Aftermath and Legacy for the Children

Hello there and welcome to Murder Mose British. I'm Zach. Hi, I'm Rachel. welcome back Well, today we are heading to Northeast Scotland. where a wealthy farmer, Maxwell Garvey, vanished from his home in West Carnbeg In May of nineteen sixty eight Well, for three months, no one knew where he was Then his body was found in an underground tunnel near Loriston Castle The case that followed would expose a marriage filled with control, violence, affairs, sex parties and one of the most sensational murder trials Scotland had ever seen Yeah, I've been looking forward to doing this case. I've been wanting to do it for a long time. As soon as I actually come across it, I was like, yes, gott to do it. got It is the It is the winner of our Patreon poll for the next Scotland case And I pretty much was like just like the last one. We we stacked it, you know with that one we like, Of course Eone's probably going to win. And I'm glad because I really wanted to do it, so Well it was I thought it was either going to be that one or the Beast of Birkenshaw Peter Manuel, shall be later on So Let's kid. I mean, ye, you know what Let's just get into it. We're both pretty excited. Very much excited for this cast. It wass just interesting and 's loads of different dynamics to it Well Before we begin If you enjoyed the episode, please just give us a like and subscribe on YouTube. Follow the show and leave us a five star rating, which wherever you listen, it genuinely helps Others discover our archives, so So This episode contains discussion of murder, domestic abuse, coercive control, and disturbing crime scene details Some listeners may find this contentistressing so listener discretion is strongly advised Let's get to the story So in the northeast of Scotland, behind sheltering trees and respectable stone walls. There was a house people whispered about long before anyone had banished Cars came and went Curtains stayed drawn, laughter spilled into the dark Then stopped when the doors closed To neighbours, it was gossip into the newspapers It would become a gift But inside that house, behind the jokes about sex parties and scandal There was a marriage curdling in private a woman running out of exits and a man who would soon disappear into the ground Long before the name Kinky cottage became a scandal. Maxwell Garvey and Sheila Watson looked like the kind of couple a small community could understand. He was handsome wealthy and rooted in the farming land of Incardanshare She was young, striking and had worked at Balmoral as an assistant housekeeper before later becoming a secretary they met at a young farmer's dance And by nineteen fifty five, they were married Sheila just eighteen years old and Maxwell was twenty one From the outside, it looked like a life moving exactly where it was supposed to go They settled at West Cambeg Maxwell's family's five bedroom farmhouse near Ford Dne and Lawrence Kirk withith room, money, land and promise Children followed, Wendy, Angela, and Lloyd Cars in the drive, comfort in the house, and all the signs of a family doing well in post war rural Scotland But Maxwell was not the muddy boots farmer of imagination Employers did much of the labor while he enjoyed the rewards. Status, money, leisure, and time to chase whatever bored rich men chase when ordinary life is no longer enough So first came fast cars, then came the private plane and even a flying club helping make him known locally as the flying farmer He would take to the skies after drinking heavily and swallowing tranquilizers Great idea Chasing danger over the North Sea with reckless hands free stunts. The farm gave him status. Not satisfaction The family gave him a home Pace Maxwell wanted sensation. admiration and the feeling that every room he entered could be made to turn around him Well at home, that appetite began to change the marriage Well, Maxwell developed a taste for pornography, nudism, affairs, and sexual games that pushed far beyond ordinary betrayal Sheila. was not simply being cheated on She was being pulled into a private world, her husband controlled He photographed her naked and showed her the pictures of her to other people He took her to Nudest places that she did not want to visit While she was pregnant with their third child, he took the whole family to a new discamp in Porsica. Well The holiday Sheila later remembered as hellish She did not want to go, but refusal had become dangerous in its own quiet way. Remember, folks Consent Kin sent is cake. Goodness gracious. You can't just force people to do something like that. I say Hey, we're going to Greece, you know, or whatever You know, I don't really want to go to Greece, you know That's a little different Hey, we're going to Cua to go to a new dis place, and we're gonna take the whole family and everybody's gotta be mate. I mate. Everybody has to be down for that ood j. Most defep. and to even see it, not even if they're not like getting naked themselves, but just rocking up on a Nudist beach and then just seeing all these people Absolutely naked. des. Yeah,. I definitely have to have consent from people This sounds like a wild holiday. Well, I guess I'm not sure that's really something you take your kids to, but no, I wouldn't need No. uh Well, that is where the later scandal can blur what was actually happening inside the marriage becausecause people would laugh about the nickname and the newspapers would have an absolute field day with the sex, the nudism, the parties and the gossip This was not just naughty rural misbehavior Sheila was being mocked pressured, controlled