Jessie Gilbert
Encyclopedia
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
chess player
Chess
Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...
.
Biography
Jessica was the daughter of Angela and Ian Gilbert and was raised in WoldinghamWoldingham
Woldingham is a village and civil parish in Surrey located above sea level just within the M25, southeast of London. Situated high on the North Downs between Oxted and Warlingham, it is a village of 2,326 inhabitants...
, Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
. She attended Croydon High School
Croydon High School
Croydon High School for Girls GDST is a leading non-denominational independent school for girls, located near Croydon, Greater London, England. It is one of the schools in the Girls' Day School Trust....
. Her father was a career manager with the Royal Bank of Scotland
Royal Bank of Scotland
The Royal Bank of Scotland Group is a British banking and insurance holding company in which the UK Government holds an 84% stake. This stake is held and managed through UK Financial Investments Limited, whose voting rights are limited to 75% in order for the bank to retain its listing on the...
. Gilbert's parents had separated in 2003, and Jessica was living in Reigate
Reigate
Reigate is a historic market town in Surrey, England, at the foot of the North Downs, and in the London commuter belt. It is one of the main constituents of the Borough of Reigate and Banstead...
with her mother and siblings; while her father had remarried to a lawyer
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
named Sally, and lived in Hackney
Hackney Central
Hackney Central is the central district of the London Borough of Hackney in London, England. It comprises the area roughly surrounding, and extending north from Mare Street. It is situated north east of Charing Cross...
, east London.
Jessica Gilbert had represented England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
in every major chess competition from the age of 12, and came to prominence when she won the Women’s World Amateur Chess Championship in 1999. She was mentioned in a parliamentary
Parliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...
debate by the then sports minister, Tony Banks
Tony Banks, Baron Stratford
Anthony Louis Banks, Baron Stratford was a British Labour Party politician, who was a Member of Parliament from 1983 to 2005, before being made a Member of the House of Lords. In government, he served for two years as Minister for Sport...
, who said: "We are extremely proud of what Jessie Gilbert has achieved for chess and for this country."
She also gained the Woman FIDE Master (WFM) title from the game's governing body, FIDE. In recognition of her achievement, the Brain Trust
Brain Trust
Brain trust began as a term for a group of close advisors to a political candidate or incumbent, prized for their expertise in particular fields. The term is most associated with the group of advisors to Franklin Roosevelt during his presidential administration...
charity and Swedish health care company Bure
Bure Equity
Bure Equity is an investment company involved in communications, textiles, training, and education. It is largest private school operator in Sweden. This role gained it international attention in connection to the rise of independent schools in Sweden...
provided Gilbert with a bursary of £
Pound sterling
The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...
4000 so that she could travel to America to study with grandmaster Edmar Mednis
Edmar Mednis
Edmar John Mednis was an American International Grandmaster of chess born in Riga, Latvia. He was also a popular and respected chess writer.-Biography:...
in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
.
Gilbert had won a place at the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
to study medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
from September 2005, but decided to take a gap year
Gap year
An expression or phrase that is associated with taking time out to travel in between life stages. It is also known as sabbatical, time off and time out that refers to a period of time in which students disengage from curricular education and undertake non curricular activities, such as travel or...
in order to spend time focused solely on chess. In the space of only a few months in early 2006, Gilbert achieved three "norms" in major chess tournaments.
Death
On the night of 26 July 2006, she fell from the eighth floor of the Hotel Labe, in PardubicePardubice
Pardubice is the capital city of the Pardubice Region and lies on the river Elbe, 65 miles east of Prague. Pardubice has an antique centre square and old town, with many restaurants that stay open until late in the evening. There is an old Tower and a recently renovated Castle...
, Czech Republic
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
, where she was playing at the Czech Open. On the evening of her death, it was reported she had consumed beer
Beer
Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...
and vodka
Vodka
Vodka , is a distilled beverage. It is composed primarily of water and ethanol with traces of impurities and flavorings. Vodka is made by the distillation of fermented substances such as grains, potatoes, or sometimes fruits....
from the room's minibar. Jessica also shared the room with a 14-year-old friend and fellow chess-player. Her friend got up to visit the bathroom
Bathroom
A bathroom is a room for bathing in containing a bathtub and/or a shower and optionally a toilet, a sink/hand basin/wash basin and possibly also a bidet....
sometime in the early morning. When she returned, Jessica was missing, and the friend assumed that she had gone for a walk.
Some of her acquaintances came forward to claim that Jessica was a sleepwalker
Sleepwalking
Sleepwalking, also known as somnambulism, is a sleep disorder belonging to the parasomnia family. Sleepwalkers arise from the slow wave sleep stage in a state of low consciousness and perform activities that are usually performed during a state of full consciousness...
