Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky Listener Discretion advised Thursday, November seventh,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four. The residential London neighborhood of Belgravia was
Speaker 1: known back in the Tudor period as a hotspot for
Speaker 1: highwaymen and robberies, but by the nineteen seventies it was
Speaker 1: considered a quiet space in the heart of the city. Today,
Speaker 1: the neighborhood's Lower Belgrave Street has its own wiki page
Speaker 1: with four notable residents listed, two writers, the wife of
Speaker 1: a Nicaraguan dictator, and John Bingham, the seventh Earl of Lucan.
Speaker 1: The night of November seventh, Lucan's estranged wife, Veronica, was
Speaker 1: home with the couple's children and their nanny, a woman
Speaker 1: named Sandra Rivet. Thursday was normally Rivet's night off, the
Speaker 1: evening she would go out with her boyfriend, but Sandra
Speaker 1: switched her schedule that week and had seen her boyfriend
Speaker 1: the night before. A little before nine, Sandra Rivet put
Speaker 1: the youngest children to bed and asked Lady Lucan if
Speaker 1: she wanted a cup of tea. After a while, Veronica
Speaker 1: began to wonder what was taking the nanny so long,
Speaker 1: and so she headed downstairs to the home's basement kitchen.
Speaker 1: She made it to the top of the basement stairs,
Speaker 1: where she was struck by a metal pipe. Aving to
Speaker 1: later testimony, Veronica screamed for her life and then recognized
Speaker 1: her attacker's voice as her husband's when he told her
Speaker 1: to shut up. A struggle ensued. Lucan only released the
Speaker 1: grip on his wife's throat when Veronica managed to grab
Speaker 1: his testicles, and he gave up the fight. With tensions
Speaker 1: slightly calmer for the moment, Veronica asked her husband where
Speaker 1: Rivet was. At first he was evasive, Finally he admitted
Speaker 1: she was dead. In an attempt to placate her husband
Speaker 1: and by herself some time, Veronica suggested she would help
Speaker 1: him dispose of the body, but that she had to
Speaker 1: stay in the house until her wounds from their earlier
Speaker 1: fight were healed. Her gambit was successful. Lucan agreed, and
Speaker 1: when he went into the bathroom to get a wet towel,
Speaker 1: Veronica realized he wouldn't be able to hear her over
Speaker 1: the running water. She fled the house and successfully ran
Speaker 1: to a nearby pub, the Plumber's Arms. The story of
Speaker 1: the Lucans captivated the nation and continues to perplex true
Speaker 1: crime fans to this day, not only because it was
Speaker 1: a murder case involving nobility, but because of the incredibly
Speaker 1: mysterious circumstances of the crime's aftermath. In nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 1: Lord Lucan was found guilty of the murder of Sandra Rivet,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't there to hear his sentence, nor did
Speaker 1: he serve his time. In fact, the last time Lord
Speaker 1: Lucan was seen was the day after the murder, November eighth,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four. Lord Lucan simply disappeared, despite being legally
Speaker 1: declared dead twice. The whereabouts and status of Lord Lucan
Speaker 1: remain a mystery to this day. Lady Lucan's opinion has
Speaker 1: oscillated over the years, from her being convinced her husband
Speaker 1: was still alive at times in the decades following his disappearance,
Speaker 1: to the staunch belief that he must be dead. Described
Speaker 1: in her twenty seventeen obituary by The New York Times
Speaker 1: as imperious and wickedly witty, Lady Lucan's life was documented
Speaker 1: from nineteen seventy four up until her death through a
Speaker 1: series of interviews and reflections about the fateful day in
Speaker 1: question and the abusive marriage that preceded it. Her marriage
Speaker 1: has largely defined not only her public image but her life.
Speaker 1: Lord Lucan may Or may not have been able to
Speaker 1: escape with what he had done, but Lady Lucan was
Speaker 1: the one who had to live with it. I'm Danish
Speaker 1: Schwartz and this is noble blood. Lady Lucan was born
Speaker 1: Veronica Mary Duncan on May third, nineteen thirty seven, in
Speaker 1: the coastal English town of Bournemouth. Her father, a major
Speaker 1: during the First World War, died in a car accident
Speaker 1: when Veronica was only two years old, which meant Veronica
Speaker 1: and her younger sister, Christina were raised entirely by their mother.
