How Dominic Cummings should have handled his press conference

Cummings should have done is this:

1. Pointed out the wording of the guidance/law which said that people with children in special circumstances could use their judgement and ignore the rule.

2. Every time  Cummings  was asked a question about how he justified his behaviour   he should have simply referred  the questioner to the special circumstances passage in the guidance/law. The reptiles would soon have lost interest.

3. Offered to resign if

a)  every one of the reptiles who beseiged his London  home is  fired from their job  for not observing the social distancing rules and not reemployed in the media.

b) if any member of the Commons or Lords who breaks the rules is forced to resign.

Cummings most stupid mistake was his claim that his drive to Barnard Castle was to test his eyesight. He made the classic error  of someone trying to plug a hole in a story only to find he had created a bigger hole.

However, if he had done what I propose the Barnard Castle trip would have been put on the back burner  as the politicians and the  media ran away from attacking him when their own position was threatened.  If he had to give an explanation for the Barnard Castle trip he should have said his car was playing up  on his drive to the NE  –  a knocking noise would do the trick – and he wanted to make see how the car was running before the 260 mile drive home.

This would prompt the question “Why did you not seek the help of a mechanic? ”

Best answer: because I did not want to breach the lockdown rules.”

Worst answer: there weren’t any mechanics available. ”

The worst answer is the worst answer because it leads off to another line of questioning – “What efforts did you make to find a mechanic ” and such forth.

The best answer is a simple one which leads nowhere beyond the answer itself.

Finally, I do not know what the problem is with the Cummings child, but having put the “my child has special problems” into play Cummings needed to play it to its uttermost, ie, say clearly what the child’s problem is.

 

What to do if you are accused of inciting racial hatred

Robert Henderson

There is a growing enthusiasm by the authorities in Britain  to  prosecute people who are judged to have  broken the law by  being  racist in speech or writing.   This enthusiasm is fuelled by  the adoption of political correctness as the elite ideology of the day.   Anyone in a position of power and influence is forced on pain of being cast from  such circles to at least pay lip service to the creed and the fear of being called racist has those without power or influence in a vice-like grip as they see people who have been accused of racism having  their lives turned upside down by  the media engaging in hate campaigns against them,  their jobs taken from  them and, in an increasing number of cases,  criminal records put upon them for simply saying what they think.

The police have become frantically keen on showing their politically correct credentials. Recently the  Home Secretary  Amber Rudd  found the police recording a complaint of racism  against her after she made a speech dealing with immigrants as a  “non-crime hate incident, a category without any statutory basis  that the police have invented.  In cases such as this the police cease to act as police and become political commissars.

The “non-crime hate incident”  will be logged on a police computer,  quite possibly the  central computer the  police have. It is unlikely to affect the likes of Rudd but anyone without power or influence could well find the police bringing such a record into play  if they end up, for whatever reason,   being questioned by the police. Even if it never happens it will hang heavy in the minds of the person to whom such a record  refers because  they  will have become “a person known to the police” despite  ever having been charged with an offence.  It might well come up on a criminal records check undertaken because of the nature of a job someone is applying for. Even if that never happens to you imagine  how your  employer  or your family  might  react if  becomes public knowledge in some other way such as a newspaper report    that  you are  a person deemed  to have been the perpetrator of a “hate non-crime incident”.

The police are rather less enthusiastic about one class of complaint of racism. Any complaint of a “non-crime hate incident ” to the police which falls outside what the politically correct deem to be a worthy case – basically any complaint involving racial incitement against whites –  will not be recorded. I have in the past tried out the police’s willingness to record such complaints, for example, I made a complaint of racial incitement against Greg Dyke when he was Chairman of the BBC following  his “hideously white” description of the Corporation.  The police refused to record the complaint let alone investigate it.

The great advantage you have

All that will seem daunting to anyone  accused of racism which reaches the police . Do not despair. People accused of this type of offence has one great advantage : those with power and influence in the UK  have a dread of the issue of free expression  being the subject of public debate in the courts. This is so for two reasons. First,  they know that prosecuting people for simply saying something  goes against the idea of a free society, something which the British elite  invariably  claim to believe in in the abstract.   Second,  the free speech that is being  suppressed is that which goes against  the politically correct version of what is permissible. The politically correct know in their heart of hearts that  political incorrectness is the natural order of things and that only by censoring  can the pretence that political correctness reflects reality  be maintained.

As a consequence  of these fears  the police and those in the  justice system do everything possible to persuade those charged with such offences to plead guilty.  This was graphically shown in the case of  Emma West who maintained her innocence for many months even though initially she was held on remand in the highest security women’s prison in the UK .  Her crime? To make  what was really no more than a public  protest about  the consequences of mass immigration. Eventually, she pleaded guilty to lesser charges after the stress got to her, not least the fear that  her young son would be taken from her.  The extraordinary efforts to  made to get  the woman to change her plea strongly suggests  that had she stuck by her original Not Guilty plea there was  a very good chance the case would never have come to court.

The lesson of all this is always get on the front foot if you are threatened  by those with power and influence.  Show that you are afraid and intimidated and the powers-that-be will simply ride all over you.  Let those who are harrying you know that you are coming out fighting. That is not only your best chance of neutralising the accusation of racism it is probably your only chance.  Try googling  cases of  people accused of pc “crimes” who tamely pleaded guilty. Despite assiduous researching  I cannot find one  case which ended  with a person pleading guilty  being left in their original position, either in their work  or  socially.  At best,  the  common outcome  is for people   to lose their job  and to find getting another one very difficult; at worst they can  end up in prison.  Pleading guilty to such charges is never a soft option.

Subject access requests

If the complaint which has led to criminal charges being brought  has been made by someone representing an organisation rather than just acting as an individual you may be able to get useful information  from your accusers  by using the Data Protection Act  to make a subject access request . This places the data holder (the organisation to whom you are directing the subject access request)  under a legal obligation to supply the person making the request  with copies of any information they hold about them.

It is also worthwhile to put in a subject access request to other organisations, for example

1. the police force which is dealing with the complaint against you.
2. Any media organisation such as a the BBC or a national newspaper if it has shown an interest in your case.

Such organisations  may  hold  data which will be at embarrassing at best  and at worst damaging to their accusation against you. For example, there may be data showing that there were  arguments against  making a complaint  by some members of  the organisation making or supporting the complaint;  details of the surveillance of you before any alleged crime has been acted upon by the police or attempts to entrap you which depending on circumstances could be illegal.

There is an exemption in the Act for legal  documents and information held for journalistic purposes, but  often  the recipient of a subject access request will have data which is not covered by the exceptions.

Apart from possibly gaining useful information, the effect of making a subject access request will be  to reinforce  the fact that  you are coming out  fighting for even if no useful  data is forthcoming  the sending of a subject access request will signal that you mean business.

How do you do make a subject access request?  Use the wording   below for the request, enclose £10 for the fee  and ask for the data they hold in paper form. The reason for asking for the material in paper form is that often paper documents have manuscript notes written on them.  These may carry important information.

Dear Sirs,

I am making a subject access request to the  Campaign Against Anti-Semitism  under section 7 of the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA).  This data will include any qualifying information held on any type of media.

Please send to me copies of any data relating to me which your organisation holds within the 40 calendar days allowed by  the Act.

I want any qualifying  information you hold to be supplied to me  in paper form.

A cheque for £10 is enclosed to pay the fee.

Yours faithfully,

———————————————————————————————————————————

If the matter does go a trial

Base your defence on free expression  and the fact that political correctness requires the denial of  the reality  of  homo sapiens’  biology  and evolved social nature.

For free expression  make  these arguments:

1. When it comes to censorship there is a simple binary choice: there is either free expression or a range of permitted opinion which may be altered at any time.  In present day  Britain there is only  a range of permitted opinion, the scope of which narrowing by the day.
2. Free expression is an integral part of democracy. If people are not allowed to put forward their views there is no democracy.
3. By definition any totalitarian ideology is incompatible with democracy because it excludes any viewpoint apart from its own.

Political correctness is a totalitarian ideology. It  both potentially covers every aspect of life because the non-discrimination test can be applied to any aspect of  life and   insists that the only correct and permissible view  of anything  where political correctness applies is the politically correct view.  The defining of antisemitism , especially in its present very broad  sense, is part of political correctness.

4. Many in the West who want to censor also wish to also pretend  quite absurdly that they support free expression. It is important to  ensure that  their hypocrisy is made clear at every opportunity . The notes below provide a potent way of driving  those adopting this position into a corner.
5. For a detailed examination of the issue of free expression see Free Expression or a range of permitted opinion . Use the details in that essay   to give chapter and verse on the  vast constraints on free expression in England today.  Simply  reciting in court   the long list   of ways in which free speech is discouraged today  should have the effect of knocking on the head any claim that free speech exists.

For the denial of  the reality  of  homo sapiens’  biology  and evolved social nature use these arguments:

Humans are social animals. Social animals only become social (what biologists call the development of sociality)  by setting limits to those within their group. This is because sociality can only develop where there is trust  and trust comes from triggers ranging from scent and chemical triggers  to, in the case of humans, a recognition of those who belong to a group through a mixture of biology –  basically does this person look like me? –   and acquired knowledge that an individual belongs to the  group through their cultural behaviour, for example, speaking the same language or having the same accent. That is the basis of group or tribal  belonging .  Tribal feeling is not  an optional extra. It is an essential  evolved behaviour which protects the group.

Political correctness denies  that humans have  an evolved social nature and insists against all the evidence that everything is down to cultural imprinting.  When presented with this argument simply point out  (1) that  wherever a society is racially/culturally  mixed there is always serious friction and (2) that  the universality  of racial and ethnic tension  in mixed societies can only be plausibly explained  by tribal feeling being innate .

Dealing with accusations of racism generally

Always  get those accusing you of racism to define the word. This will simply stump most people because they are rarely if ever called upon to explain what is meant by racism. That is particularly true of the politically correct who rely on their control of the positions of power and influence, including the media,  to censor out challenges to political correctness.  That this is done and accepted as legitimate by the politically correct tells us one thing: at some level they realise, as the religious do, that their beliefs cannot stand up to argument.

Asking for a definition of what is meant by racism is a tool which can be used to fluster and unsettle everyone involved in bringing and prosecuting a case against you. If  they are unable give a satisfactory definition  you are halfway to winning the case.  If they give a definition to which you can answer “I do not meet that definition” so much the better. Indeed, there is a good chance that asked for a definition of racism people are  likely to say  something along the lines of “Well, it  means you think some people are inferior to you because of their colour”. To that you can say, no, that does not  apply to me. I merely, like all human beings, naturally seek the company of those who resemble me because of my evolved nature.

The person to whom the question of a definition has been addressed  may well be unable to  meaningfully expand on their original offering.  If they do it will probably be by saying something like “It’s discriminating against people”.  This allows the defence to then bring out the fact that all humans have to discriminate all the time between people because  we have to make choices.

That is just a few  examples of how even in a court the prosecution and their witnesses can be exposed as having no firm grasp of what they mean by racism and that in turn will make it difficult in principle to say whether what you are accused of inciting actually  exists.

The effect of this type of defence is to keep the prosecution on the  back foot.

The special case of  Antisemitism

These  contrary arguments  will cover most of the  accusations of anti-Semitism:

1. It is not anti-Semitic to apply the same test to Jews as should rationally be applied to any minority group, namely, is the group or  members of the group attempting to gain an advantage for their group which is achieved at the cost of disadvantaging the rest of the society  in which they live. That is simply rational self-preservation by the majority population.  The most potent  example of  unacceptable behaviour by a minority group  is  one which advocates free immigration to the country in which the group lives and whose members are  either immigrants themselves or  the descendants of immigrants.
2. It is not anti-Semitic to be concerned if there are  a disproportionately large  number of Jews in positions of power and influence such as politics and the mainstream media.   The prime example of this is the Jewish lobby in the USA. Such positions  are gained most commonly not because the best person gets the job but because those occupying them are either born into a privileged position or the position is an appointment made  by patronage.  For example, a significant percentage of  those  employed in the media have relations who worked in the media before them.
3. It is not anti-Semitic to refuse to treat the Holocaust as an event which is uniquely abominable and consequently something that must be placed before the world to be condemned ceaselessly. It is now 71 years since the ending of the Second World War . Even the youngest of the surviving   death camp survivors will be old.  Most will be dead or in their eighties and nineties.  Time has reduced to the Holocaust to  what everything  eventually becomes,  an historical event which can be viewed objectively.
4. It is not anti-Semitic to point out that huge numbers of  non-Jewish  people  died in the Camps and that the  frequent portrayal of the mass killings as an essentially  Jewish event is wrong. That is not to deny  that  huge numbers of Jews died or to belittle their  suffering.  Rather, it is to provide an accurate account of what the death camps were  and to rebalance the emotional response to what occurred.
5. It is not anti-Semitic to treat the six million figure for Jews  killed as uncertain.  That does not mean six  million did not die. Indeed, many more may well  have done so.  What matters here is that the  six  million figure is not an historical fact.   To give just a couple  of  examples of the difficulty in calculating the numbers  killed. Estimates of  the number of Jews in Europe before  1933 run into two primary problems: the definition of who is a Jew  (which covers a wide span of circumstances) and  the reliability  and lack of uniformity of methodology  of  census  records  compiled in different jurisdictions. Piled on top of that is the post-Holocaust dispersal of  European Jews outside of Europe which makes  comparison of the  pre-1933 Jewish  European population  with the post-1945 population of Jews in Europe very difficult even if the definition of who is Jew is ignored.
6. It is not anti-Semitic to view the modern state of Israel as illegitimate in foundation and support for it to be against Western interests because it puts the West perpetually at odds with the Arab world in particular and the Muslim world in  general.

How to deal with the police

Do not be aggressive to or try to ingratiate yourself with the police. Be formally polite but reserved. Make it clear by your behaviour that you are not to be intimidated. I realise that is difficult for people who have no experience of the police but adopting  a  reserved manner will go a long way to achieving this. Always have at the front of your mind that  the police and the justice system are not geared up to deal with people who will not plead guilty to charges relating to racism.

If  you have been  arrested get your lawyer to  ask the police to justify the arrest – they must have reasonable grounds for suspecting that you have committed a crime or intend to commit a crime.

