By Hayley Dixon

Experts who tried and failed to recreate the method of death of spy Gareth   Williams say they do not agree with the police finding that the MI6 man died   by accident.

The codebreaker could not have got into the bag and locked it from the inside   alone, witnesses who worked closely with the investigation have claimed   after attempting the task more than 400 times. No one has ever come forward   who has been able to recreate the scene.

When Mr Williams’ naked, decomposing body was found in the bath of his flat in   Pimlico, London, in August 2010, the handles of the holdall had been   fastened with Velcro, there was no sign of him struggling to escape, and the   eyelets on the locks had been perfectly aligned.

No finger, foot, palm prints or DNA belonging to Mr Williams was found on the   rim of the bath, padlock or zipper and he was not wearing any gloves.

Despite the mysterious circumstances surrounding his death and an inquest   finding that he had been unlawfully killed, the police have now concluded   that Mr Williams most likely got into the bag by himself and died after   failing to get out again.

However, William MacKay, a confined spaces expert who gave evidence at the   inquest, said that he still believes that someone else was involved.

“Everything leads to that being the case,” he said. “When you put the forensic   evidence together with the other evidence the likelihood that one person   could do it is slim.

“Where is all the DNA that would have been around the bath? I would stay short   of saying it was murder, because obviously it could have been an accident   that someone else could have been involved in, the scenarios are many.”

For the inquest he and a yoga expert, who was of very similar stature to Mr   Williams at 170cm tall and weighing 68 kilos, made hundreds of attempts to   recreate the scenario in which Mr Williams’ body was found. Although the   expert could get into the bag, he was unable to lock it.

Peter Faulding, who also worked closely with the police and gave evidence at   the inquest, agrees that Mr Williams was not alone when he was locked in the   holdall.

He believes that the evidence points toward murder as the heating in the flat   had been turned up despite it being midsummer, which would have speeded up   decomposition, a doorknob which could have given forensic clues had been   removed, and Mr William’s iPhone had been wiped.

Mr Faulding told the Sunday Express: “I believe the bag was placed in the bath   to let bodily fluids run down the plughole.”

He has always said that Mr Williams was dead or unconscious when he was placed   in the bag, and believes it was then lifted into the bath.

Mr MacKay, a former Army officer, said: “As I told the coroner I have seen   some amazing things being done in my career, and so I could not say beyond   all reasonable doubt that nobody could do it.

“We got close, but close is still far away. With all the other demonstrations   generally it showed damage to the bag when it was done. That was based upon   hundreds and hundreds of attempts, maybe if we had tried it 2,000 times we   would have done it, I don’t know, but there were two of us.

“One of the key things for me is that after we released all the evidence we   waited for people who would come and show us how to do it.”

Days after the inquest, a retired Army sergeant did claim to demonstrate how   it was possible to climb into a similar North Face bag and lock it from the   inside.

However, Mr MacKay said: “One person did come forward, but the eyelets weren’t   put together in the same way, we dispelled that method as it wasn’t the way   that the bag was closed.

“Nobody else has come forward and for me that is very telling, people   always want to show off and show us as experts how badly they think we have   done.”

Despite their findings, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Martin Hewitt, who led   the police investigation, last week concluded “it is a more probable   conclusion that there was no other person present when Gareth died.”

Mr Williams’ family have rejected the results of the three and a half year   police investigation and maintain that he was murdered