and humiliated Maxwell controlled the money made her feel unstable and taught her the saying no ering rage Yeah. I mean definitely need to ask your and a wife if this is something that you know, not push it onto you. Yeah, well, it's It's like, yeah, you want to do some things or whatever. And at that point, you just be like You know, we're on different paths. Yeah. You know, mayaybe it's time for us to split up or whatever. Um and see other people and Yeah or good, you know, husband, you do what you're inj, you know, what you were allowed to do and you know, But it's not kind have like persuasion, ye. Yeah, like an open relationship type of being forced into doing something like this this type of lifestyle and stuff is not the way to go. No Near Alford, a small property became the center of Maxwell's secret entertainment A triangle of trees and thick bushes around it looked ordinary enough in the part of Scotland where shelter from harsh weather made sense But they also screened place from prying eyes Behind them came nudist weekends, sex parties, wife swapping, heavy drinking and drug use What kind of private excess rural neighbours could only half imagine Locals notice the cars The visitors and the rumors and gave the place the name that would follow the case for decades Kinky cottage They're definitely taking that swing in sixties to the to its name there. Good God. Yeah You know you know, you can you can definitely say like the newspapers and that they're like Oh, this is, you know, oh gosh, sexon All this stuff But then when you dive deep into it and you find out Not everybody was down for it And then you're like Okay, that's not fun anymore, you know I mean, Kinky Cottage bght a name to give it, you know, it's Yeahah They definitely do come up with reat Y love like wordpl in this country it's so funny. Yeah very much So anyways, back back to it Maxwell's private life moved through both women and men offtten with the same relentless hunger that marked everything else he touched away from the farm He was an office bearer in the SNP And through those political circles, he met Brian Tevndale goodood looking bearded young man whose family was connected to the Bush Hotel near St. Cyrus Brian had attended Montreau's Academy and tried wireless college in Aberdeen before giving it up after his father had died A brief spell in the army ended after he went absent without leave and borrowed a car Maxwell invited him flying of brought him to the house and pulled him into that orbit of West Carnbg Hm Brian was invited back again and again Maxwell left him alone with Sheila then pressed her afterwards, asking whether they had slept together To Sheila, that crossed a line even in a marriage already distorted by partisan affairs. Then one night in nineteen sixty seven Maxwell forced the line himself. Sheila was pushed naked into Brian's room Sverren and exposed and told to spend the night there or else After that, Maxwell and Bryant tossed a coin to decide who would sleep with her When Maxwell lost, he insisted that all three go to bed together. That's definitely someone who's like, I don't lose I'm not like I lost the co a coin liip, but I win anyways because I'm going to force it to have all of us in the same, you know Yeah, and it's like just gets what he wants. Yeah then they've got no way of saying no because he's so forceful with you know manipulating them into doing what he wants. So But it just Yeah especially like, you know, when he's got rage and all that and she's like, I have to do this or I'm going to get assaulted you know There's no like good way. Either way. You know, it's either you just go and have sex with them or you get beat up. Awful. notot good But something escaped Maxwell's control, though. Sheila and Brian fell in love Or at least He didn't see that coming, did he? Jesus. Well, Or at least Sheila believed Brian could become a way out att the same time Maxwell began an affair with Brian's sister, Trudy Burst, whose own husband Fred was a police constable H. Trudy Trudy also saw Maxwell's violence close up. later recalling that one beating left her needing a surgical collar. Even Fred was drawn into the sexual circle with another woman arranged for him while the Garveys, Brian and Trudy tangled themselves into a four in a bed encounter Hmm. Wow When Maxwell, tired of Brying and Trudy, he wanted them discarded like every other diversion had bored him. Sheila refused. By then, Brian was no longer just another person passing through the house He had become the one person who seemed to offer a door out But Sheila tried to leave with Brian and the children takaking them to a hotel in Stonehaven Maxwell's answer was terror. He threatened to shoot them all And at another point threatened to shoot Sheila between the eyes Okay, that that's that's escalating it quite severely instead just meetetsings. I'm I'm going to shoot you Uh, well, there was another attempt, this time further away to Bradford But Sheila could not face the thought of losing the children. and she returned A violent assault left her in a neck brace And when she confided in her GP, the doctor phoned Maxwell and told him everything she said That's up. Come on. you're a doctor. Yeah. Doctor patient confidentiality, anyone But this is Yeah Yeah, this is the sixties, you know, you're just owned by your husband Well, she was on sleeping tablets living with terrible anxiety, while Maxwell treated her fear as proof that she was the unstable one A divorce lawyer in Aberdeen told her she was technically an adulteres and deserved no sympathy Even the local minister encouraged