Speaker 1: The sister's childhoods were spent between England and South Africa,
Speaker 1: where their mother remarried, and then Veronica would settle in London.
Speaker 1: As a young adult, she spent her first years out
Speaker 1: of school doing what many do, throwing interests and possible
Speaker 1: careers at the wall and seeing what stuck. She went
Speaker 1: from art school to helping out in her stepfather's bar,
Speaker 1: to modeling school, to learning shorthand, which eventually led to
Speaker 1: becoming the director of a small printing company. She recalls
Speaker 1: she didn't date much during this period of her life,
Speaker 1: but that would change in nineteen sixty three. That year,
Speaker 1: Veronica's younger sister, Christina, married William shand Kid, the son
Speaker 1: of a wallpaper magnet, and the sisters were both introduced
Speaker 1: to London society. If that name, or the phrase British
Speaker 1: wallpaper magnet is ringing some kind of bell for you, you
Speaker 1: probably know a lot about Lady Dye. William shand Kidd's brother,
Speaker 1: Peter shand Kid, was Princess Diana's stepfather. It was at
Speaker 1: a London Society function, a golf club actually, where Veronica
Speaker 1: first saw Lord John Bingham, eldest son of George Bingham,
Speaker 1: sixth Earl of Luken. Although their exchange was brief, he
Speaker 1: stood out to Veronica among the other men present. Quote
Speaker 1: he looked like a gentleman, almost in caricature, Veronica recalled
Speaker 1: in her memoir, it's a good description. John was apparently
Speaker 1: briefly considered for the role of James Bond before Sean
Speaker 1: Connery beat him out for it, probably on the grounds
Speaker 1: of acting experience. That was March. Veronica wouldn't see John
Speaker 1: again until August, when John visited Christina and her husband
Speaker 1: at their country house in the south of France, and,
Speaker 1: remembering Christina's sister, Veronica asked for her to join. Christina
Speaker 1: was weary of the potential match, warning Veronica that he's
Speaker 1: got socialist parents, he's a professional gambler, and he's said
Speaker 1: to be queer. Quite untrue, Veronica would reflect on the
Speaker 1: last bit, but no one could deny John's gambling addiction.
Speaker 1: He had first picked up the taste for it as
Speaker 1: a student at shocker Eton College before becoming a regular
Speaker 1: at the Clermont Club as an adult. He would sometimes win,
Speaker 1: but his losses were often bigger, once he found himself
Speaker 1: out ten thousand pounds in one night. She recalled that
Speaker 1: the two spent time together during this trip, but Veronica
Speaker 1: didn't feel a spark, and she was surprised to learn
Speaker 1: he was interested in her. When he asked her out
Speaker 1: following their return to London. He was apparently impatient to
Speaker 1: sleep with her, and they did so after a few dates.
Speaker 1: John's passion it appears was even more intent though, when
Speaker 1: it came to powerboats. He had spent all of his
Speaker 1: money buying one, which he called White Migrant, and had
Speaker 1: his sights set on winning the Daily Express powerboat race. Quote.
Speaker 1: He was obsessive about gambling and everything else he was
Speaker 1: interested in. Veronica reflected if he also later observed that
Speaker 1: spending all your money on a boat was a silly
Speaker 1: thing for someone without a job to do. Quote, why
Speaker 1: would I work in a bank when I can earn
Speaker 1: a year's money in a single night at the tables,
Speaker 1: John once told a colleague after he lost out on
Speaker 1: a promotion and quit. Apparently his boating aspirations weren't totally
Speaker 1: far out. White Migrant was leading the race for some
Speaker 1: time before it sank then and there during the race,
Speaker 1: leaving John's only asset at the bottom of the English Channel.
Speaker 1: Despite what was perhaps a perfect symbol, Veronica did not
Speaker 1: see the fate of the White Migrant as representative of
Speaker 1: their budding relationship. It seemed they were headed toward marriage,
Speaker 1: both feeling like it was time to take the step. Quote,
Speaker 1: you haven't got a line on your face, John said,
Speaker 1: praising the youthful appearance of his Then wait, for it.
