Opinion on Robert Blake

Several people have asked me to give opinions on what I think about Robert Blake. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any video of him talking in so long I can’t remember when it was. I searched the web and tried to find some footage, but I am clearly unable too. The old footage has expired and been removed from the web. I am bummed so I thought I’d tell anyone out there, if you happen to find footage of him talking about the murder, let me know!

When I was searching, I did find and recall that I watched ABC’s 20/20 with Barbara Walters sometime ago — when she interviewed him. I don’t remember anything about the interview in particular, but I do remember I had formulated a “strong” opinion back then — and opinion that I didn’t believe Blake. I remember being confident about it.

In my search for footage, I did read little tidbits about the murder case and several facts really stand out as inconsistent and disturb me. They are:

1. “Blake said he left her in the car while he returned to the restaurant to retrieve a handgun he had left behind. He told detectives he was armed because his wife feared someone was stalking her.”

   Isn’t this odd?? This statement jumped out at me and screamed more than any other. I had to stop and figure out why. After some thought, I did.

   If Blake is being honest and Bakley really was truly afraid that “someone” was “stalking” her, wouldn’t he or she have insisted that she go back with Blake to the restaurant?
   
   If you were afraid of someone was “stalking” you, wouldn’t you have done that??? Wouldn’t he have done that too??? This shows inconsistency in his story. He didn’t act like a person who was protecting someone else.

   HOWEVER, if you were afraid of Blake, you wouldn’t necessarily follow him back to the restaurant, would you? Perhaps you would wait in the car like Bakley did.
   
   I believe what Blake did was take the truth that Bakley was afraid of him, and twisted it and used it against Bakley by saying that she had some unknown “stalker” that she feared when in fact she feared him!!

   If he believed she had a stalker, the prosecutor should have asked him — then why didn’t you have her go back to the restaurant with you? You were carrying a gun for her sake — not yours as you suggest. Why didn’t you, Mr. Blake??

   In another odd twist, Blake considered Bakley a “celebrity stalker” when he met her. Those were his own words. The use of the word “stalker” is a bit haunting considering he used it in his defense (above).

2. Isn’t the timing of this just miraculous? What are the odds! He happens to forget his weapon — his self-protection for him and his wife — his gun — haphazardly in the restaurant when they are supposedly afraid of some stalker.

   Then once he realizes it, he leaves his fearful wife alone in the car while he goes to retrieve it while at the exact same time (or within minutes of when) — someone ELSE shoots her.

   It’s important to note that the gun used in the killing wasn’t the one he went to retrieve.

   What are the odds of this happening? Also, more importantly — who takes their gun off when wearing it for self-protection and forgets about it? When there is supposed fear? This doesn’t make ANY SENSE.

3. I have found four separate people who all speak of Blake approaching them to knock Bakley off when reading about this case. Two people were stunt men, one was a retired police detective and another was a co-star. I could doubt one person, maybe two if their reputations were exceptionally shady but I can’t discount three or four people — people who I am guessing didn’t know each other. It shows a pattern.

   Even more, I would have a real hard time discounting Welch, the retired police detective.

   In light of four people speaking of Blake’s desire for her to be killed, I ask myself: What was their relationship like? Was he loving and affectionate? Was his behavior inconsistent with what these four people said or consistent?

4. It is clearly consistent with the pattern of the four people speaking out against him. Blake did not like Bakley at all. He despised her for outsmarting him and trapping him into becoming a father. I found part of the 20/20 interview in text. Bakley acts off-balanced here — another concern. He makes it clear he is beyond outraged that he was fooled by a woman. He loathes her for it to the point I remember how scary he looked on 20/20 — frightfully scary. I am remembering his facial expressions. I feared the man.

5. Blake offered Bakley $250,000 to get out of his life after learning about the pregnancy– yet Bakley refused. Then Blake offered to marry her and let her and the baby live on his property if she agreed to rules –rules which if she broke — they mutually agreed would allowed him to take full custody of the child. More than that, when he married her, he told her whoever breaks the marriage agrees to give up the child. He was trying everything in his power to set her up to fail him so he could claim victory. Victory was that he got the child and got rid of her.

