New evidence of cover up in Dr David Kelly's death. Doctors want inquest.

[Jan Klimkowski]

It's strange the the Daily Mail got their teeth into this and don't appear to be letting go.

Peter - this is to do with the nuances of individual British newspapers.

For our international members, the Daily Mail (commonly known as the Daily Hatemail) is a right-of-centre, Little Englander, rag which has almost always been uncritically Tory-supporting. Thatcher is a Goddess in their pantheon.

My own sense is that this is part of the Mail's anti-Blair agenda.

However, they do have good contacts with the security services, and it may be that spooky elements have told them, deniably of course, that Kelly was murdered and Blair knew.

In other words, I refuse to believe the Mail is acting in the interests of Truth and Honour.

The motives of the Daily Mail are probably banal. The consequences of their actions may be far from banal.

Well, we can but hope...

[Jan Klimkowski]

Doctors demand inquest to 'prove Dr David Kelly was murdered'

Six eminent doctors have launched a legal action to reopen the inquest into the death of Dr David Kelly in an attempt to prove he was murdered.

Published: 8:00AM GMT 05 Dec 2009

Doctors have demanded an inquest into the death of Dr David Kelly

They plan to publish a report which they claim proves the weapons expert did not commit suicide, as the Hutton Report decided, and have hired lawyers to call on Baroness Scotland, the Attorney General, and the coroner Nicholas Gardiner to re-examine the circumstances of his death.

The doctors are asking for permission to go to the High Court to reopen the inquest on the grounds that it was improperly suspended.

In a phone conversation after he was outed as the source Dr Kelly said he wouldn't be surprised "if my body was found in the woods".

The inquest into Dr Kelly's death was suspended before it could begin by order of the then Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer, a former flatmate of Mr Blair.

He used the Coroners Act to designate the Hutton Inquiry as "fulfilling the function of an inquest".

The six doctors claim that the original inquest was never formally closed, and a proper inquiry should now be held.

They are Michael Powers, a QC and former coroner; trauma surgeon David Halpin; Andrew Rouse, an epidemiologist who established that deaths from cutting the ulnar artery – as claimed in Dr Kelly's case – are extremely rare; Martin Birnstingl, another surgeon; plus Stephen Frost and Chris Burns-Cox.

Lord Hutton concluded that Dr Kelly killed himself by severing an ulnar artery in his left wrist after taking an overdose of prescription painkillers.

However, he was criticised for glossing over controversies about the causes of death and instead concentrating on the political row between Downing Street and the BBC, which broke the story.

Dr Kelly's death certificate states that he died of a haemorrhage, but the results of a post mortem examination have never been made public.

The doctors tried to persuade the coroner to reopen his inquest in 2004 but were rejected because they were not judged to be "properly interested persons". However, now they have hired human rights lawyers Leigh Day & Co to challenge the use of the Coroners Act to close the inquest.

A source close to the doctors told The Daily Mail: "Lord Falconer is on record saying this is a "useful little law" but it was set up to avoid multiple inquests in cases where there were multiple deaths.

"It has been used for victims of train crashes and the Harold Shipman case but Dr Kelly's was not a multiple death.

"We argue that that's an abuse of due process. The lawyers have sent the letters this week.

"We have concentrated on the finding on the death certificate that the primary cause of death was a haemorrhage. We are spelling out why he could not have died from a cut to the small ulnar artery."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopi...dered.html

[David Guyatt]

Hat's off to the Kelly team for not giving up and keeping this going. Let's hope they have success.

[Peter Presland]

I wonder if there is any precedent for the post mortem (autopsy) of an officially 'confirmed' suicide being embargoed for 70 years under 'The Official Secrets Act'?

Says it all really. David Kelly clearly did NOT commit suicide and the precise circumstances of his death must be hidden because they are vastly damaging to The Establishment. What other conclusion can their possibly be?

As for the Oxfordshire Coroner speculating that the motive for the secrecy is 'to protect David Kelly's Children' - It would be hilariously funny if the whole thing were not so serious. Is that really the best they can do?

