Jeremy Bamber blog March 2013

Spring Submissions to the Criminal Cases Review Commission

I'm still waiting to hear on the outcome of my appeal against my whole life tariff which is with the European Grand Chamber in Strasbourg and was heard back at the end of November last year. I'm told that my lawyers will be advised of the outcome in advance

of it being announced publicly.

Simon McKay and his team are currently working on new material for the submissions to be made to the CCRC there is a lot to get through and a case will only be put forward when all material has been fully interpreted within a legal and forensic framework.

The disclosure issue is still being addressed more fully and the writing campaign has been delayed as a result, to be honest we had no idea how much crucial information has been withheld from the defence by Essex Police which can prove my innocence – documents referred to in other documents tell us the extent of the non disclosure issue and the evidence continues to mount.

This month also sees the launch of our 'Case QT' which enables information on the web pages to be watched/listened to in quick time – in just a matter of minutes. This is a crucial online resource in the campaign to educate people on the material in the case which shows my innocence and helps to make the information accessible for all.

Thank you to those of you who have been helping us work on the material for the new submissions and those involved in re-writing and structuring the web based case evidence.

Enjoy the Easter Break and let's look forward to events which will unfold this year.

Jeremy.

Plastic Bottles & BPA: negative impact on brain

Attrib:

 Mike Barrett
March 11th, 2013
Updated 03/12/2013 at 11:28 pm

http://naturalsociety.com/bpa-negatively-impact-brain-development/

 

A ubiquitous chemical found in plastics, soup can linings, and receipts, bisphenol-a is just one health-compromising substance that has been under fire for many years. While the scientific community has gathered ample evidence regarding BPAs toxic effects, the chemical is still widely used today. Adding to this evidence, recent research has found that BPA could negatively impact brain development by disrupting a gene responsible for proper nerve cell function.

For the study, which was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and conducted by Duke University researchers, it was discovered that BPA could negative effect central nervous system development by disrupting a gene called Kcc2. With the disruption of this gene, it can no longer properly produce proteins partly responsible for removing chloride from neurons. If chloride can’t be removed, then the functioning of brain cells is hampered.

“Our study found that BPA may impair the development of the central nervous system, and raises the question as to whether exposure could predispose animals and humans to neurodevelopmental disorders,” study researcher Dr. Wolfgang Liedtke, M.D., Ph.D., an associate professor of medicine/neurology and neurobiology at Duke University, said. “Our findings improve our understanding of how environmental exposure to BPA can affect the regulation of the Kcc2 gene. However, we expect future studies to focus on what targets aside from Kcc2 are affected by BPA. This is a chapter in an ongoing story.”

The study abstract concludes with:

“Overall, our results indicate that BPA can disrupt Kcc2 gene expression through epigenetic mechanisms. Beyond increase in basic understanding, our findings have relevance for identifying unique neurodevelopmental toxicity mechanisms of BPA, which could possibly play a role in pathogenesis of human neurodevelopmental disorders.”

Avoiding BPA

Unfortunately, avoiding BPA is not quite as easy as it should be. Despite the endocrine-disrupting chemical being linked to reproductive problems, obesity, diabetes, and now negatively altered brain development, the FDA rejected BPA’s ban back in March 2012 – so now consumers need to look out for the chemical for years to come.
 

But there are still many tips for avoiding BPA and even reversing the negative effects sparked by the chemical. Here are a few tips:

• Avoid using plastics whenever possible. Instead, use glass and filtered water for your bottled water. If you do use plastics, look for the recycling symbols with the numbers 2, 4, and 5. Avoid recycling symbols 3, 6, 7, and 1.

• Buy BPA-free soup cans.

• Use ceramic cookware.

• Wear gloves if you’re constantly handling receipts or currency.

• Take probiotics, as they could degrade BPA.

• Consume more royal jelly, which has been found to halt estrogenic effects of BPA.

About Mike Barrett: Google Plus Profile | Mike is the co-founder, editor, and primary researcher behind Natural Society. Studying the work of top natural health activists, and writing special reports for top 10 alternative health websites, Mike has written hundreds of articles and pages on how to obtain optimum wellness through natural health.

Read more: http://naturalsociety.com/bpa-negatively-impact-brain-development/#ixzz2OkiCb2c2
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Jeremy Bamber: Mystery of the 'Missing' Message

 Attrib:http://www.jeremy-bamber.co.uk/nevill-s-call-to-police

Arguably the cornerstone of the flawed prosecution case to convict Jeremy Bamber involved phone calls made on the night of the tragedy, specifically from Jeremy to police and from Nevill to Jeremy. Nevill’s call to police is cast iron proof that Jeremy was not, and could not have been responsible for the deaths. Read on to discover the details of Nevill's call to report his daughter’s psychotic episode and how attempts were made to smother the fact the call was ever made.

The ‘Missing’ Phone Call Made by Nevill Bamber to the Police.
Last updated 27.01.13 by S, Hanover and J, Martin-Adams.