Always remain silent until you have  a lawyer present.

The police must caution you if they  are attempting to get evidence from you about a crime that you have committed or  are intending to commit  or are otherwise involved with, for example, fencing stolen goods.

If you have been cautioned without being arrested  you  must be told that you are free to leave at any time.

Be aware that if you accept the offer of a formal police caution (this can be with or without conditions) to avoid going to trial that  can be as damaging as having a criminal  record particularly if you work  in jobs requiring a criminal records check.  These cautions have nothing to do with the caution previously described

Be aware  that if you  accept an offer to plead guilty to a lesser charge  in the long run this can be as damaging to your life as fighting a more serious charge.

For my detailed advice on dealing with the police see https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/what-to-do-if-you-become-involved-with-the-criminal-law/

 

 

 

 

Operation Elveden and Piers Morgan – My attempt to enlist the help of Leo McKinstry

Robert Henderson

After I met him at  the Campaign for an Independent Britain meeting of 26 April  I tried to enlist Leo McKinstry’s help to make public Piers Morgan illegal receipt of information from a Met Police officer    He refused. A copy of what I sent McKinstry and his replies to my emails are below.

Because I needed to explain the background to Piers Morgan’s letter to the PCC in which he admits receiving information from the police in circumstances which can only have been illegal, I also presented McKinstry with the details of the Blairs’ attempt to have me prosecuted, Blair’s use of the state security apparatus to harass me throughout Blair’s premiership and the persistent refusal of the police to investigate Morgan and others. I also offered him the story of the refusal of Leveson to use the story despite the fact that Morgan was questioned under oath at the Leveson Inquiry about receiving information illegally from the police.

McKinstry represents himself as someone who is willing to challenge the abuses of authority and political correctness. I offered him at least  four major political scandals. What does he do? He refuses to take them any of the  up because of the length of time which has passed and the  large number of people in positions of power and influence are involved.  A disinterested observer might think those are reasons  to become involved.

The age of the general story is of no account because (1)  serious crimes are should be and frequently are prosecuted are far longer periods have passed than those relating to the Morgan  (2) crimes involving the powerful and famous have a considerable attraction for the general public and  (3) part of the scandal is the determination of everyone who could and should have made the matter public to have censored it over such a period.

His  second reason for not taking up the story, that his not an investigative  reporter, is ridiculous because he is a political commentator. That inevitably means he will routinely have to do some fact checking and digging. Moreover, he does not need to do any investigation because I can supply him with the  objective evidence he needs. Yes, that’s right, every single part of this story is substantiated by documents or recordings. Suppose he wanted to run just the Morgan story. All he needed was Morgan’s letter to the PCC and the written refusals of the police to investigate, both of which I had supplied to him.

McKinstry gave  the game away after I suggested he pass the story to an investigative reporter. He came up with the pathetically weak excuse that he does not have the time, viz:

 I’m afraid I can’t spend time on chasing up this story or liaising with any colleagues over it, especially as it has been already investigated in such detail – though not to your satisfaction – over a long per

Not have the time to write a short note along the lines of “these stories requires investigation  which is not my cup of tea, but it looks to be right  up your street”  and forward my email to him to  a colleague  Ten minutes work.    As for his claim that the story ha s been investigated in great detail, this completely ignores the fact that my general complaint is that it has never been meaningfully investigated,.

Apart from the inadequacy of his reasons for refusing to take up the story, there is another pointer to something going on beyond what is overt. There is nothing in the information I sent him to suggest that there were “a huge number of people involved”. That means he was  either well aware of the story from the Blairs onwards before I sent him the material or  he has learnt about the story since receiving the material, either from my Living in a madhouse blog or from his journalist colleagues.  The living in a madhouse blog can be ruled out because there has been no wide-ranging traffic on the Blair and Morgan stories in the day it took him to reply.

Ever since the Blairs tried to have me prosecuted I have made a conscious effort to avoid paranoia driving me to believe every person in  the media is intimately aware of my story. However,  I have encountered a surprising number of people in the media who initially claim they have never heard my story,  but who in the course of conversation make it very clear they are well acquainted with it by revealing familiarity with details of the story which I have not supplied to them.  I suspect that is the case with McKinstry.

 

Robert Henderson  1 May 2014

 

—– Forwarded Message —–

From: leo mckinstry <mckinstryleo@hotmail.com>

To: robert henderson <anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk>

Sent: Tuesday, 29 April 2014, 11:30

Subject: RE: The political scandal I promised you at the CIB meeting

 

Dear Mr Henderson

I’m afraid I can’t spend time on chasing up this story or liaising with any colleagues over it, especially as it has been already investigated in such detail – though not to your satisfaction – over a long period.

Yours sincerely

 

Leo McKinstry

 

Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2014 08:59:14 +0100

From: anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk

Subject: Re: The political scandal I promised you at the CIB meeting

To: mckinstryleo@hotmail.com

Dear Mr Mckinstry,

How about passing the story on to one of your investigatory reporter colleagues?

Yours sincerely,

 

Robert Henderson

 

———————————————————————————————–

 

From: leo mckinstry <mckinstryleo@hotmail.com>

To: robert henderson <anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk>

Sent: Monday, 28 April 2014, 16:52

Subject: RE: The political scandal I promised you at the CIB meeting

 

Dear Mr Henderson

Thank you for your message and for sending me all the detailed documents and correspondence about the story you mentioned.

However, I am afraid that I cannot pursue the matter, for two reasons.

– Firstly, this case is not a new story but has been going on for years.   A huge number of people have been involved, including the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, other members of the press and a large phalanx of MPs.      I don’t think any purpose would be served by adding my membership to this substantial cast.

– Secondly, as you are no doubt aware, I am a columnist and commentator, rather than a reporter.  I therefore rarely carry out individual investigations.

So I am sorry but I will have to leave it there.

 

Yours sincerely

Leo McKinstry

 

———————————————————————————————–

Date: Sun, 27 Apr 2014 17:21:16 +0100

From: anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk

Subject: The political scandal I promised you at the CIB meeting

To: mckinstryleo@hotmail.com

 

Tel: 0207 387 5018

 

27 4 2014

Dear Mr Mckinstry,

As promised at the CIB meeting yesterday, I attach a facsimile copy of a letter from a Fleet Street editor to the PCC in which the editor admits receiving information from the Met Police in circumstances which can only have been illegal. The man in  question is Piers Morgan when he edited the Daily Mirror – you will see on the second page Morgan writes “The police source of our article (whose identity we have a moral obligation to protect) ” .

In January 2013 I supplied Operation Elveden with a copy of this letter and other evidence incriminating Morgan and his one-time chief crime reporter Jeff Edwards together with evidence against a senior  (now retired) Scotland Yard detective superintendent Jeff Curtis showing he failed to investigate Morgan when I first submitted the complaint.

Elveden refused to investigate and the matter has now worked its way to the top of the Met’s complaints system, the Directorate of Professional Standards. They are currently attempting to stop an investigation being made.

Since I referred the matter to Elveden in 2013 I have made persistent attempts to meet with the police face to face and give a formal statement. These requests have been ignored.

I have two problems in presenting this story to you.  The first is the volume of correspondence which has been generated by the failure of Elveden to act. That I shall attempt to deal with by giving you just a few sample pieces of correspondence to let you get a feel of the complaint. The documents are my original submission to Elveden, the refusal of my complaint by Elevden and my latter correspondence with the Directorate of Professional Standards. You will find them below.

The second problem is more difficult. When you read Morgan’s letter you will see it tries to paint me as a racist. As you know anyone who makes the slightest stand against the politically correct view of race and immigration gains that epithet. In my case it came in the unlikely form of an article I wrote for Wisden Cricket Monthly pointing out that an England cricket team stuffed with South Africans and West Indians made a mockery of the idea of national sides. I think you follow cricket so you may well remember the stink it caused. As you can imagine, no article which was in any meaningful sense racist would get into a mainstream publication  like WCM.

As for the Blairs I wrote to them asking for their help after I had been refused any opportunity to reply by the media to the torrent of abuse which occurred after the publication of the WCM article and the PCC had utterly failed me. This resulted in a highly libellous piece about me in the Daily Mirror claiming I was a dangerous racist threatening the Blairs. (this was the cause of the  Morgan letter).  This was utterly false.

 

The Blairs went to the police to try to get me prosecuted for sending malicious communications. The police immediately  sent the letters to the CPS who in a matter of hours  sent them back to the police marked NO CRIME. This was unsurprising because (1) I had never made any threats against the Blairs  and (2) the Blairs did not go to the police when I sent them the letters, but only later after I sent copies of my letters and the non-replies I was getting from the Blairs’ offices to the mainstream media during the first week of the 1997 Election campaign.

Despite all that Special Branch were set on me (the Mirror story blithely reported this) and I spent Blair’s entire premiership being harassed  by what were almost certainly state agencies, everything from death threats to the ostentatious opening of my post.

Sir Richard Body put down this EDM in 1999 on my behalf after my own MP Frank Dobson refused to help me:

10 November 1999

CONDUCT OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MEMBER FOR SEDGEFIELD 10:11:99

Sir Richard Body

That this House regrets that the Right honourable Member for Sedgefield [Tony Blair] attempted to persuade the Metropolitan Police to bring criminal charges against Robert Henderson, concerning the Right honourable Member’s complaints to the police of an offence against the person, malicious letters and racial insult arising from letters Robert Henderson had written to the Right honourable Member complaining about various instances of publicly-reported racism involving the Labour Party; and that, after the Crown Prosecution Service rejected the complaints of the Right honourable Member and the Right honourable Member failed to take any civil action against Robert Henderson, Special Branch were employed to spy upon Robert Henderson, notwithstanding that Robert Henderson had been officially cleared of any illegal action.

This motion is now part of the official House of Commons record – see  http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=16305&SESSION=702

 

I think the best thing I can do to place the Morgan letter in context is to reproduce the letter with my comments interposed in brackets with RH at the beginning. Here it is :

 

FROM THE EDITOR

Piers Morgan’s letter with Robert Henderson’s comments interpolated

By fax (0171-353 8355) & by post

16 October 1997

Your ref: 970738

Christopher Hayes Esq

Press Complaints Commission

I Salisbury Square

London

EC4Y 8AE

 

Dear Mr Hayes

Mr Robert Henderson

I refer to Mr Henderson’s complaint as outlined in his letter of 23 September.

As you are aware, we have been in contact with Mr Henderson for some time due to his propensity to bombard individuals and this office with correspondence. [RH Translation: Mr Henderson sent more than one letter because the Mirror refused to reply].

There are certain irrefutable facts that escape emphasis in Mr Henderson’s correspondence.

Far from ignoring any of his correspondence we have written to him on the 20 May, 22 July and 6 August. [RH The letter of 20 May merely said he was not going to enter into correspondence. The other two letters were from his legal department in response to Subject Access Requests I made under the data Protection Act]. We have consistently made it clear that we have no intention of entering into any further correspondence  with him.

Be that as it may I will address his concerns:-

In essence, the basic “sting” of the article, of which he complains, was that he had been sending numerous insulting letters, some with racist undertones, to Mr and Mrs Blair which had been passed to the Crown Prosecution Service for consideration.

Mr Henderson himself admits that he sent Mr and Mrs Blair at least thirteen letters. [RH I sent each an initial letter detailing the problem and then follow ups along the lines of “I have  yet to receive a meaningful answer to my letter of ….” ] I have no way of directly knowing of the content of those letters because I have not had sight of them. However, clearly they sufficiently concerned Mr Blair’s office to be passed to the Crown

Prosecution Service [RH The CPS said as soon as they saw the letters that they were entirely legal] and I think the Commission is perfectly entitled to draw an adverse inference on the contents of those letters as a result of that referral.

I cannot accept Mr Henderson’s explanation for writing to Cherie Blair.

To do so was clearly designed to intimidate.

In Mr Henderson’s draft article “Moral Simpletons Target Innocent Man” the bile that he shows on the second page of that article clearly illustrates his capacity to insult in his letters to Mr and Mrs Blair [RH an absurd deduction. What I wrote to the Mirror says nothing about what I wrote to the Blairs] (to the extent that they be referred to the Crown Prosecution Service). I would also refer the Commission to Mr Henderson’s gratuitous reference to a “Blaireich”.

He also admits to expressing his disgust (we can only guess in what terms) of the decision of Mr and Mrs Blair not to send their son to a school whereby a white schoolboy was, apparently, murdered by five  other boys (and that that murder was racially motivated). [RH This was the Richard Everitt murder].

The police source of our article (whose identity we have a moral obligation to protect) [thus the police informant behaved illegally by supplying the information] gave us the detail of the letters that we then published. Nothing that Mr Henderson writes has convinced me that the article was anything other than accurate.

Perhaps one can get a flavour of his correspondence with Mr and Mrs Blair by examining the final sentence of his draft article in which he states “It was a cargo of ancient male gonads”.

The Commission may be aware (I am attempting to get hold of the article) that the article of Mr Henderson’s that appeared in Wisden’s Cricket Monthly in 1995 gave rise to an extraordinary amount of controversy and resulted in Wisden paying substantial libel damages to the Cricketer, Devon Malcolm, whom the Commission will be  aware is a coloured fast bowler for England. As I understand the  matter, and Mr Henderson will correct me if I am wrong, the article implied that coloured players will not try as hard when playing for England as white players. [RH The article put it forward as a possibility, no more].

I have discussed the legal position with the newspaper’s solicitor, Martin Cruddace [Cruddace is a proven liar. He made a declaration to my Subject Access Request under the Data protection Action to the effect that the Mirror held no qualifying documents. Eventually after I had done some detective work, he had to admit that the Mirror had a small matter of 118 pages of documents relating to me], and he has assured me that the law has recently developed whereby words (be they written or spoken) can constitute assault if the pattern of those words is such as to make the  recipient of them either anxious or ill. It has developed as a reaction to the former impotence of the law on stalking. [RH: No person in the UK has been convicted of such a crime. The definition of GBH has been extended to non-physical abuse such as abusive phone calls but it requires a psychiatric illness to be proved to be caused by the alleged abusive behaviour. Mere emotions such as fear do not qualify. The failure of the police to consider such a course and the CPS’ immediate definition of the case as “NO CRIME” shows that my letters were entirely lawful] .The law has therefore developed since the publication of the dictionary reference on which Mr Henderson relies.

