Ian Bailey podcast drama as ex Jules Thomas fires back at ‘hurtful’ accusations

Ms Thomas, 73, who stood by her partner through decades of

accusations and court cases, called out Mr Bailey’s ‘hurtful’ claims.

Ian Bailey’s ex Jules Thomas has hit back at his “insulting” podcast accusing him of putting out a false narrative about their split.

The 66-year-old takes a swipe at his former partner of 25 years and her family in the third and final episode of his podcast, Ian Bailey In His Own Words.

He claims he was evicted with a “f*** off letter” and speaks of Ms Thomas and her daughters in terms which she describes as insulting.

Mr Bailey is a former suspect in the 1996 murder of French woman Sophie Toscan du Plantier.

Ms Thomas, 73, who stood by her partner through decades of accusations and court cases, called out Mr Bailey’s “hurtful” claims.

She told the Irish Sunday Mirror: “I haven’t heard it [podcast] because I don’t want to listen to his voice, but I’ve heard from other people. That is pretty insulting. If anybody believes this they’re believing the wrong stuff.”

Ms Thomas asked Mr Bailey to move out of The Prairie, her cottage in Schull, West Cork, around the time two documentaries on Ms Toscan du Plantier’s unsolved murder began streaming on Sky and Netflix.

Murder At The Cottage, directed by Oscar-winner Jim Sheridan, features interviews with Mr Bailey, but he said he was unable to watch the series in full because “it was so depressing”.

In his podcast, Mr Bailey says the two 2021 series “resulted in the total unravelling of my life” and that he suffered panic attacks.

He says after a judgment in his favour at his extradition hearing in 2020: “I went back to the Priory where Jules was noticeably very cool.”

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He describes Christmas 2020 as “the loneliest one I could ever remember” outlining how “Jules went off to stay with her family in Cork”.

Mr Bailey then describes being handed a letter in early 2021 by Jules, written by her eldest daughter Saffron, asking him to leave The Prairie.

He says: “In the letter my long-term partner’s daughter informed me that her mother had decided our journey was over and that she required me to vacate The Prairie as soon as possible.

“It was a notice of termination, or to put it another way a f*** off letter. Maybe I should have anticipated this but it came as a great shock and I was overcome with a deep sense of fear, apprehension and anxiety.”

He tells how he registered with Cork County Council and after a stint in emergency temporary accommodation secured an apartment in Bantry.

He claims he spent years working on the garden at The Prairie planting vegetables and digging a pond.

Ms Thomas, who was assaulted by her former long-term partner in the past, told us: “He did dig a pond years ago and only rarely planted any vegetables.

“I did most of the planting. He used to show people around the garden and pretend he’d done it. I was the one who did all the planting, the edging, all of it.”

Mr Bailey’s three-part podcast series details his life before and after the murder of mum-of-one Sophie Toscan du Plantier on December 23, 1996.

In the second episode he claims gardai told him he would be shot if he didn’t confess to the murder.

He says: “I’m not a saint but I’m certainly not a demon or a killer.”

Welsh-born Ms Thomas, an artist, said some of the podcast comments about her and her family were “hurtful yes, but I’m beyond that”. She added: “I’m just getting on with life.”