 

One of the big mysteries in this case which has always been harmful to Jeremy's testimony was the prosecution argument that Nevill Bamber did not call the police. This is featured in the Daily Mirror article of 5 August 2010. Jeremy has always claimed that his father called him before calling the police, and then he, in turn, also called the police[1]. Nevill Bamber did indeed call the police during the early hours of 7 August 1985 – view the police transcript of Nevill's call here and the transcript of Jeremy's call here. As you can see, there are two phone logs showing clearly that two separate phone calls were made. Yet, at the trial in 1986, the members of the jury were led to believe that only one call was made . . . by Jeremy. Rural Policing Why did Nevill Bamber’s call remain secret for so long? Consider the following set of questions and answers, which help to unravel the mystery of the ‘missing’ call: Question: It looks as though one log is simply a copy of the other, meaning that both logs refer to Jeremy’s call. Is this the case? No. The logs are rolling documents, meaning that they are updated as events unfold. This is not apparent on first glance – the handwriting looks as though it has all been written down in one go. However, both of these logs were started when the calls were made, and then added to throughout the morning. For example, the Essex Police Communications log (for Nevill’s call) shows ‘mobiles dispatched to the scene’ (mobiles being police vehicles). It shows that three police cars were dispatched, and the time that each arrived, and also that three police tactical firearms vehicles were dispatched, and the time that each of those arrived. This clearly shows that the log is a gradually evolving document, updated as the events unfold. Question: If it really was Nevill who made this call, why does the log refer to Jeremy? In the log relating to Nevill’s call, the sentence which confuses people is ‘message passed to CD by son of Mr Bamber after the phone went dead, Mr Bamber has a collection of shotguns and .410’s’.     This statement has misled some into believing (a) that this log refers to the call made by Jeremy, not Nevill, and also (b) that Jeremy mentioned ‘shotguns and .410s’ during the call. However, in the call made by Jeremy, there was no word in the log of him mentioning which firearms were at White House Farm. The sentence ‘message passed to CD by the son of Mr Bamber after the phone went dead. Mr Bamber has a collection of shotguns and .410’s’ was added to the log later on after the officer in car CA07 contacted headquarters by radio to explain that Nevill’s son had given PC Steve Myall a list of firearms[2] after officers met him outside the farmhouse. Thus, the log was updated with the new information. The next page of Jeremy’s call (West’s log) suggests that Jeremy had told PC West on the phone that there were guns at the farm, the authenticity of this log is in question, but the line above in Bonnet’s log was an addition not the original message clearly. The Log of Jeremy’s call was not shown to the jury and was not an exhibit at trial.    Question: how and why was it possible for the prosecution to argue that only one call was made (by Jeremy)? 1. The C1 log relating to Jeremy’s call (written by PC West) was not shown to the jury. It existed in the ‘material exhibits file’ and not the ‘exhibits list’, meaning that it was not given an exhibit reference at the trial.[3] There are now several different copies with various alterations, which are currently being investigated.   2. The above statement (‘message passed to CD by son of Mr Bamber’) enabled the prosecution to claim that the one log available to the jury (referring to Nevill’s call) actually referred to the call made by Jeremy[4]. The members of the jury were completely unaware that a separate call had been made by Nevill Bamber. 3. The log relating to Nevill’s call states ‘message passed to CD by son of Mr Bamber after the phone went dead’. This line allowed the prosecution to argue that this log was started because a call from Jeremy was passed from one office to another[5]. In other words, they argued that this log relates only to Jeremy’s call. In reality, the line ‘message passed to CD by son of Mr Bamber’ was added to the log later on after Jeremy met officers at the scene, one of whom updated headquarters with a radio message. Therefore, the statement ‘message passed to CD by son of Mr Bamber’ has nothing to do with a phone conversation – it refers to a face to face conversation between Jeremy Bamber and PC Steve Myall outside White House Farm[6].   4. Audio recordings of both calls have failed to materialise (see below). The emergence of the second log in March 2004 (the one referring to Jeremy’s call, written by PC West) confirms that two separate calls were made to the police, and the following table outlines clear differences between the two: Nevill’s call Jeremy’s call Address of caller White House Farm, Tolleshunt D’Arcy Head Street, Goldhanger Telephone number 860209 88645 Reference to Sheila ‘daughter’ (26 yrs old) has gone ‘beserk’ My ‘sister’ (27 yrs old) has gone ‘crazy’ Details of firearms Daughter has ‘got hold of one of my guns’. Details of shotguns and .410s in the farmhouse. Sister has got ‘the gun’. Action taken Car CA07 dispatched 3.35am Car CA05 dispatched 3.36am Time of call Malcolm Bonnet records the time of the call as 3.36am, but this is impossible as CA07 was dispatched at 3.35am so the call must have been made earlier 3.36am Question: Was it not possible for Jeremy to have made both calls if they were several minutes apart? In other words, could he have called the police from White House Farm, pretending to be his father, and then gone home and called the police as himself? No. It is not possible to get from White House Farm to Jeremy’s house (Head Street, Goldhanger) in less than ten minutes without going by car on the main roads[7]. Jeremy’s car remained outside his house until he went to meet the police outside White House Farm. All of the roads were accounted for and no one appears to have seen Jeremy or his car or anyone suspicious along the route from his home to White House Farm. This is why the prosecution’s case was that Jeremy had cycled across three miles of farmland, on his mother’s bicycle, in the dark to carry out the murders[8]. Furthermore, if Jeremy had called the police claiming to be his father, it would have been easy to prove that both calls were made by the same man as all police calls were recorded onto audio tape (see below) and the police could have used the recordings to prove that the same voice was on both tapes. Question: Why was the log referring to Jeremy’s call never shown to the jury? Nevill’s call was to Malcolm Bonnet, a civilian telephone operative, and Jeremy’s call was to PC West, but PC West informed Malcolm Bonnet of Jeremy’s call[9]. PC West claimed at the trial that he – and not Malcolm Bonnet – received Jeremy’s call. Bonnet put in his witness statement of 13 September that the call he received from Jeremy was at 03:36am, despite the fact that the log shows that car CA07 was dispatched at 3.35am. How could Bonnet have received Jeremy’s call at 3.36am if he sent a car to White House Farm at 3.35am? The judge put in his summing up that Mr Bonnet may well have recorded the wrong time on the log sheet.[10]   The call timings remain a grey area because PC West maintained in one statement – which was undisclosed to the defence before the trial – that he wrote down the time as 3:36, but, in his later statement on 13 September – which was disclosed – he claims that he could have made a mistake and was therefore uncertain if he wrote down the time as 3:36 or 3:26.[11] When charged with altering his log during the City of London Police (COLP) investigation in 1991[12], West maintained that he wrote down the time as 3:36 when Jeremy called him. It cannot be possible that West, at 3.36, took the only call the police received, because Malcolm Bonnet’s C6 log (and court testimony) confirms that he (Bonnet) received a call at 3:26. The 2002 Appeal judgement notes that Jeremy’s call must have come at 3:26, which would suggest that West’s log was a fabrication: if PC West had simply made a mistake, then his original log would have read 3:26 and not 3:36. In other words, either West’s C1 log is a manuscript copy (and, therefore, a fabrication[13]) or he made a mistake, but if he made a mistake, his log would still read 3:26, which it does not. This presents a very grave situation because a man is serving a whole life sentence on the strength of the police timings.   Question: If all emergency calls were recorded, what happened to the tapes? Malcolm Bonnet claimed in his 16 December statement that all police calls were recorded onto audio tape[14]. According to the ICO letter (see Doc A7 and list of evidence destroyed), Essex Police destroyed the audio tapes after twenty-eight days[15]. This was probably standard practice unless the tapes were requested by the defence team, but Jeremy was not arrested until after this twenty-eight day period had expired. However, documents released to the defence team show that tapes of the calls were copied after 12 September 1985 (action 146)[16]. This action was carried out, and was recorded on report number 123, which is also dated 12 September 1985[17]. Although these tapes were supposed to have been destroyed on 7 September, this could not have occurred since copies were made of these calls after this date.Had members of the jury been allowed to hear the tapes, the voices would have been sufficiently different from one another to prove that two calls were made – one by Nevill and one by Jeremy. The copies of the tapes must still exist, as the destruction of any exhibit must be accompanied by a written record, but no such record exists. Could these tapes be part of a collection of documents held under public interest immunity?[18]   Question: Why did the police dispatch more than one car? The police dispatched two cars in response to two calls about the incident. Why would the same police officer make two different records of a call from the same person, at different times, referring to details passed to him about the caller’s ‘daughter’ in one, and the caller’s ‘sister’, in the other, and then dispatch two different police vehicles to the scene, when both calls clearly related to the same incident? The patrol car which overtook Jeremy en route to the farmhouse that morning (CA07) was responding to the call made by Nevill. CA07 could not have been responding to the call made by Jeremy because the log shows that it was dispatched at 3.35am – one minute before Jeremy apparently made his call to the police at 3:36am. This anomaly was apparently commented upon during the judgement at the 2002 appeal[19]. Note that the second patrol car, CA05, was dispatched to respond to the call made by Jeremy at 3:36am, as verified by the fact that these details are recorded in the message log relating to Jeremy's call (‘Dispatched CA05 to scene’).   Question: How could Jeremy have called the police if Nevill really had called him? The phone was off the hook at White House Farm and would still have been connected to Jeremy’s line, making him unable to make another call from his phone. Nevill called Jeremy before he called the police. Jeremy claims that during Nevill’s call to him, the line ‘went dead’[20]. If a line goes ‘dead’, it means that someone has either hung up or the line has been disconnected, so it could not have been left ‘off the cradle’. When Jeremy tried to call Nevill back, he kept getting the engaged tone because Nevill was either trying to phone the police, or had already got through to Malcolm Bonnet. With Nevill’s line out of action, Jeremy opted to make his own call to the police, and got through to PC West. Later on, the police asked an operator to check the line at White House Farm, and the operator confirmed that at that stage, the handset was off its cradle, a rustling noise was audible, and a dog could be heard barking[21]. This means that Nevill left the phone off the cradle after his call to Malcolm Bonnet, not his call to Jeremy.

