Actor Blake's four-year nightmare

Robert Blake had always protested his innocence

Actor Robert Blake found himself at the centre of a murder trial which could have come straight from the movies. Almost four years after the death of his wife Bonny Lee Bakley he has been cleared of her murder.

Bonny Lee Bakley was discovered shot dead in a car outside a Los Angeles restaurant in May 2001.

Mr Blake told police he had left Ms Bakley in the car while he had returned to the restaurant where they had just dined to recover a gun he had left behind.

Police questioned Mr Blake for more than five hours, failing to find any forensic evidence, and initially ruled him out of their investigations, according to his lawyer.

Mr Blake hired a private detective to investigate a possible motive for the crime, and to look into her background to find clues as to who could have killed her.

But in May 2002 Mr Blake was arrested by Los Angeles police. Authorities pointed the finger at Mr Blake as their prime suspect, and his bodyguard and handyman Earle Caldwell was suspected of conspiring to kill her.

Bonny Lee Bakley was married to Blake for five months before her death

'Chequered background'

Mr Blake was held in custody for 12 months until he was finally freed on $1.5m bail. All charges against Mr Caldwell were eventually dropped.

His first lawyer, Harland Braun, alleged Ms Bakley had a "chequered background" and was believed to have been involved in a "lonely hearts con scheme" in which she married men across the country for money.

Mr Braun even went as far as suggesting she had been married as many as 100 times.

It was also said she had been stalked by a man and shot at, asking Mr Blake to carry a gun to protect her.

Mr Blake and his legal team painted Ms Bakley as a celebrity-obsessed woman who had fallen pregnant in order to trap him him into marriage.

She had given birth to their daughter in November 2000 and they had married five months later when a DNA test proved Mr Blake was the father.

Mr Blake also accused prosecutors of going after him because of his fame.

But prosecutors said it was overwhelming evidence, not his celebrity, that drew them to believe he was guilty.

'Trust in God'

From his arrest in May 2002, right through to the end of his trial in 2005, Mr Blake denied he was the one to pull the trigger. He even went against the wishes of his lawyers by giving a TV interview to ABC's Barbara Walters from inside prison, causing two of his attorneys to quit in succession.

In the interview, Mr Blake said he trusted God would not let him down and that he would be found not guilty.

But he also accepted that everybody thought he was guilty.

In early court proceedings it was decided not to push for the death penalty.

The court heard that Mr Blake had tried to solicit two former stuntmen to act as hitmen.

Stuntman Ronald Hambleton said he had discussions with Mr Blake about possible locations for the murder, and the actor had said he would do it himself if no-one else would.

Elaborate plot

But the defence attempted to discredit the two stuntmen, by claiming they were ex-drug addicts who had unreliable memories. Mr Hambleton was called an outright liar.

The defence added it was "absurd" to suggest Mr Blake would come up with such an elaborate plot, attempting to kill Ms Bakley outside a restaurant he had been visiting for 30 years, then leaving his wife - if she survived the attack - to possibly identify him.

In summing up the case, the defence reiterated there was no forensic evidence to link Mr Blake to the murder and that somebody else with a grudge against Ms Bakley must have carried out the shooting.

With Mr Blake acquitted of murder, and left to pick up the pieces of his life and career, police must now try to find who did really did kill Bonny Lee Bakley.