her to stay Sheila tried to leave and every exit seem to close. Well. Everybody man everybody there fail It just makes you think like, you know, like liiving now to living back then. you know, it just seems so different It's like he's beating on me. he's forcing me to do stuff, sexual stuff. And they werere just like, just stay with them My. By nineteen sixty eight, West Cambeg no longer looked like a great brand farmhouse It looked like a trap with lights in the windows. On the evening of the fourteenth of mayay, inside the house We' three children, a wife, with nowhere safe to turn and a husband whose appetites had turned his own home into a place where comfort had curuddled into threat Somewhere beyond the farmhouse, Bryant Heandell waited in the life Maxwell himself had helped invite him into through the door By morning, the ordinary world would be told that Maxwell Garvey had disappeared So on the night of the fourteenth of may of nineteen sixty eight, Maxwell was last seen around ten o'clock at an SNP meeting in Stonehaven Later, Westcarnbeg settled into darkness like any other farmhouse Wend Dy, Angela, and Lloyd were sent to bed early with Sheila warning them not to get up Whatever they heard downstairs. She drank gin and orange and waited Oside, Brian Tendale and Allan Peters were making their way towards the house Not for another party notot for another private game behind drawn curtains But for the sleeping man uppstairs. Well, in the early hours, Sheila let them in through the back door That access would become one of the most important facts in the case Brian and Allan were hidden inside while Maxwell slept in the bedroom above. was Maxwell's twenty two calibber rifle Taken from the house where he lived, and a pillow was ready to muffle sound Everything depended on quiet The children were nearby and the house was dark Morning was only a few hours away. Brian went upstairs to the bedroom Maxwell was asleep in the bed he had shared with Sheila earlier that night He was struck with the rifle, then shot at close range with the pillow pressed into the violence to keep the sound contained Bullet was small, but it did what it was meant to do In the darkness of West Carnbeg Maxwell Garvey was killed in his own bed Well, afterwards, there was no freedom On the practical horror of what they had done Downstairs with no shattertered. they drank through a bottle of whiskey Then Maxwell's body was wrapped in bedding and a blanket cararried from the room and loaded into the boot of Allan Peters's Ford The bedroom still held the traces of the killing, but the dead man had to be gone before the house woke up Yeah, that wouldn't be good, heaven Having his dead body there and the kids waking up finding it. Oh at least they were spared that. There's something ye, definitely kids should not be so seeing anything like that. They shouldn't be murdering somebody, but yeah. Yeah att least they shouldn't have in aur the children to see, you know. Yeah Well, they drove towards Lauriston Castle near St Cyrus, where Brian knew of an underground tunnel from childhood It was not an obvious place to search It was a hidden space reached by memory, and that was why it mattered The body was taken down into the channel and concealed beneath stones and debris Far from the farmhouse where Maxwell had gone to bed, as if the night would end like any other. Well, the work was filthy and clos Brian dropped into the inspection hole dragged Maxwell's body. in after him and then over the dead man to get back out. Later, he would describe the awful intimacy of it cheek brushhing Maxwell's face in the dark. A heavy stone slab was pulled across the body sailing him into the tunnel Whatever fantasy had carried them towards the night ended in damp stone and dead h What get you really Frushhing your cheek? No I mean, just sounds like something out of a movie, like a creepy movie. no Not for me Sometimes h The truth is stranger than fiction Yeah. I mean I've only seen one two dead bodies and that was my grandparents my great grandparent and a grandparent and They were both equally freaky and they just died of natural causet. Like Not a nice thing to be. If it'd be something different as someone that you knew that you had been You had done that. Yeah. And then you're hiding them, o wild. No. Okay. so back at West Cairnbg cover upp had to begin The bed, the mattress, the clothing, the marks of violence All of it threatened to expose the truth of once daylight came. The story had to be made ordinary before anyone could ask the right question Maxwell could not be dead. He had to be gone by his own choice And because he had built a life of drink, secrets, sudden flights, and reckless exits, The lie had somewhere to hide Yeah. I think you kind of tri to make out that You know, because he has gone off and D done st Yeah hes he's a man of' me Oh he's gone, you know, he's gone off and he'll be back in a few weeks or whver, do you know what I mean? likeike Oh he told me he's going here. So people wouldn't question it as much to be fair. Yeah Wh is you some time Yeah On the fifteenth of May, the farm still stood as if nothing had changed The children woke in the same house. Sheila was still there Maxwell was not low he had flown somewhere Perhaps he'd walked out had vanished into one of the storms that he' spent years creating around himself But Be long, police were being asked for a missing man Beneath stones in a tunnel near St. Cyrus The truth Tid. Well, at first, The story had just enough room to breathe Shea said Maxwell had just gone and that did not sound impossible He was