Judges, Juries And Horseshit
Iain Lawson’s fine blog today reveals that Nicola Sturgeon has already taken it upon herself to answer Jim Sillars’ complaint from Thursday – which was sent to Permanent Secretary Leslie Evans, not to the First Minister – about her breaking the Ministerial Code by casting doubt on the jury’s verdicts in the Alex Salmond trial.
It’s certainly an innovative approach to justice – we presume that if we were to murder someone tomorrow the police would now simply forward the allegations to us and allow us to find ourselves not guilty without any external input.
But it was the precise nature of Nicola Sturgeon’s self-acquittal that really left us with an uneasy feeling about the current state of Scotland.
Because what she said was this:
And that’s a barefaced lie, because Sillars’ complaint was about this line:
And here’s the problem: that’s exactly what it DOES mean.
Everything Alex Salmond was charged with in his trial last year was a crime. Otherwise he couldn’t have been charged with it (duh). He wasn’t charged with going down to the corner shop and buying a Twix, because that isn’t a crime. You can, by definition, only be charged in a criminal trial with things that are crimes.
And the jury’s only task in a trial is to decide whether or not the things the accused is charged with happened. Nothing else.
It’s not up to them to decide whether things that have been alleged are crimes – that’s been determined in advance by the police and the Procurator Fiscal. And it’s not up to them to issue a sentence if the accused is found guilty – that’s the judge’s job.
The jury’s ONLY responsibility is listen to the evidence presented by the prosecution and defence counsels and make up its mind whether the things that have been alleged actually took place. If they have, the accused is guilty and the judge passes sentence. If they haven’t, the accused remains innocent and free to walk out of the court and live their lives without a stain on their character.
Let’s just spell that distribution of decisions out once more for the extra-dim:
POLICE: “Is the thing that has been alleged a crime?”
PROCURATOR FISCAL: “Is there at least a chance of a conviction?”
JURY: “Did the alleged thing actually happen?”
JUDGE: “What sentence should I give the accused if convicted?
In the trial of Alex Salmond, the jury decided that the things that had been alleged DID NOT HAPPEN. While they have not – and cannot – speak of their reasoning or deliberations, we can ascertain that particular fact with 100% certainty, because they didn’t find him guilty of any of them.
If they’d been persuaded by one of Scotland’s most senior prosecutors, marshalling the evidence collected by a vast multi-million-pound police operation, that any of the events DID happen, they’d have had no choice but to return at least one guilty verdict, because that’s literally the only thing they were there to do.
But they didn’t return any guilty verdicts, ergo the things didn’t happen.
That is now, in every legal sense, a cast-iron fact. It’s been heard, judged and ruled. There was no appeal. It is the sole reality. If Nicola Sturgeon says “Hey, maybe it did happen really”, then beyond the slightest sliver of a shadow of a dispute what she is doing is questioning the verdicts of the jury.
It was not for the jury to determine whether or not any non-criminal things took place or to offer a view on what sort of a man Alex Salmond might or might not be in general. They were not asked to do so, they had no right to do so, and so they did not do so. What they collectively decided, absolutely unambiguously and definitively, was that the things Alex Salmond was accused of in court had not happened.
The First Minister is a liar, and plainly now considers herself above and beyond the law of the land. Fortunately for her, on this occasion she somehow gets to be her own jury (or to be more accurate in terms of this piece, her own police and Procurator Fiscal). Perhaps one day not too long from now she’ll face a real one.
Absolutely spot on!
Maybe NS has a brain tumour, that would explain things.
Hold up your hand if you were stiched up
link to theguardian.com
She’s gone. She’s now her own counsel.
No ‘memento mori’ in her ears.
Alex yesterday showed the world how to conduct yourself in the face of adversity. You cant keep a good man down. No matter how much forces of the state you throw at him. Leslie Evans is still losing the war.
Nice of you to provide the Sturgeonites with a wee booklet for free Stu.
The Law For Dummies.
I totally agree that legal verdicts must be respected. But by your same logic, OJ Simpson didn’t kill anyone.
“I totally agree that legal verdicts must be respected. But by your same logic, OJ Simpson didn’t kill anyone.”
So you agree that verdicts must be respected, except you don’t at all.
But that’s not even the point. If I said to you “Are you questioning the jury’s verdict in the OJ Simpson trial?”, I presume you would in fact reply “Absolutely I am, because that cunt’s guilty as fuck”. Plainly you ARE questioning it. Fine, that’s not against the law. But Sturgeon is pretending NOT to be doing that, because she’s a fucking liar.
She’s exonerating herself. No one is fit to judge her except herself. Shades of Napoleon grabbing the crown from the Pope and crowning himself emperor.
I dread another term of government, headed by Nicoliar and the wokey cokey. The majority of SNP and independence supporters, are as thick as mince. They worship Queen Nicoliar and truly believe there will be a referendum in 2021, making Scotland free by the end of the year.
Not use whether to laugh, or cry.
You must also be 100% convinced that Michael Jackson did not abuse his alleged victims. Fine. Valid viewpoint. Must be nice to have such complete faith in the legal process though.
I am not sure I agree with part of your argument regarding the remit of a jury. The argument about some of the charges was about consent rather than the actual events taking place. Its not a crime for a man and woman to get it on but if one of those parties does not give or withrdaws consent at some point during the act it maybe a crime.
A prosecution may alledge a crime and a hury may have to decide whether acts which are not in dispute were criminal acts or not.
It was addressed to the Permanent Secretary so a reply should have come from the Permanent Secretary. The need to control appears to show someone losing control of how to conduct oneself. Note the use of the word conspiracy yet again which is used mostly by those who continue to smear Alex Salmond.
“You must also be 100% convinced that Michael Jackson did not abuse his alleged victims. Fine. Valid viewpoint. Must be nice to have such complete faith in the legal process though.”
See above.
(And I have literally no idea whether he did or not, btw. I didn’t pay much attention.)
Let me spell it out again: I am NOT saying courts are infallible. Of course they’re not. I’m saying that you can’t question their verdicts and then turn around and say that you’re fucking not doing that.
This isjust wrong. We all know, for instance, that “beyond reasonable doubt” (used in criminal trials) is a much higher bar than “balance of probabilities” (used in civil cases). The decision of the jury in Salmond’s trial that he was not guilty on 13 charges and not proven on one, means that the “proof” led by the prosecution and/or the evidence led by Salmond’s legal team to rebut this, led the jury to decide that the prosecution case was not proven beyond reasonable doubt. However, that is not the same thing, as saying the behaviour complained of didnt happen – it means that the behaviour complained of did not meet the bar of it being criminal. To argue as you do that because the jury ” didn’t return any guilty verdicts, ergo the things didn’t happen” is just nonesense and way below your usual standard of forensic analysis.
It is also interesting that you assert that it wasnt for the jury “to offer a view on what sort of a man Alex Salmond might or might not be in general” – but Gordon Jackson, Salmond’s QC, did in his summing up speech – “he might have been a better man”, I think was how it was put.
When you conclude that what the jury “collectively decided, absolutely unambiguously and definitively, was that the things Alex Salmond was accused of in court had not happened” you are quite simply totally wrong. It is quite possible for behaviour to be “inappropriate” (let’s say), even “very inappropriate” without it being criminal.
This might be an inconvenient fact, but continuing with this line of argument is misleading, and even more important adds more fuel to a fire that burns to the detriment of us all who believe in independence.
To claim that miscarriages of justice never, ever happen and jurys are always 100% correct is mind-numbingly stupid.
Though perhaps not helpful or responsible, Sturgeon’s statement is logically sound.
Judging by a few of the initial comments on here, we should consider doing away with trial by jury and just go back to public denouncements in church and pressing folk to death once the congregation has decided the devil is afoot.
Criminal trial awaits, surely.
“The argument about some of the charges was about consent rather than the actual events taking place.”
No, you’re entirely wrong. It is absolutely intrinsic to the charge that consent was not given, or was withdrawn but ignored, because CONSENSUAL ACTS ARE NOT A CRIME. (Well, except in certain very limited circumstances which did not apply here.)
The charge was not “touching people”, it was expressly UNLAWFUL touching. If lawful consensual touching happened, that’s not a crime. If the jury’s finding was that touching happened but that it was consensual, then that’s a finding that the thing he was charged with (unlawful touching) didn’t happen.
Do we know for a fact ‘she’ wrote it? She has previous for passing things along to Evans.
It’s come to something that this needs to be said. We were all brought up to obey the law. Learn right from wrong. If you got in trouble not nice things would happen. As we got older we perhaps learned about what happens in a court. We also learned that in a court if you’re found guilty, more not nice things would happen. But if you tell the truth you’ll be OK, you’ll be innocent and not guilty.
At that point, you moved from Primary 7 to the big school.
Is there no recourse at all against this kind of mendacity?
‘But that doesn’t mean that the behaviour complained of didn’t happen’…..
That is finest example of narcissistic hubris from a parliamentarian that I can remember. To make it on live TV, on the BBC, was staggering.
She thinks it’s OK? Scotland needs to dump this idiot.
She’s a full on Jeremy Hunt.
This is interesting if you have two minutes spare…
link to healthline.com
When you’ve finished, ask yourself if you’re reminded of anyone.
I certainly was.
Sturgeon – and the others – can’t get their heads around the idea the people on the jury don’t see the world through woke-tinted glasses
If nothing else
Such verdicts are likely to become more commonplace when the post-election Hatecrime regime starts dragging people through the courts
“To claim that miscarriages of justice never, ever happen and jurys are always 100% correct is mind-numbingly stupid.
Though perhaps not helpful or responsible, Sturgeon’s statement is logically sound.”
I’m going to say this once more and if you fail to listen for a third time I’m going to block you.
NOBODY HAS SAID THAT JURIES ARE NEVER WRONG. I explicitly made that point in my second reply.
The thing I’ve raised an issue with is that Sturgeon is lying when she says she’s not questioning the jury’s decision, because she REALLY FUCKING OBVIOUSLY IS DOING THAT.
I hate saying this, but it needs to be said in case it comes to pass. Despite the masterful presentation, the gravitas, the cool intellect and the clear and deep knowledge and clarity of speaking the truth…it very possibly won’t matter. Alex Salmond may well be vindicated, legally and politically, but it won’t matter. Sturgeon will somehow limp along til May, and either finish her job of destroying the SNP, or turning it into a zombie party.
A couple of days ago I posted something about whether we are in a chess match or a zoo. I think we’re in a zoo.
The media, ALL the state media (for the bulk of the population who don’t venture beyond TV) are all aligned behind whatever dark and satanic deal they have made with Sturgeon, or vice versa.
It’s not deluded to say that the strange tectonic drift from constant SNP bad coverage, to either softballing or complicit silence has been notable, and, to me, alarming in it’s completeness. The many many awful fawning facebook and twitter posts and tweets whenever herself utters anything are astroturfy (and expensive) and to my eye, significantly engineered.
Before 2014 I was naive enough to believe that the left wing media would at least be fair in their coverage of the referendum issue. How very wrong I was. We saw how left and right disappear in the face of a substantive threat to the British state. That was the end of the Guardian for me.
I feel that naive again. I thought that there were enough principled and committed people to represent the desire to gain independence, and that the vehicle was the SNP. I thought that anyone who managed to become an SNP representative had that goal in mind, not some parasite shuffling towards whatever warm political body they could enter and feed on.
I thought that there were enough non internally colonised members of Scots law, politics, academia, government, industry, that would align around supporting a better future. There may be, but I can’t see them.
One of the great clarifications of this debacle, the horrible, corrupt and arrogant behaviour of the Scottish Ceau?escus, the abuse and malevolence endured by someone who should be held and lauded as one of Scotland’s greatest politicians, is this; we’re not special, we are as fecked up as any other country. If we are going to get independence, we are going to have to take it, or make it.
Nice of her to ‘double-down’. Instead of trying to slither off the hook by claiming her words were ‘possibly badly put’ or even ‘were misconstrued’ she decides to jump straight in, with both feet, reinforcing her culpability. Methinks she is really starting to unravel.
Excuse my extreme simplicity but why is it even normal, seemingly in this special legal area, to use woolly terms like “complainants” and “behaviour complained of” instead of “alleged victims” and “alleged crimes”? Am I still thinking in shillings and tuppence while the world has moved onto a new currency? Or are these just some kind of weird weasel words intended to blur the distinction between guilt and innocence.
I seriously worry for that woman’s mental health. She is delusional
Re Adam, when one reads law, one is taught the presumption of the accused is innocent until proven guilty. That presumption stands until the person is convicted by the jury/judge. In that sense OJ was, is and will innocent unless and until decided otherwise in court. You have to have complete faith in the system. If the system is imperfect, then fix it. You on the underhand are undermining it. Very Trump-ian if I might further add.
Outcome-based people always trust their own instincts above everything else, regardless of the truth. Process-based people trust the process, be it legal, procedural or whatever. This clash of identities within western civilization can be boiled down to this division.
…will be^ innocent
The First Minister’s Lessons in Legal Logic 101:
Nicola – “There’s no evidence of a conspiracy therefore there was no conspiracy.”
Also Nicola – “There’s no evidence he did it, therefore he still did it.”
Sorry, I missed your second reply as I was writing mine. My point, which you still don’t seem to understand is that Sturgeon’s comment is factually sound. You said “And here’s the problem: that’s exactly what it DOES mean” but nobody other than Salmond and his accusers know what actually happened. So if you accept that miscarriages of justice are possible then you accept that Sturgeon’s statement is true. As I say, it might not be a responsible thing for her to say but the logic you set out in this article is partly flawed.
Her arrogance is off the scale. Still trying to bluff her way through. Well it’s about to get called. Wonder if blinky will give it all away.
