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in 2014 in a suburb of Dublin a brief romance between Sonia blunt and Eric Loch went sour setting off a chain of
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events that would end with Sonia's violent death this was a brutal awful murder it
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was rage fueled furious at being rejected lock became obsessed with getting Sonia back and he was going to
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do that by hook or by crook whether Sonia wanted it or not he brought cable ties at the Stanley knife duct tape the
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imitation gun after taking Sonia's life Eric Lo threw off all responsibility for
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his terrible crime the defense really argued for his mental disorder it was a momentary Insanity I never meant to do
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it despite his attempts to play the victim Eric lock depraved actions mean that he will forever be known as one of
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the world's most evil [Music] killers in May 2017 Eric Loch was jailed for the murder of his colleagues Sonia
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blunt the 35-year-old had vied Sonia to a hotel room in Dublin and ended her life after pretending to be someone else
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online lock was a Lonely Heart's worst nightmare the person that you're meeting
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may not be the person that they say that they are but it could be somebody deceiving you and then you could end up
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in a situation where you're murdered or killed I think that's what's scary about
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it 31-year-old Sonia thought she'd done enough to keep herself safe but she'd
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not reckoned on the determination and evil intent of Eric lock he has been online he has changed his identity a new
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profile on social media he pretended to be somebody else so that he could have access to her he had no intention of
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leaving there that night without having hurt her that was the plan Sonia blunt was a single mother
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simply looking for love killer Eric deceived and manipulated her in pursuit of Revenge and
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retribution this killer Story begins in the spring of 1982 6 miles west of Dublin City
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Center Eric luck was from St John's Park East in kundan in County Dublin quite a
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small community and he was born to a very good family lock grew up with his parents and sister in the workingclass
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town it was an ordinary childhood that though Lo's mother and father had concerns from time to time about their
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son's state of mind he had been hyperactive as a child and his parents had sought treatment for him he was
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noticed by his family at a young age to be interested in lining up things and making lists and they were concerned
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about him but he was never diagnosed with [Music] anything and he also said that he was
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some object of of ridicule because of a deformity on his penis when Eric lock was born his urethra was on the the
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underside of his penis and there was a surgical attempt to correct it but it was unsuccessful so then he was left
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with both the deformity itself and the scarring and he didn't know about this
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really until he was teased in the showers after PE class when he was 12 or 13 years of age and after after that he
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always felt different whether because of his issues in his teenage years or for some other reason those who knew Eric L
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in his 20s noticed something a little unusual about the way he interacted with the opposite sex I think one person said
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of Eric CL that he was weird about women he had no problem getting girls he was a
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quite a good-look man objectively but he never could hold on to them and nobody ever knew much about his Rel
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relationships one friend described him as Charming but Dead behind the eyes Eric lock was definitely an odd person
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but he didn't seem to be a dangerous person he had no History of Violence or
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any police history at all after graduating from college Lo entered the world of work and enjoyed socializing
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with friends and colleagues he was a football player as a Young Man a Manchester United supporter some people
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say he did a bit of modeling whether it's true I'm I'm not sure but certainly he was you know
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upright and you know throughout his 20s didn't really make much of an impression
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on anyone he just had an ordinary life in 2013 31-year-old Eric lock was single and living with his parents in
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clondalkin when he got a new job at a glue manufacturer 4 miles away in talor this is where he met the woman who
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would soon become the focus of the dark side he'd so far managed to keep under
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wraps Lo worked with a number of people in a daily course of his employment and one such person he worked with was Sonia
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blunt she was a 31-year-old lady from the tala area they caught each other's eye at