Speaker 1: Twenty six year old girlfriend Veronica reflected with a sort
Speaker 1: of tragic honesty in a twenty seventeen documentary I Was
Speaker 1: Getting On, She said, I was twenty six, and in
Speaker 1: those days you were approaching being on the shelf. John
Speaker 1: was twenty nine, and while men generally had a longer
Speaker 1: shelf life when it came to marriage, then he also
Speaker 1: felt it was time. Both of them seemed to have
Speaker 1: the idea that marriage was what they were supposed to do,
Speaker 1: not necessarily what they wanted. In all her descriptions, Veronica
Speaker 1: conveys the sense that the couple were attracted to each other,
Speaker 1: but that the relationship lacked a depth or intimacy beyond that.
Speaker 1: Whether this is something she realized in retrospect or her
Speaker 1: feelings at the time, however, we can't know. One morning,
Speaker 1: after the two spent the night at John's place, John
Speaker 1: woke Veronica up with the words will you marry me?
Speaker 1: In the documentary, Veronica recalled not being able to say
Speaker 1: anything at first, while in her memoir she even claims
Speaker 1: she fell back asleep. Will you marry me? He asked again,
Speaker 1: this time earning a reply yes, I will marry Despite
Speaker 1: John's having no money. Veronica still believed quote to marry
Speaker 1: a peer of the realm was a coup on your part.
Speaker 1: Their engagement was announced in The Times in October nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty three with the headline Lord Bingham to wed business girl,
Speaker 1: and the couple were married in December. It was sparsely
Speaker 1: attended on both sides, Veronica reflected, because neither of us
Speaker 1: were very pospoula. Their most famous guest was poor Princess Alice,
Speaker 1: as the bride called her sympathetically, who had attended because
Speaker 1: Veronica's mother in law had been a lady in waiting.
Speaker 1: Veronica recalled one woman at the wedding exclaiming there's nobody here,
Speaker 1: and added that she was quite right. There was nobody,
Speaker 1: at least nobody of social interest there at all. One
Speaker 1: of the couple's wedding presents was two hundred pounds to
Speaker 1: spend at John's beloved Claremont Club from the club's owner,
Speaker 1: John Aspinall. Veronica later argued that her husband was useful
Speaker 1: to Aspinall, as looking like the poster child for British aristocracy,
Speaker 1: conveyed a sense of legitimacy to foreign players in the club.
Speaker 1: Sitting beside her husband quietly as he gambled. Veronica noticed
Speaker 1: he was growing anxious and she could tell it wasn't
Speaker 1: going well. John eventually got up and asked one of
Speaker 1: the club's directors to join the big game, but he
Speaker 1: was sternly told no. John go home in the car.
Speaker 1: That night, John apologized to his wife, and when she
Speaker 1: asked him how much he had lost, he told her
Speaker 1: the truth eight thousand pounds. At the time, his capital
Speaker 1: was nine thousand pounds, all of the insurance money he
Speaker 1: had received after his boat sank. Veronica performed what she
Speaker 1: considered quote her duty as a gambler's wife, assuring her
Speaker 1: husband he could win it all back. But he and
Speaker 1: I'm sure she was in no place to be comforted.
Speaker 1: They spent a quote very unhappy Christmas, but in a
Speaker 1: dark twist of irony, it wouldn't be long for John
Speaker 1: to come in to plenty of money. In January, when
Speaker 1: his father died. John was now the seventh Earl of
Speaker 1: Luken and Veronica a countess, money land and a title.
Speaker 1: Things were looking up for the couple after a messy
Speaker 1: start to their marriage. They soon sought to purchase a
Speaker 1: home after learning Veronica was pregnant, and they finally found
Speaker 1: one they liked at forty six Lower Belgrave Street, which
Speaker 1: is where you'll recall. The beginning of this episode began.
Speaker 1: In October, Veronica gave birth to the couple's first daughter, Francis.
Speaker 1: The chapter of Veronica's memoir titled Francis doesn't actually tell
Speaker 1: us anything about Francis. Instead, it consists of Veronica telling
Speaker 1: the reader about how she hired a nanny for Francis
Speaker 1: so that she and John could spend more time together
Speaker 1: at the Claremont Club. John and by extension, his wife,
Speaker 1: had an obsession with being seen, with being socially regarded,
Speaker 1: even if they weren't that popular or liked all that much.
Speaker 1: The chapter then concludes, quote at about that time, meaning
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty six, I considered that it was time to
Speaker 1: start another child, as I wanted to have a three
Speaker 1: year gap between my first and second child. In the
Speaker 1: December of nineteen sixty six, I became pregnant in a
Speaker 1: somewhat less clinical manner. Veronica described in the twenty seventeen
Speaker 1: documentary the expectations on women to produce children and the
Speaker 1: special pressure that was on her to have a son.