Nicola Murrell is being propped up by the Globalists, Devi Sridhar for example. Clinton foundation.
That Queen Elizabeth. She’s been a terrible influence.
She has form with trying to pervert Justice, remember this link to dailyrecord.co.uk
Yeah so prosecution say there was no consent and defence says there was consent and it wasn’t a crime. But the events are not in doubt. Perhaps Nicola is not arguing that a crime was committed but that inappropriate acts were committed by Alec Salmond (trying to have sex in Bute House with a member of staff). Crime or not it can be argued that that event is a “stain on his character”.
@Alasdiar Galloway
Are we to assume that you are a perfect man, that there has never in your life been an occasion when you could have been a better man?
There are times when I could have been a better woman, I’m sure, but thank god (or whoever) no group of liars ever had me charged with criminal acts that could have sent me to jail for a very long time, for not always behaving perfectly.
The jury of mostly women, in front of a female judge, found Alex Salmond not guilty. Had his accusers felt that was wrong, they could have appealed. They didn’t.
Please come down from your high horse and have some sympathy for a man who has been put through immeasurable pain, yet still managed to conduct himself yesterday in a way that I doubt any ‘better man’ could have.
@Karen: I doubt NS has a brain tumor. Her actions suggest a recent lobotomy.
Someone suggested that NS as a brain tumour. How about being menopausal, that can do strange things to people
Could a jealous husband who had been forever overshadowed by the boss of his wife, take an opportunity to undermine the boss?
Could a jealous man be easily manipulated?
Could a woman in a high-powered job, be unaware her husband was doing things behind her back?
Could a woman who was usually very organised be involved in a cluster-shambles?
My recollection is that woman H, who claimed attempted rape, wasn’t even in the building at the time of the alleged assault.
That’s correct, isn’t it?
Mac Maghnais says:
27 February, 2021 at 2:31 pm
Its not a crime for a man and woman to get it on but if one of those parties does not give or withrdaws consent at some point during the act it maybe a crime.
Ruby replies
I had to give your comment a lot of thought.
Getting it on is not a crime
Rape is a crime.
Jury decide if crime happened not if rape is a crime.
OJ Simpson didn’t kill anyone. Even if he did. That’s how it works once the trial is over and you have been found not guilty. Only new evidence can change that.
Liars have a tell.
Sturgeons tell is “uncontrollable blinking”
Boris Johnson’s tell is “his mouth forms a smirk”.
Bye bye Adam.
“So if you accept that miscarriages of justice are possible then you accept that Sturgeon’s statement is true. As I say, it might not be a responsible thing for her to say but the logic you set out in this article is partly flawed.”
For fuck’s sake.
STATEMENTS BY NICOLA STURGEON I AM NOT ARGUING WITH:
“Maybe the things did happen and the jury were wrong”
I think that’s bollocks but it’s a thing she’s legally allowed to say.
STATEMENTS BY NICOLA STURGEON I AM ARGUING WITH:
“I am not questioning the jury’s verdict”
Yes you fucking are you lying cunt.
I gave you a chance, you were too dumb to read. Banned.
Dorothy Devine says:
27 February, 2021 at 3:00 pm
Bye bye Adam.
———————
Or whoever he really is.
Adam’s on a blocking.
I reckon the trolls are posted right beside laptops – orders from their masters – and making sure they’re among the first ten comments. Sticking out like sore Sturgeons.
Some excellent points well made again Stu. What yesterday’s marathon session surely illustrated above all else is the loss of one of the independence movement’s best assets is debilitating but must be addressed. Alex presented his case with integrity and aplomb. Hopefully he will soon be back making arguments for an independence referendum without Westminster permission or veto with similar integrity and aplomb. Here is my interpretation of the evidence session yesterday and the extraordinary events involving Alex Salmond over the last three years. I have already attracted opprobrium from some quarters for referencing this website. Those who refuse to open their eyes are the blindest of all link to sptnkne.ws
D’ahh! No sooner said than banned!
Adam’s off!
‘She’s gone. She’s now her own counsel.’
She has no choice. They won’t be answering the phone at the Faculty of Advocates.
Alex Salmond told the committee yesterday that if they wanted copies of evidence that he has and the inquiry doesn’t, then all they have to do is contact his solicitors over the weekend.
He said his solicitors will provide them with very important information relevant to the hearing.
I was wondering if they have contacted Salmond solicitors or not?
Anyone any information regarding this?
I think this is of extreme importance and yet no one is really talking about it.
@Mac Maghnais @ 2.53pm
In criminal cases it is up to the prosecution to prove their case against the defendant. The defence do not have to prove anything.
There has to be corroborating evidence from more than one source to the event for it to be given any weight at Court by a jury during their deliberations
“When you conclude that what the jury “collectively decided, absolutely unambiguously and definitively, was that the things Alex Salmond was accused of in court had not happened” you are quite simply totally wrong. It is quite possible for behaviour to be “inappropriate” (let’s say), even “very inappropriate” without it being criminal.”
Yes, that is possible. But it’s absolutely none of the jury’s business. The jury’s business is to decide whether or not CRIMINAL things happened. They decided that they did not.
Has everyone had a fucking lobotomy today, or are you all just trying to piss me off for laughs?
Adam, which bit of the denial in NS’s statement that she has not challenged the verdict when she clearly has in her earlier statement is causing problems?
A blind man on a galloping horse can see this is clearly the case.
@Adam,
Sturgeon is in a different position to most. She is the FM and her parliament creates and upholds the law.
When she sends out signals that the law is somehow unsatisfactory or unacceptable then we are in a bad place.
The law cannot bend to suit anybody and everhbody. We have the jury system to decide on the balance of available evidence.b That decision must be accepted. What if we told the jury.nope to go out and decide again and come back with the right verdict.
The onus is on the Crown to provide proof that is convincing enough. It is not on the defendant. This case was less than convincing.
Some ridiculous accusations and those that were severely serious found not to have occurred at all.
The FM must accept this without reservation otherwise her oath to uphold the rule of law is also empty
“It was also entirely wrong of you to suggest that I was casting doubt on the outcome of the criminal trial.” You can’t doubt what you don’t accept! There is no doubt about it, she is clearly refusing to accept the verdict.
“It is the sole reality.” That is unquestionably true Stuart, but we know the difficulty Nicola Sturgeon has with reality. She lives in a fantasy world.
“The First Minister is a liar, and plainly now considers herself above and beyond the law of the land.” This is undoubtedly true also, but she has always considered herself above the law, it is just that things are getting out of hand now. She has ridden roughshod over all the checks and balances that should be in place to prevent such a deranged and deluded individual wielding power in the first place.
The argument about some of the charges was about consent rather than the actual events taking place.
I’m not sure that’s true in this case. It may be true in a rape case, but no rape was ever alleged. One attempted rape was, and the defence on that one was very strong and that came back not guilty.
With the other charges, they were mostly “sexual assault”, and that was what was on the front page of all the papers. However most of them were weak, eg hair pinging, touching a knee while the woman’s husband was there, a hand on the back while his wife was there etc. So the question then surely is not so much “Did it happen?” but “Did it constitute sexual assault”. So it would be perfectly reasonable to deduce that “No, regardless whether you believe it happened or not, it wasn’t sexual assault, hence the accused is not guilty of the charge laid.”
Yes, you could argue “The hair pinging did happen; that woman didn’t lie about it” (which is probably true and there were some events he admitted to in the case). But if the only charge sheet the public has ever seen is “sexual assault”, it’s disingenuous and utterly wrong to suggest he is actually guilty and “the behaviour complained of did happen” because the behaviour complained of was sexual assault. Had he gone to prison that’s what it would have been for, and you don’t prosecute someone and put them through court unless you think there is a good chance of a guilty verdict, hence prison for “sexual assault” was very much a possible outcome.
If some people wish to lower the barrier for criminal sexual assault to “touching anyone without their express permission every single time”, they should look at legislating for that. Personally, I miss hugs and arms around my shoulder and wouldn’t like to live in that world.
“Adam says:
27 February, 2021 at 2:48 pm
Sorry,
…
So if you accept that miscarriages of justice are possible then you accept that Sturgeon’s statement is true.”
Do you know what a miscarriage of justice is?
I’ll spell it out for you because you are clearly thick as pigshit:
“A miscarriage of justice, also known as a failure of justice, occurs when a person is convicted and punished for a crime that they did not commit.”
Alex Salmond’s innocence was upheld by a jury trial with a majority female jury in the High Court on 13 SEPERATE CHARGES, therefore no miscarriage of justice happened to Alex Salmond at his criminal trial.
I’m going to pre-empt you here and answer your retort to the above: “…the complainers had a miscarriage of justice..”
The complainers were not on trial, so they cannot have suffered a miscarraige of justice, it’s that simple.
If that doesn’t smack you that a persons innocence was upheld 13 seperate times in the highest criminal court in Scotland then you are beyond help.
“As I say, it might not be a responsible thing for her to say but the logic you set out in this article is partly flawed.”
Nicola Sturgeon stated that even though the highest criminal court in the land along with the jury upheld his innocence THIRTEEN SEPERATE TIMES, that he still did the things which the High Court upheld is innocence on.
She implied that the majority female jury at the high court and the sitting judge got it completely fucking wrong 13 seperate times.
No minister, and especially not a First Minister should be bringing into disrepute the judicial system nor the validity of jury trials, simple because she’s made her fucking mind up and thats it, the final ruling is whatever shite comes out of her mouth.
Get a grip.
Nicola Sturgeon you are an arsehole and a total disgrace.
For goodness’ sake- Rev Stu is correct as any first year law student can appreciate
If the Indictment (Or charge sheet or whatever its called up there) does not disclose a criminal offence then it is defective and would be struck down. That hardly ever happens (oh hang on isnt that exactly what happened in one of the Rangers FC lash-ups recently?)
The Judge tells the Jury what the law is. The jury decide the facts. Ergo they decided the facts were not made out and thus the defendant was not guilty
Any departure from this is a dangerous precedent especially I would suggest at such a high level of office
There is a positive campaign of “Alex did it really” posting going on. Amazing it has extended to Wings.
Alex admitted to ONE incident of inappropriate behaviour. ONE. In 30 years. Which was entirely consensual.
All the other allegations the defence was they DID not happen, or were not in any sense sexual (putting his arm round the shoulder of someone who was crying being one example, giving someone a push to get a move on as they were blocking the stair was another).
There was NO sexual behaviour charged to which Alex admitted except the one incident.
“So the question then surely is not so much “Did it happen?” but “Did it constitute sexual assault”.”
No it isn’t. In nearly all of the charges his defence was expressly that they didn’t happen at all. There were only a couple where he admitted SOMETHING happened but that it wasn’t anything either non-consensual or illegal.
For pity sake, if you don’t think 2 years of effort by a team of 22 police officers
trying to produce something on Alex Salmond dismal failure before a Judge and Jury
isn’t a sign of innocence they you can open every cell door in the country.
Nicola casting doubt on this declaration has just lost any credibility I had for her.
She wants to look at the lump on the other side of her bed for criminal activity.
At a very high cost that man has done nothing for the SNP or Independence.
Who the hell he thought he was trying to put pressure on the police I’ll never know.
Both must go and take others of that ilk with them.
Police have a duty to establish if a crime has been committed, conduct full enquiry, trace sufficient evidence to identify the person/s responsible, if possible.
The PF – duty – has a crime been committed, is there sufficiency of evidence to prove beyond all reasonable doubt that accused committed it, is it in the public interests to prosecute.
Jury: was it a crime? did accused do it, have the Prosecution provided enough evidence to establish that ‘beyond all reasonable doubt.’ If any one of those legs is missing they have a duty to aquit.
The responsibility to prove beyond all reasonable doubt – rests with the prosecution – not the accused.
A consensual act between adults is exactly that – and not a crime. The essence of the crime is in the overcoming of the other persons will. If there is not enough evidence to prove beyond all reasonable doubt the ‘against their will’ part – then one cannot establish that it was a crime, ergo, it didn’t happen in a way that could be described as criminal.
The fact, that for the most serious criminal allegations, multiple witnesses and documents established that the female complainer – wasn’t there – puts it beyond the pale in establishing – it didn’t happen.
One awful thought about NS’s appearance next week – will she have parliamentary privillage? A license to slander AS at every turn?
You can’t reason with insane people. She is obviously mad and drunk on power.
When you get to the other shore you can burn the boat that got you there.
Buddha is mind, mind is Buddha,
Mind and Buddha are basically illusions.
If you know there is no Buddha and no mind,
this is at least the real Buddha of true suchness.
@Craig Murray – There was a healine in The Spectator earlier: ‘Sturgeon responds to claims of an establishment stitch-up, with another establishment stitch-up.’
Thankfully though, she doesn’t seem to have the Crown Office on her side any longer (or does she); just the wee hairy-marys on Twitter.
Rev you will be glad you’re off twitter or your swearometer would be off the scale.
It’s a shitshow out there.
The Sturgenistas, the press with an agenda, the hard of thinking and the bots.
I despair at how dense people are.
This is the same reason Labour controlled Scotland for so long
Of course this could be Nicola laying a defence of Murell for the future.
Dear Adam the office junior in a solicitors’ office has more legal knowledge than you …. that is all
Don’t Ban Me! I am not a troller or a yoon either! It took me a while to compose my message which I started when there were only 14 comments to this thread.
Hello Stu
I can understand why you have said what you did, but I have to agree with Adam at 2.26 on this one. The jury’s job is not to decide whether the alleged thing actually happened.
We have in Scotland what is called an Adersarial criminal system whereas in France, for example they have an Inquisitorial criminal system.
In the French system, the job of the court is to work out insofar as they can what happened.
In the Scottish system the job of the jury is to decide whether the prosecution has proved the case beyond reasonable doubt.