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work and um there were rumors around work that they they fancied each other and they did go on a few dates
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31-year-old Sonia had worked at the manufacturing PL for about 10 years when she met new employee Loch Sonia was
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brought up in T at Southwest of Dublin Center one of five was a close family the parents separated but it was still
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amicable the eldest of five children Sonia was known as a caring sister and daughter with a strong circle of friends
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she'd studied Child Care at College before starting her career at the Manu facturing plant Sonia was also a devoted
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single mother with a toddler son from an unhappy long-term relationship that had
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broken down in the Autumn of 2013 he was domineering and she had gotten away from
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that relationship the man had left the country and she really was beginning to enjoy life again at that stage cuz she
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wasn't looking for a serious relationship in December 2013 Sonia blunt and Eric L started spending time
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together outside of work the romance however was short and not particularly sweet I think lock was to say later we
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were never boyfriend girlfriend it was just a sort of they went a number of dates early in January
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2014 Sonia and Eric lock go on a date together it's a gig so far so normal at
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some point in the night Sonia decided to go out and have a cigarette ultimately Lo was a bit
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suspicious she was gone for 20 minutes and this seemed to upset him after a while Lo came out looking for her and
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she was talking to other people including males and he called her a [ __ ] Furious lock berated Sonia for daring to
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chat with other men basically accusing her of flirting very gendered slurs so that incident actually is probably the
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biggest red flag you can have from anyone who's going to become a problem for you in the relationship and she
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didn't like it and she was upset by it horrified at the dark turn the date had
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taken Sonia left telling Lo that the romance was over as he took a taxi home a few hours later a drunk and apparently
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remorseful Lo tried to take back his verbal attack he was just hounding her by text
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message and just begging her to to let him see her and explain it and she said there's no need to explain it Sonia
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explained to in the messages that she knew he was a nice person however she couldn't accept being spoken to in that
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manner over the next couple of days Eric log bombarded Sonia blunt with dozens of
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messages demanding a second chance Sonia asked him repeatedly to stop but the text kept coming peppering her with
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excuses for his jealousy and aggression he did acknowledge the only reason that he reacted in this way was because he
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was insecure and that Sonia hadn't told him that he was effective this was surprising to Sonia that he would react
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in this way or seek this type of approval Sonia had only had a couple of dates with him this kind of behavior
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after a relationship breakup is not about love it's actually about possession an inability to take any kind
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of rejection at all and it can become really quite dangerous quite quickly Sonia found Eric Lock's respon on
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surprising even alarming but it was only the beginning on the 13th of January 3 days after their disastrous date he
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walked out in the middle of his shift he stopped answering his phone or replying
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to co-workers messages about his whereabouts Sonia being the caring and and kind and considerate person that she
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was sent him a text to say oh we're worried about you is everything okay but
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he didn't resp sponge until the following day and he said that he was in a hotel room and that he had a rope and
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that he was sorry it was at this time that Sonia decided to contact the G Sonia was worried sick she had no idea
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what this desperate volatile man might be capable of doing the guarde were able to trace Lock's phone to a hotel room
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and when they got there he said that it was just a joke however the guardy didn't believe him and weren't convinced
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so they arrested him under the mental health act he was then hos hospitalized he discharged himself later
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that day and she stayed in touch with him her text messages to him were more of a caring nature after that asking him
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to get help encouraging him to get help she was extremely worried and her friend
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said she wasn't sleeping or eating Sonia felt terrible about the way things had turned out which is perhaps
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exactly what Eric Lo intended Sonia was such a gentle and kind and soul that she was looking after
