‘Pinterest is an American image sharing and social media service designed to enable saving and discovery of information on the internet using images, and on a smaller scale, animated GIFs and videos, in the form of pinboards.’ Not my words but those of Wikipedia. I had heard of Pinterest, but until I looked it up tonight I had no idea what it was. Paul Ansell, the partner of Nicola Bulley, knows about Pinterest because he has an account. Disgracefully, it was hacked and filled with ‘explicit photos’. I don’t wish to speculate on exactly what kind of ‘explicit photos’ they were, but it’s safe to assume they were deeply unpleasant. There aren’t half some sick people about these days.
While Ms Bulley’s disappearance brought out the best in people – and I include in this frontline police officers who searched night and day for evidence and some of whom had to drag her dead body from the river – it also brought out the worst. Conspiracy theorists, sick voyeurs, brain dead loons attacking Ms Bulley, Mr Ansell in cyberspace, the media, especially the gutter press, as well as ITV and Sky, which has shamed itself throughout, fake psychic mediums (all psychic mediums are fake, by the way) pretending to know where Ms Bulley would be found and, sadly senior police officers who will need to review how abysmally they handled the shambolic PR side of the investigation. It was just so horrible to watch.
I kept hearing normally sane people explaining how there was something dodgy about her disappearance and, yes, I heard people casting suspicion about Mr Ansell, on the basis of no evidence whatsoever. And that was just in my life. It will have been the same everywhere.
The Mail – who else? – decided the most important subject was what Det Supt Rebecca Smith looked like and wore. Amanda Platell tweeted: ‘Detective Superintendent Rebecca Smith at press conference yesterday – skin tight navy dress, stilettos, poker straightened hair – whatever happened to a cop uniform! Or is she auditioning for Love Island for midlifers. Show some respect for a missing mother!’ Petronella Wyatt, one of Boris Johnson’s ex wives who clearly knows a thing or two about people’s appearances, tweeted: ‘Detective Superintendent Rebecca Smith seems to be using Nicola Bulley’s disappearance as a excuse to showcase her toned physique. Who wears a sleeveless dress in February? To those who say, does it matter what people wear to work? Yes, it does, when they are police officers.’ This was the level of journalism offered by the best-selling ‘newspaper’ in the land. Is it any wonder that plenty of other people lost their minds, too?
And all this stuff was going on when the dead body of a woman was being washed down a tidal river. The police, who were slaughtered by sections of the media and a large swathe of social media, were right in their initial theory. If their presentation left a lot to be desired, then the accuracy of their assessment was spot on.
Ms Bulley’s family has asked to be left alone to grieve and come to terms with what has happened to her. I suppose I haven’t helped much by blogging about it but at least my readership is usually measured in double figures and not in millions. Sky and ITV should hang their heads in shame for contacting the family after a body was found when asked not to. Do these people never think: would I want that to happen if she was their mum, their partner, their friend? Or does the relentless pursuit of that exclusive story mean that being kind and showing some respect doesn’t come into it?
Most of us were interested in the story because we are human beings. And most of us didn’t judge Ms Bulley, nor made wild assertions about her disappearance when no evidence existed. In our hearts, we all felt strongly that it would end like this but we held out hope, even when we knew there was very little hope left. We may never know what led to this tragedy but I don’t suppose it will prevent amateur detectives and twisted ghouls making up their own versions of events. If these people aren’t ashamed of themselves for their behaviour, then they must have hearts of stone who will never have feelings for anyone else. Seriously: how could they?