Although I do not fly a flag either for RCS or for NS, it is therefore perfectly possible according to our criminal justice system for an accused person to have committed a crime but because of the failure to discharge the burden of proof, to walk free.
In the case of Alex Salmond, I am personally firmly of the view that he is innocent of the charges, but I do have to accept that a strict interpretation of the Law for ANY criminal trial is that just because an Accused was found Not Guilty does not mean that he was innocent.
As I said at 7.10 pm in the Post entitled The Fall of Saigon:-
“Here we have Scotland’s current FM saying that the Alphabetties have been “accused…of being liars…”
This is quite breathtaking. For a member of the public to have such a view is, to some extent, understandable, but for the so-called Leader not only to have that view but to state it publically is appalling. It demonstrates the respect which she has for our Judiciary.”
She has gone too far. The finding of Not Guilty has a corollary namely that it has not been proved beyond reasonable doubt that the Alphabetties were truthful. It certainly does not mean that they have been accused of being liars. Naturally there is specific evidence which can be led in certain specific cases which can be referred to, to demonstrate that, for example, a complainer (“victim/survivor”) is a liar but a verdict of Not Guilty does not of itself speak to any evidence, merely that the case was NOT PROVED BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT.
I agree that NS is unfit to be FM and ought to resign for the good of the country. She has allowed the SNP to be ruined as a party of Government and has turned it into a party for a minority with overtones (not undertones) of Stalinism.
I also agree that she is questioning the jury’s decision.
“just because an Accused was found Not Guilty does not mean that he was innocent.”
Yes it does. Everyone is innocent until proven guilty. If you’re not proven guilty, you don’t BECOME innocent, you REMAIN innocent, and have never been anything BUT innocent.
I don’t know the origin of this quote, but it was a response to “With all due respect…”, to which the response was:
“Don’t ever use that phrase on me. It always precedes an insult.”
In nearly all of the charges his defence was expressly that they didn’t happen at all.
Agreed. For a lot of them there were absolutely no witnesses to say they happened and several saying they didn’t. So that must be true for at least some of them.
Would it be possible legally to write an article clearly setting out all the allegations with the defence case and witnesses summed up for each? I still think most people have no idea what they actually were and what the defence was. I’ve read some of the blogging around the case at the time and am still not wholly sure myself. But most people have literally no idea. Brought together in one neat article might help show just how weak the case really was.
Hey, lets look on the bright side, Iain Lawson suggests that Alex is returning in some way…fun times ahead and maybe even Independence before I am deid!
I have problems with the fact that most of the charges brought against Alex Salmond are crimes!
Being that ‘The Reverend Mother’ believes they are not criminal then perhaps to avoid any further misunderstanding she needs to make a precise list of what is and isn’t acceptable behaviour.
I say so what if the behaviour happened?
I believe Nicola Sturgeon has some very serious psychological problems.
@ Mac Maghnais says:
27 February, 2021 at 2:53 pm
Yeah so prosecution say there was no consent and defence says there was consent and it wasn’t a crime. But the events are not in doubt. Perhaps Nicola is not arguing that a crime was committed but that inappropriate acts were committed by Alec Salmond (trying to have sex in Bute House with a member of staff). Crime or not it can be argued that that event is a “stain on his character”.
Actually Mac – your wrong. You don’t get taken to the highest criminal court in the land charged with a ‘stain on your character’. And if you bother to look into it, on multiple, multiple charges, not only was there no corroboration that the events alleged to have taken place in very busy public places, took place, but the defence produced witnesses there, at the time, who stated, ‘that never happened’.
This includes for the most serious charge, when the complainer, was not signed into Bute House on either night she made allegations for – that cannot happen – for security reasons – with a First Minsister. The kitchen rota was checked to see if the complainer was one of the guest that night – no she wasn’t, the actor abroad, failed to describe her properly – she had a stookie on her arm for goodness sake, oh, and a good friend who knows her well, was there that night and states that the complainer was definitely Not There.
It is not a case of ‘he said/she said, no one really knows’. Its very much a case of ‘this stuff never happened’. THE EVENTS WERE PROVEN BY THE DEFENCE – NOT TO HAVE HAPPENED.
What worries me most about Sturgeon’s ridiculous statement about the verdict is this:
Nicola Sturgeon holds a degree of LLB from Glasgow University – with Honours, and has a diploma entitling her to practice Law.
She in fact practiced Law prior to entering Politics. Now, if someone with that legal training and hands-on experience can get it so wrong – what does that say about the level of training at her old university and within the legal profession in Scotland?
It is not reassuring to learn that someone who spent four years acquiring a degree in law, then spent five years qualifying as a solicitor and working in general legal practice can have such total disregard for the principles of her calling.
By her behaviour with regard to Alex Salmond, she has shown herself unfit for the office she holds.
Nicola Sturgeon will not resign – she should be sacked. Are there enough people within the SNP to demand this?
I’m sick of these lowlife bloodsucking bastards bringing us all down to their tabloid sewer levels. Yesterday for the first time in about 3 years I felt like I could breathe.
There’s a distinct pattern to SNP politics today;
1) act like cunts
2) get caught and deny it by lying
3) hide the lies with more lies
4) drag us into the gutter of you either believe us or you don’t.
Everybody sees through it. The SNP is a toxic brand, irretrievably corrupt, and we need to destroy it to move on.
They want a war? Vietnam? How about some Rambo?
“I’ll give you a war you won’t believe!”
The First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is way out of her depth on almost everything, but remains afloat on a raft of arrogance.
This needed to be said, because Sturgeon and Swinney have been trying to muddy the waters of late, suggesting that a person can somehow be guilty and condemned in some vague and unspecified way, even after having been acquitted by a jury. If that’s not undermining the justiciary then I don’t know what is. Miscarriages of justice do of course happen, but they are not alleging any. They are just flinging insinuations around hoping that the gutter press will do the rest. I’m still an SNP supporter, not because of the leadership but in spite of it
AS was considerate towards NS yesterday during the committee hearing and stated that it does not follow that she has to resign,
However NS is defeating herself by openly showing hostilities towards AS, by indicating that the jury and court decision is not correct in its entirety.
It seems to every man and his dog that AS is correct in saying there was malicious behaviour towards him from certain SNPs. The withholding of his evidence by the advocate, seems to bring much joy to those that did conspire against him.
From that point of view everything that AS has said is becoming more and more obviously true.
There is now no back door out for her as she shows more and more vindictives and bias behaviour proving AS correct in malicious behaviour from herself and the Scottish goverment,
Alex Salmond is indeed on a higher level intellectually, politically and in humanity.
“There has to be corroborating evidence from more than one source to the event for it to be given any weight at Court by a jury during their deliberations.”
This goes to the heart of this and lot of other issues, some of them related.
It’s obvious that across large parts of society that the basic tenets of the scientific method, objective and substantiating evidence based inquiry, due process etc have been rejected in favour of creating your own subjective reality.
In individuals this is bad enough. However, it is becoming increasingly problematic for the effective functioning of society and social discourse when institutions and organisations are also operating on the basis of rejecting any notion of objective reality.
Relying instead on the reactionary and regressive approach of “this is so because I say it is so, therefore it must by definition be so because I’ve said it and my subjective opinion and feelings are sacrosanct and everybody else has to accept this or be punished.”
It’s why the Permanent Secretary offered no argument or substantiating evidence when responding to the legal advice of AS’s legal Counsel re. the JR other then ” We think the process was legal.”
It’s why self styled legends in their own bedrooms Twitter ‘warriors’ – too many of them in elected and other positions of influence, authority and power, way beyond their level of actual maturity – spend all their time collectively spitting the dummy out in heir own purity spiral, virtue signalling echo chamber, when anyone ventures a spoken word which contradicts the made up ersatz reality residing in their heads.
The present divide is not so much political, more that between what seems to be a rapidly heading towards extinction reality based community and an exponentially growing mass incapable of the maturity required to cope with objective reality.
Nothing extraordinary about the FM’s behaviour, she and her court have power and the intention is to keep hold of it.
“It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.”
Aung San Suu Kyi, (and she should know)
May I digress slightly from Sturgeon-bashing (although that is a mighty fine pastime) to just say to Rev, what a fantastic album that Weather Prophets one is!!
THE EVENTS WERE PROVEN BY THE DEFENCE – NOT TO HAVE HAPPENED.
This is what is missing from the narrative, as – to the best of my knowledge – the defence has never been reported beyond a few blogs who were reporting under severe restrictions. It needs to be more widely out there, both what the allegations really were and the defence and witnesses which persuaded the jury.
Hey, lets look on the bright side, Iain Lawson suggests that Alex is returning in some way…fun times ahead and maybe even Independence before I am deid!
Hi Dixon
I made a comment re this on the previous thread at 1.05. I think the committee have a major challenge re this, particularly the role of Mr. Salmond’s QC’s. I agree it is a serious moment.
Prior to trial an accused is considered innocent.. The Crown must prove guilt.
During the trial the accused is considered innocent till the Crown proves guilt.
After the trial guilt is established or not.
The accused resumes their status as before or during trial
If guilty they go to jail.if receive suitable punishment.
That’s spot on Mr Wings. Can we please see the back of her soon because she is ruining my days. And goodness only knows how Mr Salmond has maintained his honour and strength of purpose and character when faced with this woman’s treachery.
I’m not religious but Sturgeon is truly ‘evil’ and I take ‘evil’ to be ‘live’ backwards. She has upended morality through SNP and her dominance of Scottish government.
Alex Salmond was arrested and tried under the following charges:
1. Indecent assault of a woman on various occasions in June and July 2008 in Glasgow by kissing her on the mouth and touching her buttocks and breast with his hands over her clothing.
2. Sexual assault of the same woman on an occasion in December 2010 at Ego, a nightclub in Edinburgh, by touching her arms, breasts and hips with his hands over her clothing.
3. Indecent assault of a woman on an occasion between October and November 2010 at Bute House in Edinburgh by repeatedly seizing her by her wrists and repeatedly pulling her towards him and attempting to kiss her.
4. Sexual assault of a woman in a car travelling between Holyrood Road and Waverley Station in Edinburgh on an occasion in February 2011 by touching her leg with his hand over her clothing.
5. Sexual assault of a woman on various occasions between May 2011 and June 2013 at Bute House, at the Scottish Parliament and elsewhere by touching her buttocks with his hands over her clothing, and touching and stroking her hair.
6. Sexual assault of a woman on an occasion between November and December 2013 at Bute House by kissing her on the mouth.
7. Intent to rape of the same woman on an occasion in December 2013 at Bute House by causing her to sit on a bed, lie on top of her, make sexual remarks to her, touch her buttocks, thighs and breasts over her clothing with his hands, repeatedly kiss her face, struggle with her and pull up her dress.
8. Sexual assault of a woman on an occasion in March 2012 at Ubiquitous Chip, a restaurant in Ashton Lane, Glasgow, by touching her buttocks with his hand over her clothing.
9. Sexual assault of the same woman on an occasion in April 2014 at Bute House by placing his arm around her, making sexual remarks to her and attempting to kiss her.
10. Sexual assault of a woman on an occasion in May 2014 at Bute House by placing his arm around her body, placing his hand under her clothing and underwear and touching her breast, repeatedly kissing her on the face and neck and stroking her leg with his hand.
11. Attempted rape of the same woman on an occasion in June 2014 at Bute House by lifting her legs and placing them over his legs, repeatedly kissing her on the face and neck, placing his hand inside her upper clothing and touching her breast over her underwear, repeatedly blocking her path, pinning her against a wall, removing his clothing and underwear, pushing her on to a bed, kneeling over her, pinning her to the bed by her shoulder, lying naked on top of her and then trying to rape her.
12. Sexual assault of a woman on an occasion in September 2014 at Bute House by seizing her by her shoulders, repeatedly kissing her on the face, attempting to kiss her on the lips, and touching her leg and face with his hand.
13. Sexual assault of a woman on an occasion in November 2014 at Stirling Castle by touching her buttock with his hand over her clothing.
You will see that Alex Salmond was not tried for “inappropriate behaviour in public office,” and he would not have been jailed for “inappropriate behaviour in public office.” The crimes of which he was accused were far more serious, ranging from assault to attempted rape. The jury don’t get to decide whether the things listed above were crimes or not, because it is self-evident that they are crimes. If any of the above charges were to be proven correct, then they cannot result in a Not Guilty/Not Proven verdict, because they are crimes. Therefore, either they did happen, and an error of impunity (i.e. a guilty man walks free, the opposite of a miscarriage of justice) has occurred, or they did not happen, and were therefore not crimes.
Those who think that a great injustice has occurred in this trial can only base it on those crimes, nothing else. This being the case, if you truly support survivors, then you must believe them when they say they were sexually/indecently assaulted and/or the victim of attempted rape – not that Salmond behaved inappropriately, but criminally. And if you believe them, then you must believe that a monstrous error of impunity has taken place. You must believe that Mr Salmond was guilty of the crimes of which he was charged, otherwise, you do not believe the women at all.
And if you believe the women, then you do not believe the jury. If you do not believe the jury, then at least have the courage of your convictions to advocate an appeal to undo this horrific injustice. Note that in doing so, you are also calling into question the defense, the judge, and the process itself – and if you believe yourself to be correct, that should not deter you from seeking out the truth. It is, in fact, your moral imperative to do so – otherwise, you are intimating that justice has failed these women, and that there is nothing that can be done about it, which is neither true or remotely the message anyone wants to send vulnerable victims of heinous crimes.
There has been no appeal against the jury’s decision.
Apart from the arrogance of the reply, is it not rather a bad look for Evans to have passed Jim Sillars’ letter (addressed to her, Evans) straight to the FM?
