Bamber case reviewed

(PA)

A man who has spent the past 23 years in jail for shooting dead five of his relatives is to have his conviction re-examined after doubts were raised over key evidence used during his trial.

Photographs which were used as prosecution evidence against Jeremy Bamber are to be reviewed after an expert claimed there were discrepancies with crime-scene pictures.

During Bamber's trial in 1986, members of the jury were shown pictures of the scratch marks said to have been made by a scuffle between Bamber and his adopted father. But the photographic expert Peter Sutherst told The Observer yesterday that the scratch marks could have been made a month after the killings.

Bamber, now 49, has always insisted he did not shoot his wealthy adopted parents, June and Neville, his sister Sheila Caffell and her six-year-old twin sons, Daniel and Nicholas, at their farmhouse in Tolleshunt D'Arcy, Essex, in 1985.

A spokesman from the Criminal Cases Review Commission confirmed: "We have received submissions from Bamber recently and we will need to consider those very carefully."