UK UK - Sarah Everard, 33, London - Clapham Common area, 3 March 2021

[arrogantcat]

My brain keeps snagging on her phone.

The most logical explanation is that it simply ran out of battery. But what a miserable and unfortunate coincidence to run out of battery on the important part of the one walk where it could have been vital for her to have it with her, if only for tracking purposes. Presumably an attacker could not have known such a thing.

It seems unlikely that in a potential scramble with an attacker/ being bundled into a vehicle/ etc, that someone would have the time to find her phone and turn it off. Turning an iPhone off is surprisingly faffy these days, and they’d need her access code to switch it to airplane mode or similar.

Destroying a phone to the point it can no longer ping, either accidentally in a struggle or deliberately, is also not the easiest of tasks.

If this *were* an intentional disappearance on her part, turning off her phone would probably make the most sense. But for it still not to have been turned on in the subsequent days still gives a sinking feeling, even if it was under her own volition.

 

[Parmalade]

I've had a quick look at what the police have revealed and my first thought is something seems to have happened between the CCTV at the junction of Poynders/A205/Cavendish roads and the junction of Kings Avenue/A205 (there is a traffic cam here that points right at the pavement:https: A205 Poynders Road / Kings Avenue CCTV | London Traffic Cameras.) .

Good find, and I’d agree that would be a good next port of call, and maybe also the Clapham Park Londis on Poynders Parade just after Clarence Ave junction if it has CCTV and, even if it can’t stretch to the A205 to catch SE (or a potential perp) walking by, could be used to see if there are any individuals or vehicles about close to 9:25pm to 9:35pm that could be spoken to further.

 

[ElizaKate]

I've had a quick look at what the police have revealed and my first thought is something seems to have happened between the CCTV at the junction of Poynders/A205/Cavendish roads and the junction of Kings Avenue/A205 (there is a traffic cam here that points right at the pavement:https: A205 Poynders Road / Kings Avenue CCTV | London Traffic Cameras.) .

Great info about the CCTV placement thanks!

My only counter would be, based on the fact she's been seen on a private doorbell camera I would speculate she's walking on the right hand side path (towards Tulse Hill) closer to the houses and therefore could possibly be out of shot of this CCTV camera which covers the other side mostly.

 

[ElizaKate]

My brain keeps snagging on her phone.

It seems unlikely that in a potential scramble with an attacker/ being bundled into a vehicle/ etc, that someone would have the time to find her phone and turn it off. Turning an iPhone off is surprisingly faffy these days, and they’d need her access code to switch it to airplane mode or similar.

Destroying a phone to the point it can no longer ping, either accidentally in a struggle or deliberately, is also not the easiest of tasks.

Snipped.

Good points. Perhaps if a perpetrator is involved via car, it would lead you to think more than one person involved. Driver and kidnapper. Thinking to turn off the phone almost instantly implies it's well thought out/planned.

 

[Vera_dci]

What if the phone was discarded on a road and a car ran over it? Just my thoughts.

 

[Parmalade]

My brain keeps snagging on her phone.

The most logical explanation is that it simply ran out of battery. But what a miserable and unfortunate coincidence to run out of battery on the important part of the one walk where it could have been vital for her to have it with her, if only for tracking purposes. Presumably an attacker could not have known such a thing.

It seems unlikely that in a potential scramble with an attacker/ being bundled into a vehicle/ etc, that someone would have the time to find her phone and turn it off. Turning an iPhone off is surprisingly faffy these days, and they’d need her access code to switch it to airplane mode or similar.

Destroying a phone to the point it can no longer ping, either accidentally in a struggle or deliberately, is also not the easiest of tasks.

If this *were* an intentional disappearance on her part, turning off her phone would probably make the most sense. But for it still not to have been turned on in the subsequent days still gives a sinking feeling, even if it was under her own volition.

