21 August (Part 2) - Councillor Sandra Bauer
From
the written evidence available prior to John Kerlen’s appeal hearing it was
unclear whether councillor Sandra Bauer was the source of councillor Melvin
Seymour’s untruthful police statement or whether the responsibility for it was
entirely his. In those circumstances both were tarred with very similar brushes.
Last Friday I
said “I’ve never been sure if councillor Sandra Bauer is a naive innocent in a
wicked world or a liar who had maliciously teamed up with councillor Melvin
Seymour to silence a council critic” and after listening to her and councillor
Melvin Seymour give evidence that “I am going to assume that Sandra Bauer was
telling the truth”. I think she was. Melvin Seymour certainly wasn’t.
It isn’t practical and probably not honest to make retrospective changes to blog
posts but to set the record straight so far as is possible the following footnote
has been added to those blogs which blamed either or both councillors for the
untruthful references to dog faeces and letter boxes.
Note dated 17th August 2012. At
an appeal hearing
where both Seymour and Bauer were called as witnesses and cross examined
it became clear that it was Seymour who had dishonestly exaggerated the content of the Tweet
in order to attempt a miscarriage of justice and Bauer had merely sent him a copy and took no part in its embellishment.