wealthy, erratic, and known for sudden risks. The police gazette later described a man who spent freely, drank heavily, mixed tranquilizers with alcohol, dealt in pornography and belonged to Nudist camps Police even considered that he might have even left the country Quite a man disappearing from a farmhouse might have triggered suspicion faster, but Maxwell's life offered too many possible explanations His car was found parked across the runway at Fdon Flying Club putting attention back towards The flying life that he had already made him seem reckless. and unpredictable, but There were business contacts, private habits, rumours and a shadow Kinky cottage, pulling attention in different directions But for weeks, police were not just looking for a missing farmer They were trying to work out whether his disappearance belonged to scandal, impulse, flight, or something worse Psibilities were endless at that time. Yeah, yeah Here's the break. It came through Sheila's mother, Edith Watson By August Sheila had said enough to make Edith believe Brian Tevndale might know more than he had admitted. Edith went to the police and the investigation changed its course Until then, the case had been drifting through rumor and possibility Now it had begun to narrow around Brian West Cairn Bay placed hidden near St. Cyrus. Well Brian was brought in for questioning And under pressure, he broke. He had grown up near Sain Cyrus and knew an underground tunnel near Laoriston Castle from childhood. Now that old memory became the map police needed. It took the investigation away from speculation and gave it something solid Not a theory, not a rumour But a place where Maxwell might be found Detective inspector Alisair Smith was among the first to enter the tunnel The smell reached him before certainty did Beneath a pile of boulders lay something wrapped in what once had been a white sheet Three months after Maxwell had vanished from West Carbg His body was found underground near St. Cyrus covered with rocks and shut away from the world that had been searching for him Well, decomposition had taken a great deal but not everything Clothing remnants and dental records helped confirm Maxwell's identity. The skull showed the path of a bullet And the investigation moved back from the tunnel to the farmhouse Police now had to connect two scenes. The hidden place where Maxwell was found and the bedroom where he had last been seen alive Oh man, imagine J haaving to jump down there and I it to spe fair. once they opened it, the smell would have just been Horrendous, you know, so they would have known that there was something down there that o definitely dead.mistakable. Yeah. Oh God. I mean They do say, don't they? once you like with decomposition Once you smell it You will never ever forget that smell. Yeah. Anywways sorry Photographs fixed that route in black and white There was the tunnel near Loreistine Castle There was the car used to move the body. There was the bedroom at West Cirn Bg with blood spray marking the headboard There was Maxwell's rifle There was the x ray showing the bullet still inside his head The case was no longer about where Maxwell had gone It was all about how he had been carried from his bed to the ground Well one forensic detail gave the case its most Macre image. becausecause the body was so badly decomposed The skull became central to proving what had happened It was separated and sent to Abberdeen University's pathology department where it was boiled so the damage could be examined any It is a grim detail But it mattered In this case, Boone gave police what lies triried to bury Part of the cover up began to surface Trudy Burst and her husband, Fred had learned of the murder kept silent An old boy was a policeman as well Fred helped burn the blood soaked mattress along with Maxwell's clothing and identification. Later accounts would raise darker questions about Trudy too including claims that she lent Brian a car helped with his clothes and assisted in disposing of evidence One later theory went further, suggesting Trudy may have been more influence over the plot than the original investigation ever proved The circle around Maxwell's death was wider than the three names drawing attention from the police M. Well, at West Cambg Ordinary family life had and police work collided Wendy later remembered cooking potatoes when detectives arrived and took her away her father's guns. while Maxwell was still officially missing Well, in one police photograph outside the farmhouse Noid' bike and two cars sat near the house Sm signs of ordinary family life caught beside a murder inquiry Sheila was eventually taken for questioning too and officers remembered her calmness. The farmhouse still looked like a home, but the evidence was pulling it apart room by room The account did not line up cleanly Because Sheila denied knowing the full truth of what had happened Brian shifted responsibility towards her. Alan Peters part sat somewhere between fear, assistance and guilty knowledge By then, the investigation had moved beyond finding Maxwell It had become a question of Wh had opened doors who had carried secrets Wh had destroyed evidence and who had helped turn a disappearance into a murder By the seventeenth of August, the disappearance had become something else entirely Sheila Garvey was taken from West Camburg And Brian, Tevndell, and Allan Peters were arrested too Now, the farmhouse that had once seemed protected by money Privacy and gossip was now a crime scene with its walls opened up to scrutiny The story Sheila had offered that Maxwell had simply gone could not survive