I cannot accept that the taking of the photographs of Mr Henderson, given the clear public interest concerning the subject matter of The Mirror article, could possibly constitute harassment under the Code.[RH it was an unequivocal offence because the photographer took the photograph within my property].

I am most concerned not to waste any further time in dealing with Mr Henderson’s complaint but, naturally, if the Commission wishes me to address any further matters then I will endeavour to do so.

However, I hope that the above is sufficient to convince the Commission that the basic “sting” of the article is accurate and that Mr Henderson’s complaint ought to be dismissed.

Yours sincerely

 

Piers Morgan

Finally, Leveson refused to use any of the material relating to Morgan and the Mirror, this despite the fact that Morgan was asked under oath whether he had received information illegally from the police. Leveson was so desperate to write me out  of the story that he arranged for my name to be omitted from his report as one of those who had made submissions to the Inquiry.

I would dearly like to meet you to take you through the detail of the case.

Yours sincerely,

 

Robert Henderson

Appeal against Operation Elveden’s refusal to investigate Piers Morgan and others

 

DPS Appeals Unit,

Metropolitan Police Service,

22nd Floor ESB,

Lillie Road,

London

SW6 1TR

Email:  Appeals@met.police.uk

CC

Rt Hon Theresa May MP (Home Secretary)

Rt Hon Dominic Grieve MP (Attorney-General)

Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Commissioner)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

Mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

6 April 2014

Dear  Sirs,

This is a formal appeal against the refusal of the Metropolitan Police to investigate Piers Morgan and Jeff Edwards for the illegal receipt of information from the police and perjury before the Leveson Inquiry and Det Supt Jeff Curtis (now retired) for a failure to investigate Morgan and Edwards  when the complaint was first submitted to the Met.

You will find below the following correspondence in this order:

My correspondence with Operation Elveden (Elveden)

My correspondence with the Directorate of Professional Standards (DPS).

The two batches of correspondence are clearly delineated. Each set of emails runs from the earliest to the latest in that order, that is , the latest email will be the last one in the set.

The matter looks complicated simply because of the volume of correspondence. This is entirely due to Elveden and the DPS prevaricating. You will see from the correspondence  that I made the complaint in January 2013 and I did not receive a conclusive answer from the DPS until March 2014 and only then after I had written to the Home Secretary to complain.

Stripped of the volume of correspondence the business is very simple. I have provided Elevden  with a letter sent by Piers Morgan to the Press Complaints Commission  when he was editor of the Daily Mirror in which  Morgan admits that he received information from a Metropolitan police officer in circumstances  which can only have been illegal.  A facsimile copy of Morgan’s letter is attached.

Edwards was the Mirror’s chief crime reporter  who wrote the story based on  the information obtained illegally from the police.   Even without Morgan’s letter it is  clear from the Mirror story that information had been illegally obtained because of the nature of the information in the story.  I supplied  Elveden with a photostat copy of the story

For the perjury complaint I supplied  Elveden with the relevant extracts from Leveson stating that they have never obtained information illegally.

As for Det Supt Curtis, not only did he fail to question anyone at the Mirror or examine their records for evidence of payment for information, he did so after promising me that he would be doing both things. I provided Operation Elevden with a tape recording of Curtis making those promises.

The fact that  I made the complaints against Curtis 14 years ago and the PCA rejected them is neither here nor there because of the peculiar circumstances which obtained at the time. Tony and Cherie Blair attempted to have me prosecuted and failed in the most humiliating fashion during the 1997 General Election campaign (the CPS sent the papers back to the police within hours of receiving them with NO CRIME emblazoned across them) . The Mirror story concerned the Blairs’  failure to have me prosecuted.  After that failure the Blairs set  Special Branch  and MI5 on to me (I used the Data Protection Act to force both to admit they held files of me) and I consequently  suffered ten years of harassment (for Blair’s entire premiership) which the Tory MP Sir Richard Body made public in the following Early Day Motion:

CONDUCT OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MEMBER FOR SEDGEFIELD 10:11:99

 Sir Richard Body

That this House regrets that the Right honourable Member for Sedgefield [Tony Blair] attempted to persuade the Metropolitan Police to bring criminal charges against Robert Henderson, concerning the Right honourable Member’s complaints to the police of an offence against the person, malicious letters and racial insult arising from letters Robert Henderson had written to the Right honourable Member complaining about various instances of publicly-reported racism involving the Labour Party; and that, after the Crown Prosecution Service rejected the complaints of the Right honourable Member and the Right honourable Member failed to take any civil action against Robert Henderson, Special Branch were employed to spy upon Robert Henderson, notwithstanding that Robert Henderson had been officially cleared of any illegal action.

This motion is now part of the official House of Commons record – see  http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=16305&SESSION=702

The reason I could not get the police and the PCA to act is horribly simple: they were not willing to act because Blair was Prime Minister, that is they refused to apply the law for illicit reasons to protect the most powerful politician in the land.  This was truly a who shall guard the guards situation. To reject my complaint on the grounds that it is out of time would be perverse in these circumstances.  At the least, those at the PCA who refused my complaint  should be charged with misconduct in a public office.

As this matter has already been reviewed by the DPS, I presume that they have the full documentation and other items such as the tape recording of Curtis.  Should anything be missing let me know and I will supply duplicates. If the DPS do not have the complete papers and other supporting artefacts, the DCI Neligan’s review of the case is by definition a sham.

My grounds for appeal are as follows:

1. I have not been adequately informed about the findings of the investigation or any proposals resulting from the report

As I have already pointed out, the handling of my complaints  has been a dismal catalogue of prevarication. In addition, despite my repeated requests to be interviewed byElveden and give a formal statement and  to be interviewed by the DPS, astonishingly I have been denied any face to face contact with any member of Elevden or the DPS and consequently have not been able to make a formal statement. This behaviour strongly suggests that both Elevden and the DPS know very well that I have provided cast-iron evidence and are desperate not to be subjected to questioning as to why no investigation has occurred because  they know that it is impossible to give a rational reason for why they have not acted on Morgan’s incriminating letter.

2. I disagree with the findings of the investigation including whether a person has a case to answer for misconduct or gross misconduct

The findings are absurd because of the Morgan letter alone, but the Mirror story and Curtis’ failure to investigate Morgan, Edwards and the Mirror generally make them doubly ridiculous.

All that both Elevden and the DPS have done is say we do not choose to investigate. They have not meaningfully justified their refusasl. For example, take DCI Neligan’s dismissal of the complaints against Morgan and Edwards,viz:

As Appropriate Authority, I am required to consider the findings and conclusions of complaint investigations to determine:

• whether the report should be referred to the Director of Prosecutions (CPS);
• whether or not any person to whose conduct the investigation relates to has a case to answer in respect of misconduct, gross misconduct or no case to answer;
• whether or not any such person’s performance is unsatisfactory;
• what action, if any, we will take in respect of the matters dealt with in the report; and
• what other action (if any) we will take in respect of these matters.

After considering these points I am satisfied the outcome does not need to be referred to the CPS.

I can also inform you that it has been determined there has not been a breach of the professional standards by any officer. Furthermore, I have conducted review of the officers’ performance, which I found to be satisfactory. This means that no further action will be taken in respect of your complaint.

Absolutely no explanation of  why the complaints were refused is provided , merely the grounds on which they have been considered.  That is  shamefully inadequate. Worse, there is good reason to believe DCI Neligan cobbled together this  judgement after I had panicked him into doing something by writing to the Home Secretary and copying the email to  the type of  distribution list  that is attached to this email. I very much doubt whether he has even read most of the correspondence which arose from the case  before it came to his desk.

The evidence is cast-iron and a failure to investigate is clear evidence of misconduct in public office and an attempt to pervert the course of justice by every officer who has handled my original complaint and the referral to the DPS.

3. I disagree with the police proposals for action – or lack of them – in light of the report

I disagree with them for the reasons given in 2, that is the evidence is cast-iron and a failure to investigate is clear evidence of misconduct in public office and an attempt to pervert the course of justice by every officer who has handled my original complaint and the referral to the DPS. Please take this as a formal complaint against all these officers. You have their names in the supporting correspondence.

4. I disagree with the decision not to refer the report to the CPS.

I disagree for exactly the same reasons I have given under 3.

The hard facts which are being ignored are these:

a. The Piers Morgan letter to the PCC is enough to convict Morgan of receiving  information illegally from a police officer, conspiracy to breach the Official Secrets Act and  conspiracy to commit misconduct in a public office and breaches of the Data Protection Act.  All that applies whether or not it can ;proved that money or any other material inducement was given to the police officer.

b. Morgan’s letter plus the Mirror story which used the illicit information is enough to convict Edwards  of receiving information illegally from a police officer, conspiracy to breach the Official Secrets Act and  conspiracy to commit misconduct in a public office and breaches of the Data Protection Act.

c. The evidence given by Morgan and Edwards under oath provides strong grounds for investigating them for perjury. If it could be shown that the police officer received money – which was almost certainly  the case – they would be open and shut cases of perjury.  At the least Morgan and Edwards should be investigated to see whether money did change hands.

d. The Morgan letter, the Mirror story and the tape recording of Curtis promising to investigate Morgan, Edwards and the Mirror generally is enough to convict Curtis or misconduct in a public office and of perverting the course of justice.

I suggest you print out the attached Piers Morgan letter and sit and look at it for a while and ask yourself how on earth a failure to investigate such evidence could be explained in a court or before TV cameras.

Finally,  I repeat the request  to meet with whoever is going to deal with this case at the DPS  and to give a formal statement.

Yours sincerely,

 

Robert Henderson

—————————————————————-

From: robert henderson [mailto:anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk]
Sent: 09 April 2014 17:20
To: DPS Mailbox – Appeals
Subject: Appeal against failure of Operation Elveden to investigate Piers Morgan and others – please acknowledge

Directorate of Professional Standards (DPS)

Appeals Unit,Metropolitan Police Service,

22nd Floor ESB,Lillie Road,

LondonSW6 1TR

Email:  Appeals@met.police.uk
9 April 2014

 Dear Sirs,

I sent the appeal reproduced  below  to you on 6th April. I have not received an acknowledgement. Please acknowledge receipt of the original email by return. 

Yours sincerely, 

Robert Henderson 

—————————————————————–

• Appeals@met.pnn.police.uk
• Today [11 April 2014] at 10:51 AM

To

• anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk

Dear Mr Henderson,

Thank you for your appeal regarding your recent complaint against police, reference PC/0455/14. This was received in this office on 6th April 2014.

I regret to inform you it is taking approximately sixteen (16) weeks to consider new appeals. Therefore, you ought to expect not to hear anything in the intervening period. However, we are constantly reviewing cases and that timescale may be reduced. If not, we will write or email you again in 16 weeks time with an update, providing a realistic timescale of when you can expect your appeal assessment to be completed.

Yours sincerely,

Elizabeth Gibbs 
Police Sergeant
Directorate of Professional Standards
Appeals Team 

———————————————————————–     

   

Directorate of Professional Standards

 

Empress State Building

22nd Floor

Lillie Road

West Brompton

London

SW6 1TR

Telephone: #0207 230 1212

#Email:

Your ref: #

Our ref: # #PC455/14

 

Date:   16 April 2014

 

Mr Robert Henderson

156 Levita House

Charlton St

London

NW1 1HR

 

Dear Mr Henderson,

 

On 10/03/04 a letter was sent to you, which asked for your representations in relation  to the complaints you made concerning Operation Elveden, as it was considered your complaint was out of time. You were given 28 days to make these representations and informed that at the end of this period an application for permission to take the the investigation no further (disapplication) may be made.

 

This letter is to inform you that due to the lack of representations, or sufficient representations, an application was made to the DOPS Complaints Support Chief Inspector, who has been delegated by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police to consider disapplications.

 

I can now inform you they have decided to grant disapplication on the grounds that this case is out of time.  This decision was made on the information and the evidence provided for your complaint and has been deemed appropriate because as explained in my original letter, the events you are complaining about happened some 14 years ago.

 

As your complaint has been disapplied the DPS Complaints Support Inspector has also considered what, if any, further action needs to be taken with the conduct or performance of any MPS officers or staff. They have decided no further action is required.

 

You have the right of appeal in relations to the decision to disapply your complaint and the outcome of it, to the Appeals Unit of Directorate of Professional Standards . There is no right of appeal to the IPCC. You have 28 days from the day after the date of this letter within which to make your appeal. The 28^th day is 16/05/14. Appeals received after 28 days may not be allowed unless there are exceptional circumstances.

 

If you do decide to appeal, this is the address to write to:

DP S Appeals Unit, Metropolitan l Police Service, 22^nd Floor ESB, Lillie Road, London SW6 ITR

 

Further information about appeals and how to appeal can be found on the IPCC website:

www.ipcc.gov.uk

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

TM Neligan

DCI DPS 

———————————————————————–  

Tim Neligan

Detective Chief Inspector

DPS SI

Empress State Building

22nd Floor

Lillie Road

West Brompton

London

SW6 1TR

Telephone: #0207 230 1212

#Email:

Your ref: # #PC455/14

 

CC

Rt Hon Theresa May MP (Home Secretary)

Rt Hon Dominic Grieve MP (Attorney-General)

Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Commissioner)

DCS Alaric Bonthron (Head of DPS)

DCI Tim Neligan (DPS)

CI Andy Dunn (DPS)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

Mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

Directorate of Professional Standards (DPS) Appeals Unit

 

Date: 27 April 2014

 

 

Dear DCI Neligan,

 

I have your letter dated 16^th April which only arrived today, 25^th April. The envelope in which your  arrived is postmarked the 23rd April. Why the delay?  (I have included a copy of your letter immediately below to inform those on the circulation list).    

 

Your letter is distinctly odd.  It could reasonably be interpreted as you saying that I did not make an appeal within the 28 days allowed. In fact, I submitted an appeal on 6^th April which was within the 28 days. Not only that I included you in the distribution list for that appeal. You will find below the  original email and add the acknowledgement of its receipt on the 6^th April. The  acknowledgement informed me that the appeal was accepted but  would probably not be looked at for six months. (Please note that I have copied this email to the DPS appeals section).

