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News and Comment November 2011

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3 November (Part 1) - Bexley-is-Bonkers to be prosecuted

CuttingIt 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.

 

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