Is that not the type of sharing of documents and information that we are supposed to believe absolutely never happens inappropriately within SG High Command? The kind of behaviour they have so vehemently denied in relation to their attempts to Get Salmond?
Or did NS read the letter on Iain Lawson’s blog? Surely not. Isn’t that every bit as much proscribed samizdat as Wings?
Sometimes people think their just too smart , just too fkn clever I will sort this upstart out myself no need to go through the little niceties Campbell and that fkr Sillars are getting it just watch this , twang thud
That’s the sound of a trap springing shut and you sweetie just walked in and all of your own free will .
Princess Nicola and the other shit throwers are well and truly up to their necks in something they will regret pushing their mouths and egos have drawn them into something they now can’t wriggle out of can’t control , use proxies to hide behind by saying , hinting ” aye he’s guilty ” it just wasn’t proven , these people just can’t go around in public and saying the stuff your little witches coven discus on a daily or even hourly basis ,
The First Minister of Scotland has just been branded a liar in a online forum it’s there for all to see its not hidden it’s freely available to all to verify .
What are you going to do about it Nicola Sturgeon First Minister ? Your Character and Trustworthiness have just been drawn into question , what do you say in reply ? .
We are waiting ! .
Aye and Frank isn’t at the fkn door dear, hopefully it’s the friendly local constabulary, yer nicked
Alex Salmond says he’s no saint!
That is 100% OK with me. Most people I know aren’t saints.
I don’t get along with the ‘holier than thou’ saintly types.
Saint Nicola would be better placed in a nunnery.
“Get thee to a nunnery!”
Is her wiggle room here that the ‘behaviour complained of’ in her mind relates to alleged events that at one time might have stayed part of an HR process? The problem being terminological confusion between a complainer in an HR process and in a criminal trial.
The problem for NS is that she chose not to intervene in an HR process after having indicated she might do so, which meant responsibility was handed to Leslie Evans who then referred the matter against the complainers’ wishes to the police (is that right?). Why did she give an assurance of intervention to Alex Salmond’s face and then relay her change of mind by a WhatsApp message? That kind of change of behaviour often signifies a guilty conscience…
I agree it’s repugnant for Sturgeon to exonerate herself, but it is equally repugnant for Leslie Evans, who is up to her neck in this, to be left in charge of determining which evidence the Committee is entitled to see and what is redacted.
Farcical and disgusting.
I agree that the FMs statement challenges the verdict AND her letter claims she did not. An obvious lie.
However looking at her general attitude to the verdicts. One example- The FMs logic appears to be that even though a jury believed the witnesses that one accuser was not at a dinner that night AND was not signed into the Bute House official register…it still happened.
This is not He said, She said. It is a false claim.
If I was found not guilty of such a charge because I had proved I was 400 miles away at a conference with twenty witnesses I would not expect anyone to suggest that I may still have done it.
The Jury didn’t flip a coin to decide. The listened to the evidence CASE by CASE.
First there was self-service.
Now Sturgeon has invented self-Sheriff.
What will the Law Society of Scotland do or say on Nicola Sturgeon’s repeated rubbish of a Court and a Jury. She was a lawyer if she is still licensed surely they would censure her. If she’s not they could still a statement condemning her actions which amount to making a laughing stock of the Justice system.
How did Scotland ever get into such a state where even if you are charged with multiple counts of pish and you are aquitted by a jury of (normal) people, the persons who not only accused the aquitted of such spurious charges are not only permitted to further attempt to retry,defame and destroy the aquitted through anonymity but they are supported and allied by another reckless mendacious incompetent who has supposedly studied and qualified in law , perhaps it was the kez dugdale school of Law where they don’t know the meaning of words
PLEASE the estimable judiciary and law faculty get this stupidity and egregious misuse of the law sorted or you and we will become an even bigger laughing stock
My god, she is such a weasel. Interesting, isn’t it, that this is exactly the same tactic that Boris Johnson uses, part of the Trump repertoire. That is to pay lip service to the constitution and public institutions, while making asides and thinly disguised dog whistles to that part of the public and media which you know will lap it up.
As the Rev says, the jury found him not guilty, several of the ‘incidents’ were shown to have been impossible to have happened. Therefore he is innocent. Whatever you think, based on scurrilous allegations and hearsay, is merely your opinion, and as such, in any public forum responsible people who represent legal and political institutions have an obligation to accept that. There is no get-out clause where you can say you accept the jury’s verdict but then claim that he is still guilty of unspecified offences at which you, and everybody else, were not present. Your opinion as a public servant is irrelevant – that is the first rule of public service, because your office is more important than you, and your responsibilities are to uphold the law and to speak on established facts, and not give currency to rumour and opinion. This is basic stuff.
And Alex was absolutely correct to repeat it twice yesterday, emphasising that it was the First Minister, the person above all who should act with respect for the law, with dignity and circumspection, moreover at a public health briefing where she has vowed not to speak politically, who broke the rule of ministerial conduct. To pretend that she was not denying the jury while blithely telling us the incidents still happened is an abuse of her power and position and is factually wrong, because she was not present at any such incident and therefore has no knowledge of any untoward behaviour. It is a disgrace, and she should be sued for slander, except Alex is too dignified for that. But she knew exactly what she was doing, feeding the public and press with false allegations, timed deliberately just ahead of his appearance at the inquiry. Every time she is threatened, stories mysteriously appear smearing Alex and leaking about the supposed complainants’ suffering, also evidence of which we have none.
The manipulation might be expected of a PR hack, a think tank or a SPAD, but coming from the leader of the nation brings her and her office into disrepute. That she is supported in her Machiavellian tactics by the main stream press and her army of acolytes just makes it worse. Alex Salmon is entitled to be very aggrieved, given everything he has been through, the contemptuous slimeball tactics aimed at him are beyond the pale, and should bar people like her from public office. And why is she protecting Evans? I think you can work it out.
Think the Sturgeonite trolls are toying with Stu, just to disrupt the site traffic and comments.
Keep up the good work Rev.
Don’t let the bastards grind you down.
Solution is simple. Stop talking and act. The independence movement should detach from the snp and a new psrty should be formed from the sensible snp politicians.
I don`t know how many of you have mentioned it, but it seems to have gone largely below the radar.
Alex Salmond made the pint, several times yesterday that after the Police investigation started the civil servants investigating him on these false charges, were still contacting the complainants, despite the fact that what they were doing was breaking the law.
Surely, this has to be investigated by the Police and indeed and internal civil service inquiry has to take place to see if they did indeed break the law by conducting these actions.
I notice from some of the previous posts above references to Michael Jackson and OJ Simpson, very strange! which i may add have absolutely nothing to do with A. Salmond V. N. Sturgeon.
The burden here is the fact that when the lord advocate was handed the case to take to court he is supposed to weigh up the pros and cons and decide as to whether there was enough CORROBORATED EVIDENCE TO WIN THE CASE. There was none, zero, sweet fuck all!
So it should never have gone to court in the first place! therefore the lord advocate should in all essence RESIGN!
Hopefully in the near future Alex can sue: Evans, Sturgeon, Murrel, McKinnon for defamation of character. As for lord advocate he acted in a malicious manner along side the conspirators to destroy Alex Salmond’s reputation regardless of evidence which he was aware of and had advised Sturgeon not to go ahead but for some strange reason he still carried out the prosecution knowing he would lose. Why didn’t he just say NO! ???
The lawyers also said NO but for some strange reason continued the case. I assume they were served an ultimatum from her royal highness McSturgeon. These people in question are despicable and are not fit to run an orgy in a brothel let alone a country of 5.5m people. In my humble opinion they should all be removed and banned from ever participating in politics.
as for OJ.S, AND M J. NO COMPARISON! TRY JULIAN ASSANGE! after all he was stitched just like the Rangers FC.
and from what I have read, BUTTERSTONE SCHOOL was also a stitch up involving JOHN SWINNEY and McSturgeon and numerous others.
CAN YOU SEE A PATTERN HERE NOW PEOPLES?
There are a multitude of points like this brought up yesterday which should be addressed as soon as possible. Either Mr Salmond is providing a lot of false evidence under oath, or the civil service (among others) have broken the law. This *should* be very easy to prove either way.
It is very strange logic to assume after someone was acquitted on all charges that somehow they were doing things that just fell short of being criminal.
Why not simply assume the events never happened at all. Which is what I think was the case for most of them.
The events that did happen were things that were twisted into being sexual or indecent assaults when they were nothing of the kind. The jury rejected them the same as the events that were ficticous.
The only two things that Salmond did was admit to the consensual cuddle with Woman F (and I believe Salmond’s account of that 100% at this point) and interestingly Salmond admitted to having another fully clothed amorous encounter with Woman H but that this was well before the dates her false rape and assault accusations were meant to have happened.
There is zero evidence, absolutely none, that Salmond was a sex pest to anyone.
hat it looks like to me is certain ambitious women thinking they were owed something and feeling scorned. These are the Spite Girls.
As Salmond said he is no angel. But who is.
I could not give a fuck about any of this trivial crap and it really is trivial. OooooOOOOoooo a fully clothed cuddle. Twice. What a beast eh.
FFS just how up tight and prudish are people in Scotland. Pinch faced Presbyterian pish.
Mon the Salmond.
I’m just struggling at the moment to deal with how angry I am with Sturgeon and her new brand of SNP. For what she’s put Alex and his family through – and is still, continually putting him through. But also for where Scotland could and would have been now had this not happened and instead Alex had come back to work with the independence movement and potentially with The Scotsman as well. Four years of utter hell could have been, and should have been, the four years we were winning independence as Brexit happened. I honestly can’t bring myself to watch her next week. My laptop wouldn’t survive it.
Back in the 60s, as a young reporter, I covered a rather tatty murder trial in the High Court in Glasgow. The accused man got off…but later that night he confessed to me that he had actually killed his wife.
I was excited at my “scoop” and disappointed when the office lawyer spiked it. I learned that once a trial has concluded you are not allowed to question the jury`s verdict or what is termed “murmur” a presiding judge.
I wonder what the current legal establishment make of the current FM`s words? Or has the law changed?
And speaking of grinding, word from the staff at the Caird Hall mass vaccination center (NOT) there is a developing shortage of vaccine supplies and the program is grinding to a halt.
Think there was about 1/10th desks manned out of “lots”
So I guess I was lucky just to be be called forwards for mine…
What the First Minister and others appear to be suggesting is that it is possible (or likely) that the jury might have thought that Alex Salmond committed the acts specified, but did not think those acts amounted to crimes or reached the standard of criminality. That is not a legally permissible interpretation of what happened. That these charges were on the indictment that went to the jury means that they were crimes, otherwise their presence on it would have been challenged before the trial started. It is no part of a jury’s function to decide whether the acts libelled are crimes. The jury’s only function is to decide whether these crimes have been proved beyond reasonable doubt or not. By their verdict the jury in this case decided that those crimes were not proved. It is not a legally permissible interpretation to suggest that the jury found (or might have found) the acts to be proved but did not consider those acts to be criminal.
@Adam,
There is good evidence that the complainers in the Michael Jackson trial wre in for the money. That doesn’t mean he was entirely innocent but it does mean the case was not made beyond reasonable doubt. If the defence can prove the unreliability, untruthfulness, incompetence or obvious bias of the complainers then the case will usually fall.
In the OJ Simpson trial the killer was that the gloves didn’t fit. Was that police incompetence or what? I didn’t get into that much but that was the killer fact. The prosecution alleged the killer wore those gloves to kill the victims. Maybe Simpson deliberately wore too small gloves? I don’t know but the case hinged on that.
Surely the complaint by Jim Sillars if valid should be dealt with by the legal procedure the government has for this type of complaint.
If that says Nicola can answer it then she is OK . If not then that letter is not worth the time she has spent and Evans (or the person delegated to) has to deal with it.
But the handling of this is a complete and utter mess and anyone with any value for their integrity would have run away from being involved.
I’ve not had time to read through all the comments yet so forgive me if someone has already said this.
I believe Nickolier flaming drawers is preparing to retry Alex Salmond when she appears at the enquiry and to effectively deny the verdict. The bigger the lie the more chance she has of getting away with it, and she has a lot to loose.
The enquiry was on the whole careful not to allow a retrial when Alex appeared, I sincerely hope they continue. If not then they should face the charge of being complicit.
So we are to believe she keeps the Perm Sec at arms length and has no awareness of her actions while at the same time answering the Perm Sec’s emails?
I’m horrified she said that, live on tv too and in a COVID briefing.
The leader of our country and a qualified lawyer said those things happened. A jury said they didn’t. She is smearing trial by jury. It’s the sort of crap a trump-like leader would come out with. Brazen, stupid and deeply disturbing.
She should have resigned over that alone. She has called into question one of our pillars of justice which she is entrusted to safeguard. Horrific.
The OJ Simpson and M Jackson comparisons are utterly irrelevant, unless you had the US president or senior politicians claiming that they were guilty and they respect the jury’s verdict. Which I don’t remember happening.
Oh and if you believe they were guilty, that is merely your opinion and not an established fact.
Is the fact that the letter was sent to the Permanent Secretary and the First Minister’s response to it, evidence that the FM is in part responsible for the actions that have come from that department?
Just imagine: with May, Brexit and Johnson where Scotland would be under Alex Salmond. It is even possible that we would never had Johnson and May would have lost her snap election. The SNP under Sturgeon lost crucial seats which would have denied May continuing, and of course last year the SNP colluded with the appalling Jo Swinson to call and election which put the odious liar in charge with huge majority. Well done, Nicola.
Mac says:
27 February, 2021 at 4:18 pm
It is very strange logic to assume after someone was acquitted on all charges that somehow they were doing things that just fell short of being criminal.