, and that she could have fallen to her death through the window, which would have been left open due to the hot weather in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
at the time. But the authorities and the Czech Open organizer Jiri Petruzalek pointed to suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
as the cause. Jessica was said to be taking anti-depressants, and it was later revealed that she had a history of self-harm
Self-harm
Self-harm or deliberate self-harm includes self-injury and self-poisoning and is defined as the intentional, direct injuring of body tissue most often done without suicidal intentions. These terms are used in the more recent literature in an attempt to reach a more neutral terminology...
and had tried suicide previously using paracetamol
Paracetamol
Paracetamol INN , or acetaminophen USAN , is a widely used over-the-counter analgesic and antipyretic . It is commonly used for the relief of headaches and other minor aches and pains and is a major ingredient in numerous cold and flu remedies...
tablets.
On 27 September 2007, the inquest
Inquest
Inquests in England and Wales are held into sudden and unexplained deaths and also into the circumstances of discovery of a certain class of valuable artefacts known as "treasure trove"...
into Jessica's death recorded an open verdict
Open verdict
The Open verdict is an option open to a Coroner's jury at an Inquest in the legal system of England and Wales. The verdict strictly means that the jury confirms that the death is suspicious but is unable to reach any of the other verdicts open to them...
.
Trial of Ian Gilbert
Two days following her death, it emerged that her father, Ian Gilbert, had previously been charged with seven counts of rapeRape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
and two counts of indecent assault
Indecent assault
Indecent assault is an offence of aggravated assault in many jurisdictions. It is characterised as a sex crime.Indecent assault was an offence in England and Wales under sections 14 and 15 the Sexual Offences Act 1956...
. The charges were said to relate to more than one victim. British police would not name the alleged victims, but confirmed that one of them was dead. On 29 July 2006, the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
press
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
began to name Jessica Gilbert as one of the victims.
At the time of Jessica's death, Mr Gilbert had not yet entered a plea to the charges. If she had lived, and he had pleaded not guilty, that would have raised the prospect of Jessica having to give evidence
Evidence
Evidence in its broadest sense includes everything that is used to determine or demonstrate the truth of an assertion. Giving or procuring evidence is the process of using those things that are either presumed to be true, or were themselves proven via evidence, to demonstrate an assertion's truth...
against her father, and being cross-examined by his barrister
Barrister
A barrister is a member of one of the two classes of lawyer found in many common law jurisdictions with split legal professions. Barristers specialise in courtroom advocacy, drafting legal pleadings and giving expert legal opinions...
. Mr Gilbert was released on bail
Bail
Traditionally, bail is some form of property deposited or pledged to a court to persuade it to release a suspect from jail, on the understanding that the suspect will return for trial or forfeit the bail...
, pending his case starting at Guildford
Guildford
Guildford is the county town of Surrey. England, as well as the seat for the borough of Guildford and the administrative headquarters of the South East England region...
Crown Court
Crown Court
The Crown Court of England and Wales is, together with the High Court of Justice and the Court of Appeal, one of the constituent parts of the Senior Courts of England and Wales...
on 21 August 2006. On 31 July 2006, the Crown Prosecution Service
Crown Prosecution Service
The Crown Prosecution Service, or CPS, is a non-ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for public prosecutions of people charged with criminal offences in England and Wales. Its role is similar to that of the longer-established Crown Office in Scotland, and the...
said that they would be reviewing the case in the light of the media coverage of Jessica Gilbert's death.
When the trial started, he entered a plea of not guilty. On 7 November 2006 the prosecution played a tape recording of Jessica in interview with Surrey police. She told officers of the first attack by her father when she was eight: “I was asleep and he sat on my bed and I woke up. He didn’t say anything. I did not scream or anything because he had his hand over my mouth and I was really scared.” She said there were at least another eight such attacks over the next five years. She also told the officers her father tried to strangle her by wrapping a computer lead around her neck, and would walk into the bathroom at their home in Woldingham
Woldingham
Woldingham is a village and civil parish in Surrey located above sea level just within the M25, southeast of London. Situated high on the North Downs between Oxted and Warlingham, it is a village of 2,326 inhabitants...
while she was showering.
On 14 December 2006, Mr Gilbert was found not guilty of all charges against him. He speculated that Jessie had accused him as the means of revenge after some arguments they had. Two days later it was reported that Angela Gilbert had been arrested on suspicion of threatening to kill her ex-husband, although she was later released and the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to proceed with the case.
External links
- The tormented life of Jessie Gilbert, Chessbase, 8 August 2006
- Jessie Gilbert chess games
- Exceptionally Talented, Sky News, 28 July 2006
- Chess star's father on sex charge, BBC News, 29 July 2006
- Chess girl's father is accused of raping her, Daily Mail, 28 July 2006
- Tragic chess star's history of self-harm, The Observer, 30 July 2006
- Rape trial torment of chess prodigy, The Sunday Times, 30 July 2006
- Rape case of chess girl's father under review, The Times, 31 July 2006
- Chess girl one of her father's four alleged sex victims, This is local London, 31 July 2006
- Chess talent Jessie Gilbert dies at 19, Chessbase News, 27 July 2006
- Statistics at ChessWorld.net