Notes

---

[1]Jeremy Bamber, Statement, 7 August 1985.

[2]AT-07-4, PC Steve Myall, Pocketbook entry states that JB told him the weapons in the house while he was with him at the scene, JB then produced a plan stating Sheila’s age a 27, as written on the West Log, contrasting with Bonnett’s log which shows that Nevill told police Sheila was 26

[3]AP-04-05 West’s Original Log C1 [CPS Material Exhibits File – Pages 255-258], AJ-16-27, Trial Document27, - Final List of Exhibits 23 October 1986, C1 Log is not present.

[4]Ibid, exhibit 29 is Malcolm Bonnet’s log which suggests he wrote down a call from Nevill Bamber on a C6 Log.

[5]Malcom Bonnet, Trial Transcript, 2 October 1986.

[6]Op Cit, n2

[7] Wilkinson, 17 October 1985 statement, recorded that the journey from White House Farm to Goldhanger took him thirty-five minutes, via the sea wall in daylight. R v Bamber, records the shortest route via bicycle to be fifteen minutes long, again in daylight.

[8]There are no records of any witnesses seeing anyone on the possible routes between WHF and Goldhanger during the times it was alleged J Bamber had left the scene. See R v Bamber, Appeal Judgement 2002, para 145.

[9]Malcolm Bonnet states (trial transcript) that he took 999 calls at HQ. He claims that he took a call from another officer 'relating to an incident at White House Farm', but the details on his C6 log (shown in the grid above) suggest that Nevill Bamber might have called him directly, or that there were two calls made by PC West who were relayed to him Nevill's call and then Jeremy's call - noted as a rolling log.

[10]Trial Transcript, summing up, 21 October, 1986, pg 67.