I have a suspicion that all this started as threats to Mr Salmond and they always knew that they were on dodgy ground but had hoped that at some point Mr Salmond would back down. When that didn’t happen and they realised that they’d made a mess of the ‘Harassment’policy and knew they were in trouble, they pushed the women to take Mr Salmond to court and hoped to get the Judicial Inquiry sisted. I think that those pressurising some of the ladies (one in particular I believe) thought they were bound to get one guilty verdict out of so many accusations and had really underestimated the capacity of the ‘ordinary person’ to suss out when people were telling porkies.
Can you get carry-outs from that Chinese restaurant which does that deep fried seaweed you used to order on Fridays? I have a yen for Chinese the night.
You used to post pictures of the toasted seaweed or something, on twitter, along with beers on sunhot pub tables, cat-guests and Bath bear-hunts. I miss all that. And remember that weird Sunday the village was invaded by the Wehrmacht?
While we’re all here, can I just congratulate Anas Sarwar for becoming the first person in the UK from an ethnic minority to elected leader of an accounting unit.
Words have no meaning in the world of the ‘woke’.
Can’t believe there are people on this thread that see her comments as logical.
Expect a shit load more of this when she gives testimony.
How many times is she going to perjure herself i wonder.
We have a delinquent government, a delinquent civil-service and a delinquent legal profession.
It’s what you call a perfect ‘Doom-Loop’.
Taranaich: it is not the job of the jury to decide whether someone lied or not. Their sole responsibility is to decide whether the evidence was of a sufficiency and strength to overcome the very high hurdle (quite rightly so when a person’s liberty is at stake) of ‘beyond reasonable doubt’. That may mean that someone lied or it may not. It does not mean that one or more of the witnesses had an ulterior motive, but it doesn’t rule it out either.
At the end of the day, Mr Salmond was found not guilty/not proven by a jury of his peers. The prosecution used the Moorov Doctrine to back up the two more serious allegations and charges, but, ironically, the lesser alleged incidents merely brought doubt on the more serious ones. I believe that at least one, or more, of the women did not wish to appear as witnesses but were persuaded to do so, and that does show the weakness of the prosecution case. Having to subpoena a hostile witness is never a good look.
The procedure was flawed and illegal, they lost the Judicial Review and they lost the criminal case. It is not for any member of the public to throw doubt on the outcomes. If the women are still not satisfied, they would have to bring a private civil prosecution against Mr Salmond. I hope they will listen to advice on that and eschew any such action because they will surely lose again.
Sniping from behind the shield of anonymity is also not advised because it was never intended for that purpose, and all it does is inflame public opinion against them and invites identification, helping no one. It is to be hoped that both sides have learned valuable lessons, and, more to the point, that security and records of coming and goings at Bute House are considerably strengthened.
The court cases are over, but that does not mean that the SNPG’s conduct in this whole saga was driven by probity and clarity. Far from it, it would appear. That is what is important now, so that it cannot happen again. No one is above the law, but neither should anyone be below it.
Its the creeping anglicisation of everything that might lead a person to believe a jury verdict means a person is guilty or innocent. I have thought for a very long time that the auld Scots proven or not proven were in fact much more accurate verdicts. All a jury can determine is whether the prosecution put up a good enough case to satisfy them that the accused had done the crime. It does not mean a guilty man did not do it, and equally a guilty man did do it. It merely means that the prosecution did a good enough job at making the jurors think that the accused on balance of probabilities did do or not do it. Now in this case we are reasonably happy that AS did not do it. And the jury got it right even if they were wrong. It does appear that the most serious allegation could not possibly have happened, and we wonder why the accuser is not being investigated for perjury. As to the other trivial charges, we are told a Moorov conviction was being saught. However it would seem very odd that with as we are told, over 400 lines of inquiry pursued, all of those who made it to court were linked as much by their association with a faction in government as they were with the accusation, that indeed perhaps a Moorov connection was noticed by the jury. A pattern of behaviour among the complainers rather than the accused.
I am surprised at the number of seemingly intelligent people who are still fooled by the COPFS/Police Scotland packing the charge sheet with fluffed up rubbish.
The reason they conjured up all these non events out of nothing was precisely for the purpose of making people think “there has to be something to it with this number of charges”.
This is essentially the Moorov doctrine logic. But it only applies to real crimes not puffed up non-events which is what they did to Salmond.
The meat of the charges against Salmod was only two charges, the intent to rape and attempted rape charges from Woman H and F. These charges were very weak and they knew it. Unprovable accusations, one persons word against the others.
So they deliberately went on an insane fishing expedition and still they could find nothing.
So they just elevated nothing incidents into sexual and indecent assaults anyway.
And still to this day people who should know better trot this pish out like it is prima facie evidence that Salmond must have been doing something.
If you think that you are a mug, they mugged you off. That is what they set out to achieve by packing the charge list. When you look at them one by one they disintegrate.
The whole thing was garbage, a complete stitch-up.
I am also having trouble with the second part of this quote.
What has respecting the jury got to do with protecting the prosecution service? Which i am sure she has by the way!
‘It is also entirely wrong of you to suggest that I was casting doubt on the outcome of the criminal trial. I have never, and would never, call into question the Jury‘s findings, which I
fully respect In fact, I have spent the last few days protecting the independence of the prosecution service from some really rather disgraceful, politically motivated attacks that do a disservice to all of us who care about these matters.’
Ruby says:27 February, 2021 at 3:58 pm
“Saint Nicola would be better placed in a nunnery.”
Or get a job as a cleaner at Holyrood.
Cleaners, bin men and bar staff see all. If we want to recruit discreet staff for the Scottish Secret Service, start with these folks
Most of the charges were pretty weak on their own and wouldn’t have made it to court. Moorov was the aim, as they tried to present a pattern of behaviour. That may well have worked if the eejits hadn’t set up a “support group” from the complainers. As soon as it was shown that they were talking to each other, they were always open to a charge of colluding thus destroying Moorov. It’s hard to be believe that we are currently governed by a lawyer FM who doesn’t seem to get that and continues to smear Alex.
Kind of O/T
The performance that Alex Salmond gave yesterday at the inquiry is the kind of statemanship which has been severely lacking at Holyrood since.. well basically since he left.
Nobody within the current Scottish Parliament nor Government are capable of fending off UK Ministers of the Crown, not through rigorous debate, certainly not through the legistlature and none of them are capable of standing up the scrutiny that he has had to endure for over 3 years.
Those elected representatives in ministerial roles in Scotland are only capable of the type of debate you witness in county council chambers, where if they get censured for their actions then they might get a month off work, have to forfeit some pay from what is their second job, that is about all that happens to community councillors who recieve complaints about their actions – a minor hit to the salary of their second job, some time off and afterwards you continue in your elected role generally without consequence.
This now appears to be the adopted attitude of the Scottish Governments ministers, ministers who think that defying Parliamentary votes is no worse an offence than a community councillor who goes against the will of the council.
This is the kind of adopted attitude by government ministers towards their elected roles which must be suffocated out of existence for any sort of resonable debate as well as the upholding of the founding principles of our Scottish Parliament.
Now you might well ask just what has Holyrood done in the time since Alec left politics, you can pretty much count on both hands all of the policies and legislation that the SNP Scottish Government have enacted in that time.
The glaring caveat to the enacted policies above are when you consider that the Scottish Government is made up of Scottish National Party representatives, people who are elected on (now multiple) mandates to achieve Scottish independence from the United Kingdom.
What policies or legislative actions have they taken towards Scottish independence since Alec left politics? When he left, he left the SNP with a rising number of the electorate changing their view from being pro-union to pro-Scotland, indeed through his leadership and the hard work of the party membership out canvassing the electorate he gifted the SNP a majority of MP’s to Westminster, and a pro-independence pro-Scotland majority coalition in the Scottish Parliament.
All of that was off the back of the successful 2014 independence campaign – successful because it awoke so many in Scotland to the possibility of a different future, a better future, a future built for Scotland by the soveriegn Scottish people, a right which has been denied to us for some 314 years.
The only positive, pro-indy policies which the SNP Scottish Government have enacted since 2014, are bills to speed any referendum through the Scottish Parliament whenever they decide to beat their heads off the brick walls of Downing Street trying to obtain another Section 30 order.
That is not progress, that is stalling, seven years of stalling, three more years and it will be a decade with zero progress on the future of Scotland.
It is stalling because I now firmly believe that the current SNP Scottish Government are not only unwilling, but are incapable of standing up to the rigorous debate and the rigorous scrutiny that would be required not only of themselves but of any proposed Scottish constitution and future policies (A white paper) which would form a central part of having a plebicide election return to being front and center of the SNP’s manifesto.
Some people will argue that there are still good people within the SNP, I am pretty sure there are, but the rot set in at the head of the SNP and to alleviate that rot you need to decapitate it.
I as a member of the SNP am now firmly of the belief that nothing will change the direction the SNP are heading while the current leadership are still in position, they didn’t settle up, they settled in.
‘Get thee to a nunnery” yeh inside a prison.
@Rose Ford – no you should not assume that at all. I have my flaws (ask my wife!) as well as Alex Salmond. Not being perfect is not a criminal offence though, is it?
I am fed up to my back teeth of people coming out with this nonsense regarding the verdicts. Please get it through your thick skulls that the jury had the choice of three verdicts, guilty (beyond reasonable doubt), not proven (if they are unsure) and not guilty(if they are sure beyond reasonable doubt). As they delivered not guilty in all but one charge they must have been sure they did not happen ie they were lies.
In answer to the question of what would happen if a complaint / allegation was made against the First Minister, AS stated it was passed to the Deputy First Minister.
Assuming that is still the case, why on earth is the FM dealing with a complaint which relates specifically to her.
And so the FM continues to kick bishop Brennan up the arse.
“Captain Yossarian says:
27 February, 2021 at 2:58 pm
My recollection is that woman H, who claimed attempted rape, wasn’t even in the building at the time of the alleged assault.
That’s correct, isn’t it?”
Yes, and the author of the ‘i have a plan’
link to craigmurray.org.uk
link to craigmurray.org.uk
Narcissistic personality disorder
Two visually upsetting things that I have witnessed over the past few days are:-
1/
Nicola Sturgeon turning her Covid briefing into a platform to rip Alex Salmond to shreds.
And
2/
Maureen Watt.
There is a teensy get out there though.
If “the behavior claimed of” and the charges brought were different things.
That of course is a new can of worms which can’t be unraveled. (yet?) We know what the charges were but we don’t actually know for sure what the original claims were.
So she could be 100% right in stating the behavior complained of happened, BUT… that would mean the the charges brought were made up or at least exagerted.
There are various attempts going on here and in Sturgeon’s loyalist party to declare that Salmond wasn’t really found to be innocent of the charges by a jury of his peers. However once we go down that road, everyone can be decided to be technically guilty of everything anyone else can bring against them – appear in court for slander, and if there is no proof you slandered the person, you walk. Except perhaps someone else (by the loyalists’ way of thinking) gets to say of them “ah, it just wasn’t proven well enough, that’s all; he really did slander them I’m sure of it”. Can you ever prove your innocence therefore? No of course not. Not even by that way of thinking if a jury says you’re innocent. Our sole defence as ordinary people is a jury of our peers. Not a judge’s decision; not the media deciding for us; not you deciding the charges simply didn’t quite make the bar of being convincing enough for you. This means – either you accept that a jury’s decision is accurate, until such time as further evidence disproving that is forthcoming (eg Birmingham 6, in which case you go about getting that further evidence) or you decide someone’s guilty because, well, they just are, so there. Sturgeon clearly follows the latter idea, and so it seems do the Sturgeon loyalists.
Prasad says:
Yes, and the author of the ‘i have a plan’
Which she sent to Woman J BEFORE either of them came forward as accusers.
This farce will continue because the unionist media in Scotland along with stv,bbc, sky, channel 4 etc, will continue to shield sturgeon up until about a week or so before the may election, then put the boot in to destroy the Snp. Job done, independence off the table for god knows how long.
The whole thing was garbage, a complete stitch-up.
I would dearly love to see Nicola Sturgeon’s behaviour put under a similar level of scrutiny by the Police.
RevSTU, I have read your comments above, and you must have the patience of a saint, explaining over and over again what you ACTUALLY wrote and NOT what dimwits IMAGINE you have written.
It seems some folk posting on here are wholly incapable of rational logical thought progression.
Nicola Sturgeon, in that response, shows she is unfit for office. Either she is brazenly lying, or she is Having some kind of breakdown. She is a trained lawyer, so her English language comprehension skills should mean she wouldn’t misunderstand the complaint. Either way something needs done.
Folk are remarking at how coherent and fluent Alex Salmond was in his testimony yesterday, but that is relatively easy if you are telling the truth. It would be hard to talk well for six hours, if you were covering things up. It is interesting therefore, to note the stumbles, misunderstandings, revisions and corrections in the evidence given by others (Murrell, Lord Advocate, Leslie Evans) to the committee.
Does anybody know, has the committee actually bothered to take up Alex’s offer, of documents from his solicitors??
Am I right in thinking that the code of conduct which applies to current members of the Scottish cabinet differs from that which applies to former members in that the latter allows for historic complaints while the former does not?
In other words that the complaints system was designed to attack AS?
Apologies if I have misunderstood!
Willie Hogg at 503pm,
Agree, but further, you are innocent until proven guilty in court. Alex Salmond was therefore found innocent of all charges. ALL charges.
Cenchos @5:04
“And so the FM continues to kick bishop Brennan up the arse.”
Murrell likely came up with the plan:
Nicola, why don’t you outrageously lie and obfuscate and then just carry on as if nothing has happened. The Scottish people would never believe you’d do such a thing. They’d just think they imagined it or something.
(Chuckles) That might work. That might just work Peter. As god is my witness I will kick the Scottish people up the arse!