   This was a relationship between two very ugly people, let me tell you. Bakley was known to marry men just for the money. I think I read somewhere Blake was her 10th husband. It’s chillingly evil!
   
   Blake was an incredible control freak and he did everything in his power to break Bakley into giving him the child and getting the heck out of his life. Just sadly, she continued to stay strong and outsmart him — and he couldn’t cope with it.

   I see a logical outcome building here…rage. Pure rage, and Blake shows that in his ABC 20/20 interview from the text I see (it’s only a small portion unfortunately). It jogs my memory. Worse, I believe Blake shows outrage for another reason. He is fuming mad that his gun trick still made police question HIM!!! He thought he could outsmart people too — like Bakley — and it wasn’t working at that point! He was furious. He hated Bakley all the more because of it.

6. Even more odd: Blake always went to his favorite restaurant and had the valet park his car. He even sat at the same table every time he went. However, on the night of the murder, he didn’t do his “usual”. Why???

   Instead, I read he parked his car behind a dumpster that fateful night. And he forgot his gun when he left– how convenient — at the exact same time when someone happened to kill Bakley. Uh, huh.

   More odd again is that on the night of the murder, at the restaurant, Blake introduced Bakley as his wife to staff for the first time. He had never done this before. The staff didn’t know he was married!

   Why did he do that — this night??? Perhaps so they would remember him when he came back into the restaurant — to make sure he had a rock solid alibi?? Chilling.

   These behaviors are NOT NORMAL, and NOT CONSISTENT in anyway. The truth is always consistent. Always.

7. The staff at the restaurant that night speaks of Blake in the bathroom vomiting. He doesn’t deny it. He did…why?? Was he nervous? What was he nervous about???? He wasn’t sick — everyone knows that.
   
   Was he afraid his plan might not go off as expected???

In looking at the pieces, here is what I think happened. Blake was lonely and desired the affection of a woman. He met Bakley. He knew of her questionable past, but was more tempted in pleasure than self-respect — and enjoyed her company. He played with danger and danger trapped him, as logic would expect.

Bakley framed Blake with the hopes to get money by having his child. Blake thought in their hot and heavy trysts, he could trust her and convinced himself he could, so when she violated him by getting pregnant, he was outraged.

He schemed and plotted, and finally decided he was going to outsmart this beast-of-a-woman who outsmarted him! That was his original game plan. That’s when he offered her money. Then when that didn’t work, he decided to marry her with a contract that gave him everything — or so he thought – and her very little. Furthermore, Bakley had to agree that no friends or family could ever visit her at his estate. Ever.

He enticed Bakley into it by offering her and their daughter a place to live on his estate separate from his own quarters — at no charge. She took him up on it — but didn’t break any of the rules to the point he could get her out of the contract. He was stuck AGAIN. He was stuck paying for a woman who continually fueled him and most importantly made him feel inadequate! And he couldn’t take it.

Clearly, he wanted to her out of his life. Four people speak out openly about this. What do they have to gain by doing so? It doesn’t make them look good — that’s for sure. Even worse, Bakely’s family says she spoke to them, too, about his threats — but was she too greedy to “get away” in self-preservation? Perhaps she knew she’d loose her daughter after all of her scheming and couldn’t accept that either?

Blake tried to hire four people we know about to supposedly kill her. I suspect he successfully hired a fifth. I believe he convinced someone else out there to kill her — in a much planned event. And when it happened, he once again became outraged when the police pointed a finger at him. I keep seeing his insanity during the ABC 20/20 interview. More and more flashes of it are coming back to me. I don’t remember words, just expressions of rage.

But Blake got off. I believe because there wasn’t any concrete evidence though I am convinced from what I have read there was definitely reasonable doubt. However, more than all of this, our justice system doesn’t rely on the truth, it relies on which of the two attorneys can make a better case — and convinced the jury that their side is believable.

It appears, in this case, the defense truly was a better salesman then the prosecution and so Blake, like OJ Simpson, gets to walk free.

Did you ever notice neither man has ever insisted the police focus on finding the “real killer”? That’s what an innocent man does…

Articles I used to write this piece:
http://www.courttv.com/news/blake/background_ctv.html
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6968006/
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/LAW/03/17/blake.jurors/index.html