[11]PC West, Statement, 13^th September.

[12]PC West charged with altering a police telephone log, 14 March 1991, City of London Police.

[13]PC West’s C1 log. A total of seven different copies exist, with various additions and alterations including the spelling of words. The CCRC has used its powers under s17 of the Criminal Appeals Act (detailed in their letter of the 13th of January 2012,) to obtain the original document, but it cannot be located.

[14]Malcolm Bonnet, 16 September 1985 statement.

[15]Letter from Information Commissioners Office to Defence, 31 May 2007, suggesting that it is ‘highly probable’ that audio tapes of the calls made to Chelmsford police were destroyed. This remains inconclusive, in that copies were made, and no documentation recording destruction has been produced.

[16]Essex Police Action report 146.

[17]Essex Police Action report 123.

[18]Letter from CCRC to Defence Solicitors, 28 July 2008, states that some of the material requested is held under Public Interest Immunity (PII).

[19]Op cit, N10, summing up.

[20]Jeremy Bamber, 7 August 1985 statement.

[21]Noted on what is referred to as Malcolm Bonnet’s Log, also referred to as the ‘Radio Log, or the Essex Police Communications log’, 7 August 1985.

Jeremy Bamber: Why I support him and...

I started supporting Jeremy since I watched ‘Crimes that Shook Britain’ on television in 2011.  I was shocked at the lack of information and evidence in the public domain, ashamed of my lack of knowledge – felt guilty that twenty six years had passed since the murders of all of Jeremy’s family and all that time I had been gullible in my acceptance of the ‘story’ as presented and promulgated by the press and others.  A myth has grown up around this tragedy and it appears to me that it is deliberately fostered by those who have a vested interest in continuing that myth and for whom the truth is a very dangerous thing; the outing of which will result in lives irrevocably changed.  I live a few miles from White House Farm where Jeremy was raised by his adoptive parents Nevill and June Bamber. Sheila, his adoptive sister, arrived a few years later.  In his letters to me Jeremy writes fondly of his childhood, his happy days at Maldon Court School, at the top of Market Hill and of two of his favourite teachers, Miss Carter and Miss Robinson. He writes of his French lessons from aged six and the French au pairs who looked after him, alongside his mother, until he was eight-and-a-half; he reflects on his memories of a ‘lovely little school - happy days’ and recalls fondly how his mother would drive him to school up that hill even in wet and icy weather. Jeremy’s father, Nevill, an agricultural farmer, grew and sold various crops which Jeremy would deliver to local outlets, one being Copsey’s fish shop in Heybridge, a ten minute walk from my home. Jeremy’s father grew Pentland Javelin potatoes especially for Copsey’s. Jeremy would deliver them and says that recalling delivering potatoes to Copseys is full of happy memories. The owner would give him a portion of chips made from them and Jeremy writes, ‘No other potato, chips like it’. Jeremy asks me whether the shop is still there and speculates as to whether one of the sons now runs it. Copsey’s is still there, I have sent a picture of the shop to Jeremy assuring him that I ‘see’ us both buying fish and chips there and celebrating his freedom. Jeremy writes of his father and his love for him and how he pictures his father giving him encouragement and advice. He says, ‘my father walks with me’ and he wonders how his father would respond if in the same situation. An equal injustice is that those who hold prominent positions, whether in government or the Justice Sysem, many of whom must be aware of the 'anomalies' in Jeremy's conviction, do nothing to address, what must be, the longest miscarriage of justice in the UK. Jeremy’s Campaign Team are not cranks, the people who support him are not ‘conspiracy theorists’, they are ordinary people, many of whom, with an open mind, took the time to consider the evidence. So I would encourage others to visit Jeremy’s website and do the same, because they cannot fail to conclude that Jeremy could not have committed these murders.  If I had one sentence it would be, Read the evidence, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain, bearing in mind that this could happen to you or one of yours. The Money Trail: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YppVCocVbI&index=2&list=PLNY9PYnfJaGLOOAyQv2dpGlA7x_mYrNfu Campaign website: http://www.jeremy-bamber.co.uk/

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Ken Livingstone on Paedophile Politicians and MI5

 

Listen to Ken Livingstone, former Mayor of London, talking to David Mellor on the role of M15 in the Kincora Children's Home Paedophile scandal

 

 

 

No Offence Guest Blog: Prison and Privilege

            http://www.no-offence.org/showthread.php/6720-Prison-and-Privilege

by Poppy Ann Miller

Rather than questioning why so many of our prisons are inhabited by those from underprivileged backgrounds or with mental health and substance misuse issues and seek out appropriate interventions, I feel that society would often rather lock them away, along with the problem, thus by projecting its corporate 'badness' onto others, frees it from the responsibility of facing its own demons.

'Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people'. Carl Jung.

Many of us, I am sure, have committed the occasional, minor, offence; taking stationery from the office, using the work mobile phone for private calls, fiddling mileage and time-sheets. We may justify this by claiming we are underpaid and undervalued, never-the-less it is still stealing and stealing is a crime. Well, only sometimes it seems. Look at the tax 'evasion' of the wealthy, the MP expenses and the recent 'General for hire' lobbying scandals. We are told these are not really crimes but just watch what happens when a struggling, self-employed plumber is caught trying to 'evade' tax. Or a woman in receipt of benefit doing a bit of 'cash-in-hand' so she can save for a family holiday. I am of the opinion that conveniently we categorise crime according to the status of the person, not the severity of the crime. Even Adam Smallbone, in the TV series 'Rev' who, as a vicar in a poor parish with a small stipend, feels justified in purchasing a non-essential piece of 'bling' at the cost of £900 with money he has taken from church funds. Is that criminal?

