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| - Ireland's high court rejected a bid Monday by France to extradite Briton Ian Bailey over the murder of the wife of French film producer Daniel Toscan du Plantier in 1996. Here are key dates in the long-running case. In the early hours of the morning, a neighbour finds the body of 39-year-old Sophie Toscan du Plantier outside her isolated holiday home near the seaside village of Schull in County Cork. She is wearing her night clothes, and has been beaten on the head with a concrete block. Injuries to her hands suggest that she struggled to defend herself. The third wife of prominent French film producer Daniel Toscan du Plantier, known for "The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover" (1989), she had come to Ireland for the Christmas holidays. A forensics officer doesn't reach the scene for 36 hours. Welsh-born freelance journalist Ian Bailey, who lives about 10 kilometres (six miles) from the crime scene, becomes a key suspect. He is found to have scratches on his arms and face, and a history of domestic violence. He denies any involvement and says the scratches are from cutting down a Christmas tree and carving a turkey. Bailey is arrested for questioning in February 1997 and again in January 1998, but not charged. No forensic evidence links him to the murder scene. A French magistrate begins an investigation independent of the Irish police in 2008, and in February 2010 France issues an arrest warrant for Bailey. But Dublin refuses to arrest him, citing the lack of an extradition deal between the two countries. In February 2014 Bailey loses a libel case against six British and Irish newspapers that had called him the prime suspect after his first arrest. At the trial in Cork, several people testify that Bailey had told them at a New Year's Eve party that he was the killer. French authorities decide in July 2016 that Bailey should go on trial. France issues a second arrest warrant, but Dublin again refuses. The trial opens in Paris on May 27 without the presence of Bailey, now aged 62 and a pizza seller. After several witnesses give evidence that Bailey himself had indicated he committed the crime, the court convicts him of murder. It sentences him to 25 years in jail and issues a third arrest warrant. On October 12, 2020, Ireland's high court says Bailey cannot be extradited to France. At a three-day hearing in Dublin in July, prosecutors said there was a "strong public interest" in handing Bailey over, with the victim's family feeling justice had not been done. bur/jmy/fg/lc
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