the tunnel, the blood, the rifle and the body beneath the stones. West Kenbeg had kept its secrets for three months, but now at last they were being dragged into the light At some point they're going to get you Gotem On the nineteenth of November of nineteen sixty eight, before Lord Thompson at Aberdeen High Court One of the most Fvered Scottish trials of the decade began It would run for ten days Outside, police put up crush barriers as hundreds queued for seats. And by the final day, some were lining up quarter to three in the morning just to get inside That's wild. Wow. insside, Sheila Garvey, thirty three Brian Evndale. One to two. And Allan Peters twenty Together in the Dck The public had come for murder, scandal and sex The court had to decide something colder. Well, Abdeen had seen this collision of sex, violence and public moraality before. Only five years earlier, Henry Bernet been hanged after a jealous shooting linked to in an affair Becoming the last man executed in Scotland Garvey trial brought an even more combustible mixture. a wealthy farmer his glamorous wife younger lovers, Nudism, drrugs, church groups, talking about sin and the whispered name of Kinky Cottage. Oh the press would be lapping this up I mean, just look at stuff now. Definitely a story that the newspapers would be all over. Sex drugs are rock and roll You can't get any and then murder Well, the court did not hear one clean account Sheila gave evidence for three days and maintained that Brian Tevndale and Allen Peters had appeared that night. killed Maxwell and removed the wadody while she was had know nothing of a murder plan beforehand. Brian pushed responsibility back towards Sheila presenting himself as a young man led by love and obsession Allan Peters gave a more detailed version that Sheila let them into the house sererve them drinks hid them in a guest bedroom Then signaled when Maxwell was asleep accccording to him she guarded the children's bedroom while Brian went in with the rifle The case against Sheila rested on access, silence and what happened before and after Maxwell vanished. t First, police had been working with Brian's claim that Sheila had shot Maxwell. and he had only helped dispose the body But once Brian emerged as the killer, Crown's case against Sheila had to sit somewhere else in what she had allegedly allowed, what she failed to stop. and what she helped hide. Now the court heard that she let the men into West Cirbg It hit them inside, handed them Maxwell's twenty two rifle and watched from the bedroom doorway as the violence unfolded crazy how they're just, turning on each other. Yeah They're like, oh, no, they she shot him. No, he shot him. I think there is a thing She let us in. I didn't know anything about it. I think there's a specific name for that type of thing. can't remember what the what the judge it prosecutors and defense lawyers actually call it, but there is a specific term for this type of Let just know in the comments. Yeah. She forget. I can't remember what it is, but I know there is A term Okay, so for Brian, the issue was more direct He was the young lover Maxwell had brought into the household then lost control of. His account shifted, but the physical evidence Fixed him to the night, the rifle, the bedroom. bullet, the body and the tunnel near St. Cyrus Whatever he felt for Sheila The crown placed him inside another man's house in the early hours, armed with that man's rifle beforefore Maxwell was carried away dead Well, Allan Peters remained the most uncertain figure in the dock He was just twenty years old, tied to Brian And in the strangest detail, a young man Maxwell had never met He was connected to the journey to West Kirnbeg The movement of the body and the concealment that followed But he was not involved with the people at the center of the case. The court had to decide whether he had been a frightened helper a witness trapped by stronger personalities or a participant in murder. It sounds like he just got caught up into the wrong situation. You know, you got a friend or something. Oh man, you got to help me out with this He maybe just easily led didn't really fully understand what was going on en came the evidence no newspaper could turn into a dirty joke Police photographs showed the tunnel near Laoreiston Castle and the card used to carry Maxwell away. Bedroom at West Cernbeg The rifle and bullet fragments tied the violence to Maxwell's own house Most disturbing of all was the yellowed skull prepared because dec composition had made the body difficult to read. thenen brought into court in a hat box. When it was produced One juror fainted I think I would too, especially with the boiled it in order to I mean, there's there's a difference between seeing something like a prop, you know, or a little plastic skull, but just a murder victim skull being shown and all especially in the sixties, you know And I used to all out. Yeah. well, outside that evidence, the newspapers kept feeding on the scandal. Sheila became for a time, the most famous woman in the country clothes, grooming, glamour and sexuality were picked over as if they were evidenced in themselves. One tabloid remarked that the pretty well groomed woman in the dog hardly looked like a murderer. The part was not that the sexual world around West Cambeg was irrelevant, it was that the scandal was easier to sell than the coercion and violence inside her marriage Oh yeah. I mean, just All you have to do is look back at like the OJ trial U you had the prosecutor Mercia Clark. They were all over her like what she did and then she changed her hair and