Having worked with young male offenders and in mental health communities for over twenty five years my experience has been that the vast majority of those who end-up, locked-up, are the poor and often, though not always, those who are the product of our 'care system'. Even those children and young people who have wonderful foster carers still have unaddressed needs which cannot be met with material possessions or persistent reassurances of love and support. Many act-out their anger and frustration through vandalism and drug and alcohol misuse which in turn often leads to crime. I would also say that the majority of those are incarcerated for petty crime due to the frequency, not the severity, of their actions. It becomes a vicious circle. I use the following case studies as an illustration.

Freddy: mental health issues; unemployed, criminal activity 'in trouble with the police' from early teens. At aged twenty-four Freddy was sentenced to four months in prison after breaking a window in his own flat on discovering his wife was having an affair, no other person was involved. He came out of prison angrier and with further criminal contacts.

Public attitude

Mike: aged eighteen; living rough, accused of rape. The girl's story had changed several times and when Mike said he did not do it we were inclined to believe him. He was placed on remand in a prison at least a one hundred and fifty mile round trip from his home. His parents both had mental health issues, did not drive, could not afford the rail fare so by the time I made my first visit Mike had been inside for over a month and had seen no familiar faces. It was clear he was angry and depressed. I was concerned he was suicidal, I told the duty warden, his reply, 'well he shouldn't have done it then.' Mike was inside for six months until his hearing by jury who took less than fifteen minutes to acquit him. Mike is free and on the outside but he's not free on the inside; he says that once you have been in prison, especially for rape, people think you are guilty but that you just 'got away with it'.

It concerns me that the prison warden, regardless of what his private thoughts may have been, felt free and able to voice his judgement on Mike, to me. It does not take much imagining to guess his attitude and how he may view and or treat others entrusted to his care.

The need to belong

Jack: physically abused by his father, a car mechanic. At aged four Jack was removed from his home and his older siblings and placed in the care of a local authority children's home,. From aged twelve Jack started breaking into then stealing cars but mainly due to the efforts of his excellent social worker was able to remain in his placement. Jack was fascinated by cars. Aged 22, he was living independently and as such no longer had the support of his social worker, he wanted to find his father who, as it turned out, was serving a prison sentence for assault. We often find that children defend the most abusive and violent parents. Jack's criminal activity continued and he was finally given a custodial sentence in the form of Community Service. On his non-attendance, because he had been working on his uncle’s car, so he said, he was imprisoned for three weeks over the Christmas period. We thought, why not just get him a car? Must be cheaper all round. So, we arranged for Jack to earn cash working on vehicles. Eventually with his savings plus some donations he was able to buy a car of his own. The last I heard he was engaged to be married and had not stolen again.

There was a link between Jack's need for cars and the need for his father's acceptance, despite his father's treatment and rejection of him. Once he was trusted to work on other people's vehicles, it seems he internalised that as acceptance and it became the catalyst for change. When a child, or an adult come to that, steals, it is often due to a need for attention or affection and a sense of belonging for which possessions can be an unconscious replacement.

Alan: persistent offender from early childhood; petty thieving and alcohol problems. Sexually abused by a paedophile ring from aged ten years. Aged fourteen, social workers removed him from his home and placed him in a unit for sex offenders as the only local option, and where he was sexually abused and assaulted. On discharge Alan continued criminal activity though through his advocate he was pursuing a claim against that local authority. Aged eighteen, whilst in a young offenders' institution he was gang-raped, resulting in his complete mental breakdown and psychosis. Alan was assessed and placed in a rehabilitation community for the mentally ill, only one of three in the country at the time. It closed through lack of funding when he had been there for six months and as he was settling down. I don't know where he is now.

Good coppers

I do not consider that I live in a deprived area but I know of men, aged thirty-plus who are homeless, sleeping in a 'mate's car', sometimes even a stranger's car or they find a way of getting locked-up just to get bed-and-board, even for one night. Derek was keen to tell me of the best places to sleep rough or park a car at night and of the good coppers who turn a blind eye or give him a hot drink.

Then there is the fear of finding your way in the world when all you have known are institutions. As Jo says, 'prison is the only place I feel safe', when asked why he is inside again.

It is so easy, upon release, to walk straight back into the only life you have ever known, especially when there's no-one to meet you at the gate or the only hope of accommodation is from the list of night shelters you are given as you are released. The government is now considering even removing the £45 cash they are given on discharge. It breaks my heart....

I have only ever worked in and around Essex and these are only a few examples of the dozens of stories I could relate. If this is happening in my local area how many times, I wonder, is it repeated throughout the UK?

 

Justice4Jeremy: Douglas Hurd hid increased tariff:

Another example of the lack of integrity in those we are expected to trust...

 

Jeremy's Sentence                                      Attrib: http://www.jeremy-bamber.co.uk/jeremy-s-sentence

