Alert readers may note that while Wings has repeatedly noted that the misappropriation of the fundraiser money by the SNP could constitute either fraud OR embezzlement (or both), entirely separate to the embezzlement FROM the SNP by Peter Murrell, the Crown Office continues – as its agent John Logue did in a recent BBC interview – to address only the possibility of fraud, which would be by far the more difficult of the two to prove, and to ignore the elephant in the room, which is that no less a personage than the First Minister has already admitted to spending all of the money on a purpose other than that which it was raised for.
The response is therefore plainly unsatisfactory, which we will deal with in our own reply within the next 24 hours, which will again be drafted by counsel. We will of course publish it here once it’s sent, so stay tuned.
For any of you who haven’t caught it yet, my interview from Monday’s BBC Scotcast (which is also available on Spotify).
Sadly due to a summer scheduling quirk the video version won’t go out on the telly, and seemingly not on the BBC YouTube page either, so you’ll just have to listen to the audio and somehow live without seeing my gorgeous face.
We’ve already discussed the contents of the videos released last week by the BBC containing interviews with Assistant Chief Constable Stuart Houston of Police Scotland and Crown Agent John Logue of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.
But videos (especially lengthy ones) are always a bit of a pain to reference, and these are incredibly significant documents, so we thought it’d be quite useful to post the full transcripts too, with the text tidied up (taking out all the “um”s and “eh”s and so on) for ease of reading.
This is the interview with John Logue (Stuart Houston’s is here):
And below is what’s said in it. We’ve added a comment here and there, in red.
We’ve already discussed the contents of the videos released last week by the BBC containing interviews with Deputy Chief Constable Stuart Houston of Police Scotland and Crown Agent John Logue of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.
But videos (especially lengthy ones) are always a bit of a pain to reference, and these are incredibly significant documents, so we thought it’d be quite useful to post the full transcripts too, with the text tidied up (taking out all the “um”s and “eh”s and so on) for ease of reading.
This is the interview with Stuart Houston (John Logue’s is here):
And below is what’s said in it. We’ve added a comment here and there, in red.
I’ve just recorded an episode of the BBC ScotCast podcast, which should “drop”, as we say in the media biz, around teatime tonight. It focused largely on issues around Operation Branchform, and the fact that only one of the two crimes it concerned has been resolved.
Time always flies when you’re having fun, so I ended up not being able to fit in half the stuff I wanted to say in the 40 minutes I chatted with Martin Geissler (which will likely shrink to fit into the 30-minute broadcast slot by the time they’ve edited all the most libellous bits out).
And one of those things was the bewildering fact that the investigation into the SNP’s finances went on for two years before the police stumbled into the second crime, and the only one that’s actually concluded – Peter Murrell’s embezzlement from the SNP. Because the first crime ought to have been all but done and dusted in 24 hours max.
Alert readers will have found it hard not to notice that Wings is currently focused on trying to solve one mystery above all others: why nobody has been prosecuted for a massive theft of hundreds of thousands of pounds, which took place in open sight, beyond any dispute, and is openly admitted by someone who was there at the time.
Until this week, nobody in the two organisations responsible for criminal prosecutions in the country – Police Scotland and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (the Crown Office or COPFS for short) had issued any sort of explanation of why the original Operation Branchform investigation apparently fell by the wayside when it led police to discover a second crime: that of embezzlement against the SNP by its then-Chief Executive, Peter Murrell.
But this week, with very little fanfare, the BBC quietly put out two extended interviews with senior representatives of those organisations, seemingly the unused footage from their half-hour televised documentary “Peter Murrell: The Man With The Money”.
This is the letter the SNP sent donors to the ringfenced 2017 fundraiser.
The terms are right there in the first sentence, and repeated several more times. The money will be “ring fenced for a future referendum”. It’s to “build up a sizeable war chest to fight the campaign when the time comes”. It’s to “ensure we are not outspent in the referendum campaign”.
There is no ambiguity in the email. There’s no mention of the SNP anywhere except in Jim Henderson’s email address. No suggestion whatsoever that the money could be used by the SNP for anything but a referendum campaign.
These are the people whose job it was to stop the leadership of the SNP from stealing almost £700,000 of “ringfenced” fundraiser money from independence supporters, and who utterly failed at that job.
It was also their job to stop Peter Murrell stealing the best part of £500,000 from the SNP, in a separate but related crime, and they failed at that one too.
A small handful of them (marked with red asterisks, but see postscript below) tried their best to do their duties, and were blocked primarily by one powerful woman – Nicola Sturgeon – and a room full of cowards, weaklings and bullies, listed above.