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his best interests and he exploited that instead of appreciating it for what it was he is looking for anything that will
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get her back it's like having a like little tool box right well I'm going to
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pull this tool out the begging and cry let's see if that works and if that doesn't work then we'll go to something
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else for homicide expert Professor Jane monton Smith Eric Lock's threats to take
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his own life were not just ATT tactic they were also a warning sign of the risk he posed to Sonia Blunt's
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life when I'm training police we always say if there's a threat to Suicide that
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should be interpreted as a threat to homicide Eric Lock's desperate text messages and disappearing tricks were
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just the beginning his pursuit of Sonia blunt would continue to escalate but while Lo was planning his next move
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Sonia had been online and met someone new Sonia was contacted on social media by a guy called Shane Cully and they
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started messaging and he seemed completely different from Eric lock and was there was a bit of fun a bit of
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banter back and forth and she just went with it Sonia wants to find something maybe it's
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friendship maybe it's romance one can't be absolutely sure but I can be incredibly sympathetic cuz I
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can understand exactly how she must have felt they're getting along quite well
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he's proposing to go on a date initially Sonia had some concerns she was worried
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that this could have been lock and essentially catfishing her so she asked Shane cly to send her a selfie she
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wanted to be completely assured that this wasn't luck pretending to be somebody else the young mother ignored
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her own misgivings and brushed off the fears of those who'd witnessed her ordeal with luck and even when she was
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telling the story to her coworker about this guy she was going to meet uh the cooworker said are you sure that's not
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Eric lock pretending to be someone else that's the kind of guy he was that uh
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they suspected that of him and she assured her well I I thought that but I actually got a selfie from him it's not
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him and they started to send each other RIS game messages and eventually they agreed to
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meet up in a hotel room it was something unusual for her but it was after Valentine's Day perhaps feeling slightly
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lonely and decided to spend the night with him Sonia blunt had never before arranged a romantic encounter with a
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stranger in a hotel but she pushed her nerves aside and set a date to meet cly while Sonia did her best to move on
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Eric Loch was persisting in his campaign of emotional blackmail he accused her of
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blanking him at work and said that she was spreading rumors that he was stalking her and she replied well I
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haven't heard those rumors but I would appreciate if you'd stop staring at me
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at work because it is making me feel uncomfortable Sonia had been through bad break up before she had seen probably
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the kind of behaviors that lock was displaying you know that possessiveness that
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control it must have been very difficult for Sonia on a day-to-day basis coming in and wondering how am I going to deal
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with him today what form is he going to be in today have to thread the needle uh
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be nice to him uh but not give him the wrong signals Sonia was so uncomfortable with Lock's behavior that she considered
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asking to change shifts so that she would no longer cross paths with him her former love interest seemed hellbent on
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pressuring her into submission Sonia confided in one of her friends she said that he was freaking her out it was at
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this time that Sonia decided it was time to cut all contact with him and blocked
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him on social media she wanted him to go away she was probably quite frightened of him at this point the trouble is when
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you do something like that it just makes them more Angry the mother of one desperately hoped this would put an end
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to a situation that had rapidly escalated from Awkward to troubling to downright scary but Sonia couldn't have
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been more wrong on the 24th of January Lo writes Sonia a letter quite long again pleading for a
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Reconciliation he was telling her how sorry he was and how ashamed he was of putting her in that position after
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sending the suicide text but lower down in the in the letter he would say things
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like I thought you might have stood by me um when I was suicidal and I would have stood by you and I would have