Speaker 1: If you couldn't, She explained, your reputation was in tatters.
Speaker 1: Veronica's reputation was spared, however, as her next child was
Speaker 1: her son, George. As expressed earlier, children felt like a
Speaker 1: duty to Veronica, not a calling, so they were left
Speaker 1: to nanny's. When she explained that to the documentarian, the
Speaker 1: documentarian expressed that to an outsider, it appears that the
Speaker 1: relationship between Veronica and her children were cold. A cold relationship,
Speaker 1: she repeated. She paused, all my relationships are cold. In
Speaker 1: that same vein, her relationship with John lacked not only
Speaker 1: warmth but familiarity. The couple used to travel extensively, but
Speaker 1: only to the places John considered most socially fashionable at
Speaker 1: the moment. Veronica recalls that she couldn't appreciate the places
Speaker 1: she was seeing, partly because she had no one really
Speaker 1: to share them with. You wasn't communicative, so you couldn't
Speaker 1: really enjoy it as a couple, she said. You were
Speaker 1: both on your own in a strange sort of way.
Speaker 1: John once told Veronica that's the point of being married.
Speaker 1: You don't have to talk to the person. Problems in
Speaker 1: their marriage took a darker turn after John's general disinterest
Speaker 1: led to Veronica becoming closer with a man named Greville Howard,
Speaker 1: another frequent patron of the Clermont. What it seems to
Speaker 1: come down to is that Howard treated Veronica like the
Speaker 1: thing she needed most in the world, like a friend,
Speaker 1: and she fell in love. It doesn't explicitly seem like
Speaker 1: the relationship ever got physical, but even if it did,
Speaker 1: the relationship was cut off before it could deepen when
Speaker 1: John told Howard to get lost and he did. This
Speaker 1: led to Veronica falling into a depression, likely compounded by
Speaker 1: untreated postpartum depression, and John took her to a psychiatrist
Speaker 1: for the first time. John brought Veronica to the Priory,
Speaker 1: a mental hospital in South London, under the pretense of
Speaker 1: simply going for a drive. When Veronica realized where they were,
Speaker 1: she took off running, and both the doctor and her
Speaker 1: husband gave chase. They convinced her to come back, and
Speaker 1: she was prescribed her first antipsychotic, Moditan. This was the
Speaker 1: beginning of a long battle with John over accusations of
Speaker 1: Veronica's mental state. It's an incredibly delicate matter to discuss
Speaker 1: the mental health of someone you don't know, let alone
Speaker 1: someone who's recalling the events of decades past in a memoir.
Speaker 1: But based on John's future behavior, it's fairly arguable to
Speaker 1: say he almost certainly did not have his wife's best
Speaker 1: interest at heart. You may have heard the term mother's
Speaker 1: Little helpers used in the nineteen fifties and sixties to
Speaker 1: refer to drugs like valium, which were marketed toward housewives,
Speaker 1: effectively used as tranquilizers to help them cope with their
Speaker 1: unhappiness by turning them into Stepford wives. These were usually
Speaker 1: sedatives and antidepressants, but moditon was typically used to treat
Speaker 1: more extreme cases like schizophrenia. Despite no record of an
Speaker 1: official diagnosis for Veronica, she claimed the drugs worked, however,
Speaker 1: only under the condition that the side effects were so
Speaker 1: terrible that they would make her forget about anything else
Speaker 1: that might be causing her problems. It's a terrible thing
Speaker 1: to be drugged, she would reflect, because you really are
Speaker 1: not in control. John had recently begun seeing new doctors,
Speaker 1: all men, and Veronica began to see those same doctors,
Speaker 1: despite having had a female GP up until that point.