they just ripped her apart in It messed with her You know And it's like, None of that matters Pople are dead. Exactly. you know, like with the OJ trial, it was like Wh cares what this prosecutor lady is wearing Like focus on what is supposed to be focused on suuperficial crap Ugh Okay, so the lawyers built two versions of Sheila from the broken materials. And one, she was a woman damaged by years of fear and degradation. trapped in a night that had spun beyond her control In the other, she was the calculating center of the plan. a wife who wanted a freedom Brian and Maxwell's money Court also pointed to alleged earlier talk of methods before the shooting, including Poisoning and an insurance salesman testified that she stood to receive more than fifty five thousand pounds along with the house Farm income and three family cars Wellll be quite a bit back back in them time. Oh yeah Well, that was the uncomfortable space that the jury had to sit in. Maxwell could have been cruel and still have been murdered. Sheila could have been abused and still have helped bring about his death Brian could have been young and infatuated and still responsible for entering the house, taking up the rifle and leaving with a body to hide The courourt was not there to decide whether West Kermbg been rotten It was there to decide who had crossed the line into murder Then came the verdicts And we are in Scotland after all So you probably know what's coming if you've heard some of our previous episodes For Allan Peters, the case ended. with Scotlands. Unneeasy third answer not proven He walked from court legally cleared Noough The shadow of the Kight remained around his name Brian Heansdale, the decision was unanimous guuilty for murder And for Sheila It was a majority guilty of murder The woman, the newspapers had turned into a symbol Wife, lover, victim, villain was now a convicted murderer Well, Sheila Garvey and Brian Tendaell were sentenced to life imprisonment By nineteen sixty eight, Scotland had moved beyond the rope But a life sentence still carried its own cold finality For Sheila, the verdict meant leaving West Cenbeg not as the trapped wife that she had been, but as a convicted murderer Brian, it meant the love affair he claimed had overwhelmed him ended not in escape but in prison The courtroom emptied, the crowds outside drifted away And the story that had filled Aberdeen with scandal passed into punishment Well, Sheila and Brian kissed goodbye while handcuffed And never sa each other again. correct. D the. Star struck her was it the u Starcross lovers. Romeo and Juliette, you know They smooched never saw each other again. For a moment, there was talk of a marriage and all that in trying to get permission Th then she l said No, I'm done now I have decided to have nothing more to do with you ever again is letter. wrrote a letter. Yeah Dot Dear John letter Sorry, budd Brian later believed she had written it because she was being denied access to her children. Whatever the reason. The affair that had once looked like aescape Ended, separated behind locked doors Well Sheila served her sentence at Corunton? Vil while Brian began his at Perf prrison Both served around ten years before their release in nineteen seventy eight. ten years ten years tenen years. That's it. for murder. I mean, this is a life sentence as well. you know, it's like, well, you know, surely ten years. twenty five to life What what end Do you know, sentencing is absolutely shocking. in the sixties, early seventies Even now, it's still shocking how light they are over here. I mean, I can I can understand Brian. He pulled the trigger twenty five to life you know, with With Sheila, I can think, okay She didn't pull the trigger, but she gave gave him access. so maybe sort of like a a manslaughter charge of This is compleplist to murderah. You know, ten years for her, probably. Maybe a little bit more Ten years. Yeah That's crazy. Well Obviously, upon release, Brian later married, become a pub landlord He died suddenly at his home in Sone in two thousand three whichich was just days before he was due to leave Scotland for a new life in Gambia Loo back, he said that he had been stupid, naive, and probably in love He also later admitted that he had been the one to pull the trigger while still claiming the plan had been Sheila's idea. and saying he had been put under her spell Listen, I've never been in love enough to where I'm going to murder somebody. Well he's saying he was probably in love, I mean. I'm probably You're not even certain that you're in love with this woman yet. She's gonna, you know coerce you into murdering her husband is Odd, veryer, very odd Probably love. clelearly not mate. Nah. Well, okay, so Alan Peters lived under a different shadow. He had walked away from the court legally cleared. after the not proven verdict But his name remained attached to one of Scotland's most notorious cases He was still the young man in the background. Brian's friend, drawn into the night, remembered less clearly than Sheila and Brian, but nevertheless you know, entire he was entirely not entirely free of that story And then he died of cancer in two thousand seven Sheila's life after prison was quieter but never ordinary In nineteen seventy nine, she married Rhodesian born welder David McGllan Though the marriage lasted only two years Later, she married drilling engineer Charles Mitchell That marriage appears to have been happier until his death in nineteen ninety two She ran her aunt's guest house in Aberdeen and later a sea Frp bed and brereakfast in Stonehaven, close to the world that once