Jessie Gilbert: Difference between revisions

Jessica Gilbert (January 30 1987 – July 26 2006) was a talented young British chess player.

Gilbert first became well-known when she won the Women’s World Amateur Chess Championship in 1999 at the record age of 12. Such was her achievement, she was even mentioned in a parliamentary debate by the then sports minister, Tony Banks, who said, "We are extremely proud of what Jessie Gilbert has achieved for chess and for this country." ^[1]

She also gained the Woman FIDE Master (WFM) title from the game's governing body, FIDE. Since the age of 12, she had represented England in every major chess competition.

In recognition of her achievement, the Brain Trust charity and Swedish health care company Bure provided Gilbert with a bursary of £4000 so that she could travel to America to study with grandmaster Edmar Mednis in New York. Gilbert had won a place at Oxford University to study medicine, but decided to take a gap year 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 July 26 2006, her life was cut tragically short when she fell from the eighth floor of the Hotel Labe, in Pardubice, Czech Republic, where she was playing at the Czech Open. Following her death she was posthumously made an International Master.

Some of her acquaintances came forward to claim that Gilbert was a sleepwalker, and that she could, in her sleep, have fallen to her death through the window, which would have been left open due to the hot weather in Europe at the time. But the authorities and the Czech Open organizer Jiri Petruzalek pointed to suicide as a possible cause. Gilbert was said to be taking anti-depressants, and it was later revealed that she had a history of self-harm and had tried suicide previously using paracetamol tablets. On the evening of her death, she had been drinking beer and vodka from the room's minibar with her 14-year-old friend and fellow chess-player Amisha Parmar, with whom she was also sharing the hotel room. Miss Parmar had felt ill from the effects of the alcohol and had visited the bathroom. When she returned, Gilbert was missing, and Amisha assumed she had gone for a walk.

Trial of Ian Gilbert

Gilbert's parents had separated two years before her death, and she had been living in Reigate with her mother and siblings. Her father, Ian Gilbert a director of the Royal Bank of Scotland, has remarried ^[2].

Two days following her death, it emerged Mr Gilbert had been charged with seven charges of rape and two of indecent assault. 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^[3]. On 29 July 2006, the British press began to name Jessica Gilbert as one of the victims.

Mr Gilbert had at the time of the charge to enter a plea. If he were to plead not guilty, it would have raised the prospect of Jessica having to give evidence against her father, and being cross-examined by his barrister. Mr Gilbert was released on bail, pending his case starting at Guildford Crown Court on 21 August 2006. On 31 July 2006, the Crown Prosecution Service said that they would be reviewing the case in the light of the media coverage of Jessica Gilbert's death^[4].

When the trial started, Mr Gilbert faced five counts of rape - two dropped due to Jessica's death. 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: “He’d come in and I’d close my eyes and pretend it was not happening. He would tell me “Don’t say anything or I’ll kill you.” " 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, while she was having a shower. Jessica said she had nightmares about him every night and saw a psychiatrist because of the alleged abuse ^[5]

References

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
• House of Commons Hansard debates, 15 March 1999