The former partner of late murder suspect Ian Bailey has accused gardaí of deliberately withholding the results of DNA tests that she claims will finally clear him of one of Ireland’s most infamous unsolved murders.

In an interview with the Irish Mail on Sunday, Jules Thomas said she will not stop ‘until justice is done’ and Bailey is ‘proven innocent of that terrible crime that ruined both our lives’.

Bailey was arrested twice in connection with the brutal murder of French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier outsider her West Cork holiday home on December 23, 1996. He was also found guilty of the killing by a French court but was never charged with the murder here.

The Irish courts also refused French extradition requests for Bailey, who protested his innocence right up until his death from a suspected heart attack in 2024, at the age of 66.

Ms Thomas confirmed her break with Bailey after decades together in an interview with this newspaper in 2021.

But she has always insisted the English journalist was not guilty of Ms Toscan du Plantier’s murder. And she is now convinced DNA he submitted to gardaí shortly before his death will prove his innocence once and for all.

Despite their break-up, the Welsh artist said she felt ‘very sorry for Ian when I saw him in town’ after their break-up.

She told the MoS: ‘He looked old and sick. Being wrongly accused of the murder had a really devastating effect on Ian.

‘He couldn’t let it go, ever – his addiction was a fatal consequence.’

But now she is determined to clear his name and finally remove the cloud of suspicion she has had to live under for almost 30 years.

No match to Bailey’s DNA was ever found at the murder scene.

Earlier this month, Bailey’s sister Kay Reynolds said her brother gave gardaí a fresh DNA sample before he died, in the hope that developments in forensic technology would prove that he was innocent of the murder.

Gardaí recently said they are checking international databases to test unidentified blood found on Ms Toscan du Plantier’s boot.

However, Ms Thomas pointed out that as far back as 2018, Bailey had highlighted how the French forensic team found what they described as ‘alien DNA’ on the murdered filmmaker’s boot in 2011.

This sample did not match Bailey’s DNA.

‘He went public on that to prove his own innocence,’ Ms Thomas recalled to the MoS.

‘He was entitled to see the French file and he went through every bit of it. He studied law for five years. He had stopped drinking and was a different person, obtaining three law degrees from University College Cork.

‘There was little or nothing about the case and the allegations against him that Ian had not minutely trawled through. He was desperate to prove his innocence.

‘Ian knew that the Garda investigation had run out of all his blood, and he wanted to make sure they had fresh DNA of his that could be matched with others.

‘He did so without any problem and with no qualms – he was desperate to clear his name and he believed new technology in DNA testing could do that.’

Ms Thomas believes gardaí are ‘grasping at straws’ requesting overseas police forces to cross-check the DNA samples, and that Ms Toscan du Plantier’s killer may now be dead.

‘It’s probably too late. For all we know, whoever killed that poor woman nearly 30 years ago could be dead. There are people dead who were regarded as suspects, I know that,’ she said.

She said it is ‘disgraceful’ that the long-awaited results of the new DNA tests have not yet been made public, while the cold case investigation ‘has apparently moved into another phase, seeking help abroad now’.

Speaking from her isolated cottage outside Goleen on the picturesque Mizen Head peninsula, Ms Thomas added: ‘To me, the gardaí are going through the motions, doing what they think the public would want them to do.

‘All I want them to say is, “we admit we were wrong”. There was no evidence that has ever been connected with Ian. It was all hearsay. Stories were made up, and I believe words were put into people’s mouths, whether they knew and were aware of that or not.’

She also thinks it ‘extraordinary’ that she has never been contacted since the Bantry-based cold case team began re-examining the horrific unsolved murder, reportedly taking new witness statements and widening the case with a list of potential persons of interest.

‘The cold case officers have never once been in touch with me or with any of my family either. I find that quite strange – extraordinary actually. I have nothing to hide and they know that. All I want is for the truth to come out.’

She also recalled how, early in the murder investigation, detectives cleared out her late mother’s former studio near her home, which Bailey had used as an office. None of the personal items that were removed were ever returned.

‘They took all sorts of stuff, my art history notes… If they saw any handwriting at all they took it, maybe thinking I had written something that could incriminate Ian.

‘They also took away sacks filled with my daughters’ toys, Sindy dolls that were theirs to get rid of if they wanted. We never saw any of it again.’

Ms Thomas said she is writing to the Bandon-based Garda Chief Superintendent in charge of the Cork West and Cork North Divisions to demand the release of the new DNA tests that were carried out in the US.

‘The new US-technology DNA testing results were expected before the end of last year but there has only been silence,’ Ms Thomas added.

‘I think that silence says it all. They aren’t going to admit that whatever DNA they’ve found wasn’t Ian’s, are they?

‘It wasn’t his, but they don’t want to admit that they have been wrong all along.

‘They don’t want to look as if they have failed, especially in the face of the French police investigation.’

She is also demanding ‘an apology for what I have suffered over 30 harrowing years while the accusations hung over both of us’.

Ms Thomas added: ‘It is too late for Ian Bailey now, but I am not going to stay quiet until justice is done, and he is proven innocent of that terrible crime that ruined both our lives.

‘I have been waiting for almost 30 years for Ian’s name to be cleared. I knew he was innocent but the gardaí were determined to try and prove that Ian was the murderer.

‘I have been informed that people who knew Ian were approached by the detectives to make statements to incriminate him.’

She has compiled a detailed dossier of notes and recollections about her and Bailey’s treatment by gardaí – their arrests, alleged Garda harassment, and the trauma of living under the shadow of suspicion for decades.

‘I’m in no doubt at all that Ian’s health issues, which contributed to his death, were caused by the nightmare of being wrongly accused of a murder he did not commit,’ she said.

A Garda spokesman said: ‘An Garda Síochána does not comment on statements made by third parties and does not comment on content or speculation published in third-party publications.’