From the Mail on Sunday:

Vital evidence which could solve the mystery of the death of Government weapons inspector Dr David Kelly will be kept under wraps for up to 70 years.
In a draconian – and highly unusual – order, Lord Hutton, the peer who chaired the controversial inquiry into the Dr Kelly scandal, has secretly barred the release of all medical records, including the results of the post mortem, and unpublished evidence.
The move, which will stoke fresh speculation about the true circumstances of Dr Kelly’s death, comes just days before Tony Blair appears before the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War.

It is also bound to revive claims of an establishment cover-up and fresh questions about the verdict that Dr Kelly killed himself.


Tonight, Dr Michael Powers QC, a doctor campaigning to overturn the Hutton findings, said: ‘What is it about David Kelly’s death which is so secret as to justify these reports being kept out of the public domain for 70 years?’
Campaigning Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, who has also questioned the verdict that Dr Kelly committed suicide, said: ‘It is astonishing this is the first we’ve known about this decision by Lord Hutton and even more astonishing he should have seen fit to hide this material away.’
The body of former United Nations weapons inspector Dr Kelly was found in July 2003 in woods close to his Oxfordshire home, shortly after he was exposed as the source of a BBC news report questioning the Government’s claims that
Saddam Hussein had an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, which could be deployed within 45 minutes.
Lord Hutton’s 2004 report, commissioned by Mr Blair, concluded that Dr Kelly killed himself by cutting his wrist with a blunt gardening knife.

It was dismissed by many experts as a whitewash for clearing the Government of any culpability, despite evidence that it had leaked Dr Kelly’s name in an attempt to smear him.
Only now has it emerged that a year after his inquiry was completed, Lord Hutton took unprecedented action to ensure that the vital evidence remains a state secret for so long.
A letter, leaked to The Mail on Sunday, revealed that a 30-year ban was placed on ‘records provided [which were] not produced in evidence’. This is thought to refer to witness statements given to the inquiry which were not disclosed at the time.
In addition, it has now been established that Lord Hutton ordered all medical reports – including the post-mortem findings by pathologist Dr Nicholas Hunt and photographs of Dr Kelly’s body – to remain classified information for 70 years.

The normal rules on post-mortems allow close relatives and ‘properly interested persons’ to apply to see a copy of the report and to ‘inspect’ other documents.

Lord Hutton’s measure has overridden these rules, so the files will not be opened until all such people are likely to be dead.
Last night, the Ministry of Justice was unable to explain the legal basis for Lord Hutton’s order.
The restrictions came to light in a letter from the legal team of Oxfordshire County Council to a group of doctors who are challenging the Hutton verdict.
Last year, a group of doctors, including Dr Powers, compiled a medical dossier as part of their legal challenge to the Hutton verdict.

They argue that Hutton’s conclusion that Dr Kelly killed himself by severing the ulnar artery in his left wrist after taking an overdose of prescription painkillers is untenable because the artery is small and difficult to access, and severing it could not have caused death.
In their 12-page opinion, they concluded: ‘The bleeding from Dr Kelly’s ulnar artery is highly unlikely to have been so voluminous and rapid that it was the cause of death. We advise the instructing solicitors to obtain the autopsy reports so that the concerns of a group of properly interested medical specialists can be answered.’
Tonight, Dr Powers, a former assistant coroner, added: ‘Supposedly all evidence relevant to the cause of death has been heard in public at the time of Lord Hutton’s inquiry. If these secret reports support the suicide finding, what could they contain that could be so sensitive?’
The letter disclosing the 70-year restriction was written by Nick Graham, assistant head of legal and democratic services at Oxfordshire Council.

It states: ‘Lord Hutton made a request for the records provided to the inquiry, not produced in evidence, to be closed for 30 years, and that medical (including post-mortem) reports and photographs be closed for 70 years.’
Nicholas Gardiner, the Chief Coroner for Oxfordshire, confirmed that he had seen the letter.

