'The hesitation always stayed with me' says local Ian Bailey interviewer

The clip of a remarkable interview with the late Ian Bailey, a suspect in the 1996 murder of French filmmaker Sophie Toscan du Plantier at her west Cork home, has been replayed a number of times over the past few days following the sudden death of Bailey on Sunday last.

Mount Temple resident and former head of RTÉ Radio 1 Tom McGuire was the man behind the microphone for that fateful interview, which began with him asking Ian Bailey the direct question of whether he had committed the murder.

“He hesitated for eight or nine seconds before he denied it,” recalled Tom this week, “and it was that hesitation that always stayed with me.”

It was one of the most memorable interviews that the Longford native conducted during a stellar broadcasting career spanning more than three decades, and he has been recalling details of his only face-to-face encounter with Ian Bailey to various media outlets this week, including on Liveline with Joe Duffy.

Over the years, Ian Bailey consistently and strongly denied any involvement in the death of Sophie Tuscan du Plantier.

“RTÉ had a local radio service in Cork at the time of the murder, which I was working with, and I would have been familiar with Ian Bailey's name as he was working as a 'stringer' (freelance reporter) for all the local and national media outlets at the time, he knew his way around West Cork and he was getting a few bob for phoning in RTÉ with local stories, but I had never met him,” Tom explained to the Westmeath Independent this week.

Following Bailey’s arrest as a suspect in the Sophie Toscan du Plantier murder in March of 1997, Tom McGuire recalled how “all the tabloids” were using Bailey's picture and name and RTÉ was a bit reluctant to follow suit.

“There was so much publicity around the case that they eventually asked me if I would try to arrange an interview, so I rang him and he agreed straight away.”

The interview was conducted outside the home Bailey shared with his then partner, Jules Thomas, in West Cork at the time.

“I had decided at the outset that the first question I would ask him was what everybody wanted to know the answer to:, did he or did he not murder Sophie Toscan du Plantier? But when I put the question to him, he hesitated for eight or nine seconds before he denied it,” recalls Tom.

“The fact that he hesitated before answering was something that always stayed with me and it threw me so much that I can't even remember what I asked him next,” he added.

Tom described Ian Bailey as “a very imposing character”, who was essentially “a stranger” to very many people in the area.

He said he didn’t know what had happened to Sophie Tuscan du Plantier.

“And it is very unlikely we will ever find the answer to that question,” he added.