Missing Blogger Esther Dingley

[Aliceboo]

Her yellow tent is missing. If she has had an accident, what happened to it?

If she's succumbed to hypothermia the investigators will be able to tell as she will have removed clothing.

The tent would be a wealth of forensic information.

 

[thegirlscout]

If it was suicide they would have mentioned it by now. It’s gone very quiet, the only news recently has been her partner denying his involvement.

 

[Stan]

You mean DC's focus was not about the tragedy of the missing guy but how the search affected him & ED?

Good point.

I missed that. I was too busy watching his dominant behaviour & ED being so subdued.

Playing it again in the intro DC almost knocks her over accidentally with his elbow. It seems this is why she stands behind him.

He claims a lot of space around him.

When in control he's quite a cock-a-doodle-do personality.

It's just a description that sprang to mind. Almost Alpha.

Yes. I just found it quite strange to want to comment publicly about yourself in response to a person being missing and people searching and I thought it was strange that he commented the search dogs were really cute. These people are searching for someone missing who could have had a horrid accident. Yet the dogs were cute and you’re so humbled ???

 

[kev1974]

There's a piece on Esther in today's Sunday Times magazine where the journalist joins her partner Dan Colegate in his search for Esther. Behind a paywall, but there's a free trial available.

My search for Esther Dingley: the missing hiker’s boyfriend on his desperate quest

Almost two miles up, I am standing on a knife-edge, the last hurdle before the summit, uncertain if I should go on. The flanks of this snow-draped mountain spin

www.thetimes.co.uk

Archive link that's readable without paywall

My search for Esther Dingley: the missing hiker’s boyfriend on his de…

archived 4 Jul 2021 13:14:06 UTC

archive.ph

 

[AlanB]

I agree with you Shadwells, it is pure speculation too on my part of course but the partner has endless red flags and you have certainly mentioned a number of them. The fact that they haven't actually cleared him is interesting too - it almost certainly means that he doesn't have a cast iron alibi.

As you have said what his main phone was doing is critical of course, he will have known not to take it with him but if it is doing nothing at all during the critical period that would be pretty damning.

With the relationship she has/had(?) with her mother I really don't think that there is much chance that she is alive, I think she has probably met with foul play and for me there is one main candidate...

 

[PeggyHenry]

Yes, it explains her trip to the top of the mountain so late in the day. It also explains why she couldn’t mention meeting him.

I wonder if the manner of what happened to her could be explained by an accidental fall I.e if it was deliberately made to look like it could have been an accident. Maybe they descended together for some time before something happened.

I thought it was odd that he would not join the search and rescue teams in their searches for Esther but that he would only search on his own. I think the Spanish found that odd too

 

[Johara]

I really don’t trust the police who are dealing with it so it’s very plausible that they have missed something whilst searching for her. I mean I still can’t get over how they treated her camper van and that they said the person sleeping in there was a member of their team. Beggars belief!

I think we got a convoluted story by bad journalists. At least we know the police searched it thoroughly. I don't believe the guy would sleep there. We've got no evidence he did.

I think Captain Bordinaro knows what he's doing.

He quickly highlighted the fact they had a horrid relationship and has turned it into a Criminal case.

Bit like the Madeleine McCann investigation. Thats gone on for years

now that is a whole different kettle of fish

I think the Portuguese police did good work but as per the various books were interfered with.

There was Clement Freud the influential pedophile, Gordon Brown - best we not start on him... etc high level British government involvement and even the Vatican. The fishiest case we ever saw.

Then the parents refusing to cooperate etc. The Jill Havern forum has done excellent work over the years refuting the smears of the Porto cops and all the other lies.

In this case IMO we have a Chris Watts/Oscar Pistorius type scenario.

Today's spin doctoring reaction shows me the police are doing a good job. In my opinion.

 

[SummerSky]

No - if someone falls, accidentally, into a crevasse, then the place they land could well be inaccessible. And if it's inaccessible, how would a murderer have taken the body there?
Anyway, I truly don't know, but an accident seems a lot more likely to me.

Hard as it is to stomach the French cop used the word murder.

That's a first.

The police have been very careful to cagily say they were open to all possibilities ever since this occurred.

But only now do we see this word murder pop up from their discussion.

It's all too staged from my view.
Scripted.

Bones suddenly arrive in sight of Spanish hikers when that area was scoured by experts after snow cleared - and they found nothing.

Do you think Dan has superior skills to mountain rescue/search teams?

I don't.

 

[Passive_Aggressive_Lemon]

I have to say if my partner disappeared into thin air I wouldn’t stop looking for them. I can understand why he was out there looking especially if the official searches had been halted.

I don’t think there’s anything to say he actually recovered Esther or her things. I read it as he spotted her and alerted the police. I don’t think it was an attempt to muddle the forensics.

 

[kev1974]

Because it's winter and there is a lot of snow in the area where Esther disappeared - you would be asking people to risk their lives to possibly recover a body. I'm not sure why you say there should be a huge search to recover an 'English woman' surely it would be the same for a woman of any nationality? The Thai cave boys case is not a good comparison as they were all clearly alive and communicating with the rescuers.

I do agree that it is odd that there has been no further appeals by Esther's partner or by the charity that has taken on the case.

Yes there are plenty of dead bodies up on the really high mountains around the world. Sometimes they are left until Spring and brought down once it is easier and safer. Sometimes they are left forever as they're just too hard to retrieve and they become landmarks! By now she is either well hidden away somewhere but likely safe, or she's dead somewhere and will be just as dead in Spring, that is the harsh reality.

