Honestly, it's not odd at all - that is absolutely what should happen. No details should come out until the trial. You get a victim name, cause of death (although not always) where and when it happened and then, when the person is charged, their name, age and address. And that's it. I'm not really sure about the rules on photographs - the media take them from Facebook and print them a lot of the time now upon charging but the police don't release their mugshot until they are convicted.
The victims were named early on in the court proceedings but the attempted murder victim's names can't be reported (for obvious reasons)
The media, on the other hand, had a field day when she was first arrested - they named her (not the police, who, quite rightly, didn't name her until she was charged two years later) and trawled her Facebook account, printing photographs of her, her house, her road name and even printed photographs of her reporting for bail back in her home town.
And whether she is found guilty or not guilty, because of them, her life as she knew it was over the first second they did that. Absolute
bleeping scum they are
I will keep saying it. Everyone is entitled to a fair trial in this county. Everyone, no matter what they have allegedly done.
Yes, releasing information, apart from the basics, before a trial is considered highly prejudicial here in the UK (unlike the USA)
And I wouldn't necessarily agree with your second point in her case. It took two years to charge her so I think it's unlikely there is a 'smoking gun' - as I've already said, I'm willing to bet it's more likely to be a circumstantial case based on ruling everyone else out. But sometimes, circumstantial cases can be just as compelling as a case with forensics, DNA, etc. I've watched every episode of Cold Justice!