Speaking to The Mail on Sunday today, he said: ‘I know that Lord Hutton made that recommendation. Someone told me at the time. Anybody concerned will be dead by then, and that is quite clearly Lord Hutton’s intention.’

Asked what was in the records that made it necessary for them to be embargoed, Mr Gardiner said: ‘They’re Lord Hutton’s records not mine. You’d have to ask him.’
He added that in his opinion Lord Hutton had embargoed the records to protect Dr Kelly’s children.
The inquest into Dr Kelly’s death was suspended before it could begin by the then Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer. He used the Coroners Act to designate the Hutton Inquiry as ‘fulfilling the function of an inquest’.
News that the records will be kept secret comes just days before Mr Blair gives evidence to the Chilcot Inquiry on Friday.

To date, Dr Kelly’s name has scarcely been mentioned at the inquiry. One source who held a private meeting with Sir John Chilcot before the proceedings began said that Sir John had admitted he ‘did not want to touch the Kelly issue’ .
A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said: ‘Any decision made by Lord Hutton at the time of his inquiry was entirely a matter for him.’
A spokesman for Thames Valley Police said yesterday that it would not be possible to search their records during the weekend.
The Mail on Sunday was unable to contact Lord Hutton.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...z0dXSu3RVX

[Charles Drago]

David Kelly clearly did NOT commit suicide and the precise circumstances of his death must be hidden because they are vastly damaging to The Establishment. What other conclusion can their possibly be?

Peter,

I too am firmly of the informed opinion that Dr. Kelly was murdered.

That being noted for the record, I feel obliged to anwer your question thusly:

When authorities encourage what they know to be unfounded conspiracy allegations -- theories that can be blown out of the water whenever suppressed, convincing evidence of non-conspiracy is permitted to surface -- they are acting to diminish legitimate claims of conspiracy elsewhere.

Additionally, the superficially counter-intuitive official suppression of evidence in what is claimed to be a cut-and-dried case raises conspiracy rhetoric to an annoying pitch even as it serves to maintain the endless false doubt upon which contol of the many by the few is largely predicated.

[Peter Presland]

Thanks Charles.

Both points well made and taken.

Here's what Craig Murray (that man again) has to say on the matter:

The Iraq Inquiry has taken us back again to that period where the government had engaged in a massive military build up ready to invade Iraq, and was desperately looking for evidence on WMD to trigger the invasion - an invasion on which the Washington neo-cons had pinned their entire hopes for the future of the Bush presidency.
Just at that crucial time, one of the UK's foremost experts on Iraqi WMD had let slip to the BBC that the government's claims did not stand up. As a result, he was found dead in a wood, while the BBC journalist, Andrew Gilligan, who correctly reported that there were no WMD, was fired for telling the truth.
The punishment of the BBC for failing to unquestioningly echo Blair lies went much further. The Chairman and Director General were forced out. All because the BBC said there may have been no WMD, when there were not.
It is almost incredible even now to state what New Labour have done. God know what future historians will make of it.
The BBC was traumatised, and went through an acceleration of cultural change that prized "managers" over journalists, and stopped criticising government. A foundation stone of democracy had been blasted away by Tony Blair.
Kelly's death was extremely convenient for Blair, Cheney and a myriad of other ultra ruthless people. It paved the way for war. We should not forget how very crucial the WMD issue was in convincing enough reluctant New Labour MPs to go along. Without the UK there would have been no coalition - most of the other Europeans would have quickly dropped out too. It is by no means clear that, despite Cheney's bluster, the Americans would have invaded Iraq alone.
So Kelly was the first man killed in the Iraq war. Hundreds of thousands of people died in Iraq after Kelly. Arms manufacturers, mercenary companies and the security industry made tens of billions in profit. That's a powerful motive to remove an obstacle. The Western oil companies are getting back into Iraq.
We will never know if Kelly would have gone on to repeat his - perfectly correct - doubts about Iraqi WMD, or if he would have shut up, as ordered by Tony Blair through the MOD. I do know, as many doctors have attested, it is extremely unlikely to bleed to death by cutting a wrist. I do know that the paramedics who attended said there was very little blood at the scene. I do know that the painkillers he took were a tiny proportion of a fatal dose and were not an anticoagulant. I do know that a chemical weapons expert like Dr Kelly would know better ways to kill himself.
And I do know that the government is keeping the evidence hidden for seventy years.