made her notorious In nineteen eighty, she published Marriage to Murder my story and continued to deny the version of events that had fixed itself in public memory And for those people who don't know Rhodesia It is now what is called Zimbabwe in Africa used to be a colony and all that But yeah, she wrote a book, Wild. Yeah I was like So did OJ. A lot of people do though, don't they that you know, let's write about my story and make a couuple of quid and you know But anyways By then, the public had already made Sheila into something simple Glamorous wife, the lover, the Lady Macbeth The Femfitu Those labels stuck because they were easy dramatic and salable. They turned a complicated life into a wicked portrait. Apart from her book, She said little publicly about the case again. Laving the old image to settle around her Well the longest cost fell on Maxwell and Sheila's children On the night of the murder, Wendy was twelve, Angerew were eleven and Lloyd was only four Wendy had been watching the Avengers, lost in the harmless world of John Steed When her mother sent the children to bed early and told them not get up After the trial, one reporter went to West Cenbg ound a farmhouse Whyet. The children's home made swing hanging limp on the lawn The children first lived with their grandmother After her death a year later, they were fostered in Lanarkshire So years later, Wendy said she forgave her mother Forgiveness did not make the past clean Shortly before the murder, she had seen Sheila kissing Brian and promised not to tell As an adult She wondered whether speaking up might have changed anything. She also looked back on the months while Maxwell was missing as the most defining period of her life crying for him missing him and hearing the world reduce him to a monster Her father had been difficult and domineering, she said But nothing was ever That's simple Yeah, and, you know He was probably a good father, you know, like not too Sometimes that's how it is, you know, like He might be difficult with the mom and and being a little domineering to but he's probably nicer to the kids. Yeah, you know, and but it's still her dad. I mean, we obiously we've, you know, research and stuff, there's nothing to say that he was, you know, violent to the children. I think. So And it's her dad. of course she's gonna to miss him, you know Yeah When police came for Sheila, Wendy remembered her mother saying,Qote, I won't be long, I love you. She did not see her again until she was grown. The legacy followed Wendy into adulthood, damaging relationships with her siblings, her marriage, and even her own daughter. Money could not mend it Nook a distance. What had happened in West Kenbeg had not ended when the trial ended, it had simply moved into the lives of the children left behind Wendy's memory is cut through the dirty glamour attached to the case. The sexual world around West Karnbeg was not just Candle For the children, it left wounds. Wendy later remembered being made to undress at new displaces, ashamed of her body, and aware of older men watching By eleven, she said, She was already taking slimming pills tryrying to become the child her father wanted Why entertained strangers had begun for her humiliation. Yes. So, you know, we said at the time You know, no children should be going through a noody age. at all you know, that must have been horrendous for her to experience and she's already trying swimming pills in that to look Yeah She should be having fun and riding her bike around with her friends and shit That is definitely something disgusting that Hey, you know, made the family do that, especially the children Well, in later life, Sheila developed Alzheimer's disease. In care, she seemed pulled back into the years around Maxwell's death Speaking of prison, her husband Brian and the children as if time had folded in on itself She still referred to Brian as her boyfriend and still seemed to think Wendy, Angela, and Lloyd were young children being looked after elsewhere Even then she maintained that she had not known what was going to happen taken part in the killing itself Those who knew her Neith the to the end also saft beer still close to the surface. when another resident called was mentioned aloud She reacted with terror skin and covering her ears Oh, goodness. I think this the thing with Alzheimer's and dementia, you know, they do tend to revert back to they really childhood when their children as well, you know, and they're talking to their parents which are obviously not there, but horrible Horrible. but And then also being frightened in that and Aful Sheila Garby died in November of twenty fourteen Aged to eighty After years marked by Alzheimer's disease, her death was reported as a suspected heart attack By then, most of the people at the center of the case were gone The story had not loosened its grip Pinky Cottage remained one of those names Scotland remembers with a shiver and a smirk the same time Wealth, sex, jealousy, violence, hypocrisy, and a woman u too whom the public could project every fear It already carried Modern reassessments have not erased Maxwell Garvey's murder And they should not. A man was killed in his bed, hidden in a tunnel and left beneath stones. Nor has the case been formally overturned or legally reopened The years have changed the questions people ask about Sheila about how much the original investigation understood or chose to understand Ab the world around West Kerbeg So the old picture of a cold manipulator now sits beside another A woman trapped in coercion, gaslighting public mockery Private fear and the daily