Speaker 1: Looking back, she says things might have been different if
Speaker 1: her doctor was a woman, as the male doctors believed
Speaker 1: everything her husband said about her mental health at complete
Speaker 1: face value. I can describe this period of Veronica's life
Speaker 1: best by letting you know that in these pages of
Speaker 1: her memoir, you stumble across a new drug name every
Speaker 1: couple of paragraphs. On top of the monotan, there were
Speaker 1: drugs for anxiety, drugs for sleeping, and drugs for mitigating
Speaker 1: the side effects of the other drugs. Much of her
Speaker 1: life outside of her medication stayed the same. The Claremont Club,
Speaker 1: expensive holidays to keep up appearances, and even the birth
Speaker 1: of a third child, Camilla. But the way John treated
Speaker 1: Veronica changed. He didn't think he had to be nice
Speaker 1: to me anymore, Veronica recalled. She says he told her
Speaker 1: he would beat the mad ideas out of her before
Speaker 1: giving her ten strokes with the cane. He did that
Speaker 1: three times total, Veronica claimed, and he would follow the
Speaker 1: beatings with affection and sex. The quote mad ideas he
Speaker 1: referred to were likely Veronica's vocal concerns about the couple's
Speaker 1: financial troubles, at least based on letters that were found
Speaker 1: in their home after Veronica passed away in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 1: John obsessed with keeping up the appearance of wealth, seemingly
Speaker 1: resented his wife's descent. Veronica also notes that the cane
Speaker 1: he used to beat her had had the end cut
Speaker 1: off and wrapped in plaster so that it wouldn't cut
Speaker 1: as much, which was how she knew the beatings were premeditated.
Speaker 1: The pipe that would be used in the murder of
Speaker 1: Sandra Rivet was similarly covered in plaster. The abuse would
Speaker 1: continue in other less physically drastic ways until January nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy three, when John knocked Veronica over after she goosed him,
Speaker 1: which she claimed had always been a playful move between
Speaker 1: the two. He called a mental hospital for a doctor
Speaker 1: to come over, and when the doctor arrived, John asked
Speaker 1: if Veronica was fit to look after the children. When
Speaker 1: the doctor said yes, it seemed that she was, John
Speaker 1: packed his bags and left. After John was gone, the
Speaker 1: doctor stayed behind to inform Veronica that on Boxing Day,
Speaker 1: John had actually called the hospital to attempt to have
Speaker 1: Veronica involuntarily committed under the Mental Health Act of nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty nine. While Veronica was not committed, John did use
Speaker 1: accusations of mental instability to obtain a court order allowing
Speaker 1: him to take the children. A few months later, this
Speaker 1: began a massive custody battle in which John argued that
Speaker 1: his wife was quote seriously mentally disturbed and that he
Speaker 1: feared for the safety of their children. He submitted to
Speaker 1: the court audio recordings of the fights the couple had,
Speaker 1: which Veronica claimed were edited to make them seem one sided.
Speaker 1: That day, the court heard Veronica insult her husband's quote miserable, weak,
Speaker 1: drooping little penis end quote and call him quote a
Speaker 1: ventriloquist's dummy with a mustache stuck on your face. But
Speaker 1: apparently John's deception didn't work, and coupled with John's claims
Speaker 1: that he quote needed to be out of the country
Speaker 1: and away from his children when he was really on holiday,
Speaker 1: the court did not see him favorably. On top of this,
Speaker 1: Veronica's doctors didn't support John's claims in court, and John
Speaker 1: was advised by his legal team to concede the case.
Speaker 1: Veronica believes John genuinely did not believe how much legal
Speaker 1: fees and losing would cost him, and John's finances fell
Speaker 1: into a worse state than they had ever been in.
Speaker 1: He turned to high risk, low reward gambling, and his
Speaker 1: debts began to pile. The official ruling was custody to
Speaker 1: the mother Veronica with a nanny, which meant Veronica needed
Speaker 1: to hire someone full time. This was when she hired
Speaker 1: twenty nine year old Sandra Rivet, whom she'd described as
Speaker 1: a good, kind, decent girl. Woman. Really. Veronica noted that
Speaker 1: even Francis liked her, and she was the most difficult
Speaker 1: to please. As they got to know each other, Veronica
Speaker 1: learned a bit about Sandra's background. She spent part of
Speaker 1: her childhood in Australia. She was one of three daughters.
Speaker 1: When she was nineteen, she got in gauged and became pregnant,
Speaker 1: but by the time her son was born, the relationship
Speaker 1: had fallen apart, and her parents ended up adopting her child.
Speaker 1: Three years later, Sandra had had another son, who was
Speaker 1: also put up for adoption. She was divorce, having been
Speaker 1: in a lonely marriage, but she now had a steady boyfriend.
Speaker 1: She had long red hair and a cat, Tara, who
Speaker 1: slept in her bed with her. I think this biographical
Speaker 1: information is important. The fact of the matter, unfortunately, is
Speaker 1: Veronica only knew Sandra for nine weeks before she was killed.