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waited for you until you got over this one minute he was building her up next minute he was knocking her
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down lock ended the long letter by saying that Sonia was an amazing mother who'd everything going for her and that
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he hoped they would all find happiness Lo's Behavior was escalating and in this stage Lock's Behavior turned
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to stalking he contacted his sister to say he'd got back with uh Sonia and but that
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he had heard rumors that she was ripping him off and asked if an acquaintance of
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his sister could hack into her Facebook page then he asked what about hacking into her Hotmail email account whether
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or not she believed his tale that he and Sonia were back together Eric Lock's
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sister refused to help him access Sonia's private email or social media profiles oblivious to Lock's attempt to
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stalk her Sonia continued living her life on Saturday the 15th of February 2014 she and her family celebr
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celebrated Sonia's little boy's birthday Sonia adored her son and loved being a mother and according to her
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sister she went all out for his birthday and had a party with family and his friends the festivity over Sonia got
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ready for a secret trist she had asked her mother to look after her son for the night because she wanted to go meet her
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friend Susan and was going to go out with her that evening she cancelled last minute telling that friend she wanted to
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stay in and read a book that she was tired though she did not admit it to friends and family Sonia had in fact
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arranged to meet her Facebook date Shane Cully at a hotel in talor that evening she gets to The Plaza Hotel about 9:00
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that evening and takes about 20 minutes for her to check in she's received messages from Shane say that he was
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going to be slightly later and could she leave the uh the key card for the door at the reception
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Sonia was thinking a sure I wait him we can go up together but he didn't come
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for hours and he was texting her through Facebook and most of the text messages about 12 of the text messages were
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asking her to leave a key card for him at reception and she said sure there's
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no need I'll let you in when you get here unaccustomed to arranging sexually
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leasons in hotels and embarrassed about facing reception staff again Sonia initially resisted Shane's demand
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however Shane was quite persistent and asked her to leave the key down at the hotel desk so she did so she'd been
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waiting for him for about 3 hours at that stage and she said she was going to have a drink to Cal her nerves she would
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have been tired but I suppose excited when he said he was finally on the way armed with his own room key Sonia's
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would be lover had no need to knock when the door opens just before midnight she immediately recognizes that
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the man who's just entered a room isn't Shane Cully but it's actually Eric
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Loch we will never know exactly what went through Sonia Blunt's head when she
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realized Eric lock had tricked her into meeting him nor will we ever be sure precisely what happened
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next Lo himself told gy that she was shocked to see him and that she asked could they leave together so she did not
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want to stay there with him there was no doubt about it but Lo did not agree to leave with Sonia he later said he feared
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she'd scream as they walk through reception almost 6 hours later he left the hotel alone he left the do not
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disturb sign on the door he didn't want Sonia to be found he wanted to buy himself some time he got into the
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elevator he could be seen trying to cover his face he was wiping it with a tissue Eric lock flagged down a taxi to
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take him home to clond doin telling the driver who commented on injuries to his left cheek that he'd had an eventful
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Night Out gave him some story about dancing with a girl on the dance floor and her boyfriend coming up and giving
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him a few slaps when the taxi driver said let's have a look at your your face
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which was very obvious and he said oh you'll have a lot of expl explaining to
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do about that while Eric Loch slept off his rough night Sonia Blunt's family had
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begun to sense something was a Miss Sonia always called up to check her son was all right if she'd stayed out at
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night first thing in the morning she'd ring and say is he okay however when she
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didn't call alarm Bell started to ring her mother initially called her friend
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Susan to see what had happened because she was out with her friend Susan that night and when Susan told her that she
