned

1:05:23

into a murder. But we

1:05:25

do have to say that we don't have

1:05:27

any evidence to suggest that Barrymore was the

1:05:29

person responsible for Stuart Lubbock's death. There were

1:05:32

nine people in the house that night, and

1:05:34

even if you take out the two teenage girls, that

1:05:36

still leaves seven who could have

1:05:38

inflicted those injuries to Stuart. Michael

1:05:41

Barrymore was just the most famous and therefore the best

1:05:43

target for the press. That

1:05:45

being said, his actions after finding Stuart don't

1:05:47

paint a particularly good picture of the man

1:05:50

that the public used to love. In

1:05:52

every interview, to this day, Michael

1:05:55

Barrymore has seemed more focused on salvaging his

1:05:57

career than worrying about Stuart Lubbock's death. Her:

1:06:01

maybe? The. Real reason to. Michael

1:06:03

Barrymore hasn't managed to make a Tv.

1:06:05

Come Back. Isn't because the British public

1:06:07

think. Of him as a murderer. They. Just think

1:06:09

of him as a bit of a to head. Thoughts.

1:06:13

Concerns: Feelings So many concerns.

1:06:15

Lots of them. I think he

1:06:17

did it did. There's no evidence, know, don't

1:06:20

know what. I think he is the most

1:06:22

likely person in that house that night to

1:06:24

have carried out on i do silly things.

1:06:26

That. It was a sexual assaults how

1:06:28

that. Turned. Fatal. I have no

1:06:31

doubt that it was a sexual assault

1:06:33

that had evidence that we do have

1:06:35

shows. Most. Likely

1:06:37

to add up. it was the victim

1:06:40

as brutal. And

1:06:42

whoever did it. Then either

1:06:44

found themselves with somebody they thought was dead

1:06:46

or somebody that they knew they needed to

1:06:48

keep quiet. And so I think

1:06:51

it makes more sense that maybe he

1:06:53

was smothered or something like that. Like

1:06:55

I'm not, and with the cynical evidence

1:06:57

to do hemorrhaging. Or manual

1:06:59

strangulation and then he was thrown into

1:07:01

the pool to cover their tracks. As

1:07:03

to whether Mike Bible was the person who actually

1:07:05

did it. When. I haven't yet. In

1:07:12

a reckless and of way. Throwing you. Under.

1:07:19

Does lead to a scenario where some that felt

1:07:21

comfortable enough to do. That

1:07:24

on. Yeah, they have it. Don't

1:07:27

go watch. Ninety Saturday

1:07:29

Night Tv Is it really

1:07:31

is? And

1:07:33

my farmers incredibly the to just. As

1:07:38

something out the guy. Prime.

1:07:57

Members you can listen to red handed early.

1:08:00

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