Updates 02.03.13 British Government Maintains ‘Reviews in Whole Life Orders’ are Giving Prisoners False hope. On the 28th of November 2012 the European Grand Chamber heard the case for appeal against the whole life tariff’s of three prisoners from the UK, Vinter, Bamber and Moore. Back in January 2012 the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, voted that whole life sentences do not contravene Article 3 of Human Rights Law, even in cases where a sentence was imposed on the prisoner retrospectively and in secret. The case is for prisoners to have a have a ‘review’ inserted into their whole life sentences. The prisoners assert that in contrary to article 3 of the Human Rights Act, to have a whole life sentence imposed without a mechanism for review is inhuman and degrading on the following grounds. Whole life sentencing means permanent exclusion from society in a similar way that its predecessor did -sentence to death was also permanent exclusion from society.[1]The appellants argued that to be imprisoned for whole life, means withdrawing not only the possibility of atonement, but also hope, it is then argued that to live without hope amounts to inhuman and degrading treatment. Law in England and Wales currently has conflicting ideologies where the objective of imprisonment is concerned. Our presentt alignment with European law makes us part of the reintergationist view of imprisonment, where prisoners rehabilitate as part of their punishment and become integrated back into our communities. Contrasting with this is whole life sentencing, without any reviews, which follows the exclusionary doctrine of hanging, and is at odds with the European reintergrationist ideology. As the British Government detail in their defence to the Grand Chamber, whole life orders are for the ‘purposes of punishment and deterrence,’ with not a single reference to redemption, atonement or re-integration or the possibility of a miscarriage of justice.[2] The public dissatisfaction which preceded the abolition of the death penalty in the UK, was brought about because of high profile cases where innocent people had been hanged.[3]Those who are wrongly convicted, and posthumously cleared can never have their lives back, and this is a very strong argument considering the high volume of miscarriages of justice which according to Dr Michael Naughton, of Bristol University Innocence Project, are a ‘mundane part of the justice system’ and which now total 18 cases per day.[4] One of the appellants who has always maintained innocence and makes serious representations to support his claims, is Jeremy Bamber, who was convicted by a 10:2 majority verdict in 1986. Under the old system he would not have been sentenced to death because hanging was only an option for those convicted by a unanimous verdict. Bamber would likely have had a sentence fixed at 25 years, and is therefore one of the few whole life sentence prisoners who would be better off under the archaic system abolished in 1965. The trial judge, Mr Justice Drake, sentenced Bamber to serve ‘life’ and both he and the Lord Chief Justice recommended that Bamber should serve a minimum of 25 years before a review. However, in 1988 the Secretary of State, Mr Douglas Hurd, imposed a whole life tariff without informing Bamber.[5] After prisoners won a Judicial Review of the Secretary of State’s reserved right not to tell prisoners the length of their sentence, on the 15th of December 1994, the Home Office Prison services, then formally advised Jeremy Bamber of this decision.[6]Until this point, Jeremy Bamber had been unaware that his sentence had been upgraded by the Government retrospectively. The fact that whole life sentences were introduced in 1983, and the first one was not set until 1988, is surprisingly not in breach of Article 7 (1) of the Human Rights Convention. The Home Office Prison Services also formally was advised Jeremy that he would serve the whole life sentence with a review which was already set for 2002 by the Secretary of State.[7] But this review was withdrawn when the House of Lords held that the Secretary of State was not an ‘independent and impartial tribunal,’ and that political sentencing of this type was incompatible with the convention right to a fair trial.[8] The Criminal Justice Act (CJA) 2003, reformed the law in England and Wales, and removed all reviews from mandatory life sentences upgraded to discretionary whole life orders, thus withdrawing the powers previously held by the Secretary of State to apply sentence reviews or set tariffs.[9] Transitional provisions of the CJA of 2003, allowed Bamber to apply to the High Court for a review of the whole life term because it had been set by a politician and not a judge.[10]In accordance with this provision, Bamber challenged his new sentence which had been imposed by the Secretary of State, it was heard, and astonishingly still upheld by the High Court on the 16th of May 2008 despite the CJA aiming to ‘judicialise’ sentencing. In 2012 Bamber took his case to the European Court of Human Rights with this background, and made appeals that the British Government were in breach of Articles, 3, 5 and 7 of European Human Rights Law. Submissions by his lawyers included; “the sentence which the trial judge would have passed, if he had had the power to do so, namely a minimum term of 25 years, was reviewed by the High Court nearly 22 years afterwards applying a sentencing regime created 17 years afterwards, which is more severe than the one which prevailed at the time the offences were committed. That can neither be fair nor compatible with the requirements of Article 7 (1).” Bamber’s legal team added; “It cannot be acceptable for the Government to have promised a whole life prisoner a series of reviews at the stages identified in this letter and then to renege on that promise and withdraw that right to review, and consequently the possibility of release.” [11] On 17th of January 2012 the European Court ruled that there had been no breach of Article 3. This was a narrow majority ruling, with three out of the seven judges dissenting. Clearly exclusionary forms of sentencing are still favourable in contrary to European integrationist penal trends. The dissenting judges stated that the appellants were denied the Human Right to ‘hope’ which did amount to inhuman and degrading treatment. On the 28th of November 2012 Bamber, Vinter and Moore returned to Europe, this time in the Grand Chamber to see if they could have some ‘hope’ put into their sentences. On the 24th of September 2012, a non Governmental Organization known as the ‘Hungarian Helsinki Committee’ sought leave to submit a third party intervention on behalf of Vinter, Bamber and Moore under rule 44 (3) of the court. The Committee‘monitors the enforcement of human rights’ and ‘has for years been advocating for abolishing lifelong imprisonment without the possibility of parole.’ The application made by the Committee was refused by the court as was their intervention into the case of a Hungarian man jailed for whole life without a mechanism for release.