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had changed her plans and said she was staying in that night her mother was very concerned so her family were
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looking for her and calling everybody calling her friends and it's then that
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her brother had seen on social media that a murder had occurred in tala news travels fast that a body has
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been discovered now and it's almost impossible to imagine what their parents
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must have felt the news of a suspicious death at aalor Hotel came in the late afternoon of that Sunday the 16th of
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February fearing the worst but hoping they were wrong Sonia's family needed to
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find out if she had come to harm they made their way to the hotel and saw her car
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there her father saw Sonia's car and saw police gathered around and he said that
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he just knew when they approached the guardi the guardi told the family you better come inside the guards ask the
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family to you know to describe Sonia to them and in particular they asked them about the tattoo that Sonia had because
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it's very specific well imagine the scene it is beyond description what they
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must have felt and how they must have felt it Sonia Blunt's devastated parents
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and siblings were told they would have to wait 24 hours for confirmation that the female victim was indeed their
00:22:57
daughter and sister as the shell shock family returned home Inside the Hotel the guarder were examining what was
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clearly the scene of a terrible crime her body wasn't discovered until cleaning staff went into the room at
00:23:13
3:00 that afternoon the young mother was lying on the floor in the recovery position Sonia had blood on her face and
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some kind of fabric stuffed into her mouth they found her with ligature Mark around her neck it was a very pronounced
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they also saw an imitation gun they saw duct tape and cable ties when they went into the bathroom they saw blooded tell
00:23:37
and bloodied napkins they also saw her bloodied phone cable charger something horrible has happened
00:23:45
in that hotel room the postmodern results show that Sonia died due to ciation and lack of oxygen due to
00:23:51
compression of the neck the strangulation was so vicious and prolonged that it actually broke a
00:23:56
number of bones in her neck son 's t-shirt had been pushed deep into her mouth exacerbating the effects of the
00:24:03
strangulation the state pathologist Marie Cassidy noted that due to the bruising around her mouth that she was
00:24:10
undoubtedly alive when her top was put into her mouth and it was put in with such force and such ferocity that he
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broke several of her teeth and the wire retainer at the back of her teeth Sonia blunt had been murdered in an act of
00:24:24
extreme violence detectives asked themselves who could possibly want a hardworking
00:24:31
family orientated young mother dead but they did not have to wonder for long 6 hours after her body was
00:24:40
discovered Eric Loch walked into a Garder station in the center of Dublin at around half n last night a man
00:24:48
presented himself to gari at store Street station in the city he was arrested and taken to talag the
00:24:56
station Eric lock went into store Street gation and confessed to killing Sonia blunt he said he had attempted suicide
00:25:06
but couldn't do it when he had very real images of his family in his head he
00:25:11
admitted The Killing but said it was an accident he said that he had just planned to talk to her and explain his
00:25:18
situation lock told investigating officers he had to use the fake profile to trick Sonia into meeting him because
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she'd cut all contact and blocked him online he insisted he' only bought the cable
00:25:31
ties and duct tape so that if Sonia refused to hear him out he could tie her to a chair and force her to listen the
00:25:39
weapons were simply to scare her into compliance Lo claimed that at first Sonia had been happy to stay in the room
00:25:47
with him he said they had consensual sex um he was asked by the gy if he had raped her and he he denied that when she
00:25:56
saw what he had brought with him the pellet gun the Stanley knife the masking tape she started to scream and he said
00:26:03
he just wanted to shut her up in case somebody heard her and he started to strangle her detectives found Lock's
00:26:11
version of events hard to believe the killer claimed Sonia had willingly stayed in the room with her own stalker
00:26:18
had consented to have sex with him and had only panicked when she saw the array of sinister items lock had brought with
00:26:26
him Marden investigation point of view here we have a a young woman is strangled
00:26:34
murdered and we have a guy then coming in and telling us that he did it but he didn't intend to do it so is it
00:26:43
manslaughter or is it murder can we prove the intent or can we not prove the intent he first told the guardy that he
00:26:53
strangled her with his bare hands only but then he was shown the cable of her phone charger which was Blood Stained
00:27:00
and he admitted that he had used that briefly he later said he used that first and then he changed to using his
00:27:09
hands that first attempt he made to Strangler didn't work so he strangled her with his bare hands then instead so
00:27:17
really his story didn't really stand up he was medically examined after his arrest and uh he had very obvious
00:27:27
scratch mark on his face and he also had carpet burns on his arms and legs and these were found to be consistent with
00:27:39
him having carried out a sexual assault his DNA was found on her forward her right breast on a pillow and bed sheets
00:27:49
in the room as well Sonia's blood was found on the jeans Eric lock had been wearing Lo told the Garder he wasn't