 

Wording such as “This letter is to inform you that due to the lack of representations, or sufficient representations…” is the type of cover-all eventualities  phrasing which lawyers use. It does not give any indication of what has actually happened. The use of such wording  together with  your failure to (1) demonstrate anything but the sketchiest knowledge of the matter or  (2) to address questions such as the Who shall guard the guards scenario leads me to believe that you have given this case little study or consideration. That being so please answer these questions:

 

1. What documents have you received relating to this matter? Please list the  documents individually when you reply.

 

2. Please list the documents you have read.

 

3. Have you received the tape recording between D Supt Curtis and me in which he promises to question Morgan et al?

 

4. If you have the tape recording have you listened to it in its entirety? If not why not?

 

5. Were you aware when you wrote on the 16^th April that I had appealed? If not why not?

 

6. If you were you aware when you wrote on the 16th April that I had appealed why have you not referred to the appeal in your letter?

 

7. Before receiving this email, had  you read my appeal?

 

8.Which documents relating to the matter were submitted to the DPS Complaints Chief Inspector?  Please list them.

 

9. Did  the DPS Complaints Chief Inspector know of my appeal when he made the decision?  If he did not  I shall expect you to immediately  bring this fact to immediately  his  attention so that he can consider the matter with all the facts before him.

 

In none of the correspondence with the DPS has there been any meaningful attempt to address the issues I have raised. To keep saying it is out of time is a nonsense because not only is  there  no statute of limitations for these crimes,  serious crimes are routinely investigated and people charged after far more time has passed than has happened since I made my original complaint to the police.

 

The reason why my complaints  were not initially investigated was the  involvement of the Blairs.  Once the failure of the police and every other part of the justice system to act on clear evidence of criminality by Morgan and others had happened,  the failure itself became a bar to future attempts to get the matter investigated.  Both  those in authority  who had failed to act and those who had not been originally involved but were now in positions of authority, had a vested interest in not investigating when the complaints were re-submitted together with fresh complaints in 2013.  The vested interest was both individual and corporate. The latter  (the corporate vested interest) meant that those not  involved in the original failure to investigate  refused to investigate when the old and new complaints were submitted to them, because to  investigate would potentially mean criminal trials of those involved in the original cover-up with the subsequent bad publicity  for the Met and many other people with power and influence.    

 

I repeat yet again my request to meet with you or another senior officer, for example, the DPS Complaints Chief Inspector,  to discuss the affair and give a formal statement.

 

A reply by return please.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

Robert Henderson

———————————————————————–  

 

 Metropolitan Police 

Directorate of Professional Standards

Prevention and Organisational Learning Command

 

DPS Appeals Unit

22nd Floor

Empress State Building

Empress Approach

Lillie Road

London

SW6 1TR

 

E-Mail: Appeals@met.pnn.police.uk

 

Our reference:  PC/00455/14

 

Date: 19th June 2014

 

Dear  Mr Henderson

This letter is about your appeal against the outcome of your complaint against police received on 5th December 2013. Your complaint was dealt with in two parts. Firstly, you received an ‘outcome of investigation’ report from DCI Neligan, detailing your complaints about DI Smith. Additionally, your complaint concerning retired Detective Superintendent Curtis was subject of something called a ‘disapplication’. You appealed against the outcome of the investigation, in your appeal email dated 6th April 2014. Upon receipt of a further letter dated 16th April 2014, informing you of the decision to disapply the latter part (against Mr Curtis) you submitted a further email of appeal, dated 27th April 2014. Both aspects of your appeal will be discussed and addressed in this letter.   1. Appeal against Investigation   In answer to the first part of your appeal (investigation), the Metropolitan Police Appeals Team’s role in the appeal process is to review the investigation into your complaint, not to re-investigate your complaint. This appeal outcome is completed on behalf of Superintendent Sarti, with delegated authority for dealing with Appeals on behalf of the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service.   Our decision on your appeal is linked to paragraph 25 of Schedule 3 of the Police Reform Act 2002. I have looked at the following issues in concluding your appeal:   ·         Whether the findings of the investigation need to be reconsidered ·         Whether the outcomes, for example in relation to whether any disciplinary or other actions should be taken, are appropriate ·         Whether you received adequate information about the findings of the investigation   I have reviewed your email of complaint dated 5th December 2013, addressed to the Commissioner. You complaint was recorded on 8th January 2014.   The decisions I have reached in relation to your appeal are outlined below:   1.    Are the findings of the police investigation appropriate/ proportionate to the complaint? Your heads of complaint have been obtained from the following:     Your email of 5th December 2013 and accompanying attachments/email string   Your complaint was about the decision by Detective Inspector Daniel Smith, and his refusal to investigate three allegations of crime concerning Mr Piers Morgan and Mr Jeff Edwards, repeated below;   1. That Piers Morgan when editor of the Mirror obtained information from a Met Officer(s) in circumstances which can only have been illegal. The letter from Morgan to the PCC which I have supplied to Elveden and which you have a copy of in facsimile conclusively proves this. 2. That Jeff Edwards when chief crime reporter for the Daily Mirror illegally received information from Met Officer(s).  Morgan’s letter plus the story printed by the Daily Mirror about me conclusively prove Edwards received such information.   3. That both Morgan and Edwards  committed perjury when questioned under oath about receiving information illegally from the police. I provided Operation Elveden with the relevant Leveson transcripts.   In his response to your allegations of crime, DI Daniel Smith responded;   Dear Mr. Henderson,   I write in relation to the allegations you made following your contact with DC Rooke in January of this year. I have reviewed the matters raised by you in this, and subsequent communications, with DC Rooke. I understand that the matters raised by you relate to an article published in 1997 and that the matter was investigated by the Metropolitan Police Service (Complaints Investigation Bureau). The matter was referred to the Police Complaints Authority in 1999. I understand that there is no new evidence or information available and as a result I have decided that no investigation will be conducted into the points raised by you. In relation to the Perjury allegation, having read the transcripts provided, I do not believe there is evidence that shows an offence has been committed. As a consequence this allegation will not be investigated.   Yours sincerely,   Detective Inspector Daniel Smith   Complaint Versus Criminal investigation DCI Neligan was appointed to investigate your public complaint about DI Smith’s decision, not to investigate the criminal allegations about Mr Morgan and Mr Edwards. That is an important point to differentiate because in your email of appeal you appear to be confusing the two issues.   In the outcome letter sent to you, dated 10th March 2013, DCI Neligan has identified your complaint and the steps taken to investigate it. I therefore consider that a proportionate investigation has been carried out.   I have considered your grounds for appeal, as set out in your email dated 6th April 2014.   Point 1, you have appealed on the basis that you have not been interviewed personally by the Investigating Officers, either of the criminal investigation, or the complaint investigation. In my considerations, I have looked at the email strings you have submitted. The details of the criminal allegations are comprehensive and sufficiently detailed upon which DI Smith based his initial assessment in terms of the criminal allegations. Likewise, there is sufficient detail upon which DCI Neligan can base his assessment of his complaint investigation and therefore I do not consider it necessary to interview you at any stage up to those reviews being conducted.    In terms of the criminal investigation, DI Smith had articulated his rationale for not investigating your first 2 criminal allegations (that they were already investigated by the PCA in 1999) as there is no new evidence; there was no merit in further investigation of those allegations. The third allegation, (perjury), was subject to a preliminary review, as DI Smith explained, when he reviewed the transcripts. His assessment was that there is no evidence of the offence of perjury having been made out. Consequently, that allegation would not be further investigated.   In his report, DCI Neligan has elaborated upon these points and provided you with additional information in terms of the police obligations under National Crime Recording Standards as well as the MPS Crime Management Policy. Point 2, you believe the findings of DCI Neligan’s investigation “are absurd because of the Morgan letter alone, but the Mirror story and Curtis’s failure to investigate Morgan, Edwards and the Mirror generally make them doubly ridiculous.”    I mentioned above, the difference between DI smith’s investigation and DCI Neligan’s, but following on from Point 2 above, it is important to make absolutely clear, the role difference between the two investigations.   DI Smith was asked to investigate your criminal allegations. You disagreed with his decisions and have made a public complaint about DI Smith. DCI Neligan was appointed to and has, investigated the complaint about DI Smith. DCI Neligan has not investigated your criminal allegations about Morgan and Edwards. However, in conducting his investigation, DCI Neligan has looked at the actions/decisions made by DI Smith when looking at the investigation of Morgan and Edwards.   I find the steps taken by DCI Neligan, in examining the actions of DI smith, to be proportionate and reasonable.   Point 3, I similarly refer to the response to point 2 above.   Point 4, DCI Neligan is being asked to consider if DI Smith has committed a criminal offence, by his (Smith) not investigating your criminal allegations any further. DCI Neligan has concluded that the actions of DI Smith are correct and therefore there are no criminal actions for the CPS to consider. I concur with that rationale.   On the basis of this assessment the conclusion reached by the Investigating Officer, DCI Neligan is appropriate. I do not uphold your appeal.   2.    Is the decision that the police have made about whether an officer has a case to answer for misconduct appropriate? Yes. The outcome of the Investigation is appropriate and the Investigating Officer has concluded there is insufficient evidence to prove a case of misconduct against DI Smith. I do not uphold your appeal.   3.    Are the force’s proposed actions following the investigation adequate? Yes. The Investigation has not found a case to answer and no action has been proposed. I do not uphold your appeal.   4.    Have you been provided with adequate information following the investigation of your complaint?   Yes. The original report by DCI Neligan addresses all of the complaints submitted by you, the rationale behind the conclusions reached, and includes your right to appeal. I do not uphold your appeal.   5.    Has the investigation been referred to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)? If not, is this decision appropriate? The report has not been referred to the CPS. I consider this decision to be appropriate as the investigation and the underlying evidence does not indicate that a criminal offence has been made out.  I refer to my assessment under Point 4 above. I do not uphold your appeal.   After considering all the information available I have now made a decision about your appeal against the outcome of the investigation. I have not upheld your appeal.   You are not able to appeal against the assessment of your appeal. If you have any questions or need more information about the appeal decision please contact me using the details shown at the top of this letter.   2. Appeal against Disapplication   I will now respond to your other appeal, against the decision to disapply the requirements of Schedule 3 Police Reform Act 2002 to your complaint about ex-DSU Jeff Curtis. Your appeal was received on 27th April 2014. An appeal may be made to the relevant appeal body against a decision to disapply the requirements of Schedule 3 of the Police Reform Act 2002.  The Chief Officer (where they are the relevant appeal body) must determine whether the decision to disapply those requirements should have been taken. This appeal outcome is completed on behalf of Detective Superintendent Sarti, with delegated authority for dealing with Appeals on behalf of the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service   In determining your appeal, I must consider the following points ;   Has the complaint been, or should it have been, referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC)?   The complaint about retired Detective Superintendent Curtis concerned his alleged conduct in 2003 and specifically, that he deliberately failed to investigate your original allegations against Mr Morgan & Mr Edwards despite promises made to you in a telephone conversation. Such a complaint does not meet the criteria for a mandatory referral to the IPCC, nor was it so referred (to the IPCC). The Relevant Appeal Body is therefore the Force itself.   Was the decision to disapply made with the permission of the IPCC?   No. The complaint was not referred and did not require referral to the IPCC. Therefore, permission to disapply was not required from the IPCC.   Was the complainant offered the opportunity to make representations before the decision to disapply was made and if any representations were provided, were these taken into account in making the decision to disapply?   Yes. Within the Outcome of Investigation report, dated 10th March 2014, included a request for you to provide reasons why your complaint concerning ex-DSU Jeff Curtis ought not to be disapplied on the basis that it was ‘out of time’ i.e. More than 12 months have elapsed between the date of the incident complained of and the making of the complaint, and no good reasons could be shown for that delay.     You responded in your email of 6th April 2014, and those responses were considered by Chief Inspector Dunn who decided there were no good reasons for the delay of over 12 years in the making of the complaint. I accept that you had previously reported the matters originally to the Police Complaints Authority who had ‘rejected them’.   After considering your email of appeal, dated 27th April 2014, I consider the decision to disapply your complaint was appropriate. The incident complained of was more than 12 months before the complaint was made and no good reason for that delay has been demonstrated. Your appeal is not upheld.   Actions required of the MPS The MPS will take no further action regarding your complaints or the appeals. You are not able to appeal the outcome of this appeal assessment. No further right of appeal exists with the IPCC. If you disagree with this appeal assessment, you are advised to seek independent legal advice.   Yours sincerely     David Corbet Inspector Appeals Unit

Piers Morgan’s criminality: The Met Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards prodded into action

Neligan’s response came the day after I sent an email  to Theresa May informing her of Morgan’s criminal behaviour and the failure of the Met to investigate it . (https://livinginamadhouse.wordpress.com/2014/03/10/operation-eleveden-and-piers-morgans-criminality-the-home-secretary-brought-into-play/).

The DPS’  response looks like a very hastily cobbled together  piece written simply to cover the backs of Neligan and his department because of the inordinate delay in responding to me.  Much of the text was  taken from my previous correspondence with Elevden, the CPS and the DPS. It is largely a cut and [paste job.

The rejection of the complaints is farcically thin. All Neligan does is baldly assert that there is no misconduct or grounds to investigate in the cases of Morgan and Edwards. In the case of D-Supt Jeff Curtis  he tosses aside the fact that Curtis did not interview Morgan and Edwards.

I shall be appealing and will post that appeal here.

I have written a further email to the Home Secretary Theresa May in response to Neligan’s emailhttps://livinginamadhouse.wordpress.com/2014/03/10/operation-eleveden-and-piers-morgans-criminality-the-home-secretary-brought-into-play/

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Directorate of Professional Standards

 Empress State Building

22nd Floor

Lillie Road

West Brompton

London

SW6 1TR

Telephone: 0207 230 1212

Email:

Your ref:

Our ref: PC455/14

Date:   10/03/14

The outcome of your complaint against police.

 

(by e-mail)

Dear Mr. Henderson,

Thank you for all the information you have provided concerning your complaints about Operation Elveden. We take all complaints seriously and I am grateful to you for bringing this matter to our attention.

In your latest e-mail, you explained that you had made the following criminal allegations to Operation Elveden:

1. That Piers Morgan when editor of the Mirror obtained information from a Met Officer(s) in circumstances which can only have been illegal. The letter from Morgan to the PCC which I have supplied to Elveden and which you have a copy of in facsimile conclusively proves this.