It’s possible that the phone was stolen in a precursor attack or an attack gone wrong, or a premeditated one. I think the sim being removed is what would stop a phone pinging with other masts, meaning the c.9:30pm final ping could mean the phone was still with SE for a while longer (but not long enough to reach another mast) and may have still had battery (and instead the sim was removed by a perp before it could ping a mast again). The flaw here is whether the phone/sim would have pinged the same mast if SE hadn’t moved much or the phone still had battery. So it does point to a sim removal and/or battery damage/flatlining around 9:30pm, unless the interval of pings is a relatively long time. I’ve found an article from 2019 (ie contemporary?) that suggests a phone will only ping the same mast every 8 hours or so if not used (ie phone call ends, then not used again to send message or use internet, if the phone is not moved to a new mast, it will not ping again for 8 hrs).

Edit: In summary, it’s possible the phone was still on (battery wise) but just not used between the final call to the partner and a perp removing the sim (easier than knowing to/attempting to turn it off/damage the phone), and that this timeframe could have been long enough for SE to continue past Clarence Ave/AR Gardens but just not to the next mast en route - where this next mast would be (ie how useful this theory might be) I have no idea.

 

[TheTruthWillOut]

Or perhaps her battery ran out during the phone call with her partner. Maybe she told him her battery was low and it subsequently died.

Presuming that phone call ended 21:28 and the last sighting is now reference as 21:30, perhaps her phone battery died but she was still okay at that point.

Can the difference between a battery dying and a phone being intentionally switched off be determined without having the handset I wonder?

I guess it is possible the battery ran out but how often does that really happen these days with how long phone batteries last, being able to charge them anywhere a USB outlet is and the fact they start warning of low battery at 15/20% which would mean lasting a good while beyond?

I *think* if you let the battery run completely out then I assume it is the same as it being destroyed/waterlogged and shuts off in a different way than via the power button on the phone?

 

[sundaaaay]

The footage could have been obtained from the row of houses just beyond the Londis Clapham Park, which would place her past Agnes Riley Gardens

 

[ElizaKate]

View attachment 287383

The footage could have been obtained from the row of houses just beyond the Londis Clapham Park, which would place her past Agnes Riley Gardens

The reports states "from the junction of Cavendish Rd" though. Admittedly I did the same thing to the houses around the junction and couldn't spot one but doesn't mean there's not one there now, or it's not in view of streetview.

 

[JosephineRobert]

People who ring it are getting a voicemail asking to call back between 09.30hrs and 17.30hrs!!!
As if the police just work office hours! Should be 24/7 in cases like this!!

I didn’t think we had tip lines in the UK? On the police requests for info I’ve seen they ask people to call 101 which is the non-emergency number for the police. It then puts you through to your local force. Lines manned 24/7.

Having said that, the one time I called it in the past I gave up after it rang for 30mins with no answer! I found an email address for my local station though and to be fair an officer emailed me back the next day to follow up on what I had reported.

 

[Parmalade]

The reports states "from the junction of Cavendish Rd" though. Admittedly I did the same thing to the houses around the junction and couldn't spot one but doesn't mean there's not one there now, or it's not in view of streetview.

I had a similar exchange with another poster earlier - do you think the use of the word “from” is a bit clunky in that it could mean literally from that location, or also akin to ‘CCTV on the A205 from the Cavendish Rd junction’ where the use of “from” here is to describe the stretch of A205 after the junction rather than, to compare, the stretch of A205 before the Cavendish Road junction?

 

[Audiohoney]

I guess it is possible the battery ran out but how often does that really happen these days with how long phone batteries last, being able to charge them anywhere a USB outlet is and the fact they start warning of low battery at 15/20% which would mean lasting a good while beyond?

I *think* if you let the battery run completely out then I assume it is the same as it being destroyed/waterlogged and shuts off in a different way than via the power button on the phone?

I’d considered the same and my iPhone 12 is great even with constant usage I probably have a good 20-30% remaining by bedtime. BUT my iPhone 10 was a nightmare. It definitely required charging at least once during the day. Perhaps she hadn’t done so and if her friend didn’t have an iPhone cable the phone call to the partner might have been enough to flatten it.

Do you think it’s possible to tell the difference between somebody using the power off button and it being shut off in a different way without having access to the physical handset? Can a mobile phone provider supply that sort of information?

Thinking about other suggestions of the SIM being removed too, but on an iPhone that’s pretty fiddly and requires at least a safety pin or similar to accomplish. A kidnapper / attacker would have to really be putting some forethought into doing so.