If Alex Salmond was actually guilty of something then ask yourself why did they have to rig the investigations into him at every single stage.
If Salmond was actually guilty why not just have an honest, transparent investigation and convict him.
Why did they have to cheat the system and create such a ridiculously unfair, biased and rigged process.
The answer is obvious isn’t it. Because Salmond was guilty of nothing.
You create a bent process to wrongly convict someone, to stitch someone up.
They could not rely on Fairness At Work because it was fair!
They needed ‘Unfairness at Work – The Salmond Plan’.
And that is exactly what they did.
At every stage they behaviour was appalling, it still is.
They would not have had to do any of these appalling things if Salmond had been genuinely guilty of anything.
Obvious trolling aside, some excellent comments btl on this thread. As Socrates says, it’s embarrassing for a qualified lawyer like the FM to come away with such manifestly twisted tosh but it seems to match her increasingly delusional and vindictive personality.
@David Hansell 3.38:”The present divide is not so much political, more that between what seems to be a rapidly heading towards extinction reality based community and an exponentially growing mass incapable of the maturity required to cope with objective reality.”
Just so, and it of course is at the bottom of the woke delusion: just make up whatever you want and believe that your feelings are the most important thing. Then scream at and censor anyone whom you don’t agree with.
And just wait until Yousaf’s little box of Hate Crime (lovely Orwellian language, innit?) tricks is enacted: cheerio pesky Ever-Vile Campbell!
@Taranaich 3.56: a most useful summary for Newbies/Curious but Confused and great to see you commenting here again.
The fact that Sturgeon had the brass neck to reply to Sillars surely proves her disregard for due process and her conviction that she, like a true demagogue, is the law itself. She has no right to take the complaint and refuse the permanent secretary the right to reply as a government official who respects the law and the parameters of what public servants can say in public. It is up to her to either reply, or pass it on to an independent adjudicator, but it is a matter of record that due process must be followed if you want to claim that your administration adheres to transparency and accountability. The clear implication is that this government, and its head in particular, believe that they are above the law and not answerable to normal process and regulation. Expect to see that in spades on Wednesday as she ignores the actual questions and gets on her soapbox with her prepared answers to questions nobody asked and are irrelevant to the actual inquiry. It would take a tough committee to face her down and attempt to get some straight answers to serious allegations, and nothing they have done so far would lead you to believe that they are. Obfuscation will be the game, with copious amounts of smearing of Alex. And lots of the already practised line of ‘there is no evidence’. The biggest lie of all.
My God! She must have shares in Brasso.
Philip Sim did a daily podcast from AS trial which is a fair record of the case and also includes some useful input from a BBC lawyer. It takes a while to get through but it’s worth it?
link to bbc.co.uk
I wonder if Sturgeon IS so confident because she has full protection from Westminster and the Tory press AND the BBC.
Has she been compromised?
The reason that Nicola and people like Adam are able to make these claims, is that not only are the names of the complainers (correctly) being withheld but the whole trial and incidents surrounding it (the Craig Murray affair for instance) is clouded in secrecy.
Since Alex Salmond is being constantly re-tried by the media, aided and abetted by the women who made complaints, along with organizations such as Rape Crisis Scotland, and now the First Minister and many, many of her ‘people’ why not release details of the trial with the complainers’ names redacted, so that everyone can make their own minds up about what did and didn’t happen.
One thing for sure, the information that has been withheld will certainly be damaging to the complainers because if it was damaging to AS it would have been leaked to the Daily Record months ago!
So we can see by the behaviour of the ‘Crown’ that there wasn’t a shred of evidence against Alex, and the evidence that was presented was found to be dishonest.
Nicola in her desperation to undermine Alex will have been privy to the evidence provided by the prosecution and the evidence that showed it was tainted.
So, we can say for certain that Nicola Sturgeon is a liar.
A lot of the speculation and obfuscation bandied about by those unable to accept the verdicts would have been avoided, had we had anything approaching an honest mass media in this country. Many of the allegations were denied by third party witnesses, several of whom detest Alex Salmond. It is possible for people to continue this innuendo and whispering campaign largely because there is general ignorance of how comprehensive the destruction of the prosecution actually was.
Hi all, I can’t find the video where Sturgeon said this on Thursday. Tried BBC iplayer but can’t see anything. I have some video of Sturgeon using up time challenging Salmond but the specific footage that Jim Sillers is referring to I can’t find. If anyone has a link please let me know as it would be really helpful.
We could save a lot of money if we simply dispense with lawyers, advocates, judges, juries etc. etc. and leave it up to Nicola Sturgeon to decide who’s guilty and who’s not, who should go to jail and who shouldn’t. Perhaps Rev Stu could publish a montage of all the good people she’s already thrown under a bus since assuming absolute power?
Can the Jury not take legal action against Sturgeon for her statements on TV????
Sturgeon and he cabal are a disgrace to Scotland. Hell mend the SNP if they don’t remove them. The rot and corruption runs deep if they don’t.
Taranaich says:
Very interesting details of the charges.
Can I just add that there were actually 14 charges brought to court. You have missed out Charge 6 – ‘Removing a woman’s shoe and attempting to kiss her foot’ – which was dropped during the trial, so that the enumeration of the charges on your list should run from 7-14 rather than 6-13 to correspond to the indictment.
If the SNP get a majority in May, what are the chances that they will very soon move to undermine or even completely overturn the ‘trial by jury’ system? Very high, I would imagine. In fact, there must be a very high probability that they will seek to undermine or overturn anything – or indeed anyone – whom they perceive to have been an obstacle in getting their own way.
We are on the verge of Scotland becoming a totalitarian autocracy. NS is a ‘legal positivist’ in the sense that she thinks law can change anything and everything, and even overturn natural reality. In fact, she thinks it can reinvent reality – in her own image moreover – rather than being required to respect. That means there is no such thing as ‘natural justice’ any more. It also means that nature and reality – even physical reality – is determined by law, not defended and upheld by it.
What is right or true, honest or just is what I – the Scottish Government, the First Minister, Me and My Minion in the SNP – say is right or true, honest or just. And if you oppose us, you are clearly wrong and false, dishonest and unjust – and you will be tried, found guilty and punished accordingly.
Welcome to the Brave New Scotland of – let’s say, to make it only 40 years late – 2024. Though in fact, if we don’t stop them in May, it will already be upon us by the end of 2021.
People who can do what they did to AS, and who – not being stopped – find that they can get away with it, will do it to anyone and everyone. They will trample on people at will, and drag Scotland down into the dirty mire. We have been clearly warned – it is up to all of us to do everything we can to make sure that this nightmare does NOT happen.
We have to STOP them. Not just on the second vote, but also on the first.
Wow that’s a mighty powerful point from Sillars, you enter very dangerous ground when you begin to question a jury’s verdicts, its even more preposterous when you then claim to be defending the integrity of the Crown office.
Of course other folk, and RCS, in the political public eye that we know have also dropped innuendos, as to the jury’s verdict, without so much as a warning from Police Scotland.
This type of nasty insinuation type comment whether it be from the Sturgeon or Leslie Evans or anyone or any spokesperson for a public or private body must be called out.
@Karen says:27 February, 2021 at 2:18 pm
“Maybe NS has a brain tumour, that would explain things.”
Maybe like Margeret Ferrier she has Covid or even Mad Cow Disease
link to thenational.scot
I think Jim Sillars was being clever in sending his letter to Leslie Evans – well, not sneakily particularly clever, just that I didn’t realise why he’d send the complaint to her, and also Leslie Evans and Nicola Sturgeon appear to be incredibly dim, so he didn’t have to try too hard.
NS’s reply shows that neither she, nor Leslie Evans, followed proper procedure. What was the procedure? Not very sure, but under the ministerial code, she should have reported herself to the Deputy First Minister probably, and the Permanent Secretary should have advised her to do so. Then it should have gone to the Propriety & Ethics Team in the Cabinet probably, or maybe even referred to James Hamilton QC. There seem to be a lot of choices for the FM to report possible breaches by herself of the ministerial code. So she could have got John Swinney on to it, got him to whip up a wee report saying ‘nah, NS is the bees knees and done nothing wrong whatsoever’, and fired that off to Jim.
Instead, we have Nicola Sturgeon herself writing out her standard set of lies – and the new one of her claiming she didn’t question the jury verdict! – hah yes, her own judge and jury, flatly denying everything without consultation – directly in a letter. No advice by the Permanent Secretary of what was ‘the right thing to do’, not even lip service to proper procedure or protocol. They’ve both just proved, once again, that neither should be in office!
It is possible for people to continue this innuendo and whispering campaign largely because there is general ignorance of how comprehensive the destruction of the prosecution actually was.
In this respect, the UK national media is actually better than the Scottish. Note how Sarah Smith is being pulled up today by people in England for her lies in a way that wouldn’t happen in Scotland where it’s just accepted the media lie endlessly about pro independence people. The problem is that the English media generally don’t care about Scotland and take their opinions from Scottish journalists and politicians, so they end up being driven by the Scottish media.
Is there any chance getting it out there via the English media would lead to a much more ‘Holy crap!’ reaction from them and more coverage of what actually happened? Because in Scotland all we’ve ever had is lurid headlines and coverage with zero coverage at all of the defence or why the jury found as they did. Plus re-trails like that appalling Kirsty Work documentary where the media find him guilty. That will be all anyone in England really knows if what’s been spoon fed to them by the Scottish media. Yet the real story is much more interesting and is a huge story. You’d think one of the bigger UK papers would want to break it?
For anyone wishing to re-visit the AS trial it’s also useful to know that the Complainants were anonymised alphabetically corresponding to the order of the charges:
A — charge 1&2
B — charge 3
C — charge 4
D — charge 5
E — charge 6 (withdrawn)
F — charge 7&8
G — charge 9&10
H — charge 11&12
J — charge 13
K — charge 14
In terms of the ongoing proceedings of the Parliamentary Committee it’s important to bear in mind that the two original Complainers there designated A & B are NOT the same women described as A & B in the trial.
It’s time we had another Party for Scotland. The Unionists must be leaping with joy, but the SNP really need some opposition, some folks who will talk for the real Scotland. People of insight like Salmond & Sillars, but who will present a clearer case for Scottish Independence without the EU nonsense dominating. Scotland, as with any small Nation can stand and survive on its own terms in the World, but to do so takes actual Independence, not another set of shackles.
“He wasn’t charged with going down to the corner shop and buying a Twix, because that isn’t a crime. You can, by definition, only be charged in a criminal trial with things that are crimes.”
On a lighter note.
I bought three Mars bars today when I went for petrol at my local Tescopoly pump. Thats me fecked. The quine behind the plexi glass is a mate of my niece. I am supposed to be on a diet for health reasons. Writing out or phoning my claims of innocence didn’t wash I am afraid.
As my niece and sister pointed out – I don’t get to be my own judge and jury. I had to hand over the Mars bars to my grand niece and grand nephews.
I like to think Scotland is too small a country to get away with anything long term and Sturgeon and her corrupt cabal will get their just deserts…
I am always a bit wary of people who only present the charges. Bit like only presenting the prosecution.
Here is what Salmond said at the trial via Grousebeater. I dare say Craig Murray could add a lot of detail if allowed.
A.
“On to Woman A. Alex Salmond says claims he kissed and touched her are “a fabrication from start to finish”; they were out in public at the centre of attention, it “would be insane to be doing anything like that”. He says the claim he sexually assaulted Woman A is “not just a fabrication, it’s ludicrous”. He accuses Ms A of recruiting and encouraging five of the other accusers also to make fabrications against him. He describes Ms A as extremely close to Nicola Sturgeon. He says it “accusations make no sense whatsoever” and says Woman A has encouraged some of the other complainers to “exaggerate or make claims against me. Some are exaggerations that are taken out of proportion and I think that the impact of some of the publicity of the last 18 months might have led some people quite innocently to revise their opinions and say ‘oh well something happened to me’ and it gets presented in a totally different way. And [then] people get in a sausage machine and can’t get out of it, even if they want to.”
B.
On to the specific charges – Gordon Jackson, his QC, asks about the allegation by woman B about the Christmas card. Alex Salmond says she has “mis-remembered” – he says he took her hands and suggested they reenact the card as “a piece of fun” and “high jinks”. Story has “developed” over time. Asked if he now wonders if he went too far, Alex Salmond says “from where I’m standing now, yes…I rather I hadn’t told that joke or had that idea of fun. But at the time it wasn’t regarded as its being presented now”.
C.
On to Woman C – Jackson asks if Alex Salmond “disputes” the claim he touched her leg in the car. “Yes,” he says. He says back seat armrest couldn’t go back because it had a phone fitted in it; you couldn’t have your hand on someone’s knee without those in the front seeing.
D.
On to Woman D – Alex Salmond says he had no sexual contact with her but would occasionally “tug her hair” in an “affectionate gesture”, as it was so curly it would spring back immediately. He says he believes others did this too and that she never seemed offended or upset. He says they had attended the Ryder Cup for meetings as Scotland was hosting the next one at Gleneagles. He acknowledged further that Woman D had shown him a bikini shot of her holiday in Jamaica. He agrees that he told her she looked like Ursula Andress in ‘Dr No’. Alex Salmond says from where he stands now he wishes he’d been “more careful with people’s personal space”, but “I’m of the opinion that events are being reinterpreted and exaggerated out of any possible proportion”.
F.
On to Woman F, the charge of sexual assault with intent to rape. Alex Salmond says the two had a “sleepy cuddle” on his bed after drinking Chinese liquor. He says “it shouldn’t have happened”, but says it was a cuddle and there was “no struggle whatsoever”. Jackson notes this is a charge of sexual assault with intent to rape. “It’s not true” says Alex Salmond. “Not in the slightest. I’ve never attempted to have non-consensual sexual relations with anyone in my entire life.”
