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On the trial's impact on the Dowler family: "What happened to the Dowlers and their view afterwards, the reputational loss to their family and the damage to their family was too high a price to pay for justice.”
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On the nature of the killer: "Bellfield ultimately is a coward... Somebody who is very skilled at making black, white and white, black. And a slippery character, as you would expect."
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On the necessity of the prosecution “The idea when you have a sufficiency of evidence against an individual like Levi Bellfield that you don't prosecute him for one of the most notorious cases of the past 20, 30 years simply because he's already serving a whole life sentence is unthinkable. And no justice system should ever countenance that, and one wouldn't.”
NEW PODCAST SERIES LAUNCHES: Inside the Case
First episode: "In the Blink of an Eye" - the prosecution of Milly Dowler's murderer Levi Bellfield
A powerful new podcast series by Frances Gibb and The University of Law (ULaw), Inside the Case, launches today, taking viewers and listeners behind the scenes of the UK’s most significant criminal and constitutional legal battles.
Each episode will focus on one high-profile trial, looking at the challenges in securing justice and the wider reverberations from the point of view of one of the key legal players involved.
The inaugural episode features an interview with Brian Altman KC, the barrister who led the prosecution of serial killer Levi Bellfield for the abduction and murder of 13-year-old Milly Dowler.
In a candid and detailed discussion, Altman describes the professional and emotional weight of prosecuting one of "the most notorious cases of the past 20, 30 years".
Milly Dowler Case: an “abiding tragedy"
Speaking to journalist Frances Gibb for the inaugural episode of the series hosted by ULaw, Brian Altman KC discusses the high-stakes, purely circumstantial case against Bellfield for the 2002 murder of Milly Dowler.
Bellfield was already serving a whole life sentence for the murders of Marsha McDonnell and Amélie Delagrange and the attempted murder of Kate Sheedy.
Altman reveals why prosecuting the Dowler case, even with Bellfield already behind bars, was fundamentally necessary:
“The idea when you have a sufficiency of evidence against an individual like Levi Bellfield that you don't prosecute him for one of the most notorious cases of the past 20, 30 years simply because he's already serving a whole life sentence is unthinkable. And no justice system should ever countenance that, and one wouldn’t.”
He reflects on the profound human cost of the trial for Milly's parents, Bob and Sally Dowler: “What happened to the Dowlers and their view afterwards, the reputational loss to their family and the damage to their family was too high a price to pay for justice for Milly, was for me an abiding tragedy, actually, and an indictment on the criminal justice system.”
Inside the Levi Bellfield Trial: The Man and the Murder
Mr. Altman, one of the country's most experienced criminal lawyers, offers a sharp assessment of Bellfield, whom he cross-examined during his first trial.
On Levi Bellfield's character:
"Bellfield ultimately is a coward.”
He is "a liar,” he says. “Somebody who is very skilled at making black, white and white, black."
He was "a very sophisticated, savvy criminal" who "understood surveillance and he operated anti-surveillance techniques and trade craft in effect."
The complex, circumstantial case:
Bellfield was only charged with Milly’s murder in 2010, eight years after her death in March 2002. Her body was found six months later, 25 miles away in woodland. The case lacked forensic evidence, resting entirely on a complex chain of circumstantial facts.
Crucially, the prosecution case relied on proving that Milly did not pass a specific, poor-quality CCTV camera near a flat belonging to Bellfield's partner in Walton-on-Thames.
"The Milly Dowler [case] was highly circumstantial, as I say, just like the trial before it, where we had to stitch together bits of evidence from all sorts of different sources. CCTV, phone records, elimination of vehicles, thousands of them in the first trial.”
The prosecution case posited that Bellfield abducted Milly near the flat where he was living.
Within 20 minutes of her disappearance, a red Daewoo Nexia associated with Bellfield was seen driving away from an access road near the flats. Furthermore, Bellfield had frequented the Yateley Woods area where Milly's body was eventually found.
The Dowler Family’s "Cruel" Ordeal and Media Impact
The trial at the Old Bailey in 2011 was marred by a controversial defence cross-examination of Milly’s father, Bob Dowler.
The defence sought to suggest that Bellfield was not the killer, and that Milly had run away due to her father’s "particular lifestyle". Milly's parents described the cross-examination as an "absolute ordeal" and “cruel".
Recalling the impact on Milly's mother, Altman says:
“She left court and all I could hear was screaming because she had clearly collapsed, as I discovered outside, physically collapsed to the to the floor and screaming.”
Altman concedes however that the line of questioning, however "ugly and nasty," was "a legitimate line” for defence counsel to take.
The case also led to the dramatic closure of the News of the World newspaper. This followed the disclosure that its journalists had hacked Milly's phone, with "a huge political and legal impact”.
“I just knew what the effect of it would be,” Altman says.
Brian Altman KC is currently head of chambers at 2BR. His career includes a long tenure as Treasury Counsel at the Old Bailey, prosecuting numerous high-profile crimes, and roles as lead counsel in the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, the Post Office sub-postmasters appeals, and advising Boris Johnson in the Covid inquiry.
Bellfield was convicted in 2011 and given a second whole life sentence. Brian Altman KC notes that Bellfield "remains the only person in this country to have received two whole life sentences in two different trials”.