Speaker 1: I've already told you what happened that night through Veronica's retelling,
Speaker 1: but before John's disappearance, John actually told a different story.
Speaker 1: That same night, he drove home in his Ford Corsair
Speaker 1: and called his mother, telling her there had been quote
Speaker 1: a terrible catastrophe at fourty, referring to their address. Before that,
Speaker 1: John apparently tried to go to a neighbour's house, the
Speaker 1: mother of one of Francis's friends, likely to tell the
Speaker 1: same story. Following the call to his mother, John drove
Speaker 1: to his friends Ian and Susan Maxwell Scott's house, but
Speaker 1: only Susan was home. John told Susan he arrived to
Speaker 1: an intruder attacking his wife and in a state of shock.
Speaker 1: Veronica thought he was the attacker, so he panicked and fled.
Speaker 1: Susan told reporters she believed his story entirely, even after
Speaker 1: John's disappearance, speaking of which, John left the Maxwell Scott
Speaker 1: house at one a m and that was the last
Speaker 1: time he was ever seen. While he was at the house,
Speaker 1: he wrote several letters, one to his brother in law
Speaker 1: Bill shand Kid detailing the same story he had told
Speaker 1: to Susan, with the addition, when I interrupted the fight
Speaker 1: at Lower Belgravee Street and the man left. Veronica accused
Speaker 1: me of having hired him. The circumstantial evidence against me
Speaker 1: is strong in that v will say it was all
Speaker 1: my doing. There was a sense of finality in the
Speaker 1: letter asking Bill to take care of the children in
Speaker 1: his absence, with no indication that he would return. The
Speaker 1: next day, the murder of Rivet, the beating of Lady Lucan,
Speaker 1: and the missing Lord were already in the papers, quickly
Speaker 1: becoming national news. Veronica was admitted to the hospital for
Speaker 1: her injuries, and Sandra Rivet's death was declared a murder.
Speaker 1: On November tenth, John's Ford Corsair was found with a
Speaker 1: piece of lead pipe covered in plaster and a full
Speaker 1: bottle of vodka in its trunk. A warrant was officially
Speaker 1: put out for his arrest and details were issued to Interpol.
Speaker 1: After Veronica was discharged from the hospital, Veronica resumed custody
Speaker 1: of her children. She didn't speak much about the period
Speaker 1: following the murder and the disappearance beyond the nitty gritty
Speaker 1: of the investigation. Her children, she claimed, were largely unaffected
Speaker 1: because they were so young. Whether that's true or not,
Speaker 1: Veronica remembered her youngest daughter, Camilla, remarking one day, I
Speaker 1: don't think daddy's coming back. No, I don't think he's
Speaker 1: coming back, Veronica responded. Veronica believed her husband's fate was suicide, that,
Speaker 1: based on how much he knew about powerboating mechanics, he
Speaker 1: managed to get on a ferry and jump off into
Speaker 1: its propellers. At least that was her opinion in the
Speaker 1: two twenty seventeen documentary, but in a nineteen eighty one
Speaker 1: news program, she told the presenter that she was convinced
Speaker 1: he was alive. I was very heavily drugged at the time,
Speaker 1: Veronica reflected, confirming her earlier belief that once they start
Speaker 1: you on this step, it's very hard to get off.
Speaker 1: The mental health regime. She believed her husband tried to
Speaker 1: kill her to solve his financial problems and to gain
Speaker 1: custody of the children he lost in court. He went
Speaker 1: mad with pressure, She pausits. While her insights about her
Speaker 1: life before the murder oscillate between lacking and acute self awareness,
Speaker 1: any reflection about life after the tragedy is closed off
Speaker 1: and clinical. The chapters of her memoir become procedural, simply
Speaker 1: detailing the investigation, and any details about her relationships with
Speaker 1: family and others are limited to brief mentions in the
Speaker 1: final inconclusion chapter. That might also be because there weren't
Speaker 1: many relationships to talk about. Veronica never remarried, noting that
Speaker 1: it felt impossible to her, and her relationship with her
Speaker 1: children soured. She became heavily addicted to antidepressants, and in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty two, her sister Christina and her husband Bill
Speaker 1: shand kid became the court ordered foster parents of their
Speaker 1: nieces and nephew, who remained estranged from their mother from
Speaker 1: then up until her death. She reflected in twenty seventeen
Speaker 1: that she knew all was lost, but she had to
Speaker 1: accept that her children would have a better life without
Speaker 1: her than they could living with her. I once bumped
Speaker 1: into George in a park, but we didn't say very much.