G.
On Woman G’s claim Alex Salmond touched her bottom after a dinner, Alex Salmond says any touching was on the stairs on the way in, when he gave her a “gentle shove to chivvy her up the stairs”, touching her lower back. He says it was “totally and utterly harmless”. On the other charge involving Woman G, of sexual assault at Bute House, Alex Salmond says he put his arm around her to “comfort” her but says he didn’t try to kiss her and says there was nothing sexual about it whatsoever. Adds, his wife Moira had been between Alex Salmond and Ms G when he reached up to give the shove.
H.
“Court back in open session. Jackson asks Alex Salmond about Woman H; he denies there was sexual contact on either of the occasions listed in the charges, but says there was a “consensual sexual encounter” on another occasion. Alex Salmond says there was a “consensual sexual liaison [with woman H] in the bedroom which did not involve full undress of either of us”, and says “we parted good friends with no damage done”. He says this was on a date prior to those in the two charges which he denies happened.
l. Back in session. Gordon Jackson is taking court through Alex Salmond’s diary and calendar for the month of one of the charges involving Woman H – defence has lodged a special defence of alibi on this charge. After running through a series of dates, Jackson says from the diary and calendar, is there any time that month that Woman H could have been at Bute House with Alex Salmond? “No there’s not”, he says. On to the attempted rape charge; Alex Salmond says he was “never” involved in anything like this with Woman H. He says he remembers the dinner with a celebrity she says she was at and says it’s “not possible” Woman H was there. He says he remembers the dinner and “she wasn’t there”.
m. Jackson says Alex Salmond’s position couldn’t be simpler – the allegation is “just a lie”. “Yes, that’s correct,” he says. He says Woman F was annoyed that he hadn’t backed her in a personal political project. Defence concludes questioning of Alex Salmond.”
J.
On to Woman J – the “zombie impression” claim – Alex Salmond says this didn’t happen; he says the only physical contact he had with Woman J was to tap her on the nose before he went off to bed, leaving her working on his computer. He says “nothing improper” happened.
K.
On to Woman K, who says Alex Salmond touched her bottom as they had their photo taken – he says “it didn’t happen, I didn’t grab her bottom.”
And of course the most important list – the jury’s verdicts.
Charge 1 indecent assault Woman A – NG
Charge 2 sexual assault Woman A – NG
Charge 3 indecent assault Woman B – NG
Charge 4 sexual assault Woman C – NG
Charge 5 sexual assault Woman D – NG
Charge 6 – PREVIOUSLY DROPPED
Charge 7 sexual assault Woman F- NG
Charge 8 sexual assault with intent to rape Woman F – Not proven
Charge 9 sexual assault Woman G – NG
Charge 10 sexually assault Woman G – NG
Charge 11 sexual assault Woman H – NG
Charge 12 attempted rape Woman H – NG
Charge 13 Sexual assault Woman J – NG
Charge 14 sexual assault Woman K – NG
Cheers Mac, that’s useful. Would also be good to know how many witnesses both the defence and prosecution put up to say they either witnessed the event or didn’t witness it. I have a feeling the prosecution were very short on any witnesses who actually saw the events in question, while the defence had many who – given the high profile of the trial, very bravely – stood up and said they didn’t. Many of them were in very public places where there were a lot of people about.
Dixon inform says:
27 February, 2021 at 3:05 pm
Alex Salmond told the committee yesterday that if they wanted copies of evidence that he has and the inquiry doesn’t, then all they have to do is contact his solicitors over the weekend.
He said his solicitors will provide them with very important information relevant to the hearing.
I was wondering if they have contacted Salmond solicitors or not?
Anyone any information regarding this?
I think this is of extreme importance and yet no one is really talking about it.
Spot on. The Ctte have asked the CO again for these docs; deadline midday Tuesday. I predict, at midday Tuesday, the CO will again refuse; too late to do anything else.
This faux request is a deliberate ruse to give the appearance of action while protecting theFM.
If they were serious, they would also request from Salmond solicitor in parallel.
I have not read the Hate Crime Bill, but I suspect that underneath it there is something like this: if I feel threatened by someone, then that person has threatened me. And I suspect that eventually – if not with this proposed Hate Crime Bill, then with the next one, because these things have momentum, and that momentum grows and grows – eventually, this will lead to what I would call a ‘full subjectivisation’ of ‘reality’. As in Alice in Wonderland, ‘reality is what I say it is’.
So, if I say ‘I feel threatened by you, then you threatened me’; and if I say ‘I feel abused by you – then you definitely abused me.’ You will be tried and condemned on the grounds of what other people ‘feel’ about you, and not because of anything you actually did.
I think this was already at play in what happened to AS. And it is still in play in the continuing slanderous campaign against him in the media, and within much of the SNP. Once again, if they get away with it, this total reversal of reality will simply grow and grow.
At first, even putting it kindly, it might look like a ‘Charter for the Paranoid’. In which case some might support it with the old saying to the effect that ‘Just because I am paranoid does not mean that you (or others) are not persecuting me.’ But from there, it very quickly moves much further down the line, and becomes ‘The Autocrat’s Charter’ justifying and sustaining the Totalitarian State. It provides a sure basis for those in power condemning or jailing or even killing just anyone at all whom they wish to condemn, jail or kill.
Unless we stop it now, we are on the slippery slope … Not towards independence. But towards infamy.
What happened to AS is paradigmatic for all of us, and what is at stake now is not just independence – very dear to my heart as independence is and always has been – but something even more fundamental, and deeper.
NS has made her choice. What matters, as top priority, is not independence as such, but creating the kind of Scotland she wants. For her independence is only a means towards that. She has what for her is a utopian ideal she wants to achieve for society, and GRA and the Hate Crime Bill are only the beginning. It is a whole idealistic construct present in her mind which she wishes to impose on all of us, and on the whole of reality.
She is an ideologist, with an ideology, to which all right-minded people must subscribe. If it is OK with her it ought to be – and will be – OK with everyone. She will make sure of that. GRA is just a small example – she feels OK with it, therefore everyone else should, and indeed must in future feel the same.
These, including what happened to AS, are only first steps. There will be more to come. Much more. If she gets her way – i.e. if she and her pals get away with these first steps now – where will she and they be ten years from now? And where will we be? In retrospect, these things might look very tame in comparison with what will be happening then.
Meanwhile, even now, those who desist from whatever is OK with her must be resisted, opposed, ejected, crushed and (the bus is rolling) … run over, totally expunged … which ultimately eliminated. Yes, not simply driven out, and not just not even tolerated. Why should they be allowed to exist at all? Extermination beckons.
What AS is defending is the rule of law. Once that is gone, everything goes with it – until there is nothing left. Take a look at the smoking ruins of Berlin in 1945, while the perpetrator and his pals were lying in their bunker still warm, and newly dead.
What starts with little steps leads to bigger ones, and bigger still – even to giant steps, and it can all happen very very quickly.
I don’t think this is alarmist. I think it is realistic. It has happened before. The depths of human evil are not to be underestimated, or waved away with an airy, smug, self-satisfied and potentially disastrous ‘it couldn’t happen here’.
Oh yes, it could. Just look at the state of our Press, for a start … It’s already happening, under our noses …
AS was brilliant yesterday. Time for us to learn the lessons, and take our stand.
NEW LETTER EXCHANGE.
“as First Minister wriggled Jim REFUSES to be shaken off” #salmondspeaks
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
-Wull-
A chilling thought and one which I had not considered.
-Cath-
Agreed, the English media at least has **some** diversity of thought. In Scotland there is the unionist media and the “nationalist” media which is in reality the “Nicola Sturgeon and her friends” media just as the “nationalist” party is the “Nicola Sturgeon and her friends” party. Grim.
Wow, Wales are on fire in this Six Nations rugby Tournament, three out of three I think, the latest a 40-24 defeat of England.
Nicola defamed Alex. From the Scotsman.
“As well as the new complaint from ex-SNP deputy leader Jim Sillars that this broke the Ministerial Code, it is arguably as defamatory a statement as you are likely to hear, and to defend it she would have to prove something which a jury has already said Mr Salmond did not do.
That could plunge the whole thing back into court and drag the women back into the witness box. In the space of one angry sentence, Ms Sturgeon has opened herself up to legal action of potentially enormous proportions.”
Although the women wouldn’t be dragged in. That’s been done and dusted. He was innocent. No crime.
Defamation by a lawyer and the FM. TUT TUT.
Craig Murrry also added a comment recently regarding Woman D who alleged Salmond was touching her face while she slept in a car…
Craig Murray
Exactly. And it is absolutely untrue.
The truth of that incident was he was in an official car with the person and two others. They reached the Hong Kong border check and he touched her cheek to wake her up gently for her passport.
You have read lies. I heard it in court.”
The Rev revealed on here that the much quoted “Edinburgh Airport Incident” amounted to Salmond making a joke at security. Someone ahead of him was asked to remove their high heeled shoes and Salmond quipped that they must be ‘killer heels’. That was f**king it believe it or not.
All of this stuff, these charges, are a pile of puffed up contrived pish.
I have had a very poor opinion of the Scottish justice system for a long time.
It is only the honesty and integrity, not to forget bravery, of ordinary Scots that saved an innocent person being jailed.
A vast majority of ordinary Scottish people are thoroughly decent.
The Alex Salmond led governments were an example of decency to the whole world.
The current SNP leader is the nastiest most disgraceful Scot ever.
She has thoroughly corrupted every organ of the State by putting in place her sycophants to head them.
Justice will only be served when the whole lot of them spend decades behind bars.
Reverend, may I pick you up on one small point?
You wrote `she’s a fucking liar.’
Of course, you’re absolutely right that she’s a liar, but I strongly suspect that she isn’t a f***ing.
Whatever other problems Murrell may have, I don’t believe he’s a reptophile (physically attracted to reptiles – which is what Nicola Sturgeon is) so I suspect he’d have difficulties delivering in certain departments.
She simply does not accept the decision of the jury or the judge.
What a state to be in we have to get rid of her and the sooner the better
we simply cant have someone taking such a line
At least we can understand where rape crisis Scotland and the BBC have been getting their script
After Mr Salmond’s appearance yesterday I thought it would be very difficult for those involved with the stitch-up to get away with what they’d done. After some of the conversations on social media I’m not so sure.
The FM has access to the evidence that Mr Salmond has and is pretty confident that she can bluff her way around it, the committee is not exactly neutral and only Ms Baillie and Murdo are likely to get to the point, the Yes movement, especially the SNP faction still see her as Mammy bear and will follow her regardless of any evidence (Scottish Labour!!) and the majority of the press have invested too much in keeping her in post to turn on her.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see a very confident, no-blinking FM in front of a very tame committee being cheered on by her adoring fans.
Final bit. The way Mr Salmond has been treated firstly by the false accusations and then by continued attacks that he is guilty regardless of the court outcome is not unusual. He was lucky to have the money and support to win his case, many don’t, and are in jail based purely on the word of a women and the bias in the police and court service.
Surely the ministerial code exists to stop parliament falling into disrepute? Nicola Sturgeon is a liar beyond any shadow of a doubt, and by lying she breaks the ministerial code and brings parliament into disrepute. She has no option but to resign, and resign now, especially in light of Alex Salmond’s bravura performance yesterday. The longer she delays the worse it will be for everyone. When the law makers are allowed to persist in their law breaking then we have a serious problem. It is also worth noting that in order to obey the law, we have to consider ourselves subject to the law.
_”Has everyone had a fucking lobotomy today, or are you all just trying to piss me off for laughs?”_
Indeed. What makes me particularly uneasy is the lack of “ooft…this could be *any* of us in this situation”
Simple question for your next poll:
Scottish men / Scottish women
i) “do you trust the Scottish legal system with your innocence?”
ii) “do you trust the Scottish media with your legally proven innocence?”
No argument from me, I was cogitating on something different:
I still think, that the peppering of ‘malicious’ throughout yesterday by both sides, will ensure there will be plenty of “Good faith” statements to come from NS.
The Lord Advocate (in his apology statement abount the RFC debacle) took great pains to explain that technically, something could be found to have been maliciously prosecuted, but that didn’t mean the individual(s) behind it were ‘malicious’ in the common understanding of the term.
So, that left and leaves scope for ‘it was all a cock-up, nobody was actually being malicious, it was all done in good faith – they were just dumb all over (and a little ugly on the side)
Ergo: there was no ulterior, personal ‘malicious’ motive, no vindictive conspiracy to nail Alex specifically. Just a very unfortunate fuck-up.
Following the Lord Advocate, there will then be: ‘Lessons have been learned and continue to be learned…safeguards have been put in place to ensure such a thing doesn’t happen again (until it does) yada yada.
I found it curious Alex used the term at all – he certainly must be familiar with the Lord Advocate’s clarification on interpretation of meaning and the lifeline it gave the Lord Advocate (and anyone else) to wriggle free from charges of actual vindictive and malicious intent.
Anyway, I await the plethora of “Good Faith” defences and have my drinking game at the ready.
A quick reminder for those who still doubt the validity of the jury’s decisions in Alex’s trial.
Alex faced not one accuser, or two, or three, but thirteen.
Thirteen.
And he was found not guilty for all of them in Scottish law.
More and more evidence is emerging that it was planned, a deliberate attempt to put him in prison, likely for the rest of his life.
Thirteen.
Someone sat down and figured out it would that many false testimonies (according to the jury) to put him away, regardless of the cost to him, his family, or just as importantly, the integrity of Scottish law. (And as a result Scottish Advocates issued a letter of concern, when the FM suggested publicly, during a Covid report, the jury’s verdict was to be considered inferior when compared to ‘public opinion’, or in reality, her opinion, in her determined push for personal political expedience, and survival)
Thirteen.