00:27:58
sure if Sonia was dead when he left but that before leaving he dressed the lifeless woman so that she'd have
00:28:06
dignity when she was found it's a very very creepy thing to do the confession is not about remorse
00:28:18
or shame or guilt he's now trying to say to the police I'm not really this bad
00:28:22
guy that I look like he is going to start presenting himself as the victim him he claimed that he he'd always
00:28:31
suffered with depression through his life but when he met Sonia it seemed to lift and he was happy
00:28:40
and then when she finished with him it all came crashing down again depression does not cause people to commit this
00:28:49
type of murder just after 1:00 a.m. on the 17th of February Eric L was chared charged
00:28:58
with Sonia Blunt's murder Eric lock was brought by detectives from tallard station to the local district court this
00:29:05
morning to face a charge of murder there was not enough evidence to charge him with raping or sexually assaulting
00:29:13
Sonia lock was remanded in custody at Clover Hill prison in kulin South Dublin the task for detectives now was to prove
00:29:22
their suspect intended to kill Sonia the police search Eric Lock's house and
00:29:31
discover a positive Treasure Trove of information including handcuffs cable ties a screwdriver
00:29:43
set and also a list of names of women a number of them had addresses which he obtained from social media when Lock's
00:29:51
devices were analyzed guardi found he'd been stalking several women online they
00:29:57
suspected did he planned more attacks like the one he'd inflicted upon Sonia
00:30:03
we will never know what his other plans were and who else he had taken a dislike to or a set
00:30:11
against he had a kill this he went with weapons he had got there through coercive means this guy had been
00:30:21
planning this for a what he was not an innocent he was not a victim of his own temper that's just not what was going on
00:30:29
here when a man kills a partner who has left him it is never jealous rage most cases have planning and lock
00:30:43
planned the fake Facebook profile in the name of Shane Cully had been carefully calculated to deceive Sonia and to win
00:30:52
her trust he had photographs on there he had friends on there it looked like a real Facebook profile of someone at this
00:31:02
stage it was months since he had met her and they' dated and he knew her likes
00:31:07
and he her dislikes and he behaved completely differently to Eric lock on this Facebook profile and he played on
00:31:17
that to be able to get access to her he knew enough about her to know if he came
00:31:24
in as a potential boyfriend what to say say and how to say it when the pathologist examined Sonia's body she
00:31:33
found further evidence that Sonia's death had not occurred in one brief Red Mist moment but had in fact been a
00:31:40
prolonged and determined assault she was really attacked by him she fought for her life and she she was able to scratch
00:31:50
his face and she actually got his DNA underneath her fingernails she fought like a tiger and it would have taken
00:31:58
some strength and some determination and some time strangulation murder doesn't
00:32:05
happen in a couple of seconds though they were certain Eric lock had murdered Sonia blunt In Cold
00:32:13
Blood guarder and prosecutors knew it was down to them to prove it to a jury on the 8th of May 2017 Eric Loch went on
00:32:24
trial at Dublin Central Criminal Court the process of getting Justice for Sonia had been beset by legal
00:32:33
delays the trial was supposed to start at least a year and a half earlier but it was adjourned when the defense
00:32:41
applied for a new psychiatric report for him Eric lock didn't speak during the
00:32:47
brief hearing he stood in the dock with his head down he was granted free legal aid and the judge directed that he have
00:32:54
access to his medication and be afforded medical attention ition if required before remanding him in custody to
00:33:00
appear again at Clover Hill district court this day week lock now 35 years old maintained his position that while
00:33:09
he may have killed the mother of one he was not a murderer when the trial did get underway a jury was sworn in and he
00:33:18
pleaded not guilty to murder journalist Natasa Reed attended every day of the two week trial the courtroom was packed
00:33:28
both families friends but also an awful lot of reporters there was a lot of interest in the case and there was an
00:33:35
atmosphere a very tense atmosphere that prevailed for the whole trial one of the
00:33:41
challenges for prosecutors would be convincing the jury of eight men and four women that Lo was a callous killer
00:33:48
who posed a threat to women one of the things that stood out about Eric lock is that he looked like a quite a decent
00:33:56
person he look looks like someone who didn't belong in a courtroom and sure enough he'd never been in trouble with
00:34:01
the gy in his life before he didn't come from that kind of background at all so
00:34:06
he did look out of place there and he did look kind of innocent as well as Lo had already admitting to killing Sonia
00:34:15
it really came down to his mental state in this trial so what the jury needed to
00:34:19
establish was his mental state at the time of the offense you couldn't argue
00:34:23
with the forensic evidence you couldn't argue with the physical evidence you
00:34:27
could only argue about Lock's State of Mind Lock's defense team claimed that at
00:34:32
the time of Sonia's death the killer was suffering from a mental disorder that
00:34:37
meant he did not have the ability to form a rational judgment exercise self-control or understand that what he
00:34:44
was doing was wrong the psychiatrist who evaluated Lo did say that a great deal of planning went into the murder of
00:34:52
Sonia however he did go on to say that Lock's mental capacity had diminished a
00:34:58
lot prior to this killing there are only specific mental disorders that can qualify a person for this partial
00:35:07
defense of diminished responsibility which reduces murder to manslaughter so it did come down in the
00:35:14
end to the defense psychiatrist saying he had a pervasive personality disorder which would have qualified him for
00:35:20
diminish responsibility when Dr bun asked Lo to describe himself he said he was a genuinely peaceful guy
00:35:28
however the psychiatrist had noted in these examinations that lock distinctly lacked empathy he also added that he
00:35:34
