3 November (Part 1) - Bexley-is-Bonkers to be prosecuted
It wouldn’t be fair to keep you in suspense; it’s not true, but it is what
Bexley council’s military wing have circulated. You would expect the police to
send out a weekly newsletter to newspapers, the great and the good, and their
councillor paymasters;, and so they do. And what would you expect to get top
billing this week? The fact that the IPCC are looking into their handling of the
Broadway murder of Sally Hodkin?
Progress that may have been made in the case of
the Paul Gunner murder in Bexley village? Their ‘Day of Action’ on bogus
builders as reported in yesterday’s News Shopper?
No, heading the list of Bexleyheath police’s finest achievements are the words ‘Bexley is Bonkers’
and a report that goes on about “abusing councillors and local authority staff’ and then to
gloat over a charge of “Harassment under [the] Prevention of Harassment Act“ and that the
Bexley council critic “is to appear at Bexley Magistrates court on 7th November 2011”.
News to me; but don't you just love their sense of priorities? The crime of the
week is to upset councillors. Actually the accusation under the Harassment Act
that I received didn’t say anything about harassing the poor dears. I was
accused of criticising them. Somebody has to, they have got away with riding
rough shod over the population for far too long.
So who in our glorious police farce made that mistake? Step forward Tony Gowen,
Bexleyheath’s Professional Standards Chief Inspector. I wonder if it was he who sent me
the unsigned letter
to say that in the six months since I complained about the issue of that letter,
he has not been able to locate DI Keith Marshall who issued it and who writes from the very same
address as Tony Gowen. You would think their paths may have crossed on the stairs or something
by now, but apparently not.
If you can believe Bexleyheath police, DI Marshall has disappeared
into thin air and in his absence all they could do was take my word against Will Tuckley’s, who, or so an insider
tells me, persuaded the police to take action by telling them I was threatening “their personal
safety”; or maybe the police suggested that to him, I don’t know which.
Maybe DI Marshall is one of the 489 police officers who escaped their just deserts by
resigning as revealed by this week’s BBC Panorama and if so why didn’t Bexleyheath police tell the truth?
For failing to find his colleague who works in the same building over a period of six
months or calling his number on the internal telephone system, and taking the side of Will
Tuckley who may not have told the truth, well someone made up the personal safety story,
Bexleyheath police have earned themselves another report to their Directorate of Professional
Standards and as the original complaint remains unanswered the Independent Police Complaints
Commission are on the receiving end of a letter too.
All because a man on a quarter of a million pounds pay package can’t make a decent
judgment call when he needs to. Good value for money though as council leader
Teresa O’Neil never tires of telling us, but only if you are in need of a laugh.
Note: The Metropolitan police have refused to confirm (under the Freedom of
Information Act) whether DI Marshall actually exists or not.