pressure. That left her reaching for drink and tranquilizers just to endure it Under modern coercive control laws Parts of Maxwell's behavior might have been recognized very differently Later writers have also questioned whether police looked closely enough at people around Brian and Trudy Burth One later argument went further still. suggesting a modern court might have seen Sheila's role as closer to culpable homicide then straightforward murder Yeah, That's what I was saying, you know, accessible to murder like Yeah wor accessories. That's the one. Yeah, ye. ye, you know, so Westkenberg did not vanish with the headlines decades later, the farmhouse where the Garveys had lived and where Maxwell was killed cameay back into public view when it was put on the market in twenty fifteen By then, it was owned by Loyit, the little boy who had only been four years old when his father was murdered Two years later, It appeared again, this time on the rental market for one thousand seven hundred pounds per month The house had survived the scandal but not escaped it That is why the case still feels unsettled It was solved Punished and endlessly reported Yet It never became simple Maxwell was murdered. Sheila was convicted Brian carried the violence with him Ellen walked away under a cloud The children carried them ruins at West Cairnbg with its whispered nickname Darkened rooms remains the place where respectability rotted from the inside until nothing be hidden anymore And that was the story of the murder of Maxwell Garvey Pinky cottage Whooy. Wow. That a wild. That's lovely that obviously Lloyd was only four when when the murder took place and you know, he's G, he's obvious least the house grown up in the house and, you know It was was the house. Yeah was It was like because it was Maxwell's family. Yeah. ye. It was Maxwell's family. so they just kind of passed down Yeah. and he's like, yeep, I'm done with it. Wow. Sold it off. We could have rented it, but I don't think we could have afford that seventeen hundred Yeah, that's a bit much. And I don't know about moving to Scotland, E would be fair. No. It's too open for me. There's too many fields and landscapes. beautiful. You'd love it. No. Let's built a hubbourhouse. I like built up areas And I like being close to a hospital Copy that Yeah, it's, you know Like we said with with her, I would say more of like what they said with like a couple of homicide. It shouldn't have been murder She was being controlled and manipulated and coerced and into things, even the, you know, like we said with kids Yeah. It shouldn't have been murder. In my opinion, I think like ten years was a good good sentence for her and her role in the situation. Sugarman, you know, not so much. Yeah No, he should have got a lot longer than ten years. Oh yeah. To me, that sentence was just diabolical But you guys probably already know by now I'm very for life for life, you know. So Yeah. I'm pretty brutal like that guys, okay, you know, But each their own Yeah I mean, I think there's there's a difference with different crimes and stuff. You know, I know that people do They say They criticize the American justice system and stuff like that Like, I'm I'm really critical of like plea agreements and that because people are being forced um into plea agreements saying if you don't do this, you know You're going to get twenty years. Well we'll give you five and that's horrible. obviously we have a room here as well, don't we? And I think, you know gives them with the pleading guilty Oh when you get a lesser sentence it's like You know, what if they were innocent and they've been crying that they it will, you know Not necessarily literally crying, but They've been shouting to them saying, I did not do this There You know, they're being forced to take a plea deal and say they're guilty just so that they don't have a huge sentence. And it's yeah, but so many people that are innocent Do that in order to J just to get dugged done and over with. But on the flip side, we're in America because they have cash bill. So unless you have the money Bail You're stuck in there Yeah And the and it could be it could be a year, two years, three, you know, how how long are you going to just sit in there? Yeah. And if they say, well, Instead of doing twenty five, you're going to do five Yeah. you want to just do a couple more years. Yeah And that's Terrible You should you should not You know, spend time in jail like that. No, no, no, no. Anyways So Thank you so very, very much for listening. It's been amazing ride so far, We're coming up on our one year anniversary of Yay. doing this? Not too far, notot too far away So if you'd like to support the work we do here in the archive, you can join us on Patreon for ad free main episodes, which are twenty four hours early release. and exclusive bonus cases, Q and A's, live streams and access to our Dcord community Yeah. Well, if you enjoyed this episode, please like the video, subscribe on YouTube, follow the podcast and leave us a fiveib star rating Whver you listen It genuinely helps others discover the stories that we tell here You'll find everything from Patreon, Discord and socials all in our link tree below Check it out and until next week, stay safe and stay curious Bye bye And now for our Patreon Ravens Council So these are our top tier which is Ruby Tucker, nineteen fifty six Clair Extremam plunge Misky forty five Kelly and candy Thank you so much. for joining us and joining our top tier We really, really appreciate it. Well, thank you guys, thank you for joining us. Thank you, byye bye. Its take care It's so funny