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News and Comment December 2014

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16 December (Part 1) - Bexley police. Up to their old tricks again

Some readers have first hand experience of my occasional tardiness in responding to emails. It's not just that I get rather a lot, that is not the real problem, it is the ones that are complicated and hard to follow and would take days to investigate properly that are most often neglected. Sometimes they don’t really have any connection to Bexley council either.

One such saga has been arriving in stages all year but it’s not been mentioned before because it is about Bexley police and for a change, not about them covering up for Bexley’s criminally inclined council. On the other hand neither is the corruption surrounding the Daniel Morgan axe murder and neither was the young lad who was severely injured at school by someone with friendly connections to the police. In that case they reversed the assailant and victim roles to get their friend off the hook. When Dartford Crown Court exposed Bexley police as liars they pretended to make amends by telling the victim that action would be taken against the dishonest police officers, but they were lying again. Not so much as a single knuckle was rapped.

The new case has similarities to that one.

A brief summary is that there was a marital dispute; usual thing, husband runs off with another woman. The husband subsequently broke into the wife’s house through a window and removed property. Bexley police said that was not a crime.

Following that incident the other woman accused the wife of assault.

The wife had taken a brief holiday in the USA at the time but as she returned through Heathrow she was taken aside and arrested. Can you believe it? A lady returning home to Bexley, unaware of the charges against her and who could easily be picked up when she got home, was intercepted as if she was a big time crook passing incognito through Heathrow.

The police papers suggest that an officer thought a dramatic arrest would be fun. “Wouldn’t it be good if we arrested Mrs. P. off the aeroplane.” For a common assault? Are they mad?

The officer involved denied using those words but it happened nevertheless…
Arrest
Maybe you can see the link with the case of the injured schoolboy. Yes, the other woman worked for the police in Sidcup; “Mrs. M. is one of us”. In Marlowe House presumably where Detective Sergeant Michelle Gower whitewashed my complaint against Chief Superintendent Dave Stringer. (The IPCC agreed with me but 30 months later the police are ignoring the IPCC.)

The wife was charged and brought before Bromley Court where the charge was thrown out for the simple reason there was neither harassment nor assault.

The wife then made ten complaints and allegations of Misconduct in Public Office and Perjury against police officers. You will probably guess this too. The police accepted none of it. Chief Inspector Ian Broadbridge said “I am satisfied that the report does not need to be referred to the CPS.” He signs himself “Professional Standards Champion”. I would have thought Booby was a more appropriate word than Champion but perhaps Champion is a reference to success in protecting his mates and not looking after the public as I foolishly assumed.

Ian Broadbridge is the officer who did Mick Barnbrook ‘a favour’ by telling the Directorate of Professional Standards that Mick was going to make a complaint against two constables who he believes (knows really) lied about ejecting him, me and others from the council chamber on 19th June 2013. He knew full well that Mr. Barnbrook intended to make criminal allegations against the two PCs and Chief Inspector Peter Ayling but Broadbridge’s unwanted intervention successfully threw that off track. Once again the police looked after themselves.

The police’s own report names around 20 officers involved in this case and except for the Chief Superintendent’s none are known to me. None from the Craske case, none from John Kerlen’s malicious prosecution, none from the injured schoolboy and none from the Cheryl Bacon case. One can only assume that crookedness is a trait widespread among Bexley’s police. Even the ‘honest’ ones will always support each other as I learned the hard way when one assaulted me under a CCTV camera 20 years ago.

However the wife in the foregoing case has taken her allegations against CS Peter Ayling to the IPCC so he is not out of trouble yet, and no doubt Mick Barnbrook’s case will go to the IPCC eventually as well, adding his name to Chief Superintendents Dave Stringer and Victor Olisa who are also similarly accused.

BaconWhile I am covering police matters perhaps it is an opportune moment to return to the case against councillor Cheryl Bacon, Will Tuckley, Akin Alabi and Lynn Tyler, Bexley’s Chief Executive and legal bods respectively, currently with Greenwich CID.

The latest information leads me to suspect that Bacon will get off scot free. She offended against the Local Government Act by shutting out the public from her meeting and then lied constantly about the reason why. But that is not the crime Mick Barnbrook reported. His allegation is that Tuckley and Co. Perverted the Course of Justice by refusing to investigate Bacon’s lies to excuse her minor offence and turning their backs on councillors of both parties who were happy to tell them the truth.

Lying by politicians is not a crime, if it were… well would there be any running free? So I think Bacon will walk free which is a shame. On the other hand she will be labelled a liar for ever more and there are a dozen or so councillors and a handful of council officers who know that she is a liar - because their ears and eyes will not have deceived them.

 

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