 

[chartilbury]

Don’t shoot me but I’ve got a whole new theory ….. so we’re all agreed he seems to be a bit less well off than she was so what if he cooks up a scheme whereby she goes missing in the mountains, media gets involved, everyone looks for her and then he miraculously finds her. They then write a book and make a fortune but somewhere along the way it all goes a bit wrong and she ends up in an accident. Hence why he was able to eventually find her (he knew the path she’d take) and that’s why he is dodgy as buggery!

 

[Johara]

I actually thought it was quite odd he walked alone too.

I think what is really odd is the press statement. The images he chose to remind us of her are the least flattering and in sepia resemble an OBITUARY.

1. Non colour. Sepia washed-out looking like in history books
2. Unflattering - she has some very pretty photos. Why not those??
3. The close up has her looking away from the camera
4. Her pose in the others is subdued, meek. This is not her personality.

And what's with the hair wrap? She has pretty hair in the rare pics where her hair is down. It looks as though she is a chemo patient.

I saw 2 photos the other day in which she looked stunning. One was of her in a dress at a spa. The other was her smiling hugely into the camera with El Creepo in the background.

Of all the photos to remember her by why not the most attractive full colour camera facing ones?

Why obituary-style, least attractive, non colour?

 

[SvenS]

Total bonkers that she would even attempt that though.

If she made the decision to take this route from the peak of Salv, then it would likely have been dark by the time she got to Glera too (although reported clear skies an a bright moon). She has been found at the base of this peak, so she has most likely been up on this ridge.

These ridge traverses can start off less extreme, then there might be a bit that you can get up, but would be difficult to get down. Once you've invested hours in making progress along, it's very hard to admit defeat and turn back when it gets extreme. It's all too easy to get into a pickle and start taking risks.

 

[Agent Krycek]

Anyone else still think he's done it? I just don't find him convincing at all.

I don't think he did it directly, but I do think it was likely suicide which maybe was to do with relationship issues. Why else would he be so (unconvincingly) vocal about how wonderful and committed their relationship was instead of just focussing the appeals on finding her. So I do think he has enormous guilt but not because he did anything to her first hand.

 

[LaurieLaurie]

I used to follow the BBC presenter Rachael Bland, who sadly died of cancer. Her husband moved on very quickly with a woman who looks just like Rachael and has also got himself a nice radio/Instagram side gig (even though it was Rachael who spent 20 years building a broadcasting career) out of being a 'cancer husband' where he gets constantly fawned over by women for being such an amazing guy.

(Sorry to go off-topic!)

First person that popped into my head when this subject was mentioned. Him and Simon Thomas.

 

[Bumbear]

Interesting wording on his justification message 'my only goal is to help them do what they need to do as quickly as possible'.

Shouldn't his only goal be to find his girlfriend safe and sound?

Unless he knows a little more than everyone else, about where she is right now.

 

[Passive_Aggressive_Lemon]

What's the deal with all the new posters in this thread that only ever look and comment/react on this thread, and never any others?

Are they Dan, or employees of LBT Global, getting ready to steer the narrative?

I think they’ve come from Websleuths. Right at the beginning of the thread a prolific poster explained they had come here from WS and had told others to do the same.

The tone of posts is very different from the usual tattle ones but very interesting all the same.

 

[Lanie]

Interested to know when you guys think is an acceptable time to move on to a new partner? Does it depend on relationship length? Seriousness of relationship? Age you are when your partner dies?

I feel like what you’re basically saying is you’d prefer to see a grieving person suffer alone rather than meet someone and make the most of the life they are left with.

Life is for the living not the dead. I say good luck to anyone who’s lost a partner and has a second chance at happiness. I expect they know more than most that happiness can be fleeting and life is fragile. That would be an incentive to move on and make a new life with someone else.

I think people can move on when they feel the need to,but sometimes it would be nice of they waited longer than six months before shacking up with someone else. Many of these people have children to consider and they have lost a parent too.

If anything happened to my partner i couldn't care less if the most chris Helmsworth himself asked me out the next week, i wouldnt be going anywhere near men for the sake of my children.
I dont think its fair to them.
I was single for a long time before i met my partner so i am quite content being on my own.

 

[BroccoliTreetops]

Or never moved again. Murdered on P de S.

But then heavy bodyweight to transport elsewhere. Via tent.

Didn't the dogs lose all scent of her right there? On pic de Sauvegarde.

I seem to recall that.



Yes. Their skills are incredible. They always pull better looking partners.

Agree with all the rest too.

What did she see in him? Someone who pursued her with great charm at the start - a totally false personality.

By the time she got hooked he'd reverted to type.

Well we know he didn't kill her to save his fortune, because apparently he doesn't have any money. She could have pulled someone wealthy, but she got trapped (not hooked) by that loser and then he might have killed her for more attention and book sales, so to make his fortune? She deserved so much better, didn't know her worth. So sad for Esther. Another great woman's life ruined and then taken by a sad little narcissist.

 

[PeggyHenry]

I've often thought that if there was foul play be a third party, she still might have died by falling. Being intimidated close to an edge - being pushed close to an edge. If there was foul play involved, we may never know because she died due to the fall. If an intense argument occurred in the mountains and just for a second you exploded and wished a person harm, you wouldn't need to physically harm them - you could go for them and make them fall somehow. There need be no sign or an argument etc. I do believe there was an explosive relationship going on here and it certainly wasn't idyllic. I believe , from what Laura reported, that there had been a breakup of some sorts and Esther had left and gone off to hike.. on her own. DC expected her to return but she kept on prolonging the trip until it reached a very heated point.