2. That Jeff Edwards when chief crime reporter for the Daily Mirror illegally received information from Met Officer(s).  Morgan’s letter plus the story printed by the Daily Mirror about me conclusively prove Edwards received such information.  

 3. That both Morgan and Edwards  committed perjury when questioned under oath about receiving information illegally from the police. I provided Operation Elveden with the relevant Leveson transcripts.

On 13 June 2013, you received the following response to those allegations from Detective Inspector Daniel Smith:

Dear Mr Henderson,

I write in relation to the allegations you made following your contact with DC Rooke in January of this year. I have reviewed the matters raised by you in this, and subsequent communications, with DC Rooke.

I understand that the matters raised by you relate to an article published in 1997 and that the matter was investigated by the Metropolitan Police Service (Complaints Investigation Bureau). The matter was referred to the Police Complaints Authority in 1999.

I understand that there is no new evidence or information available and as a result I have decided that no investigation will be conducted into the points raised by you.In relation to the Perjury allegation, having read the transcripts provided, I do not believe there is evidence that shows an offence has been committed. As a consequence this allegation will not be investigated.

Yours sincerely,

 

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith

You subsequently complained about this decision and as the Professional Standards Champion (PSC) with responsibility for Operation Elveden, I was asked to deal with that complaint. The legislation surrounding complaints against the police requires that the relevant force (referred to as the Appropriate Authority) considers the outcome of any complaint investigation. A PSC for a particular department is the senior officer that has been delegated by the Commissioner to act as the Appropriate Authority for that department.

I have now reviewed all the correspondence you have submitted, including the clarification of your complaint that you supplied to Chief Inspector Dunn, and the police records that relate to this matter. I am now in a position to inform you of the outcome of my enquiries. The police do not have to record or investigate an allegation of crime if there is evidence that no crime has taken place. The information you supplied to Operation Elveden was properly considered, as is evidenced by their correspondence with you in which they seek to clarify matters and identify any new evidence or information. The matter was then properly referred to one of the Detective Inspectors leading the operation to consider whether further investigation was required.

Detective Inspector Smith, as he explained in his e-mail to you, decided that the first two of your allegations had previously been recorded and investigated and as there was no new evidence or information, no further investigation was justified. He also reviewed your allegation of perjury and found that following initial investigation (a review of the relevant transcripts) there was evidence to indicate that in fact no crime had been committed.  He therefore decided that this allegation did not need to be recorded or investigated. His actions and decisions comply with the Home Office National Crime Recording Standards and the MPS Crime Management Policy. These are decisions he had the authority to make and they were made through the appropriate process, in line with the relevant policy and guidance and were made after giving all the information due consideration.

As Appropriate Authority, I am required to consider the findings and conclusions of complaint investigations to determine:

whether the report should be referred to the Director of Prosecutions (CPS);

• • whether or not any person to whose conduct the investigation relates to has a case to answer in respect of misconduct, gross misconduct or no case to answer;
• whether or not any such person’s performance is unsatisfactory;
  • what action, if any, we will take in respect of the matters dealt with in the report; and
• what other action (if any) we will take in respect of these matters.

After considering these points I am satisfied the outcome does not need to be referred to the CPS.

I can also inform you that it has been determined there has not been a breach of the professional standards by any officer. Furthermore, I have conducted review of the officers’ performance, which I found to be satisfactory. This means that no further action will be taken in respect of your complaint.

In addition to the points above it has also been considered whether you received an appropriate level of service from the Metropolitan Police. This means how you were dealt with overall and not just by any one individual. After reviewing the circumstances of your complaint the Chief Inspector (CST) is satisfied there has not been a failure identified in the way we dealt with you. Your complaint is therefore not upheld.

We are grateful to you for raising this issue and giving us the opportunity to review the actions of those concerned. It is always useful to receive feedback on how our officers and staff perform; as an organisation it allows us to learn and develop and to identify ways we can improve our service in the future.

If you do not agree with the outcome of this investigation or its findings you can appeal to the Appeals Unit of the Directorate of Professional Standards. There is no right of appeal to the IPCC. You have 28 days from the day after the date of this letter to make your appeal. The 28^th day is 07/04/2014. Appeals received after 28 days may not be allowed unless there are exceptional circumstances.

You can appeal on any one of the following grounds (you will see that not all of these necessarily apply to your case); that you:

have not been adequately informed about the findings of the investigation or any proposals resulting from the report;

disagree with the findings of the investigation including whether a person has a case to answer for misconduct or gross misconduct;

disagree with the police proposals for action – or lack of them – in light of the report;

disagree with the decision not to refer the report to the CPS.

 If you do decide to appeal, this is the address to write to:

DPS Appeals Unit,

Metropolitan Police Service,

22nd Floor ESB,

Lillie Road,

London

SW6 1TR

 Or by email to ‘Appeals@met.police.uk’

Further information about how to appeal can be found on the IPCC website:

www.ipcc.gov.uk

You also made a fourth allegation:

4. That Det Supt Jeff Curtis committed misconduct in a public office and perverted the course of justice by claiming he had investigated my complaints against Morgan and Edwards when the reality was that he failed to conduct any investigation at all, and that  despite having Morgan’s letter to the PCC and the Mirror article about me.  Curtis eventually shamefacedly admitted to me in a phone call that he had  not spoken to anyone at the Mirror including Morgan and Edwards and consequently there had been no  investigation of the Mirror’s accounts  and other records to see whether any money had been paid. Curtis failed to investigate Morgan and Edwards despite his promise to do so in an interview with me which I recorded. I have supplied Eleveden with a copy of that recording so you can hear  him making the promise on which he reneged.  

This amounts to a complaint about Detective Superintendent Jeff Curtis, who retired in 2003. This complaint appears to arise from events that occurred between 1997 and 1999, some 14 years ago. I also note that the PCA were involved and decided that no further investigation was required. There is a statutory time limit of 12 months in which a complaint can be made and as a result, unless you can provide reasonable grounds to account for this time delay, an application to “disapply” your complaint will be submitted. This means that although your complaint has been recorded, no further action will be taken.

If you disagree with this, you need to provide further information to show why your complaint is not out of time. You need to do this within 28 days from the day following the date of this letter. The 28th day is XX/XX/XX. Please provide your representations in writing to the postal or e-mail address shown above.

Any representations you make will be taken into account before a final decision is made as to whether your complaint will be investigated or not. If no representations are made or your representations are deemed to be insufficient, then your complaint will be disapplied.

If your complaint is disapplied then no further action will be taken with it. Further information about disapplications can be found on the IPCC website: www.ipcc.gov.uk

Yours sincerely,

Name   Tim Neligan

Detective Chief Inspector

DPS SI

Operation Eleveden and Piers Morgan’s criminality – the Home Secretary brought into play

To:  Rt Hon Theresa May MP

Home Secretary

2 Marsham Street

London

SW1P 4DF

CC Rt Hon Dominic Grieve MP (Attorney-General)

Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Commissioner)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

Mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

9 March 2014

Dear Mrs May,

Operation Elveden are failing to  investigate serious crimes committed by Daily Mirror staff despite having  cast iron evidence. I provided the evidence.

The full story is in the correspondence I reproduce below -. However, I realise that you are an immensely busy woman,  so to take you to instantly to  the heart of the corrupt behaviour of Operation Elveden please read first the attached facsimile letter Piers Morgan  sent to the PCC whilst editor of the Daily Mirror. In this letter he admits receiving information from the Metropolitan Police in circumstances which can only be illegal, viz: “The police source of our article (whose identity we have a moral obligation to protect)…”.

The other document you need to  read is my initial email (dated  21 January 2013) to the then head of Operation Elveden  Deputy Assistant Commissioner  Steve Kavanagh – see first  document below this letter.   That will give you the background to and the range  of crimes Elveden are  failing to investigate.

I have provided Eleveden with a copy of Morgan’s  letter, together  with other evidence of criminal behaviour on the part of the Mirror’s erstwhile Chief Crime Reporter Jeff Edwards,  in receiving information illicitly from the police. I have also supplied Elveden with evidence that both Morgan and Edwards  perjured themselves before the Leveson Inquiry.  Finally, there is the misconduct of the police in not investigating these crimes for which they have cast-iron evidence.

Despite having the Piers Morgan letter (amongst other very strong evidence), DI Daniel  Smith (see letter dated 13 June 2013) informed me that no investigation would be undertaken without giving any meaningful explanation.

The Metropolitan Police’s ’ Directorate of Professional Standards is now supposedly investigating the failure of Operation  Elveden to investigate the crimes I have reported to them.  However, they have had  my complaint for more than seven months and have not come to a judgement.

As you will see from the correspondence, I have also tried without success to get the DPP to act on what is a clear failure on the part of the police to investigate serious crimes .. They have made the spurious excuse that they cannot direct the police to investigate a complaint.  The excuse is spurious because in a recent case of rape they had done just that. That  involved  Acting Detective Constable Hannah Notley  who wilfully mishandled the investigation. After a third party intervened with the CPS the matter was taken up by the police, viz: : “In April 2012, after an independent representative supporting the alleged victim contacted the CPS, Notley finally confessed, and last month admitted a single charge of misconduct in a public office.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10500744/Detective-jailed-after-failing-to-investigate-alleged-rape.html).

Since I made my complaint to Eleveden  I have not been interviewed by any person from Elveden, the DPS  or the CPS, this despite my frequent requests to be interviewed and to give a formal statement. This is a very strong indication that all of those  in the police and justice systems who have been involved  with the matter  know  very well that my complaints are exceptionally well founded.  They will not meet me because they do not know how to tell me to my face that black is white.

I ask you to take up this matter and to  use your influence to get my allegations of criminality investigated thoroughly. I would greatly welcome a meeting with you to discuss the matter.

If the police are not brought to book over this, it will mean they are a law unto themselves.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

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156 Levita House, Chalton Street, London NW1 1HR

Tel: 0207 387 5018   Email: anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk

To:  Rt Hon Theresa May MP

Home Secretary

2 Marsham Street

London

SW1P 4DF

CC

Rt Hon Dominic Grieve MP (Attorney-General)

Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Det Chief Superintendent  Alaric Bonthron (Directorate. of Professional Standards)

Detective Chief Inspector I Tim Neligan (Directorate  of Professional Standards)

Chief Inspector Andy Dunn (Directorate of Professional Standards)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Commissioner)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

Mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

18 March 2014

Dear Mrs May ,

My email to you of 9 March concerning the criminality of Piers Morgan, Jeff Edwards and  D-Supt Jeff Curtis jolted the Department of Professional Standards (DPS) into a decision. After months of prevarication it provoked an immediate and definite response from the DPS in the form of Detective Chief Inspector Tim Neligan ‘s email  which you will find  below (https://livinginamadhouse.wordpress.com/2014/03/12/piers-morgans-criminality-the-met-polices-directorate-of-professional-standards-prodded-into-action/).  I doubt whether any disinterested third party would think it anything other than a panicked  reaction to the stimulus of  superbly founded complaints of extremely serious  police misbehaviour being circulated to influential people.

DCI Neligan’s email to me  bears all the hallmarks of having been cobbled together in a tremendous rush,  resting as it does very heavily on cut and pasting from the previous correspondence arising from this  case and the reiteration of spurious reasons  why no investigation is to be made.  He rejects my complaints by   ignoring the conclusive  evidence of both the initial offences of which I complained and my further complaints about the behaviour of Operation Elveden officers who have failed to investigate the clearest of evidence of serious crimes.

On my complaints about Morgan and Edwards  receiving information illegally from the Met , DCI Nelligan  simply  ignores the damming evidence I have supplied,  most notably the letter from Morgan to the PCC in which he  admits to receiving to receiving information from a Met officer in circumstances which can only have been illegal.   With  my accusations of perjury by Morgan and Edwards,  he unquestioningly accepts Detective Inspector Daniel Smith’s  opinion that perjury had not been committed despite the fact that  DI Smith  provided no meaningful explanation of why he had come to that conclusion.  The transcript of the Leveson hearings which I gave to Elveden points very strongly to perjury.

As for D-Supt Jeff Curtis, the fact that he  did not interview Morgan, Edwards or anyone else at the Mirror  is  conclusive evidence of a wilful and criminal failure to investigate.   The failure of the then Police Complaints Authority to Act when I complained  of Curtis’ failure is clear evidence of a wilful and criminal failure to address my complaint honestly.  The  refusal of Operation Elveden to start an investigation of D-Supt Curtis  when faced with such strong evidence of criminality as the Morgan letter and a tape recording of Curtis promising me that he would interview Morgan  is clear evidence of a wilful and  criminal failure to  act on clear evidence of criminality on Curtis’ part. The failure of the DPP to act on the spurious ground that they cannot direct the police to investigate is clear evidence of a wilful and criminal desire  to stop this matter becoming public knowledge.

In short, all DCI Nelligan has done is accept unquestioningly what previous officers and authorities have claimed was the case. He has made no attempt to assess the evidence I have provided.

This scandal comes down in the end to the age old  question of who shall guard the guards? At every stage of the complaints I have submitted there has been a wilful determination by those within the police and justice system to ignore evidence which on its own is enough to bring charges.  Right from the time I made the initial complaint to the Metropolitan Police (which was  eventually dealt with by Jeff Edwards) there has been a failure to investigate not because of an absence of evidence but because of the strength of the  evidence and the people involved.

I could get nothing done while Labour was in power because the story behind Morgan’s letter and the Mirror article which led to Morgan writing the letter to the PCC leads ultimately to Tony and Cherie Blair.   The Blairs  attempted to have me prosecuted  on charges , which as lawyers they must have known were bogus, during the 1997 General Election. Having failed ignominiously (the CPS returned the papers marked “No Crime” within hours of receiving them) the Blairs set Special Branch and MI5 on to me (the Mirror article about me fingered Special Branch and using the Data Protection Act – DPA –  I subsequently proved that  both they and MI5 have files on me). I then suffered ten years of harassment  which ranged from death threats to a persistent ostentatious opening of  my post. The harassment ceased as soon as Blair left office.

