Ian Bailey to 'speak from beyond the grave' as secret tapes offered to Sky and Netflix

The main suspect in the murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier, Ian Bailey will soon be speaking to you on TV from beyond the grave.

Hundreds of hours of secret video tapes that the late journalist recorded are about to be offered to both Sky and Netflix for a new TV series on the case.

The 66-year-old Englishman who died from a massive heart attack outside his home in Bantry, Co Cork on January 21 last filmed himself almost every day for the last couple of years.

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He gives his views on life, his love interests, the murder and other possible suspects in the high profile killing that shocked the nation.

Many of his ramblings also include daily commentary on things that happened to him that particular day and also on current affairs in Ireland at the time.

But Bailey also did an hour-long full interview from his bed in Bantry Hospital a few weeks before he died when he once again declared: "I did not kill Sophie."

An undated picture taken in the French southern village of Combret, shows Sophie Toscan du Plantier, a French woman who was murdered in West Cork in 1996
(Image: PATRICK ZIMMERMANN/AFP via Getty Images)

It is understood he handed most of the tapes - both video and audio - over to a close friend a few months before he passed away and asked them to get his story out there when he was gone.

A source said: "There are hundreds of hours of Ian on camera and also talking on tape about his whole life and different things that happened to him.

"When you listen to them it is like he is speaking from the grave.

"He has a lot to say about various things but specifically the Sophie case and how it affected his life.

Ian Bailey

"The one thing that is not on camera is a confession that he did it. He has always said that he never killed her.

"We will be talking to various international broadcasters later this year to see what they want to do with all this content because it will make a cracking TV series. Both Sky and Netflix will be hugely interested - it is basically Ian Bailey in his own words."

Jim Sheridan is currently making a new movie on the Sophie murder called Re-creation which will be based on a fictional jury debating the facts.

Jim Sheridan in 2019 (stock pic)
(Image: Getty Images)

Colm Meaney is to play Bailey while Kin star Aidan Gillen will play one of the main jurors. They were filming scenes in west Cork over the past few weeks.

Sophie was battered to death a hundred yards from her holiday home outside Schull, west Cork over Christmas 1996.

Gardai have always believed that she knew her killer. Ian Bailey was arrested twice over her murder but never charged.

Bailey always denied knowing her although one or two witnesses claimed otherwise.

A Garda cold case review of the case has continued even though Bailey is dead.

Bailey himself always believed that Sophie was killed by a person connected to her late husband, Daniel, who was having an affair at the time with a young model. He later married her a few years after Sophie's death.

Sophie's son and their French family are absolutely adamant that Bailey was the killer.

The former journalist and poet was found guilty by a French court in absentia in 2019 and sentenced to 25 years in jail.

The Irish government refused to extradite him because most of the evidence was based on hearsay and would never be admissible in an Irish court of law.

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