[12] It seems even Strasbourg reject the insertion of release mechanisms, so the possibility of the appellants winning their case is slim. Our concern is that not only has England and Wales has been unethical in setting sentences, and is still in the mode of political meddling, but this country brings itself into conflict with Europe and Scotland as a result. Michael Mansfield QC has suggested the following where miscarriages of justice are concerned. “Despite the CCRC there are cases where strong evidence of innocence or serious doubts of the conviction, exist, which do not meet the stringent criteria of the CCRC and the appeal courts. The INUK and this book, then, present an imperative attempt to resurrect alternatives for such cases where the CCRC can offer no hope to, such as petitioning the Secretary of State for a pardon under the prerogative of mercy”[13] Most concerning of all is that Jeremy Bamber is not eligible for a prerogative pardon under his whole life order - there is no mechanism for review. The Bamber case highlights the most unusual set of circumstances in which the government ‘secretly’ interfered with the imposition of sentences. We should be even more concerned that there is no provision for the possibility that the judiciary is setting what is effectively a ‘death sentence’ to individuals who maintain innocence with no mechanism for review, and this has echoes of the death sentence imposed on Troy Davies in the USA, despite his maintaining innocence with supporting evidence. More attention must be paid to the absurdity of political sentencing ethics which are supported by the UK judiciary (when it suits) and how these conflict with European Human rights laws if we are ever to find a system that works satisfactorily. [1]“reintergrationist” versus “exclusionary” types of imprisonment, Dolovich. pg 13 & 122; Life Without Parole, Ed Ogletree and Sarat, NYU Press, 2012. [2]Observations on Behalf of the Government of the United Kingdom, 18thSeptember, 2012. [3]Derek Bentley, Timothy Evans [4]Daily average in Crown Court, CACD (including referrals from the CCRC) and House of Lords, Naughton, M. Rethinking Miscarriages of Justice: Hope for the Innocent, 2012 edition, Palgrave, Basingstoke. [5]Observations on Behalf of the Government of the United Kingdom, 18thSeptember, 2012. [6]R (Doody) v Secretary of State for the Home department http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Secretary_of_State_for_the_Home_Department_Ex_p_Doody [7]Home Office, Prison Service letter to Mr Bamber, 15th December 1994 [8] R (on the application of Anderson) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2002] [9] Schedule 21, CJA 2003 [10] Schedule 22, CJA 2003 [11] Bamber v United Kingdom, 2012 [12]Letters Grand Chamber and Hungarian Helsinki Committee, 27th January 2012 [13] Mansfield, foreward xxii. Naughton, M. The Criminal Cases Review Commission: Hope for the Innocent, 2012 edition, Palgrave, Basingstoke. Whole life Tariff Reviews: “hope for the future, however tenuous that hope may be.” On the 28th of November 2012, the European Grand Chamber will hear the appeal against my whole life tariff along with two other cases, Vinter and Moore. Firstly I need to clarify what this case is actually about. Many people have assumed that if my case in the Grand Chamber is won then my tariff would be put back down to the original 25 years set by the trial judge. This is not the case. What my legal team has applied for is for a review to be inserted into my mandatory whole life sentence. It is my position that the UK Government is in breach of Article 3 and article 5 (4) of the European Convention on Human Rights by imposing a whole life sentence without review, this amounts to ‘inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.’ But what does this actually mean? In light of the January ruling that whole life tariff's are not in breach of human rights law, the only appropriate submission my legal team could make to the Grand Chamber is that there is no problem with a government applying a mandatory whole life sentence, but the breach of Human Rights Law lies within there being no mechanism for review of the prisoner’s whole life sentence. It is then asserted, (and it is also my particular view) that a whole life order then becomes parallel with a death sentence. To order someone to die is to permanently exclude them from society and it then follows that to sentence a person to whole life imprisonment is also permanent social exclusion. Social death is a dimension of the slavery which replaced death in Classical society, and was and still is intrinsically linked to loss of liberty. [1] As I have stated many times, I have been sentenced to death by old age. This leads us to the psychological state of those incarcerated for whole life without reviews. It has been clarified by psychologists including those assessing me that I am at continued risk of having depression brought about the prolonged environment of prison.[2] I am in total agreement about life without hope, after all hope is what keeps the human spirit alive and without hope there is nothing. For me, even with the insertion of a review there is still very little hope of release. If the Grand Chamber rule to allow me to have reviews there is no knowing at what point a review could be placed, it might be at 30 or 40 years into a sentence. As I have maintained innocence, there lies the other difficulty of reviewing my prison term in light of this. Because I have maintained innocence I have not taken part in any rehabilitation programmes and neither can I be viewed as a prisoner who has gained atonement. The judiciary and review boards see me as being in denial of guilt. So when the European Court of Human Rights ruled against my appeal at Strasbourg in Janurary 2012, the three dissenting judges emphasised that Article 3 was being infringed and their words rang true for me, “equally importantly depriving him of any hope for the future, however tenuous that hope may be.” Tenuous, really is how I feel about this ruling even if we win in the Grand Chamber. After this digression, nevertheless the argument my lawyers have put forward is that this treatment, taking into account psychological effects does amount to inhuman and degrading treatment. To this I have to agree wholeheartedly, respect for ‘hope’ an essential dimension of human dignity does underpin the protection of human rights. [3] In the USA and China the death penalty still exists in contrast to Canada where there is no death penalty and no whole life sentencing. The USA, similarly to England and Wales currently has the sentence of ‘Life Without Parole’ (LWOP) and in Florida the US Supreme Court commented broadly on the destructive impact of this sentence “It deprives the convict of the most basic liberties without giving hope of restoration.[4] If you have always felt that England and Wales are soft on sentencing then think again because the statistics show otherwise. The position is that all majority state parties of Europe rule that life sentences must have reviews.