Sounds fantastic? Well, this should dissolve your  scepticism. The Conservative MP Sir  Richard Body put down this Early Day Motion of my behalf:

CONDUCT OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MEMBER FOR SEDGEFIELD 10:11:99

 Sir Richard Body

That this House regrets that the Right honourable Member for Sedgefield [Tony Blair] attempted to persuade the Metropolitan Police to bring criminal charges against Robert Henderson, concerning the Right honourable Member’s complaints to the police of an offence against the person, malicious letters and racial insult arising from letters Robert Henderson had written to the Right honourable Member complaining about various instances of publicly-reported racism involving the Labour Party; and that, after the Crown Prosecution Service rejected the complaints of the Right honourable Member and the Right honourable Member failed to take any civil action against Robert Henderson, Special Branch were employed to spy upon Robert Henderson, notwithstanding that Robert Henderson had been officially cleared of any illegal action.

This motion is now part of the official House of Commons record – see  http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=16305&SESSION=702

Any prosecution of Morgan and Edwards when I made the original complaint would have caused serious problems for the Blairs.  That explains why I could not get the police to act then.  The police will not act now,  doubtless partly still  because of the Blairs’ involvement and that of other powerful people who have come into the story over the course of the past 17 years , but also because of the failure of senior police officers  who have comprehensively failed to do their duty.

Please reflect upon this. If you do not act and I get story into the public fold you will have become part of the corrupt behaviour which has been the dominant and persistent  feature of this case. Ask yourself how you would stand before the media and explain with a straight face why no investigation was made when  the police have the Morgan letter to the PCC.

Is it likely I will get the story out? Well, Piers Morgan lost his CNN job four days after I circulated.  to the mainstream media in Britain and the USA his letter to the PCC in facsimile with a covering note – a copy of that email is below DCI Nelligan’s email. I do not like coincidences at the best of times and in particular I do not take to them when the coincidence involves, as this does, a complicated sequence of events to occur if it was just a coincidence.

I call upon you again to act directly as the police are unambiguously refusing to act not because they do not have evidence but because the evidence is hideously dangerous to them.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

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For an introduction to the story go to

https://livinginamadhouse.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/piers-morgans-illegal-receipt-of-information-from-the-police-his-perjury-and-operation-elveden/

Click on Operation Elveden tag for all posts on this story.

Parliamentary pay, expenses and conditions: a remedy for corruption

 

Robert Henderson

Parliamentary pay and expenses are never  far from the public eye these days. Neither the Commons voting on its own remuneration nor the setting up a supposedly independent pay review body has proven satisfactory from the point of view of the public. Nor did an earlier attempt at linking pay to that of a middle ranking civil servant avoid the difficulty of the initial setting of the peg by which MPs’ pay should be decided. .

As for expenses they have been a standing cause for Parliamentary shame ever since the Daily Telegraph exposed the gross abuses which were going on in 2009 when they purchased records of Parliamentary expenses which politicians  had done their very best to keep secret (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/5297606/MPs-expenses-Full-list-of-MPs-investigated-by-the-Telegraph.html).

MPs Pay

MPs’ pay  should be comfortable but no more than that,  let us say  three times the average national wage. That  would take it up to around £80,000 at present. I think most people would accept  that as  reasonable if MPs were banned from taking other paid  work and expenses abuse, both legal and illegal, was tightly controlled. It would give the backbench MP a salary akin to that of a doctor or a solicitor.  In addition, they have a seriously generous pension by present day standards, subsidised food and drink within the Palace of  Westminster and a substantial payment to tide them over should they lose their seat.  There might be a case for removing or lessening such perks, but for the moment I would let them stay. The subsidised food is justified by the ending of any expense claims  allowed for meals in London and the transition payment is reasonable if  MPs are allowed no  outside of politics  employment whilst an MP. The pension is more vulnerable to attack because there is a case for saying MPs should not have a more generous pension regime than is the norm for British society.

We can be sure that there would be no shortage of takers at £80,000 pa even with the other conditions I have proposed.  Indeed  the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa), which has recently recommended an 11% rise,  admits that the current £66, 000 is quite sufficient to entice many to be parliamentary candidates (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/10516391/No-evidence-MPs-66000-salary-deters-people-from-standing-for-Parliament-pay-watchdog-admits.html).  The idea that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys should produce a hollow laugh from anyone who has paid attention to how MPs behave, whether  in terms of being dishonest or lazy or simply incompetent. Our present remuneration system produces all too often MPs who act as though they see being an MP as merely a ticket to ride the  gravy train and  an ego trip.  Few  show any real independence of thought or action for very rarely does an MP, even a backbencher, step radically out of line on a party policy, even where, so often these days, the policies are self-evidently not in the national interest, for example, the continuing mass immigration in the UK and the ever increasing suppression of dissent against the ever tighter grasp  of political correctness.  

Their pay should  be uprated up or down in  accordance with the rise or fall of the average wage.  That would provide both a simple and transparent system for the public to understand and give MPs a direct reminder once a year of how their stewardship of the country is going. It would also get rid of any squabbling over who makes the decision and remove, after the initial decision on the multiple of the average wage to be used, any further human decision making. Consequently, there would be an appearance of objectivity top any rise.

The job of an MP should be full time  for two reasons. The first is a matter of practicality:  the size of the average UK constituency is large (68, 000 – http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/elections-and-voting/constituencies/ ) and requires a good deal of time spent on it if people are to be represented properly . In addition,  much of the present business of Parliament goes through with precious little  scrutiny because MPs are so often absent – even the Commons committees routinely have MPs missing. 

The second reason is fundamental to the office of MP: if they have outside interests there is a strong likelihood they will be compromised, because their extra-Parliamentary work will very often impinge on Parliamentary business.  That is not just the obvious cases such as back benchers being sponsored by unions,  being in receipt of non-executive directorships or receiving   consultancy fees, but also that deriving from seemingly innocuous employment such as practising at the Bar or working as a doctor because these can readily give them vested interests.  For example, a barrister would have a vested interest in changes to legal Aid; a doctor in the alteration of the terms of general practice. MPs are supposed to declare any  interest but they can still vote.  In principle,  Ministers have to be not only honest in actuality, but show themselves to be like Caesar’s wife above suspicion. This they do  by divesting  themselves of  directorships and placing any shares they may have in blind trusts. If it is thought necessary for ministers to have such, it should be doubly  necessary for backbenchers because they would prima facie be much more in the way of  temptation when it comes to satisfying their own selfish interests rather than those of the country because they have far less pay than a Minister.   

The post-office legalised bribes that come in the form of sinecures on the boards of companies must also be stopped.  (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10516295/Whitehalls-revolving-door-speeds-up-ex-ministers-and-civil-servants-seeking-jobs-in-private-sector-doubles.html ).

MPs Expenses

It might be thought that after the revelation  by the Daily Telegraph in 2009 of the  grotesquely inappropriate  things for which MPs were allowed to claim,  caution if not morality would have greatly curbed the abuses.  Sadly, it appears there is still some bizarre  poking of Hon Members’ noses into the expenses trough, for example, the brawling Scottish MP Eric Joyce, who sits as an independent since losing the Labour whip, stung the taxpayer for  £229 for a pair of designer glasses. (http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/disgraced-mp-eric-joyce-stung-2896178).

The only expenses MPs should be allowed are for accommodation when they are in London and have constituencies a fair distance from the capital and the cost of travel between their constituencies. It is reasonable to expect them to meet their food costs whilst away from home, not least because of the subsidised  meals they can get within the Place of Westminster.

Housing can be met one of two ways,   build a furnished hostel to house MPs or simply put out contracts to London hoteliers for a bulk rate. Fully furnished accommodation with no need for  MPs to buy any household goods.

As for travel, the government should negotiate a bulk contract for MPs and their families with the rail companies. The spouses and children could be restricted to a set number of trips a year.  I doubt whether any MPs live far from a  railway station.  I would restrict them to railway travel if the taxpayer is paying. Those who  live  a genuinely long distance away, for example, in the far north of Scotland or Northern Ireland,  could be covered  by a bulk buy contract with one or more airlines.

If this seems somewhat Spartan rations,  remember that MPs who have constituencies too far from Westminster to make a daily commute practical  probably only spend Monday-Thursday nights in London. In addition, the Commons only sits for about 6 months of the year. Consequently, the argument that MPs need a flat or house in London to maintain family life is clearly untrue.

If such a regimen was introduced expenses fraud would vanish because an MP would have little  opportunity for it. Their  accommodation in London would be paid for by the government directly, there would be no household purchases needed because the accommodation would be furnished and travel expenses would be paid for by the government directly. MPs would have to claim nothing.

The other great abuse is the employment by MPs’ of their relatives or friends as staff.   As this is public money being spent it is reasonable that these positions are put out to open competition. But even if that was done, the  MP would still be likely to choose the relative or friend.  That is a good reason to ban MPs from employing anyone close to them. A second reason to ban their employment  is that a close relative or friend would be more likely on average to turn a blind eye to bad behaviour by an MP and MPs would be aware of this and moderate their criminal tendencies. The third reason is that some MPs at least have employed relatives and friends who have done precious little work. Someone unknown to the MP before employment is much more likely to do the work for which they are paid.

To help ensure that MPs are not illicitly enriching themselves, a full statement of assets including those held by close family members should be included in the Members Register of Interests. These should be checked against the actual material circumstances of each MP  when they first become and MP, once a Parliament and when the MP leaves Parliament.

There is also a crying need for a proper investigation into the way Parliamentary  expense administrators and the special HMRC unit dealing with MPs pay have failed to apply the HMRC’s  “Wholly, necessarily and exclusively incurred in the performance of the job”  expenses test. It was clear from the Telegraph data published in 2009 that well over half of MPs had claims which comprehensively failed the test, yet very few were brought to book over it.  Consequently, the Parliamentary administrators and the HMRC unit should be investigated for systematically failing to apply the test. 

The House of Lords

The Lords is a mess. It is neither political fish nor fowl nor good red flesh. Trying to reform it is really a lost cause because most of the hereditary peers  are gone (which removes the idea of independent members  beholden to no one) and the vast majority of the regular attendees are placemen of the major political parties. It would be better if the House was abolished and replaced by an entirely new chamber with none of the placemen in it so there is a genuine change of political personnel. (Personally, I would favour a House of 1,000 members selected by lot from those who were willing to serve with a single term of eight years. They would act as a kind of jury to oversee the legislation of the Commons but would not initiate the legislation.  The primacy of the Commons would not be challenged and political parties would not be able to control the house). 

However, there is no prospect of any radical change in the foreseeable future so what should be done under present circumstances?

Peers do not get pay, but  an attendance allowance and expenses, including London accommodation if they live far enough away. . They cheat  by selling influence , claiming illegitimate expenses and by abusing the attendance allowance rules. The last they do by signing on for the day then leaving the Lords shortly afterwards having pocketed £300 from the taxpayer (http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/video-tory-lord-hanningfield-exposed-2934895#ixzz2nj1KwOwp)  It is doubtful  whether this abuse of the attendance allowance is illegal because there are no clear duties for peers, but it is clearly an abuse and should be stopped. As for the selling of influence, that  should be made a criminal offence. Expenses should be  restricted to travel and overnight accommodation and could be included within whatever arrangements are made for MPs.  

How could things be improved on the attendance allowance front?  By paying a salary? That is not really a starter because most of the peers entitled to sit in the House – there are approaching  800 at present – do not wish to attend regularly. The so-called working peers – almost all placemen and women of the major parties – might be given a salary while the others continued with a more rigorously policed  attendance allowance scheme  but that would be a messy arrangement.   The best option would be payment based on objective criteria such as participation in debates and voting  rather than simply clocking in.  This could be linked to definite duties such as I discuss in the next section.  

Terms of service

Apart from abuses in drawing expenses,  some  MPs neglect their political duties, both  at Westminster or in their constituency.  For example, Gordon Brown is notorious for very rarely being in the Commons since his  resignation as Prime Minister – he has even started describing himself as an ex-politician  (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/gordon-brown/10415046/Gordon-Brown-Im-an-ex-politician.html). In addition  there is no general public scrutiny of the performance of  a constituency MP, the only real test of the latter being the opinion of their constituency party because the vast majority of constituents will never have cause to go to their MP seeking personal help. 

MPs can get away with such neglect because there is no legal requirement for an MP to do anything either at Westminster or in his constituency. There is a Code of Conduct for MPs but observation of the Code  is not a legal requirement.  Complaints under the Code  can be referred to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards and the Commissioner’s report on any investigation  he or she may undertake may  be considered by the Committee on Standards (until the beginning of 2012 the Committee on Standards and Privileges http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/standards-and-privileges-committee/). In principle, the House of Commons can also take action as a House if it so chooses. 

Apart from the lack of legal teeth, here are two problems with this system: first, the penalties which are imposed are normally  minor, for example, a reprimand and instruction to apologise to the House; second, even the relatively  minor sanctions that the Committee for Standards can mete out are all too often not imposed.

MPs can be excluded from the House, sometimes for years, but these are rare punishments, especially where powerful and influential members are involved. Think of Peter Mandelson under Blair who was forced to resign a  ministerial position not once but twice: the first time over his false declaration when applying for a mortgage  and his acceptance of a very large loan accepted from a political colleague, the second after the Indian Hinduja brothers received British passports in questionable circumstances after Mandelson had taken a hand in the matter  (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/3130348/The-scandals-that-brought-Peter-Mandelson-down-twice-before.html). Nor would the police investigate Mandelson for his false declaration when applying for a mortgage, despite this being an established fact – I made a complaint to the Met asking them to do so but the police refused to even register the complaint (https://livinginamadhouse.wordpress.com/2011/07/07/laws-are-for-little-people-the-mandelson-mortgage-fraud-cover-up/).

The Code of Conduct is a document which shares something with  the 1936 Soviet Constitution. The latter was a wondrously cornucopia of democratic goodies; the Code of Conduct is splendidly ethical statement of how an MP should behave. Neither the Soviet Constitution nor the Code of Conduct had or has any connection with reality.  Consider these extracts from the Code of Conduct:

“Selflessness

Holders of public office should take decisions solely in terms of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other material benefits for themselves, their family, or their friends.

Integrity

Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to outside individuals or organisations that might influence them in the performance of their official duties.

Objectivity

In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit.

