Mitchell, who claimed to have found her almost immediately after a search party set out that evening to find the missing girl, rapidly became the prime suspect and was brought to trial in 2004.

It was discovered that a knife that he regularly carried around with him and which could have been the murder weapon had mysteriously disappeared, as had his coat which he had been seen wearing that night and which could have held incriminatory forensic evidence.

The pouch for the missing knife was found, and Mitchell had marked on it Jodi's initials JJ with "1989 – 2003" (her birth and death), as well as a quote from Jones' favourite band Nirvana saying "the finest day I ever had was when tomorrow never came".

[8] He was originally considered a well-mannered, smartly-dressed youth whose hobbies included army cadets, riding horses, and motorbikes, but he then changed to adopt the "Goth" style of dressing.

Jones has been described as a bright, "level-headed" and headstrong child who displayed a flair for painting and poetry and who was particularly close with her older sister, Janine.

[18] In the weeks immediately before she was murdered, Jones's social life—which largely revolved around Mitchell—was curtailed by her mother after she discovered her daughter had begun taking drugs.

[30] Forensic psychologist Ian Stephen advised that the attack indicated "an eruption of anger", adding: "It sounds like an argument has taken place, either someone who was extremely upset has come across Jodi or someone was there with her and there has been a violent dispute.

[31] The injuries sustained by Jones closely resembled those of actress Elizabeth Short, who was murdered in 1947 and was popularly referred to by media as the Black Dahlia.

[27] During a search of his home, detectives found 20 bottles of urine in his bedroom[40] and confiscated a copy of The Golden Age of Grotesque by Marilyn Manson containing the short film Doppelherz.

[42][10] A ten-minute excerpt from the film, as well as several paintings by Manson depicting the Black Dahlia's mutilated body, were presented as evidence during the trial.

[10] Manson had a "Golden Age of the Grotesque" exhibition on his website at the time, featuring images depicting the mutilation and murdering of actress Elizabeth Short in the Black Dahlia case.

[10] At his trial at the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh, Mitchell pleaded not guilty and lodged a special defence of alibi: that he was at home cooking dinner at the time of the murder.

[59] As a result of this testimony at trial, Mitchell's mother Corinne (who herself had conflictingly claimed that her son was at home cooking dinner at the time of the murder) was then charged with perjury for lying to provide him with an alibi.

[27] The prosecution also attempted to discredit Corinne as a witness by alluding to how she had been present at Mitchell getting a tattoo of a skull with flames in October 2003, and had lied to the staff to claim he was 18 and boasted "that's really him".

[10] The prosecution alleged that this demonstrated an unhealthy relationship between Mitchell and his mother and that she was pampering him and lying for him, and that from this the jury could consider her alibi for her own son to be untrustworthy.

[10] Mitchell apparently lied in interviews by saying he hadn't spoken to the other girl for months, when phone records showed he regularly rang her, including for some hours after he had had sex with Jones for the last time two days before her murder.

[71] The events of the murder as determined at trial and by the forensic evidence show that the attack on Jones would have started with Mitchell punching her in the face several times and then attempting to strangle her with his hands.

[8] This would have led to her falling to her knees, at which point the evidence suggests he began to use the knife, severing a major artery in her neck, which ultimately caused her death.

[8] Her neck was then slashed another twenty times and then her clothes were removed, with her trousers used to bind her body, at which point he would have stabbed her abdomen, breast and mouth, and slit her eyelids.

[62] As heard at the 2004 trial, Mitchell had been planning to go away for two weeks with the other girlfriend days after the murder, and the Crown argued at the appeal: "it offers a possible explanation for conflict with Jodi at the time.

[75] On 15 April 2011, Mitchell's bid to challenge his conviction for murder following a human rights ruling by the Supreme Court in the Cadder case was rejected.

[77] On 20 July 2012, lawyers acting for Mitchell launched a fresh bid to have his conviction overturned when a 300-page dossier was delivered to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC).

[78] In July 2014, the SCCRC ruled that police officers breached Luke Mitchell's human rights when they questioned him over the murder of Jones, but determined he was not the victim of a miscarriage of justice.

[79] Immediately after the decision by the SCCRC, it was announced that Mitchell would take his case to the European Courts; the competency of such a move was questionable since the ECHR has a strict six-month deadline for applications.

[82] Lean has been criticised by the family of Jones for spreading "misinformation" about the case and for selling campaign T-shirts with slogans on them such as "open your eyes to the lies" and "justice for Jodi and Luke".

[88] After the airing of a 2021 Channel 5 documentary about the case titled Murder in a Small Town which speculated that Mitchell was innocent, a number of criticisms were levelled at its selectiveness.

The family has always been of the view the police have the correct person for Jodi's murder... his team are just muddying the waters and confusing people with no knowledge of the legal system and how it works".

[7] The family of Jones have been subjected to a number of false accusations on social media, as well as regular abuse from "amateur sleuths" and supporters of Mitchell, which they have described as "soul-destroying".

[86] Professor Busuttil had in fact also given evidence at trial that there were "major similarities" between the Black Dahlia and Jones cases, such as the locations and the injuries inflicted.

Tom Wood, who was second in command of Lothian and Borders Police at the time of the murder, called the programme "very one-sided" and pointed out that Mitchell's appeals had been unsuccessful.