Monday 29 July 2013

Apparent discrepancies are not evidence

Apologies for the delay in replying. I haven't been through the documents in detail as there is no need to do so. The evidence is overwhelming. It is all consistent with suicide. Apparent discrepancies such as these are not "evidence". Unless someone can explain how the painkillers could have been stolen from the Kellys' medicine cabinet without Mrs Kelly noticing, and why we should think such an extraordinary thing happened, you are being distracted by things that are simply not important.
(I posted this as a comment on the post "The death of David Kelly: Evidence that the body was moved by a third party"; I had forgotten how to post on the blog itself.)

Saturday 20 July 2013

The death of Dr. David Kelly - Contacting me

In my previous post I refer to a couple of relevant documents that I can no longer find online, specifically the written statement of Louise Holmes is contained in a document "Annex TVP 6" released by the Attorney General in June 2011 and evidence about the position of the body is contained in a report by Dr. Richard Shepherd, forensic pathologist.

I can supply copies of those documents to interested readers on request.

I can also supply a copy of the Section 13 Application of April 2012 on request, together with the Addenda thereto.

I can be contacted by email at the following address (intelligently reinterpreted):
who killed drkelly [at] btinternet dot com

Of course, remove whitespace and reinterpret [at] as @

If there are problems using that email address please leave a comment below.

I use that email address only occasionally so you may have to wait a few days for a response.

The death of David Kelly: Evidence that the body was moved by a third party

John,

Thanks for replying.

Over the next few days I'll post a few self-contained posts in which I'll try to explain to you (and anyone else that may be reading) why I believe there is compelling reason, at a minimum, to question the Hutton Inquiry version of events with respect to the death of David Kelly.

One of the most important easily-understood issues is whether or not the body found at Harrowdown Hill was moved by a third party.

That issue is immensely important since it is crucial to the "suicide" interpretation put forward to the Hutton Inquiry by the former Assistant Chief Constable Michael Page and is pivotal to the logic by which Lord Hutton reached a "suicide" conclusion.

This issue was considered in the second  post on the subject of Dr. Kelly's death that I posted, on 22nd October 2010, after reading the postmortem results published by the Ministry of Justice. See The Death of David Kelly - Who moved the body? Who was the missing policeman? 

The basics of the evidence

The available evidence is as follows.

At 09.15 on 18th July 2003 the body of Dr. Kelly was seen from a distance of about four feet by Lousie Holmes with the "head and shoulders" against the base of a tree.

At approximately 10.15 on 18th July 2003 the ambulanceman Dave Bartlett was able to stand (and possibly kneel) in the gap between the head and the tree.

Both pieces of evidence are "solid" in the sense that there is no obvious reason to question them.

Louise Holmes' evidence is consistent in her oral evidence to the Hutton Inquiry and in her written statement to the Police. It is, at least in part, corroborated by the evidence of Paul Chapman given at the Hutton Inquiry and by statements to the press in 2010 by Detective Constable Graham Coe.

Dave Bartlett's evidence is corroborated in photographs seen by forensic pathologist Dr. Richard Shepherd who, in the photographs shown to him, commented that the head was "some distance" from the tree.

How can the evidence be explained?

What are the possible explanations for the differences in observed body position?

These possible interpretations come to mind:

  1. Louise Holmes was mistaken
  2. Louise Holmes lied
  3. Dave Bartlett and Dr. Shepherd were mistaken
  4. Dave Bartlett and Dr. Shepherd lied
First, let's dismiss options 3. and 4. Other witnesses, implicitly rather than explicitly, indicate that after 10.15 the body was flat on the ground a little distance from the tree.

There is also said to be photographic evidence comfirming that.

Could Louise Holmes have been mistaken? Could she have lied?

Louise Holmes saw the body from a distance of about four feet. It seems to me to be inconceivable that she could be wrong about the body position from that distance.

Did Louise Holmes lie? Her evidence has never been called into question. She has no identifiable motive, that I can discern, to lie.

In my interpretation of the evidence there is no discernible reason to doubt that the body was in one position at 09.15 and in another position at 10.15.

What explanations are possible?

It seems to me that, in all the applicable circumstances, there are three possible interpretations of the body being in two different positions.

  1. Dr. Kelly was still alive when found by Louise Holmes and moved
  2. The body slid spontaneously down a slope
  3. The body was moved by a third party
The evidence of Dr. Nicholas Hunt about time of death indicates that Dr. Kelly was dead no later than 01.30 on 18th July 2003. In other words he had been dead for some 8 hours before being found by Louise Holmes. I recalculated Dr. Hunt's timings and the true timings are earlier than Dr. Hunt indicated. In any case all the available evidence is that Dr. Kelly had been dead for at least 8 hours. Dead bodies don't move themselves.

Could the body have slipped down a slope? There is no evidence to support that possibility. Dr. Shepherd in his report to the Attorney General indicates there were no marks on the ground to indicate that the body was dragged into a new position. That seems to me to exclude the possibility that the body slid spontaneously a couple of feet or more into a new position.