[5] Only England and Wales and Hungary have an authentically irreducible whole life sentence, England and Wales with almost 21 times more life sentenced prisoners than any other single European country and We currently have more whole life sentence prisoners than all of Europe put together. [6] The first whole life tariff in the UK was set in 1988, and in 2003 reviews at executive discretion for these prisoners was abolished (under a Labour government).[7] Although Scotland’s sentencing is generally similar to England and Wales their human rights laws were brought into line with Europe at the time of the devolution of powers.[8] Whole life tariff prisoners cannot be subject to a prerogative pardon. The only mechanism for release of a prisoner (other than to overturn their conviction) on a whole life sentence in England and Wales is granted in exceptional circumstances, where the prisoner is medically incapacitated with death to occur within 3 months and no life sentence prisoner has ever been released under this or any other power in England and Wales. This exception compounds the view that a whole life sentence is literally a death sentence.[9] As I am not guilty of the crimes I have been convicted of carrying out, where do I fit in all of this? Currently the only avenue to appeal is through the politically controlled quango of the Criminal Cases Review Commission. When this avenue is exhausted because the commission has usurped the role of the appeal courts and is in violation of the Criminal Appeals act 1995, and non disclosure of evidential materials still prevails, surely this is a violation of both Article 3 and 5(4) of European Human Rights Law, and should be taken into consideration when assessing whole life sentences. As crime is intrinsically tied to sentencing it is axiomatic that the problem of Miscarriage of Justice cases could be expanded within this framework simply because a Miscarriage of Justice in UK law does not allow for innocence but only a “miscarriage of due process.”[10] If we are to believe the statistics quoted by Dr Michael Naughton as opposed to the Government’s ‘massaged figures’ we face a very worrying situation indeed. Naughton reveals that there are no less than 18 convictions a day over turned in the UK which is an astonishing figure warranting a full review of the causes of wrongful convictions.[11] Indeed Naughton himself states: “miscarriages of justice as understood from the perspective of the legal system are not the exception to the rule, rather they are a routine and even mundane feature of the criminal justice process.”[12] It is of course, with my own conviction and these statistics in mind when I consider what a whole life sentence means to the individuals living a ‘social death’ as I do each day. But whatever happens on the 28th of November this year it will make little difference to my current life, release for me with my conviction intact means no life at all. There is only one freedom and one hope for me and that is that the truth of my innocence will be heard in a court of Law allowing me the liberty I have been fighting for. Jeremy [1] Patterson, O. Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982 [2] Dr Anderson Report, 2006 [3]“reintergrationist” versus “exclusionary” types of imprisonment, Dolovich, pg 13 & 122; Life Without Parole, Ed Ogletree and Sarat, NYU Press, 2012. Absence of a “dignity tradition” comparative study USA, Europe, pg 19 & 282-310, op cit. [4]Graham v Florida 130, S.Ct. 2011, 2021 (2010) at 2027 & Naovarath v State, 105 Nev. 525, 526, 779 P.2d 944 (1989), at pg 4 &40 [5] http://treaties.un.org & UN report on Life Imprisonment (1994) [6]Stats prisoners serving life or IPP http://www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/statistics/prison-probation/omsq/omsq-q1-2012.pdf, The Howard, Newsletter of the Howard League for Penal Reform, Summer 2009, http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/standardsetting/prisons/& Hansard, Baroness Stern at Col 448 http://www.publications.parliament.uk/ [7]Provisions of CJA 2003 [8]Convention rights (Compliance) (Scotland) Act 2001 c.7 [9]PSO, 4700, para, 12.2.1 [10]Naughton, M. Rethinking Miscarriages of Justice, 2012 edition, Palgrave, Basingstoke, pp 21-24 [11]Daily average in Crown Court, CACD (including referrals from the CCRC) and House of Lords, 18.21, op cit. [12]Ibid pg 4 "Hope is what keeps the human spirit alive – without hope there is nothing" - Jeremy Bamber "At my trial Judge Drake gave a minimum tariff, and providing that during your jail you do nothing wrong that is how long you do. I was given 25 years. This was then sent to the Lord Chief Justice to be rubber stamped. Lord Lane said he agreed with the 25 year tariff. So as far as I was concerned I had to serve 25 years and I’d be let out on parole to serve my life license outside. Very few lifers are kept in forever. When I got my life sentence most lifers then were serving between 8 and 12 years, so 25 years was massive. Eight years into my sentence I was called up to the psychology office in Long Lartin, about 8 different people were there and it was very odd. The number one Governor said ‘I don’t know how to break this to you but Doulglass Hurd, (who was Secretary for State at the time) has ruled that you must die in jail.’ I appealed this ruling last year and I knew that the appeal court would not act on this as it was too political so they kicked it up the line to The European Court who have now agreed to prioritise my case. This ruling will just confirm how cruel the authorities are telling a man he is to die in jail as hope is what keeps the human spirit alive – without hope there is nothing. It is only because I am strong that I can and could see beyond the action of Michael Howard (Home Secretary at the time who wrote to notify me) in telling me my last breath would be staring at a prison door". See the blog by Jeremy on the ruling that his original sentence no longer stands and that the whole life tariff imposed after his sentence was set has not been overturned by the European Court of Human Rights. Jeremy intends to take the appeal to the Grand Chamber of the European Court. Written and edited by Jeremy Bamber between 2010 and 2012. Bamber Attacked - Extracts from the East Anglian Daily Standard Convicted murderer Jeremy Bamber has been stabbed in the neck in prison by a fellow inmate. Bamber was taken to hospital after the attack, at HM Prison Full Sutton near York. He had been on the telephone at the time of the assault. He needed stitches to the back of his neck, but has now returned to the jail and is recovering in the hospital wing. Bamber yesterday said that he did not know the prisoner who attacked him, and he had no idea what the reason was. The attack happened at 3.20pm on Saturday. A spokesman for the Home Office said: 'I can confirm a prisoner was taken for treatment to an outside hospital and police have been informed. It did follow an assault.' Published Monday May 31, 2004 **** “The enormity of the universe can make us feel so small but there is nothing greater than our own capacity to endure.” Jeremy Bamber September, 2012

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