suffered from ADHD and borderline personality disorder when they cross-examined the expert witness the
00:35:41
prosecution questioned the idea that Lo had lost control of himself when he killed Sonia the doctor did concede that
00:35:48
there was an element of control in Lo's actions when he was there so when he was
00:35:52
strangling her he could change his hands a person who lacks self-control is blinded by their rage and would continue
00:35:59
acting in a consistent manner however Lo was able to change both of his hands not
00:36:04
only that he didn't then made the decision to reach for the cable the phone cable and then strangle her with
00:36:10
that not only did lock show control in the moment the prosecution pointed out that he'd put a great deal of planning
00:36:18
into his crime what he did was premeditated in that he had set up a fake profile he had engineered a case
00:36:27
whereby Sonia would leave the key card at the reception he knew that if Sonia had gone
00:36:35
along with her plan to let him in as he knocked at the door that she would have recognized him through the keyhole and
00:36:41
not let him in he had brought the equipment to tie Sonia up and to to gag her and he had brought the fake firearm
00:36:50
after killing Sonia lock had also gone to some lents to cover his tracks having placed the do not disturb sign on the
00:36:57
hotel room door he'd run from the building attempting to cover his face so his wounds would not be
00:37:04
seen he went outside and he was caught on camera disposing of his mobile phone the prosecution argued that lock may
00:37:12
have had a personality disorder but he did not have a mental disorder that would qualify him for diminished
00:37:18
responsibility the prosecution case was that it was anger and rage that led him to strangle her and it was consistent
00:37:27
with retribution and Vengeance and they said you know this story about consensual sex was not even slightly
00:37:39
believable the prosecution argued that Lo was motivated by his obsessive fixation on the relationship with Sonia
00:37:46
he wanted and believed he deserved to have Lo had honed in on Sonia he had picked her out and then he had decided
00:37:56
they were going to live happily ever after and he was going to dominate her he was going to tell her what she can
00:38:02
and what you can't do and he was going to be in charge and the relationship was
00:38:05
going to go exactly along the lines that he wanted and there was no room for maneuver he feels that she has committed
00:38:14
to him in some way which she hasn't but he thinks she has then he feels this is now an
00:38:23
injustice I've had my rights taken away by this person rejecting me and finishing with me when we were in a
00:38:32
relationship and I was in charge of that relationship this was the argument put forward by the prosecution that Eric
00:38:39
lock had killed Sonia blunt because he was Furious that she had rejected him as the jury retired to deliberate on the
00:38:46
22nd of May 2017 Eric Lo must have been hoping they empathize with his plight as
00:38:52
a Love Lawn Suitor he thinks that other people will sympathize with him we go I know what
00:39:00
you mean mate that must have been so hard for you that's what he was expecting Eric lock did not have to wait
00:39:07
long to find out if he was right when the jury was called back after only about 90 minutes deliberating they were
00:39:15
asked as is all always the case do have you reached a verdict there were gasps in the courtroom when they said they had
00:39:22
actually reached a verdict uh at 1990 minutes and the ver ICT was unanimous and it was guilty they didn't believe
00:39:30
his story they didn't believe that he didn't know what he was doing was wrong
00:39:36
they didn't believe he had no intent they didn't believe there was any mental
00:39:40
disorder there as he was leaving the courtroom he turned to Sonia's family and apologized
00:39:46
and said he was so sorry this wasn't accepted by her family they found that it was completely insincere as I think
00:39:54
Sonia's sister CLA was to say later if he'd been truly sorry he wouldn't have
00:39:59
put the family through the torture of a trial and the description of what happened to her sister it's an act of
00:40:07
savagery that it is impossible to exaggerate she was an absolutely innocent mother of a three-year-old
00:40:17
boy there can be no excuse there can be no hiding from the fact that he was a dreadful depraved act on the 2nd of June
00:40:26
Eric lock appeared again at the central criminal court for sentencing the mandatory sentence for murder in this
00:40:34
jurisdiction is life and that's exactly what he got two of her sisters read out
00:40:41
very moving Victim Impact statements and they talked about not just losing a sister an aunt a daughter but a mother
00:40:50
and the fact that Sonia's little boy had lost now had lost both parents um because one had moved away and Sonia who
00:41:00
had promised him she would never leave had now left also in the aftermath of lock sentencing Sonia's family expressed
00:41:08
surprise at Sonia's actions that night their only explanation for her was that
00:41:12
she had been terribly lonely I mean she's had a relationship had a child the
00:41:18
relationship has fallen down and now she's simply looking for the next bit of
00:41:24
happiness for her they believed it was completely out of character for Sonia to meet up with a stranger in a hotel room
00:41:30
it's just not something that she would have done Eric Lo exploited Sonia Blunt's vulnerability when he tricked
00:41:36
her into meeting him his only intention to punish her for refusing to continue their shli
00:41:45
relationship he took advantage of her compassion when he threatened to kill himself she still was there looking out
00:41:51
for him even though she was concerned about her his behavior towards her she still wanted to be a really nice person
00:41:56
and be kind and considerate so it is scary and sad that somebody would take advantage of that to such an extent and
00:42:04
to manipulate her um with her kindness and to use that against her Eric lock could not accept a woman rejecting him
00:42:13
when mother of one Sonia blunt recognized his toxic behavior and made the decision not to keep dating him Lo
00:42:21
responded with every trick in the book from begging to threats to emotional black M when none of his troubling
00:42:29
tactics worked to win her back he took the ultimate Revenge depriving a caring and beloved young woman of her life and
00:42:38
cementing his place as one of the world's most evil killers [Music]