The only credible interpretation of the evidence, as it seems to me, is that an unidentified third party or third parties moved the body.

Given the absence of drag marks it seems likely that at least two third parties were present.

No such third party was identified by Thames Valley Police.

Conclusions

 The evidence is that the body was seen in two positions.

There is no identified reason to question the evidence about either position of the body.

The only credible interpretation for the body being in two positions is that it was moved by a third party or third parties.

The "suicide" conclusion of the Hutton Inquiry rests on the supposed exclusion of the presence of a third party at the scene.

I conclude that the Hutton Inquiry conclusion of "suicide" is, at a minimum, highly questionable and, in reality, is unsafe and untrue.

Is there an alternative explanation of the evidence?

John,

You are on record as stating that there is no credible reason to question the "suicide" conclusion. At least that's how I understand your past comments on the matter.

How, then, do you explain this aspect of the evidence?

I can provide links to any components of the evidence that are of interest to you in considering this question or I can supply you with copies of the original documents e.g. Dr. Shepherd's report (where they have now been removed from the Internet by the Attorney General's Office).

Why did a third party move the body?

Once one accepts that the evidence indicates that Dr. Kelly's body was moved the question arises as to the motive(s) of such a third party.

Did some random member of the public come along and move the body with no motive for doing so and escape detection by Thames Valley Police? I think we can conclude that possibility is highly unlikely.

The alternate explanation is that a third party (or third parties) moved the body with specific motivation.

The most plausible motive, I suggest, is to "set the scene" to create an impression of "suicide" when that was not the true cause of death.

In other words the seeming "suicide" was faked in that regard.

If that aspect was faked how many other aspects of the seeming "suicide" were faked?

Apart from a "scene setting" motive to fake a seeming "suicide" can you suggest any other credible possible motive?

Do you have an alternative explanation?

John,

Do you have an alternative logical alternative explanation for the evidence as it exists?

A longer consideration of this evidence

The foregoing is a slightly abbreviated version of events and my analysis of it.

Together with the late Brian Spencer I presented a more detailed analysis in an application in April 2012 to the Attorney General in terms of Section 13 of the Coroners Act 1988.

That Section 13 application is online here (after some introduction from Dr. Stephen Frost):
Suspicious Death of Dr David Kelly: Doctors Seek New Death Inquest

In that analysis Mr. Spencer and I concluded that it was likely that Lord Hutton had lied in the report of the Hutton Inquiry. At your discretion we can discuss the honesty or otherwise of Lord Hutton or simply focus on the issues of the presence or otherwise of one or more unidentified third parties at Harrowdown Hill.

If a third party (or third parties) was present at Harrowdown Hill then Lord Hutton got it wrong. At least that's my view.

Thursday 18 July 2013

Thanks for the invitation

Dear Andrew
Thank you for inviting me to take part in the debate on this blog. I don't see the point in devoting much time to it, as the idea that David Kelly was murdered is so unreasonable that it is barely worth considering, and (despite that) I have written quite enough about it already.
I would refer your readers to
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/tag/david-kelly/
But of course I am happy to respond to serious and reasonable inquiries, as I do realise that many sensible and open-minded people still find the simplest explanation of Dr Kelly's death hard to believe.
Best wishes
John Rentoul

Wednesday 17 July 2013

Suggested rules of engagement

Assuming Mr. Rentoul accepts my invitation to debate these important matters I suggest the following as sensible rules of engagement.

  1. Initially at least we attempt to focus on the issue of the death of Dr. David Kelly and whether or not the finding of "suicide" by the Hutton Inquiry is credible or unbelievable, based on the evidence.
  2. We recognise that each of us "has a life" so that delays between posts are not only acceptable but inevitable.
  3. We try, so far as possible, to distinguish between facts, conjecture and opinion. I'm not pretending that that will always be easy.
That to me seems a reasonable starting point.

Invitation to John Rentoul to be an author on this blog

A short time ago I issued an invitation to John Rentoul to become an author on this blog.

I look forward with interest to finding out if he is genuinely willing to engage in public debate on the important matter of the integrity of the Hutton Inquiry.

The Hutton Inquiry - Truth or Lie? - The purpose of this blog

I'm setting up this blog to facilitate a public, evidence-based discussion between myself, Dr. Andrew Watt, and Mr. John Rentoul, a journalist who seems to believe that the Hutton Inquiry was a trustworthy process.

Mr. Rentoul has in the past supposedly challenged people who doubt the Hutton Inquiry, in particular the official story that Dr. David Kelly committed suicide, to a public debate.


I hope to be able to give to Mr. Rentoul posting rights equal to my own, although I'm not yet certain how that is done.

Today, 17th July 2013, is the 10th anniversary of the seeming suicide of Dr. David Kelly. At least that is the official story.

That being the case I suggest that, initially at least, Mr. Rentoul and I focus on the evidence about the death of Dr. David Kelly.

I suggest that we leave until later in the process the question of whether, as I believe, a larger purpose was to conceal that the Blair Government's drive to war was dishonest and unlawful.