 

[sundaaaay]

I’m inclined to now think it was along this stretch of road as opposed to exactly at the junction! But I could be wrong

 

[MsMiniSleuth]

I didn’t think we had tip lines in the UK? On the police requests for info I’ve seen they ask people to call 101 which is the non-emergency number for the police. It then puts you through to your local force. Lines manned 24/7.

Having said that, the one time I called it in the past I gave up after it rang for 30mins with no answer! I found an email address for my local station though and to be fair an officer emailed me back the next day to follow up on what I had reported.

Crimestoppers is a tip line - and linked to this case.

Anyone who has seen Sarah or who has information that may assist the investigation should call the Incident Room on 0208 785 8244.

Information can also be provided to detectives using the Major Incident Portal or by calling Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111.

 

[ElizaKate]

I had a similar exchange with another poster earlier - do you think the use of the word “from” is a bit clunky in that it could mean literally from that location, or also akin to ‘CCTV on the A205 from the Cavendish Rd junction’ where the use of “from” here is to describe the stretch of A205 after the junction rather than, to compare, the stretch of A205 before the Cavendish Road junction?

Yeh perhaps I should read too much specificity into it but technically that stretch of the A205 before the Cavendish Rd Junction is called Cavendish Rd. The stretch after the junction is called "Poynders Avenue" which is the rd they state she was on.

Edit: *shouldn't
Edit: In hindsight I think the wording was just trying to clarify the direction in which she was travelling

 

[JosephineRobert]

Crimestoppers is a tip line - and linked to this case.

Anyone who has seen Sarah or who has information that may assist the investigation should call the Incident Room on 0208 785 8244.

Information can also be provided to detectives using the Major Incident Portal or by calling Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111.

Ahhh I see! One would hope anyone with genuine information and a modicum of sense would call 999 if they were unable to get through elsewhere.

 

[mrjitty]

The whole business about the phone is complicated IIRC

e.g. if the phone is turned off, it will normally 'sign off" with the tower so the tower knows not to allocate resource to it, then shake hands with the best tower when it is turned on again. A phone also still has active radio and GPS even without SIM - I wonder if this kind of detailed work is not complete or released yet?

Be interesting to know if it simply went dark

 

[Parmalade]

Thinking about other suggestions of the SIM being removed too, but on an iPhone that’s pretty fiddly and requires at least a safety pin or similar to accomplish. A kidnapper / attacker would have to really be putting some forethought into doing so.

My thinking was that a perp who intends to steal phones would know that removing the sim would be essential (as the owner can lock the phone remotely from another device when they got home, rendering it useless to the thief), and so maybe would carry a pin type object. It could have been a mugging gone wrong, or something more sinister and the perp still chose to remove the sim to ensure their tracks beyond that point were harder to find. Not sure: battery or damage in an attack or disposal is still a strong argument. My old iPhone used to lose battery in the cold too. If SE was using her phone like she was in the CCTV still to call her partner (ie externally, not from a warm pocket using headphones), it could have killed the battery even quicker than she herself was expecting.

 

[ElizaKate]

The whole business about the phone is complicated IIRC

e.g. if the phone is turned off, it will normally 'sign off" with the tower so the tower knows not to allocate resource to it, then shake hands with the best tower when it is turned on again. A phone also still has active radio and GPS even without SIM - I wonder if this kind of detailed work is not complete or released yet?

Be interesting to know if it simply went dark

Interesting insight. I don't know enough about how these things work.

How would a phone "simply [go] dark"?

 

[mrjitty]

Or perhaps her battery ran out during the phone call with her partner. Maybe she told him her battery was low and it subsequently died.

Presuming that phone call ended 21:28 and the last sighting is now reference as 21:30, perhaps her phone battery died but she was still okay at that point.

Can the difference between a battery dying and a phone being intentionally switched off be determined without having the handset I wonder?

There would certainly be clues in the network data

e.g if the phone is connected to the network handling a call but then the call suddenly terminates and the phone is never seen on the network again - that would indicate that the phone dropped during the call.

that would look different to the phone being switched off.

I am not sure how long this kind of analysis takes