Hello tiktakers! Surely most of you enjoy watching shows and movies, just like we do.
And thus, today we want to talk about a documentary we recently watched on Netflix
titled: Sophie: A Murder in West Cork.
As you may deduce from the title, this documentary is about a brutal
murder which took place in a rural area in Ireland. It happened in 1996,
but to this day the perpetrator has not been found. Let's start from the beginning:
Sophie Toscan du Plantier was a 39 year old French documentary maker who had been
to Ireland many times throughout her life. She loved it so much that in 1993 she decided to buy
a vacation home in Schull, West Cork. Sophie was married to Daniel Toscan du Plantier,
and had a son from a previous marriage. She lived in Paris with them.
On the winter of 1996, Sophie decided to travel to her vacation home in West Cork, since she wanted
to spend a few days in nature. She asked some of her relatives to join her, but none of them could,
so she decided to go alone. Everyone who knew her said that she had found her perfect spot:
A faraway place with an ocean view and in the middle of nature.
Sophie was planning to come back to Paris just a few days later… but that couldn't be. Her
neighbor Shirley Foster found her dead body the morning of December 23. She was wearing sleeping
clothes and boots, and had multiple wounds on her head and face. She had been supposedly
murdered with a stone block they found near the body, which was completely stained in blood.
West Cork is a remote area which is also difficult to access,
resulting in the pathologist not being able to access the crime scene until
28 hours later. During all that time, the victim's body remained lying on the ground.
However, the neighbors and local agents did arrive at the scene soon. The town was pretty small,
and even though many foreigners lived there, most kept following the rural traditions of the place.
Sophie's body was covered in so many wounds that when they asked a neighbor to identify her,
he couldn't. The beating she received was ferocious. An investigation was opened that day,
and many people think it was plagued with issues and mismanagement. For instance,
the police in the area was accused of mishandling evidence, and coercing the witnesses.
Although subsequent reports claimed that there were many issues with the procedure,
no corruption at the high level was found. In any case, they did found a suspect:
Ian Bailey. He was a journalist who moved to Ireland in 1991.
He had a record of violence against women, and was caught twisting information many times.
He denied knowing Sophie, but at the same time, he also seemed to be manipulating information
without other people noticing. Moreover, shortly after Sophie's brutal murder,
he had wounds on his hands and arms. This made the investigators think that
he could've gotten them after the struggle with the victim… but none of that could be proven.
What stands out is that during the investigation on Ian, he started publishing information throwing
shade at Sophie's life and reputation. For instance, he accused her of being
with different men, and seemed like he wanted to redirect the attention to France. As we mentioned
before tiktakers, there was no evidence, so he was not prosecuted. But even then, part of Sophie's
family is still convinced that he was the murderer, and are still asking for justice.
We also want to focus on something else tiktakers: This story also has a very mysterious background.
According to Irish folklore, Castle Dunlough in West Cork has a curse. It is believed
that the family that lived there hundreds of years ago, died under strange circumstances.
And from that moment, many people claimed to have seen a white woman lurking around the place.
She would supposedly wander around the lake surrounding the castle, and
everyone who sees her… ends up dying. According to Sophie's relatives, she visited the castle a
few days before her death, and a neighbor even confirmed to have seen her around that area.
The townsfolk told the investigators that if Sophie had told a neighbor what she wanted to do,
they wouldn't have let her go, and she would still be alive.
What do you think tiktakers? Does the white
lady have something to do with Sophie Toscan's horrible demise?