Accountability

Holders of public office are accountable for their decisions and actions to the public and must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny is appropriate to their office.

Openness

Holders of public office should be as open as possible about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly demands.

Honesty

Holders of public office have a duty to declare any private interests relating to their public duties and to take steps to resolve any conflicts arising in a way that protects the public interest.

Leadership

Holders of public office should promote and support these principles by leadership and example.” (http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmcode/1885/188502.htm#a1)

How far  this is from reality is epitomised by the IPSA chairman claiming that the 11% pay rise for MPs is necessary otherwise they would return to large-scale abuse of expenses. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/10512763/Increase-MPs-pay-or-risk-another-expenses-scandal-Ipsa-chairman-says.html).

The Code of Conduct needs to be enforced rigorously, but that would still leave MPs free to  devote too little time to their political duties. Consequently, there needs to be a legal enforceable job description which requires MPs to do things such  hold regular constituency surgeries, respond to constituents mail within a certain numbers of days  and attend Westminster whenever Parliament is sitting unless they have a reasonable excuse for being absent such as attending to ministerial duties or undertaking official Parliamentary business away from Westminster.

What improvements in politicians’ behaviour would result?

The changes I propose, or something like them, would remove from Parliament those who are there to enrich themselves. The remuneration (including perks) would be sufficient to enable an MP to live decently but not extravagantly.  Because MPs would have all the previously legal ways of enriching themselves through such things as  absurdly lax expenses rules, employing relatives  or spending large amounts of  time on non-political work, only surreptitiously selling influence would be available to them.  However, with proper oversight  such as checking the actual material circumstances of  an MP even that would become decidedly risky. Make selling influence a criminal offence with a hefty prison sentence and it would be most unattractive prospect.

If MPs come to the business knowing they cannot be a law unto themselves but will be subject to the type of constraints which the general population are held by in their work, that in itself will tend to produce politicians who are interested in formulating and implementing policy and serving their constituents rather than serving their own interests.   What I propose  would not be a panacea but a good beginning in the sorely needed attempt to change the ethical weather in Parliament.  There is nothing more corrupting than seeing those with power being corrupt for it  taints the whole of society by example.

 

Operation Elveden and Piers Morgan – The Metropolitan Police Commissioner brought into play

To:

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe

Commissioner

Metropolitan Police

New Scotland Yard

8/10 The Broadway

London  SW1H OBG

(Tel: 0207 230 1212)

CC Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

5 December 2013

Dear Sir Bernard,

In January 2013 I submitted to Operation Eleveden a complaint against Piers Morgan and others regarding the illegal receipt of information from a Met police officer by  Morgan when he was editor of the Daily Mirror.  The evidence against Morgan could not have been stronger, because I supplied Elveden with a letter sent by Morgan to the PCC in which he admitted receiving information in circumstances which could only have been illegal. I attach a copy of the Morgan’s letter in facsimile.

Despite my requests that I be interviewed by Elevden  and make a formal statement,  Elveden denied  my requests and eventually after six months of prevarication refused to investigate my complaints without giving any meaningful reason. This refusal was clearly absurd because they had a letter from Morgan admitting his guilt.

At that point I wrote to the DPP to complain about the failure to investigate a cast-iron complaint. . This prompted a referral of my complaint to the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards, where it was dealt with by the head of that unit, Det Chief Superintendant Alaric Bonthron .

Mr Bonthron has had the complaint for  more than three months. I have received nothing more than holding emails from him, the last of which was sent on 2 October. He has ignored my requests to meet him and has failed to answer my last email to him dated 8 October.

It is now more than ten months since I made the original complaint to Elveden and Morgan and the others mentioned in my complaint have still to be investigated. The evidence I have provided is unreservedly conclusive of the crimes alleged  and the bald failure to investigate constitutes prima facie both misconduct in a public office and a perversion of the course of justice.  The way to judge what has been going on is simple: just ask yourself what the general public would make of the Met’s behaviour in this matter.

Because I cannot get any meaningful response from anyone I have dealt with within the Met, I ask you, as the head of the force, to intervene and ensure an investigation into my complaints is begun immediately.   I also seek a meeting with you to discuss the matter.

I include in this email my complete correspondence directly with Elveden and the other correspondence arising from Eleveden’s behaviour.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

———————————————————————————————————-

My last email to the Met Police Commissioner elicited these replies and my responses:

From: “Bernard.Hogan-Howe@met.pnn.police.uk” <Bernard.Hogan-Howe@met.pnn.police.uk>
To: anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk
Sent: Friday, 6 December 2013, 12:18
Subject: RE: The Met’s Directorate of Professional standards still refuses to meet me

Mr Henderson

Thank you for your e mail.I am sorry to read of the frustration you have encountered.

Unfortunately it is not possible for the Commissioner to become involved in individual allegations, however I asked that you receive a response from those dealing with this matter.

Best Regards

Neil

Neil Williams

Detective Chief Inspector

Commissioner’s Private Office

 ——————————————————————————————————————–

To:

Neil Williams

Detective Chief Inspector

Commissioner’s Private Office

Metropolitan Police

New Scotland Yard

8/10 The Broadway

London  SW1H OBG

(Tel: 0207 230 1212

CC Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Det Chief Superintendent Alaric Bonthron

(Head of the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk9

9 December 2013

Dear Mr Williams, I have your email of 6 December. You say the Commissioner cannot become involved  in individual allegations,. Please answer these two questions:

1. What legal bar is there to prevent him doing so?

2. Are you claiming that in the entire history of the Metropolitan Police has (1829 to date) has there never been a case where a  Commissioner has intervened?

Bear in mind when answering that unless there is a legal bar to him acting in this capacity, I would need to find only example where a Commissioner has intervened to knock the legs from under your claim.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

    

 ——————————————————————————————————————————–

 From: “Andy.J.Dunn@met.pnn.police.uk” <Andy.J.Dunn@met.pnn.police.uk>

To: anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk
Sent: Friday, 6 December 2013, 11:54
Subject: Your Correspondence with the Commissioner Concerning Operation Elveden.

Dear Mr. Henderson,

I am sorry for the delay in replying to your messages. As you are aware this is a complex matter with a considerable history and it is taking us some time to gather together all the relevant information so that we can provide you with a proper reply. I am afraid that we are still having trouble getting together some of the older material so I thought I would take this opportunity to thank you for your patience, to let you know what is happening and to clarify a few issues with you.

I am the Chief Inspector in charge of complaint support within the Directorate of Professional Standards in the MPS. This means I have responsibility for the way that complaints about officers are dealt with. As such, DCS Bonthron has asked me to review the issues you have raised. In order to assess them properly could I just check my understanding with you? Following the Leveson Enquiry, you asked Operation Elveden to investigate criminal allegations you are making against Piers Morgan and the way that he obtained information for an article about you that appeared in the Mirror in 1997. The background to this is an article you wrote for Wisden Magazine and the subsequent correspondence you entered into with Mr. and Mrs. Blair, the then Prime Minister and his wife. You allege that information about this was supplied to the Mirror by the police. You now wish to complain about the fact that Operation Elveden have refused to investigate that criminal allegation. I appreciate that this is a very brief summary but is it basically accurate?

I am less clear about the following: I also understand that you may have made similar criminal allegations previously in around 2002? These were referred to DCS Simon Foy and you then made a complaint about the way he dealt with them, which in turn was dealt with by DCS Tony Dawson of DPS? This is the older material I referred to above and our files seem to be incomplete. Can you confirm whether the matters that you raised at this time were the same criminal allegations you are now making about Piers Morgan, or is this a different issue?

Once again, thank you for your patience.

Yours sincerely,

Andy Dunn.

Total Policing is the Met’s commitment to be on the streets and in your communities to catch offenders, prevent crime and support victims. We are here for London, working with you to make our capital safer.

—————————————————————————————————————

To:

Chief Inspector Andy Dunn

Head of complaint support

Directorate of Professional Standards

Metropolitan Police

23rd Floor North

Empress State Building

Lillie Road

London SW6 ITR

CC Alison Saunders (DPP)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Commissioner)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

9 December 2013

Dear Mr Dunn,

I have your email of 6 December.  This is not a hideously complicated matter either in its detail or in the way I have presented it to Operation Elveden. In fact, I would go as far as to say I have done most of the spadework for the bringing of charges because the evidence I have provided is so compelling.  The only reason it seems complicated is the large amount of correspondence it has generated, a fact which is down to the failure of the Met Police to do their duty and investigate cast-iron evidence of wrongdoing.

Having explained the position concisely but fully in my correspondence with Elveden, I really should not need to go over the matter yet again. However, your email suggests you do not possess the full papers relating to the case, which if I am correct is rather disturbing because you are meant to be reviewing the case. It also suggests that Alaric Bonthron has not been working from the full papers because  presumably you are working from what he gave you..   Consequently,  I will write yet another summary to ensure there is absolutely no room or opportunity for a claim of misunderstanding on your office’s part.

The whole business did start with the publication of an article of mine in Wisden Cricket Monthly (WCM) entitled “Is it in the blood?” This created a storm of media protest which severely libelled me. To this I was allowed no opportunity to reply.  I  could not afford to sue   so I went through all the possible channels – the PCC, my MP, the BBC complaints system and so on  – without any success.  I then wrote to the Blairs for help: Blair because he was odds on to become the next PM; his wife because she was a noted human rights lawyer as well as being Blair’s wife.  All I got was non-replies  from their offices.

At the beginning of the 1997 general election campaign I sent copies of my letters to the Blairs together with the non-replies from their offices  to every mainstream media outlet in the country. It was then that the Blairs went to the police and tried to have me prosecuted under the Malicious Communications Act.   They obviously had not been worried by the letters  as letters  because they only went to the police after I had supplied copies to the media not when they received the letters. Presumably their motivation was a  concern their non-replies showed them in a bad light. The police referred the matter to the CPS immediately and the CPS sent the papers  back to the police on the day they received them marked NO CRIME. (I obtained all this data using the DPA).

Blair then set Special Branch  on to me – you will find that mentioned in the Mirror story –  and I also used the DPA to prove that both Special  Branch and MI5 had opened files on me. I then endured the ten years of Blair’s premiership being harassed by one or more of  Special Branch, MI5 or some other  agency  with everything from the ostentatious opening of my post to incitements to attack me posted on various social media which included my name, address and phone number.   The harassment stopped as soon as Blair was out of office. The general circumstances of the affair are summarised in an Early Day Motion put down by Sir Richard Body MP, viz:

Early Day Motion put down on my behalf by Sir Richard Body on 10 November 1999:

CONDUCT OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MEMBER FOR SEDGEFIELD 10:11:99

 Sir Richard Body

That this House regrets that the Right honourable Member for Sedgefield [Tony Blair] attempted to persuade the Metropolitan Police to bring criminal charges against Robert Henderson, concerning the Right honourable Member’s complaints to the police of an offence against the person, malicious letters and racial insult arising from letters Robert Henderson had written to the Right honourable Member complaining about various instances of publicly-reported racism involving the Labour Party; and that, after the Crown Prosecution Service rejected the complaints of the Right honourable Member and the Right honourable Member failed to take any civil action against Robert Henderson, Special Branch were employed to spy upon Robert Henderson, notwithstanding that Robert Henderson had been officially cleared of any illegal action.

This motion is now part of the official House of Commons record – see  http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=16305&SESSION=702

My complaints to Eleveden are these:

1. That Piers Morgan when editor of the Mirror obtained information from a Met Officer(s) in circumstances which can only have been illegal. The letter from Morgan to the PCC which I have supplied to Elveden and which you have a copy of in facsimile conclusively proves this.

2. That Jeff Edwards when chief crime reporter for the Daily Mirror illegally received information from Met Officer(s).  Morgan’s letter plus the story printed by the Daily Mirror about me conclusively prove Edwards received such information.

3. That both Morgan and Edwards  committed perjury when questioned under oath about receiving information illegally from the police. I provided Operation Elveden with the relevant Leveson transcripts.

4. That Det Supt Jeff Curtis committed misconduct in a public office and perverted the course of justice by claiming he had investigated my complaints against Morgan and Edwards when the reality was that he failed to conduct any investigation at all, and that  despite having Morgan’s letter to the PCC and the Mirror article about me.  Curtis eventually shamefacedly admitted to me in a phone call that he had  not spoken to anyone at the Mirror including Morgan and Edwards and consequently there had been no  investigation of the Mirror’s accounts  and other records to see whether any money had been paid. Curtis failed to investigate Morgan and Edwards despite his promise to do so in an interview with me which I recorded. I have supplied Eleveden with a copy of that recording so you can hear  him making the promise on which he reneged.

That I could not get any redress when I made my original complaint against Morgan and Edwards was simply a consequence of the powerful people involved in the affair, most notably the Blairs.    My complaints to the police were deliberately not acted upon because they involved the Blairs, either directly or indirectly. There was no way I could do anything at the time because I had no money to employ lawyers nor any access to the media.  This was a very clear who shall guard the guards? territory. In short, it was a perversion of the course of justice.

Those were my complaints to Elveden. It would already be perfectly reasonable for me to make complaints of misconduct in a public office and a perversion of the  course of justice against  those in Eleveden who refused to investigate the clearest evidence of criminality (criminality which definitely falls within its remit). Whether I proceed with such complaints will  depend on whether an investigation is made.  In view of the strength of evidence I have provided, it is extremely difficult to see how such an investigation  could not result in charges being brought against, Morgan, Edwards and Curtis.

You will find below your email to me the complete correspondence arising from my complaint to Eleveden.  As your department is reviewing the case you should already have this, plus the tape recording of my interview with Jeff Curtis which I supplied the Elveden.  The correspondences is grouped so that emails to each person or office appear in a block. In addition to the correspondence and the tape I passed these documents to  Holborn Police:

 

The documents I  passed to PC G James 423EK and PC L Scully 471EK  from Holborn police station were:

1.Piers Morgan’s Letter to the PCC date 16 October 1997  in which he admits receiving information from the police in circumstances which can only have been illegal.

2. A copy of the Daily Mirror  story about me dated 25 March 1997 which produced the complaint to the PCC  which caused  Morgan to write the letter in which he admitted receiving information from the police in circumstances which can only have been illegal.

