A FORMER Forest journalist says he is innocent after a Paris court convicted him in his absence of murdering a French TV producer outside her Irish cottage more than 20 years ago.

Ian Bailey, formerly from Newent, was sentenced to 25 years in jail on Friday (May 31), and French authorities say they will again request his extradition from Ireland, having had two previous requests rejected.

But the 62-year-old, who still lives three kilometres from the Cork Riviera murder scene, has dismissed the three-day court case at the Palais de Justice as a “show trial”.

No one has ever been charged in Ireland with the 1996 Christmas-time murder of 39-year-old mother-of-one Sophie Toscan du Plantier, wife of the head of the Paris Film Festival and a friend of President Mitterand.

She was found battered to death in her nightdress beside her clifftop holiday cottage near Schull where Bailey was the first journalist on the scene, filing stories to Irish and French papers.

He was later arrested by Irish police, but the nation’s Director of Public Prosecutions ruled there was “no evidence” to charge him, and the case remains unsolved in Ireland.

But pressed by her family, French authorities took the case up in 2008, leading to last week’s trial in Paris, which just two Irish witnesses attended.

Bailey, who makes pizza to sell at a local market and writes poetry, told Irish broadcaster RTE that claims he was the killer were a “bundle of lies”.

“I know there are people in this country who know that it was not me that was the culprit. And I know that, sitting on that, my prayer has been that the truth will come out,” he said.

Convicting him on Friday, Judge Frede- rique Aline said there was “significant evidence” of Bailey’s guilt.

But having refused to travel to France to face the court, and still claiming his innocence, he said he might get a knock on the door this week but it was “business as usual” at the home he shares with his Welsh artist partner, and the trial outcome was “water off a duck’s back”.

He said Ms du Plantier’s family was told a “bundle of lies from the beginning.”

“They chose to believe that and they still have my sympathy,” said Bailey, who moved from the Forest in the early 1990s and graduated with a law degree in 2013.

The twists and turns of the cold case murder have gripped people in Ireland and France over two decades.

Bailey was arrested twice, but was never charged, amid allegations of incompetence and corruption against local Irish police.

Shop owner Marie Farrell, the only witness to put him near the scene on the night of the killing, later retracted her claim, saying she had been groomed and bullied into giving false evidence.

The judge and two magistrates heard live evidence from two Irish witnesses in Paris, and relied primarily on read statements, including Ms Farrell’s evidence, despite her retraction and the fact she is considered an unreliable witness by Irish authorities.

The court was told of evidence of scratches Bailey had on his hands and forehead on December 23, the day Ms Toscan du Plantier’s body was found.

He said they were from killing and plucking three turkeys and cutting down a Christmas tree, although the Paris court heard that witnesses had seen him playing a bodhran drum in the pub the night before with rolled-up sleeves and observed no scratches.

Bill Fuller – one of the two original Irish witnesses to give live evidence – said Bailey had recounted a scenario of the killing the day after the body was found.

He claimed Bailey said: “You did it… you saw her in Spar and she got you excited as she walked through the aisles

“You went to her place to see what you could get, but she wasn’t interested so you attacked her.

“She tried to escape and you ran after her.

“You threw something at the back of her head and you went further than you planned to.”

He said he believed Bailey was recounting what had actually happened and switching the perpetrator.

Also examined were Bailey’s differing accounts of his movements on the night of the killing.

Bailey first claimed he had spent the entire night at home in bed next to his partner Jules Thomas.

But later he revealed he had left in the early hours of the morning to walk to his studio about 300m from the house.

He said he had wanted to finish an article.

Ms Toscan du Plantier’s son Pierre-Louis Baudey-Vignaud, who was 14 when she was killed, watched the court case alongside her parents.

If Bailey were to be extradited, legal experts say he would be entitled to a retrial in France with a judge and jury.

The French court is set to announce next Tuesday (June 11) how much compensation Bailey will be ordered to pay.

Back behind his market stall at the weekend, Bailey said he expected an immediate attempt by the French authorities to seek his extradition.