The Independent today reports on the killing, the family seem to be arguing assassination, of Mark Saunders. Saunders was a successful and well to do Barrister. He lived in Chelsea, a two million pound flat. Of course anyone who watches films or television drama about the Police will realise that they don’t like lawyers. Lawyers are scum, worse than the criminals that they represent. The only reason criminals escape justice is because of tricky lawyers, or crap juries who are dim-witted and lazy. Nothing to do with the “criminal” being innocent or the prosecution evidence (gathered by the police) being useless. The idea that Police “fit up” villains is a good one, human rights are for nerds and courts are a damned nuisance. These are the usual themes of anti-lawyer police dramas. Rarely do we see the routine corruption that permeates the police, nor the racism, bigotry and routine violence. Of course not all police officers are like that. But many are. There has not been a prosecution of a police officer for murder in the cells ever. There will not be either. The Krays were given tariffs of thirty years. The survivor, I forget if it was Ronnie or Reggie became a political prisoner once his tariff had passed. Harry Roberts, the friend of every football hooligan from the seventies, is a political prisoner. Both because the police opposed their release.

The latest case to collapse and embarrass the prosecuting authorities was the prosecution of those terrorists. In the Telegraph a view was expressed to the effect that the jury were stupid and biased for acquitting the “liquid bombers”. Conveniently forgetting that they convicted some of murder in the same trial. The only folk who heard every word of the evidence were the jury, the lawyers and the judge. They clearly gave the matter much thought.

It is this dangerous “Dirty Harry” point of view that undermines respect for the law across the whole of society. People are not stupid. The police hate lawyers, nine of them shot one called Mark Saunders, who also happened to be rich. He posed no threat, other than as a lawyer. The officers who killed him are allowed to compare notes and get their stories straight. The family, who are challenging this process, are in a position to take them on. There are many dead men who have died violently in the custody of the police who did not have such relatives.

Predictably the Police spin against the grieving family. The only reason, they say, there will not be any prosecutions is because the family are “prejudicing” the case by challenging them. What? Not likely. The chances of the killers being brought to book is zero.

In Lancaster, here in Lancashire, a man who reversed over a four year old child at high speed, and then went over him again going forwards, got out of his car to have a look. He saw what he’d done and ran away with an accomplice. In that case the villain was charged with careless driving. The child was from a background that could be described as economically challenged, working class in other words. Saunders is upper class.

Who said the class war is over?

I personally wish Saunders’ family luck. But they need to watch their backs carefully. The police in the Uk have no respect for the law and get away with it every time.

I suggested that they do this some time ago. What better way to clear one’s name? Of course I am not suggesting they are guilty or that they are anything but distraught parents innocent of any wrong doing. To do otherwise would result in litigation. The treatment of them is in marked contrast to the alleged insurance fraud involving that chap who disappeared five years ago and mysteriously reappeared after the life insurance was claimed. The Police seemed pretty keen on that one.

Of course Lie Detector tests are only 98% accurate and not admissable in Portuguese or English Courts. This is the alleged reason for their refusal. They are of course determinative in the Court of Public Opinion. Like the UK Government are fond of saying:

“If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear.”

Explains the Official Secrets Act then. I wonder if they have found the data they lost that belongs to 25,000,000 people: bank details, addresses, dates of birth, mothers’ maiden names: everything you need to steal money.

We got a letter from them about that. It said that if one is an “innocent victim of bank fraud” one will be reimbursed. But what exactly is an “innocent victim” then? By implication there must be “guilty victims”. I can imagine the pain that will be endured by anyone trying to make a claim. The same letter advised against changing banks. This means they won’t pay and you should change banks.

So if you live in the UK and you have had any dealings with the Inland Revenue change your bank, cancel your cards, change your passwords and then your name. Once you’ve done that write a letter of claim to them for the hassle. You will get a standard letter back that says in three hundred words what they could have said in one: tough.

 Are they to blame? No, they never do anything wrong.

Will someone get the bullet? No, they never do.

Is our personal data secure in the UK with HMG? No.

Will they lose our medical records next? Yes.

I made the mistake of hosting with Dotster. Their servers got hacked by phishers and they couldn’t get it working again. Had to call in outside help. After three weeks offline the best they could do was tarball up my sites and databases. Even this was done reluctantly as they did not want to admit the hack.

To make matters worse UKReg and Fasthosts have been effectively shut down by hackers. 100,000 UK websites offline since Thursday 29th November. They reset all the passwords without telling anyone. This meant everything failed: Sites, email, DNS, Databases, control panel – the lot. I can’t get on even now to change DNS and make glue records.  I rang the premium rate number and there were 51 people ahead of me in the queue.

The thing that is worrying is that Fashosts called in the Police to try and resolve it and they still got shutdown. Of course being hacked may not be their fault, but reseting passwords and posting them out (I still haven’t got mine) is sheer idiocy. Of course some would say this was just an excuse, delaying tactics even, or a ruse to generate premium rate ‘phone numbers.

Either way as soon as I get back in I will be transferring everything out.

I just posted a couple of comments on some UK newspaper websites suggesting this but they’ve been censored. I read the idea on another blog. I must admit that I had not thought of this before. The problem for me with this whole case is that I only know what I read or see. It seems odd to me that they have not thought of this themselves. They seem to have thought of everything else: PR, Lawyers, litigation and so on.

Of course lie detector tests are not determinative in the UK legal system because they are not admissable as evidence. However the case does seem to be playing out in the Court of Public Opinion. I would have thought passing a lie detector test would be more effective in gaining worldwide goodwill than expensive lawyers and a PR machine.

I hope they are innocent, I really do. But whatever the outcome the whole incident is a tragedy for all the family whatever happened. It’s the little girl we should think of.

I think there is a bloodlust in the air. This may or may not be justified.