3. Copies of the then director of Presswise Mike Jempson’s correspondence on my behalf with the PCC relating to the Mirror story dated 23 December 1997, 9 January 1998, 20 January 1998, 18 February 1998, 2 March 1998.

 4. My evidence to the Leveson Inquiry of  Morgan ’s perjury dated 23 December 2011

5. My evidence to  the Leveson Inquiry of Edwards’ perjury dated 25 March 2012

6. My original submission to the Leveson Inquiry dated 25 November  2011

7. Sir Richard Body’s Early Day Motion 10th November 1999 which dealt with the general context of the events surrounding the Mirror story  with the role of the Blairs at its heart.

8. A copy of my Wisden Cricket Article Is it in the Blood? (from the July 1995 edition). It was my gross mistreatment by the mainstream British media after the publication of the article that led me ultimately to write to the Blairs asking for their assistance after all other available avenues of redress had failed me .

9. A copy of my final letter to  Det Supt Curtis dated 2 December 1999, Det Supt A Bamber’s reply to that letter 13 December 1999 and the PCA’s letter dated November 1999  refusing  to investigate further

10. A letter addressed to the new head of Operation Elveden Deputy Assistant Commissioner  Steve Kavanagh dated 21 January 2013.

To date, despite my repeated requests, I have yet to meet  anyone from Elveden or your office to give a formal statement and interview. That in itself says a great deal. Why not break this dismal pattern Mr Dunn by meeting me?

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

    

       Click on the tag Operation Elveden for the full story

Piers Morgan and Operation Elveden – an approach to the new DPP

Alison Saunders DPP

Rose Court

2 Southwark Bridge

London

SE1 9HS

Tel: 020 3357 0000

CC

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Met Commissioner)

Det Chief Superintendent Alaric Bonthron

(Head of the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

John Whittingdale MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

5 November 2013

Dear Ms Saunders,

In your role of Chief Crown Prosecutor (London)  I have been copying you into the correspondence relating to my complaints  against Piers Morgan and others which I made to Operation Elveden  in January 2013. I now write to you in your new role of DPP.

To recap. I have presented Elveden with  a prosecution on a plate. I have supplied Elveden with a letter from Morgan to the PCC when he was editor of the Daily Mirror. In it  he admits receiving information from the Met Police in circumstances which can only have been illegal. In that letter Morgan writes “The police source of our article (whose identity we have a moral obligation to protect…”.  A facsimile of the letter is attached. I would be willing to stake my life on that being the only letter the Met have ever had which has a Fleet Street editor admitting to illegally receiving information from a Met officer.

My complaint has been in the hands of Elveden for over nine months,  while  Det Chief Superintendent   Bonthron has been sitting on the complaint for several months.   I have not heard from him since 23 September.

I am asking you to intervene because  we are in who shall guard the guards territory here.  The police are ignoring cast iron complaints and their only plausible motive for  doing so is the power and influence of those accused.  I would welcome a meeting with you to discuss the matter.

The complete correspondence relating to my complaints is below.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson

I received no reply to this email

————————————————————————————————————

    

Ms Alison Saunders DPP

Rose Court

2 Southwark Bridge

London

SE1 9HS

Tel: 020 3357 0000

 

CC

Mr Dominic Grieve (Attorney-General)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Met Commissioner)

Det Chief Superintendent Alaric Bonthron

(Head of the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

 

9 December  2013

 

Dear Ms Saunders,

I wrote to your predecessor Keir Starmer on 25 July (copy below) asking him to intervene in Operation Elveden’s  failure to investigate rock solid evidence which I had supplied to them in January of serious crimes ranging from  the illegal supply of information by a Met Police officer or officers to the Daily Mirror when Piers Morgan was editor to perjury, misconduct in a public office and a perversion of the course of justice.

On 16 August Gregor McGill,  Head of Organised Crime Division of the CPS replied “ The CPS has no power to instruct the police to carry out an investigation. That is a decision entirely within the discretion of the police.” A copy of his letter is below.

I did not believe that answer at the time and a case has arisen which contradicts Mr McGill.  In December Acting Detective Constable Hannah Notley was convicted and jailed for four months for failing to investigate a claim of rape. Action  was only pursued by the police after a third party (not the police)  approached the CPS directly.  The Daily telegraph article directly below contains the details.

My complaints against Piers Morgan et al have suffered the same fate. I have submitted cast iron evidence to Operation Elveden which has not been acted upon.  Consequently, once again I ask you to take up this case and ensure that my complaints of serious crimes are investigated fully. I also seek a meeting with you to discuss the matter  because it has implications which extend beyond my complaints, namely, the seeming willingness of those within the police and justice system , including the CPS, to deliberately suppress complaints which involve those with power, wealth and influence.

I have been copying you into the complete correspondence surrounding the case , both in your previous role as Chief Crown Prosecutor (London) and  as DPP. Hence, you should have the full picture available to you.  If for some reason you have not kept details, please tell me by return and I will supply you with the complete correspondence relating  to the affair.

I have attached the Piers Morgan letter in facsimile in which he admits receiving information from a Metropolitan Police Officer  in circumstances which can only have been illegal. I do this because it is the most dramatic and readily accessible piece of evidence in the whole affairs. That Operation Elveden have not acted on such clear evidence long ago tells you something is seriously amiss.

Yours sincerely,

 

Robert Henderson

 

Daily Telegraph

Detective jailed after failing to investigate alleged rape

Acting Detective Constable Hannah Notley never submitted papers on the case to the Crown Prosecution Service

By Rosa Silverman, and agencies

2:32PM GMT 06 Dec 2013

An alleged rape victim attempted suicide after a detective failed to properly investigate her claims and told her the case was being dropped, a court has heard.

Acting Detective Constable Hannah Notley, 30, visited the woman at her home in February last year and told her she was “gutted” about the apparent decision by the Crown Prosecution Service not to bring a prosecution.

Everyone in the office believed her, she said, and even gave the woman a kiss and a hug.

But in fact Notley, a specialist trained in handling cases involving sexual offences, had never submitted the papers on the case to the CPS.

Instead, she fabricated a report to her superiors and failed to correct an assumption that the case had been investigated and passed on to prosecutors.

She also blamed the alleged victim for taking too long to report the allegations.

In April 2012, after an independent representative supporting the alleged victim contacted the CPS, Notley finally confessed, and last month admitted a single charge of misconduct in a public office.

The Essex Police detective was found to have committed a “gross breach of trust” in neglecting to look into the rape claim between July 6, 2011 and February 21 last year while based at Rayleigh Police Station.

She was jailed for four months at Southwark Crown Court today.

 

read more at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10500744/Detective-jailed-after-failing-to-investigate-alleged-rape.html

————————————————————————————————-

 

—– Forwarded Message —–

From: Enquiries <enquiries@cps.gsi.gov.uk>

To: “‘anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk'” <anywhere156@yahoo.co.uk>

Sent: Friday, 13 December 2013, 13:39

Subject: Re: Operation Elveden

Dear Mr Henderson,

Thank you for your email of 5 November 2013.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is responsible for reviewing and, where appropriate, prosecuting most criminal cases in England and Wales , following an investigation by the police. The CPS has no power to investigate allegations of crime and will only advise the police if a police file is submitted to it. It is for the police to decide whether or not, or how, they will investigate an allegation that is referred to them.

I note your dissatisfaction with the way the police have handled your concerns. If you wish to complain about the police you should contact the complaints and discipline department of the relevant police force.  You can also write to the Independent Police Complaints Commission at 90 High Holborn, London , WC1V 6BH .

I hope that this information is of assistance and I apologise for the delay in responding to your enquiry.

Yours sincerely

 

 

Parliamentary and Complaints Unit

Public Accountability and Inclusion Directorate

Crown Prosecution Service

Rose Court, 2 Southwark Bridge, London SE1 9HS

http://www.cps.gov.uk

——————————————————————————————————

Alison Saunders DPP

Rose Court

2 Southwark Bridge

London

SE1 9HS

Tel: 020 3357 0000

 

CC

Mr Dominic Grieve (Attorney-General)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Met Commissioner)

Det Chief Superintendent Alaric Bonthron

(Head of the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

 

17 December  2013

 

Dear Ms Saunders,

You will find below the CPS’ answer to my email to you of 9 December (not 5 December). The first thing to note is it has no name attached. That would not be acceptable in any state  agency.  It is particularly reprehensible in one which is at the heart of the justice system.

The second angering thing about the email is this:

”The CPS has no power to investigate allegations of crime and will only advise the police if a police file is submitted to it. It is for the police to decide whether or not, or how, they will investigate an allegation that is referred to them.”

As I supplied a recent example where the CPS did intervene after being approached by a third party following the failure to bring a charge of rape,  the claim that the CPS cannot instruct the police is demonstrably false. This is what I wrote in my previous email:

“In December Acting Detective Constable Hannah Notley was convicted and jailed for four months for failing to investigate a claim of rape. Action  was only pursued by the police after a third party (not the police)  approached the CPS directly.  The Daily Telegraph article directly below contains the details.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10500744/Detective-jailed-after-failing-to-investigate-alleged-rape.html).

I want you (yes, that you Ms Saunders) to explain to me why so  blatant a piece of police misconduct as the failure to investigate Piers Morgan after I supplied the police with a letter written by Morgan in which he admits receiving information from the police in circumstances which can only have been illegal does not warrant the same action by the CPS as that taken in the case involving Hannah Notley.  Please write to me with your explanation by return.

Yours sincerely,

 

 

Robert Henderson

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Click on the tag Operation Elveden for previous posts related to this story

Operation Elveden become nonsensical over Piers Morgan’s illegal receipt of information from the Met

Note: The most likely explanation for this absurd email from Marion Kent is that Elveden are well aware of the toxic (for them) nature of the case and they are paralysed by the knowledge.  Robert Henderson

From: “Marion.Kent@met.police.uk” <Marion.Kent@met.police.uk>

Sent: Friday, 27 September 2013, 15:12

Subject: Re: Operation Elveden and their refusal to investigate Piers Morgan et al

Sent on behalf of Det Chief Superintendent Gordon Briggs

Dear Mr Henderson,

I have been asked to respond to you on behalf of Commander Basu in his absence.

I am aware that DI Smith has now passed onto you, as you requested, the contact details of Detective Chief Superintendent Bonthron, the OCU Commander of the Department of Professional Standards. DCS Bonthron is over seeing the review into your original complaint, a review which I asked him to undertake to assess whether there may be any new lines of enquiry which can be progressed. DI Smith wrote to you on 29.07.2013 to notify you of this. Your complaint concerning Mr. Piers Morgan sits outside of Operation Elveden’s terms of reference and it was for this reason that DPS have been asked to take the lead and review your case.

DCS Bonthron has recently informed me that you have made a formal complaint about Operation Elveden’s decision not to re-investigate your allegations and whilst that matter too is being investigated it is more appropriate for you to liaise with him so that he can update you on the progress of both issues.

Yours sincerely

Detective Chief Superintendent Gordon Briggs

Operations Weeting, Elveden and Tuleta.

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To

Detective Chief Superintendent Gordon Briggs

Operations Weeting, Elveden and Tuleta.

CC Det Chief Superintendant  Alaric Bonthron

Head of the Metropolitan Police’s Directorate of Professional Standards

Keir Starmer (DPP)

Alison Saunders Chief Crown Prosecutor (London)

G McGill (CPS Head of Organised Crime Division)

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe (Met Commissioner)

Commander Neil Basu (Head of Operation Elveden)

Detective Inspector Daniel Smith (Operation Elveden)

John Whittingdale MP

George Eustice MP

Sir Gerald Howarth MP

mark.lewis@thlaw.co.uk

29  Sept 2013

Dear DCS Briggs,

Thank you for your email of 27 Sept. You write “Your complaint concerning Mr. Piers Morgan sits outside of Operation Elveden’s terms of reference and it was for this reason that DPS have been asked to take the lead and review your case.”

This is frankly bewildering. Operation Elveden’s remit is to investigate the illicit supply of information by police officers to the media. I have supplied you with a letter in which Piers Morgan admits  receiving information in circumstances which can only have been illegal.  Please explain to me  by return how that part of my complaint against Morgan is not within Operation Elveden’s remit.

To aid you let me remind you of what AC Cressida Dick told the Home Affairs Committee:

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmselect/cmhaff/67/67we18.htm

Home Affairs Committee

Written evidence submitted by AC Cressida Dick, Metropolitan Police [LSP 40]

Question 3—Your policy regarding leaks by police officers to the press where no payments have been made

Operation Elveden’s terms of reference are “to investigate alleged criminal offences that police officers or public officials have accepted money for supplying information to journalists”. The terms of reference have not been changed, however when suspected criminal wrongdoing that does not include payment comes to light it cannot be ignored.

Of the 64 arrests made on Operation Elveden, only one has been where payment is not a feature of the investigation. It is difficult to comment further on this issue without potentially prejudicing future prosecutions.”

And

“LETTER FROM AC CRESSIDA DICK TO EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE SOCIETY OF EDITORS, 26 MARCH 2013

I am writing to you concerning the Metropolitan Police investigation into allegations of inappropriate payments to police and public officials (Operation Elveden) which is running in conjunction with the Operation Weeting phone-hacking inquiry.

In the light of some recent reporting and commentary about Operation Elveden I thought it would be helpful to reassure editors on a number of points. I am sure you will understand that for legal reasons I will not refer to current active cases. I believe it is important to remember that we are not investigating victimless crimes nor has the remit of Operation Elveden been extended to any police officer who has simply spoken with a journalist, as has been suggested. The investigation is about police officers and public officials who we have reasonable grounds to suspect have abused their positions in return for corrupt payments. However when suspected criminal wrongdoing that does not involve payment comes to light it cannot be ignored.”

That is of particular interest because it commits Elveden to pursuing investigations even where no payment to the police can be proved. Of course, it is odds on that the Mirror did pay the police officer concerned, but whether or not that can be proved after this period of time Morgan and Edwards can be readily pursued for this part of my complaints against them. In fact,  Morgan’s letter hands you their prosecutions on a plate.

I would further remind you that the information received illegally by the Mirror caused  me considerable damage so it definitely was not “a victimless crime”.  You might care to tuck away in your memory the fact that I had a heart attack 11 months  after the Mirror story appeared, an attack almost certainly down to the stress generated by  the story and its aftermath.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Henderson