Speaker 1: Over the years, the children have also taken various stances
Speaker 1: on the guilt and status of their father, despite being
Speaker 1: so young at the time of the incident. In twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: John Lucan was officially declared dead so that George could
Speaker 1: inherit his title and become the eighth Earl of Lucan.
Speaker 1: In twenty seventeen, Lady Lucan died at eighty years old
Speaker 1: from respiratory failure caused by barbituates and alcohol poisoning, and
Speaker 1: the coroner concluded the death was a suicide. Veronica believed
Speaker 1: she was developing Parkinson's disease, even though she had not
Speaker 1: spoken to a doctor yet and had been researching assisted suicide.
Speaker 1: Despite having not spoken to her children in over fifty years,
Speaker 1: all three of them attended her funeral. She finished her
Speaker 1: memoir A Moment in Time the very year she died,
Speaker 1: making the final edits and choosing the photos to include
Speaker 1: just weeks before she passed. The memoir concludes with the line,
Speaker 1: I will eternally regret that an innocent woman died because
Speaker 1: of my relationship with my husband. That's the tragic story
Speaker 1: of Lady Lucan and Sandra Rivett. But keep listening after
Speaker 1: a brief sponsor break, to hear more about the speculations
Speaker 1: of the fate of Lord Lucan. The disappearance of Lord Lucan,
Speaker 1: a seemingly powerful and well connected man who seemed to
Speaker 1: get a way with murder, gave birth to no small
Speaker 1: number of conspiracy theories. In early apparent sighting actually turned
Speaker 1: out to be brace yourself the politician John Stonehouse, who
Speaker 1: was attempting to fake his own death. When he was arrested,
Speaker 1: he was ordered to pull down his pants because Lucan
Speaker 1: had a six inch scar on the inside of his
Speaker 1: right thigh. John Lord Lucan has been reported in France, Columbia, India, Switzerland, Australia.
Speaker 1: You name the place, they've probably seen a guy that
Speaker 1: looks a little bit like the Missing Lord. One of
Speaker 1: the most interesting theories, however, popped up in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Spearheaded by Sandra Rivet's son. Neil Barriman, a builder from Hampshire,
Speaker 1: was Rivet's second son who had been put up for adoption,
Speaker 1: and he only found out who his birth mother was
Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight. His shock eventually turned to
Speaker 1: anger as he tried to learn more about his long
Speaker 1: lost mother. Everything is about Lord Lucan. Where did he go?
Speaker 1: He said? And Sandra is just a forgotten victim in
Speaker 1: the whole equation. Bharman contacted Professor Hassan Ugale, a facial
Speaker 1: recognition expert, who concluded that an eighty seven year old
Speaker 1: man living in a Buddhist community in Australia was in
Speaker 1: fact the missing Lord Lucan. It's him, he told the
Speaker 1: Daily Mail. This isn't opinion, that's a fact. However, when
Speaker 1: contacted by the Guardian, Professor Ugale explained, I can't one
Speaker 1: hundred percent confirm it's Lord Lucan. It looks remarkably like him.
Speaker 1: It's worth investigating further. Okay. Then the eighty seven year
Speaker 1: old man or his part, denies being Lord Lucan, and
Speaker 1: the Metropolitan Police have eliminated him from the investigation. However,
Speaker 1: Bharman still continues his search. Quote my mission is to
Speaker 1: keep my mother's memory very much alive and to seek justice,
Speaker 1: he states on his website. She is not quote just
Speaker 1: the nanny. She is a victim of a violent crime
Speaker 1: who became secondary because her killer was a lord, a
Speaker 1: lord who was protected and who vanished abroad with the
Speaker 1: aid of his rich and powerful friends, rather than face justice.
Speaker 1: Noble Blood is a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and
Speaker 1: Mild from Aaron Mankie. Noble Blood is created and hosted
Speaker 1: by me Dana Schwartz, with additional writing and researching by
Speaker 1: Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Mira Hayward, Courtney Sender and Lori Goodman.
Speaker 1: The show is edited and produced by Noemi Griffin and
Speaker 1: rima Il Kahali, with supervising producer Josh Thain and executive
Speaker 1: producers Aaron Manke, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.