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English journalist Ian Bailey will once again deny any involvement in French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier’s death and speculate that the person who killed the 39-year-old mother of one in west Cork almost 25 years ago is now dead.
Bailey (64) will tell Colette Fitzpatrick on The Big Interview on Virgin Media One on Monday night he knows that Toscan du Plantier’s family including her son, Pierre Louis Baudey-Vignaud (40), believe he is the killer but that they are mistaken in this belief.
Bailey, who was twice arrested but never charged in the Republic in connection with the killing, will say he is still “hoping and praying that the truth will come out”. Toscan du Plantier was killed at her holiday home near Toormore in west Cork in December 1996.
Bailey, who was convicted of murder in absentia in 2019 in France, will tell Fitzpatrick that he believes Toscan du Plantier’s killer is dead. “I have my own theory that the killer is actually dead,” he will say.
Earlier this month, Toscan du Plantier’s son, Pierre Louis Baudey Vignaud, appeared on RTÉ One’s Late Late Show and issued an appeal to anyone who has any information about the killing to contact either himself or the gardaí who have never closed the file on the case.
“It’s been 25 years. The truth has not arrived yet – we must end this story – for me, for my mother, for Irish people,” Mr Baudey told host Ryan Tubridy when he appeared on the TV show.
“Please for you, for me, for my mother . . . we must end this; please call me, send me an email or go to the gardaí, for sure, you [who] know something,” said Mr Baudey-Vignaud.
“It’s extraordinary but when I am in west Cork . . . all the people I meet are very clear . . . it’s a very small community and it’s not easy to say but now it’s been 25 years but this land, this very little part of Ireland must find peace again,” he said.
“Thanks to the very recent films of Netflix and Jim Sheridan. they want answers. There are new testimonies in recent weeks, some public, some not. But I know there are people out there with information.”
Bailey, who admitted that the case had consumed him for 25 years and at times led to some “really really low dark periods”, will say he has watched Mr Baudey Vignaud on the Late Late Show and believes his appeal, which he found “very sad”, was directed at him.
Bailey, who split from his partner of 30 years, Jules Thomas, earlier this year, will also say he has not watched the Netflix documentary, Sophie – A Murder in West Cork, but he has watched two episodes of Jim Sheridan’s documentary Murder at the Cottage: The Search for Justice for Sophie.

Ian Bailey: The Big Interview airs Monday night at 9pm on Virgin Media One.