My own gut feeling about Kelly's murder is that the US SIS's were the instigators - probably without MI5/6 knowledge to make their message doubly clear. It's a vastly complex area but, having read Norman Baker's book (he blames the Iraqi's BTW) and most of the other public domain stuff, my best shot is that the wavering Limeys were 'made an offer they couldn't refuse' with David Kelly's silencing the opportunistic clincher.

Pure speculation I know - but it does have a certain ring to it in keeping with what we know of their modus operandi

[Magda Hassan]

To protect David Kelley's (grown up adult) children? heep: That makes no sense. If his children want to see the report/documents it can then be made public? Almost as bogus as Jack Ruby's excuse for shooting Oswald. Interesting timing with the coming appearance of war criminal Blair in front of the inquiry.

[Peter Presland]

Looks like we were a bit hasty over the 70 year gag.

This from the BBC:

Details of the post-mortem examination of government weapons inspector David Kelly should be seen by doctors seeking an inquest, Lord Hutton has said.

The peer confirmed he had requested a 70-year gagging order on the material at the conclusion of his inquiry into Dr Kelly's 2003 death.

But he said on Tuesday the purpose of the secrecy order had been to avoid causing distress to Dr Kelly's family.

He has written to ministers saying the report may be seen by the doctors.

Dr Kelly's body was found in woods close to his Oxfordshire home in 2003, shortly after it was revealed that he was the source of a BBC report casting doubt on the government's claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction capable of being fired within 45 minutes.

Challenge

An inquest was suspended by then Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer, who ruled that Lord Hutton's inquiry could take its place.

Lord Hutton's report in 2004 concluded that Dr Kelly had killed himself by cutting an artery in his wrist.

But the finding has been challenged by doctors who claim that the weapons inspector's stated injuries were not serious enough.

One of them, former assistant coroner Michael Powers, raised concerns over the secrecy order after seeing a letter from the legal team of Oxfordshire County Council explaining the unusual restrictions placed by Lord Hutton on material relating to his inquiry.

The letter stated: "Lord Hutton made a request for the records provided to the inquiry, not produced in evidence, to be closed for 30 years, and that medical (including post-mortem) reports and photographs be closed for 70 years."

On Tuesday, Lord Hutton released a statement explaining his decision and revealing that he had written to the Ministry of Justice.

In it, he said: "At the conclusion of my inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly, I requested that the post-mortem report relating to his death should not be disclosed for 70 years as I was concerned that the publication of that report in newspapers, books and magazines would cause his daughters and his wife further and unnecessary distress.

"Much of the material in the post-mortem report had been given in oral evidence in public at the inquiry and substantial parts of that evidence had been set out in my report.

"However, I consider that the disclosure of the report to doctors and their legal advisers for the purposes of legal proceedings would not undermine the protection which I wished to give to Dr Kelly's family, provided that conditions were imposed restricting the use and publication of the report to such proceedings, and I have written to the Ministry of Justice to this effect."

Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, who has conducted his own inquiries into Dr Kelly's death, said: "It's astonishing and unheard-of for material of this nature to be hidden away for any length of time, let alone 70 years.

"Coroners' inquests are held in public. Lord Hutton's inquiry was unique in its format and unique in requesting restrictions of this nature.

"His statement today undermines the validity of his own inquiry and gives further justification to the case being made by many for a proper inquest to be held into this most public of deaths."

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

[Peter Lemkin]

That the old fallback...the family's sensitivities....They tried that with the autopsy photos of JFK - and Jack Ruby even killed 'Oswald' to protect Jackie's sensitivities and a protracted trial.....ha, ha, HA! :evil:

[David Guyatt]

My increasing sense is that the US were driving this assassination. Did Bliar, the secret Opus Dei convert, know about it? Probably.