But as Peter Murrell begins a five-years-and-three-months prison sentence – more than we were expecting, in truth – let’s not lose sight of the key fact that the theft of hundreds of thousands of pounds of independence supporters’ money by the SNP, which accidentally exposed Murrell’s entirely separate crime of theft FROM the SNP, has still not been answered for by anyone.
Be assured, readers, that Wings won’t rest until it is.
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Agentx, It was and is of no account what Scotlands old parliament did when adjourned in Scotland in 1707. To…” Sep 19, 12:03
Spartan 117 on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Many of the people you refer to as “Yoons” are independence supporters, myself included. (I was recently accused of being…” Sep 19, 11:58
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Agentx, The old Scottish parliament was already dissolved by the Monarch of England on the 28th April 1706 in England,…” Sep 19, 11:56
Spartan 117 on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “A bit early to be pished. Someone obviously left the COSHH cabinet unlocked last night. Snorted the Denso and necked…” Sep 19, 11:51
Confused on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “bbc shilling for war on the front page https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cmn0jke547r5o delusions of a fool, pining for the past https://archive.ph/f0c0J getting involved…” Sep 19, 11:42
Confused on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Ben Gvir recently had a rant on X “It’s time for the State to publicly recognize that the Malvinas Islands…” Sep 19, 11:40
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “This makes the “Scotland Act itself reservations and restrictions on Scotland from the legislation and Statues of then Westminster parliament…” Sep 19, 11:39
agentx on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Timeline of the 1707 Union January 16, 1707:The Treaty of Union was formally ratified by the Parliament of Scotland. March…” Sep 19, 11:02
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Simply said for late comers, The ratification of Scotlands side of the 1707 treaty of union occurred after the parliament…” Sep 19, 11:02
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Both the bill of rights and the act of Settlement were passed by the parliament of England prior the Scottish…” Sep 19, 10:47
Andy Ellis on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Why would anyone trust a word Trump – or indeed any of his GOP successors say? Even if the Democrats…” Sep 19, 10:41
Hatey McHateface on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Are Sweden and Germany Anglophone countries? How about Greece, Austria, Italy and Ceuta (Spain)? Your response is just more of…” Sep 19, 10:05
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “The Westminster parliament records do not float an idea or theory that Scotland is Colonised , it proves it into…” Sep 19, 10:05
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Alf, Even you and the UN have to chronologically apply dates and time lines to arrive at the ” theses”…” Sep 19, 09:54
Hatey McHateface on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “If you’re referring to the US-Denmark-Greenland deal, the reality would appear to be more nuanced. And it’s yet to be…” Sep 19, 09:44
James Che on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “No psychology, no theory, putting meat on the bone through the records of Westminster parliament, from the Horses mouth one…” Sep 19, 09:34
Andy Ellis on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Or, you know…in the real world, it’s not the yoons contributing to BTL discourse that are the issue it is…” Sep 19, 09:29
Hatey McHateface on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “@Dunx According to the Declaration of Arbroath, the Picts were genocided by the Scots. That’s an awkward truth that can’t…” Sep 19, 09:26
TURABDIN on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “@Hatey McHateface Thirty years ago i wasnt around however the flooding as you term it may have had something to…” Sep 19, 09:25
Hatey McHateface on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “See, Dave? You can string a few sentences together when you’re prepared to make the effort. Why don’t you build…” Sep 19, 09:17
diabloandco on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Dave L , with you there , never ceases to amaze me how much time they spend on here relentlessly…” Sep 19, 08:17
DaveL on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “The yoons on here constantly moan whinge and cry about various btl posters, sometimes demanding they just stop posting their…” Sep 19, 05:10
Mark Beggan on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Let’s just say, playing the victim now is not got the payback that one might have thought. Perhaps the victim…” Sep 18, 23:28
Alf Baird on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Hopefully you may be able to present evidence for your revised thesis that Scotland is not now a colony? Much…” Sep 18, 20:51
Alf Baird on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Yes, Malgrati in his review does not quite get as far as ‘Doun-Hauden’ which would have helped him explain the…” Sep 18, 20:20
Hatey McHateface on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “If you should ever choose to stand for office in Scotland, New Northy, I’ll be paying close attention to your…” Sep 18, 20:04
Northcode on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “When posters invoke antisyzygy, they’re not using it as a literary concept. They’re using it as: – a psychological explanation…” Sep 18, 19:56
Northcode on A Thousand Islands In The Sea: “Pathologising dissent isn’t just rude — it’s a form of control based on authoritarian logic. It’s the same manoeuvre used…” Sep 18, 19:29