Truly an intended stitch up of significant proportions, by a group dedicated to the preservation of the Murrell Cult. And followed up by an inquiry as rigged as any can be. A sham of an inquiry tory fascists would be proud to call their own.
I hope Alex goes on a legal hunt to rival any other, targeting every journalist, politician, civil servant, and organization that has continued the myth of “the jury got it wrong” and “he got lucky this time, but he’s really guilty” (and paraphrases of this.)
While the scottish justice minister is busy trying to enact a bill that will have families reporting each other for anything labelled as hate speech (as a result of petulance around the dinner table or otherwise), he is deliberately ignoring what was, and still is, a massive legal wrongdoing according to the laws we ALREADY have.
A deliberate, amoral, and most profoundly, politically corrupt witchhunt of a man found completely innocent by a jury of his peers, by the scottish government and it’s cult, spread across the civil service and other arms of both the scottish and british establishment.
Sturgeon herself stated on Marr that she never saw AS behave inappropriately and now she’s going around claiming how bad he was. She’s a joke. It is no surprise that she never made it far as a lawyer. I’m just not sure how anyone thought she was leader material but then again she was managed by AS so perhaps these odious traits of hers were not allowed to surface.
The story is like Topsy-it grows and grows and I must admit to a developing interest though I do not live in Scotland (Or England)
I wonder if anyone can help me with this; at the criminal trial-as I understand it- the defence on behalf of Mr Salmond were prevented by the learned Judge from advancing a defence of conspiracy on the part of some or all of the complainants/witnesses including, presumably, cross-examining on that basis
Again if my understanding is right then one of the complainants is agreed by all concerned to have sent a message (the ‘I have a plan’ message) to other/s A conspiracy only needs an agreement between two or more people to do an illegal act-
Does any Scots legal eagle know whether this indeed was the ruling of the learned judge and
If it was would that be viewed as unusual under these circumstances in the Scottish courts?
In the OJ Simpson trial the killer was that the gloves didn’t fit. Was that police incompetence or what?
No it was the simple fact that leather gloves can shrink depending on exposure to various conditions such as moisture etc. Basic stuff.
“it means that the behaviour complained of did not meet the bar of it being criminal”
I disagree. It is not the jury’s job to determine if the “behaviour did meet or not the bar of being criminal”. That is the job of the prosecution and a lousy job at that one they did if by their standards pulling somebody’s hair or putting a hand on a knee is criminal. But hey, that is what the prosecution brought forward. The criminality of the alleged event was already established, otherwise they would have never been in that court.
The jury’s job is to determine with the evidence before them, if the behaviour the person is accused of happened or not.
The result was: no guilty or no proven. In other words, the jury did not believe he did it or in one case it could not be proven if it happen with the evidence provided.
Lorna: ” If the women are still not satisfied, they would have to bring a private civil prosecution against Mr Salmond. I hope they will listen to advice on that and eschew any such action because they will surely lose again.” But if the charges that the Crown brought to Alex Salmond were true, why would they not fight for it despite legal advice? Again, these charges were profoundly serious, and to suggest, as the First Minister and others have, that the verdict “doesn’t mean the complained-of behaviour didn’t happen” must mean that they approved of the police & Crown’s decision that this behaviour was criminal, and quite seriously criminal at that.
Mac, while I don’t particularly appreciate the inference of your wariness, I can’t exactly blame you either given the invective surrounding this case. The reason I didn’t go over the defense was because it seemed superfluous given the jury returned Not Guilty/Proven verdicts, ergo suggesting the jury decided there was, at least, reasonable doubt that the events took place. In the interests of fairness, it was very good of you to include them, and I shall do the same in future.
Derek, well, in my (ultimately pointless) defense, I did say tried: you can’t exactly be tried for a charge that doesn’t make it to court. Nonetheless, a fair point.
The criminality of the alleged event was already established, otherwise they would have never been in that court.
Put like that, it makes it even worse that so many clearly not criminal things were used to bring a man to court.
We’ve heard Nicola Sturgeon repeatedly question the judgement of the judge and the jury on this. Then she turns round and says she hasn’t! Couple this with her replying to Jim Sillars complaint of her which was addressed to Lesley Evans then it’s straight out the Stasi rule book! It’s like we’re through the looking glass now. Her judgements of late are way below what we all expect of a decent leader.
I saw she broke her Twitter silence earlier today to comment on Anas Sarwar becoming the branch manager of British Labour in Scotland she said “I like him and I rate him “.
Remind us , who has got the ego problem again!
Derek M Morison says:
In terms of the ongoing proceedings of the Parliamentary Committee it’s important to bear in mind that the two original Complainers there designated A & B are NOT the same women described as A & B in the trial.
Ruby replies
Thanks for that info.
Is it known what the original charges were & which letters they were designated at the trial?
Does anyone else find it worrying that not one SNP official, MSP or MP, councillor or other has actually stood up and called Nicolas Sturgeon out properly for her actions ?
I’m reading her response to Jim Sillars and thinking ‘she’s loopy and dangerous’
(Yes, before anyone starts, I am aware of Cherry and Kenny and Chris etc and there valiant efforts and reason and question, but afaik no one has actually had the nerve to stand up and say ‘she should resign immediately’ )
Tinto, thanks. I haven’t commented on here in a long time, but I was moved to by some of the sheer audacity of some comments by people whose opinions I held in high esteem. Independence supporters are supposed to be better than this, and yet…
It is long past being more about whose lies are sweetest than who’s lying per say so to sugarcoat the claim that attacks on the prosecution service are really rather disgraceful, etc. it might be helpful if the harassment committee can establish how many people are serving time for hair pinging, knee squeezing and other such sexual assaults – and clarify how many were heard by a jury (and why/ why not) prior to being put there.
Bonus being that, following the recent Bowes Lyon guilty plea (presumably to avoid a lengthy trial and harming the extended family by association), those who are not allowed to be politically motivated in the slightest might deserve a share of the budget for malicious prosecutions too – so forcing the department to showcase its work in a more positive light might better strengthen morale at such a difficult time (peak bullshit) for all concerned.
Wait.
Jim Sillar’s writes to Leslie Evans to complaint that Sturgeon breached the ministerial code. He requests Ms Evans, if not handling it herself, writes to inform him who will be handling it.
Sturgeon writes back to inform him she has decided she didn’t break the ministerial code.
s this even remotely acceptable behaviour? Does the First Minister now decide for herself if she broke the code? She is her own judge now?
What? What? What am I missing here?
Taranaich
the jury returned Not Guilty/Proven verdicts, ergo suggesting the jury decided there was, at least, reasonable doubt that the events took place
They only returned a not proven verdict to one minor charge, which to my mind says they gave serious consideration to each of the charge and found all the others as unbelievable.
Mike Hovit6.31pm
Mike, SALMOND’S solicitors are sitting on a mountain of evidence that hasn’t even been discussed at this hearing, why the hell is no one interested in it?
The Chair of this committee was told yesterday, so why are they not working all through the weekend to get them examined in time to be presented on Monday.
They can’t turn round and say they didn’t know about them.
How frustrating this whole fiasco is.
Banana Republic is doing a disservice to a banana.
Not only 13 accusers, none of them appealed the jury’s decision.
Why? Because all of them had been lying?
Anyone who now questions the verdict is in contempt of court.
And to think that this nasty disgraceful woman is a lawyer.
The whole lot would be prosecuted and be sentenced to decades behind bars, if only Scotland had a fair and decent justice system.
What I don’t understand with Sturgeon is that she is talking so strongly about wanting protect and encourage women to speak up if they have been harrassed, intimidated etc. However, this only seems to apply to Alex Salmond. In Cunninghame North, loads of allegations were made against Kenny Gibson MSP from women who complained to SNP HQ but she and the SNP did nothing to investigate or support those concerned. You can only conclude that she is only interested if it is about a powerful rival and not just one of the pawn SNP MSPs.
Have to disagree with you rev. Part of the juries’ job is to decide whether actions constitute a crime. Actions can be completely uncontested, but there’s still a court case, as the jury has to decide whether these actions constitute the crime that the accused is charged with.
So it is valid to say that actions did happen as alleged, but no crime was committed.
I am not supporting sturgeon. I think that she or the cabal around her are rotten.
From Dani Garavelli’s Tortoise Media article”Woman K is one of two women whose complaints about Salmond prompted the original Scottish government inquiry back in early 2018, just months after the Harvey Weinstein story broke.”
“Woman F – the other original complainant, who never actively sought criminal charges”
link to tortoisemedia.com
List of charges in previous comment
@Wull 6.32: yes, that’s where the Hate Crime Bill is going. “I feel offended, so you’re censored, Poindexter!”
As I keep saying, never forget that Yousaf proposed even worse for Scottish courts last summer: no cross-examination, no automatic right of appeal, “phoned in” video testimony and no jury trial. Covid, the virus that just keeps giving for the authoritarian wokelings.
Multiplied organisms all over the place for the utterly corrupt SG, no doubt, but they had to pull back from this when the legal profession began to push against it (perhaps, cynically, through potential loss of earnings on the defence side).
@Taranaich 7.13: lay on, MacDuff 😉 !
Jim Sillars & Kenny MacAskill have been writing about the Murrels for quite a long time.
I don’t think they were taken seriously in the beginning.
Might be interesting to search the archives and see what they were saying a couple of years ago.
Im English and generally for the Union. (Sorry to intrude.) But would not for a second deny a Scot democratic vote for Independence. (Out of politeness, please wait til HMQ is no longer with us.)
I think I am going to my damn best to support the SNP; because this SNP is the biggest democratic obstacle to independence anyone could possibly contrive.
(When your counterpart is making a mistake, don’t interrupt.)
Alex salmond needs to ask himself now was there anything, anything at all in Nicola’s past behaviour that could call into question her loyalty to the cause.
I read NS response to Jim Sillars and his reply requesting that his complaint is moved to higher authority.
The Ministerial code is begining to resemble the Pirates code “The Code is more what you would call guidelines, than actual rules”
When will the high paid legal eagles sort this shit out!
I suspect NS will get back in and I am deeply worried for the future.
I am just recently unemployed after working in Finance for global companies for 40 years in Scotland and have, for the first time, contemplated leaving Scotland.
In my daily dealings with people all around the globe, Scots were always held in high respect for hard work, fairness,intelligence, financial acumen and humour.
What the fuck is going on ?
The recent events have just shit on all this, we live in a global world where Twatter and Farcebook have become the mouthpiece of the uneducted and pishbabbling fools.
I try to be reasonable, but all this shit is driving me to borderline alcoholism and my latent sychosis is getting worse
tartanfever says:
“Does anyone else find it worrying that not one SNP official, MSP or MP, councillor or other has actually stood up and called Nicolas Sturgeon out properly for her actions ?”
Even when the likes of Thatcher and Blair had massive majorities, there were open dissenters from their own parties.
The SNP has been poisoned beyond redemption. It cannot be reformed from within, even if this nasty disgraceful woman has been forced to resign.
The only clean solution is a new party with only one policy – independence.
Alex salmond needs to ask himself now was there anything, anything at all in Nicola’s past behaviour that could call into question her loyalty to the cause.
She simply can’t be trusted. Stu I am sorry I doubted your previously stated positions re nicola. She is simply not fit to hold office. SHE IS STARTING TO SOUND LIKE TRUMP
Mike, SALMOND’S solicitors are sitting on a mountain of evidence that hasn’t even been discussed at this hearing, why the hell is no one interested in it?
Is there any way some or all of it be published outwith the committee at a later date, if the committee refuses to publish it? Or is it all subject to court orders that would keep it hidden? If the latter, presumably a judge led inquiry or malicious prosecution case would bring it to light if either were to be brought?
Mike @7.38pm.
I’m pretty sure most Scots don’t give a monkey’s about Old Queen Lizzie, dissolving this vile union is far more important. Lizzie will still be purring like a cat in her 776 roomed palace regardless of whether or not we exit the union.
Mike Hovit @ 7:38 pm
“Im English and generally for the Union.”
So are perhaps as many as one million ‘No’ voters in Scotland, unfortunately, maybe half the ‘No’ vote.
Its no surprise this group mostly reject the offer of Scottish nationality as it is not their national identity. But they really don’t have to block it for the Scots and prevent our right to national ‘self-determination’.
Hi ‘No more corruption’ at 5:40 pm.
You enquired,
“Hi all, I can’t find the video where Sturgeon said this on Thursday. Tried BBC iplayer but can’t see anything. I have some video of Sturgeon using up time challenging Salmond but the specific footage that Jim Sillers is referring to I can’t find. If anyone has a link please let me know as it would be really helpful.”
link to twitter.com
(You’ll have to increase volume to max.)
So here’s the question. If Sturgeon is so sure that AS acted inappropriately with colleagues, staff etc. why the fuck did she not do something about it at the time? Why did she not blow the whistle? If, on the other hand, she had no knowledge or evidence of such behaviour, why didn’t she take his word? They had been close friends and colleagues for a good number of years. With friends like that…
To those on the thread asking. The front page of the Times today carried the story that Salmond’s solicitors are being asked for their evidence on Monday morning. Good
I don’t understand why Nicola replied to Jim S. I would have expected her to ignore him, it’s bizarre.
Cath 7.48pm
If there is evidence out there relevant to this case, then it needs to be heard IN PUBLIC.
The logical answer to all of this.
Evans has something on Sturgeon. It explains why Evans is still in a job. It’s not rocket science. Murrell is probably up to his eyes in something, so Sturgeon can’t get rid of Evans.
FYI I somehow acquired two copies of’Judges, juries and horsemen… if anyone needs one, Pete Astor rocks in a shy way. Mr Campbell… salute!