Police find body in bag at MI6 man's London flat

[Jan Klimkowski]

I realise that as a newbie here I will be treated with some caution (and understandably so). But I would just like to say that the site linked to by Jan K in the post before mine is one of the finest pieces of investigative work - "fictional" or otherwise - that I have seen in a long time.

Craig - welcome to DPF. I agree that "Winter Patriot's" Holmesian piece constitutes exemplary investigative digging, presented in a novel fashion.

"Former" counterintelligence agent Trowbridge H Ford's attempt to slur Williams as a traitor to western interests (see earlier in this thread) is also highly relevant to this hypothesis.

My own working hypothesis continues to be that Williams had discovered that his code-breaking work was contributing to the maintenance of a Big Lie (the "War on Terror"), and that he was either blowing, or about to blow, the whistle.

If "Winter Patriot" is correct in his Holmesian blog, and the "mystery Mediterranean couple" who the police claim visited the MI6 safe house are in fact one and the same as the "agent provocateur couple" in the Holland Park cafe, then the game is clear.

Unfortunately, it is highly unlikely that there will be any justice for Gareth Williams or his family, since these are Volkland Security matters.

[Magda Hassan]

Did the Russian mafia kill MI6 agent Gareth Williams?



Source claims Williams was working on system to foil Russian money-laundering


By Eliot Sefton
LAST UPDATED 2:51 PM, JUNE 26, 2011 Share


MI6 agent Gareth Williams, who was found dead zipped into a holdall in his London flat last year, was working on technology designed to thwart money-laundering by the Russian mafia.
The claim, made by an unnamed source in the Mail on Sunday, has sparked off yet another theory about how and why the 31-year-old died: that he was assassinated by a Russian gang to stop his work in its tracks.
The source said: "He was involved in a very sensitive project with the highest security clearance. He was not an agent doing surveillance, but was very much part of the team, working on the technology side, devising stuff like software.
"A knock-on effect of this technology would be that a number of criminal groups in Russia would be disrupted. Some of these powerful criminal networks have links with, and employ, former KGB agents who can track down people like Williams."
The Russian mafia theory is just the latest in a series which have failed to explain Williams's death. At first, police were said to be working on the theory that he had died when a bondage sex game went wrong.
This was quickly questioned, with the suggestion that Williams had been murdered and the bondage gear had been planted by his killer to throw investigators off the scent.
Next, Williams's uncle suggested that stories Williams was secretly gay, visited drag bars and had an extensive collection of designer women's dresses were indeed a smokescreen but one planted by the government.
In January this year, it was suggest that he had died in a bizarre accident brought about when he zipped himself into the bag as part of an art project.
The Russian mafia story may be flimsy - but it's at least more credible than that outlandish theory.


Filed under: Gareth Williams, The body in the holdall, MI6 murder, Gareth Williams Russian mafia, MI6 mafia link


Read more: http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/80842,news...z1R2EF9Qk2

[Danny Jarman]

Looks like very poor bait again to me Magda. Another story to deflect people off course from the truth.

[Magda Hassan]

Looks like very poor bait again to me Magda. Another story to deflect people off course from the truth.

Agreed Danny. Another red herring. Just putting it out here for the record.

[David Butler]

I know it's from the Mail but -

Russian Embassy car spotted near 'body in bag' spy's home days before he was murdered

Cars registered to the Russian Embassy were spotted near the home of a British spy just days before his body was discovered in a locked holdall at his London flat.
The unexplained presence of Russian diplomats in the area will add to suspicions that the MI6 officer was killed because of his work.

Gareth Williams is believed to have been working on spy technology tracking the movements of Russian money into Europe.

The 31-year-old was last seen alive on August 15 last year the same day a Kremlin car was identified near the officer's Pimlico flat.

In the days before Mr Williams's death, two cars with Russian diplomatic number plates were seen parked or driving close to his flat in Pimlico, Central London.

The vehicles' details were logged by a former KGB agent who fled to London 12 years ago after defecting to the West and who lives near Mr Williams's former home.

The 51-year-old, trained in surveillance and counter-surveillance, believes that the sudden appearance of the cars raises immediate suspicions.

The former agent, who has just realised how important his sightings are after reading about the case, observed the vehicles on his daily walk to local shops which took him past the flat.

Coincidence? The 31-year-old was last seen alive on August 15 last year - the same day a Kremlin car was identified near the officer's flat

On August 15 the agent logged a dark blue BMW 3 Series bearing the diplomatic number plate 251D198 seen being driven slowly along a road 50 yards from the flat. Mr Williams's naked body was finally discovered eight days later locked inside a large holdall in the bath at his top-floor flat.

CCTV images show him entering Holland Park Underground station at 3pm on August 14, three days after he returned from a holiday in the US, and he was spotted shopping in the West End and Knightsbridge.

A still image taken from a video security camera shows murder victim Gareth Williams at Holland Park tube station in London at 3pm on August 14, 2010

Earlier, around midday on August 12, the Russian car had been logged by the former agent, parked close to the junction with the road where Mr Williams lived, with the driver inside and the engine running.

The Russian Embassy, where the car is based, is four miles away at Kensington Gardens.

The following day, the agent noticed another Russian diplomatic car, a blue BMW 3 Series bearing the diplomatic number plate 251D306.

This time the car was spotted in the multi- storey car park directly behind Mr Williams's flat.

The agent saw the driver clearly and described him as male and aged 35 to 45 with a brown moustache.

He added: I saw him because he had to get out of the car to pay for a ticket. To my mind, these suspicious appearances show that the Russians were working in the area and were keeping someone under close surveillance.'

It has since been claimed that Mr Williams, who was on secondment to MI6 from the Government's eavesdropping centre GCHQ, was working on equipment that tracked the flow of money from Russia to Europe.

Gareth Williams was found dead in a locked holdall at his flat in Pimlico, London
Further suspicions that Mr Williams's death is linked to Russia were raised when it emerged that his former flat is owned by private company New Rodina.

In Russian, rodina' means motherland' and the name The Rodina Society was used as a cover operation for KGB activity in the West during the Cold War.
The inquest into Mr Williams's death which sparked several outlandish conspiracy theories resumes next month.

Up to 40 spies questioned by police could give evidence anonymously. No one has been arrested in connection with Mr Williams's death.

Post-mortem tests have failed to determine how he died and detectives say it would have been impossible for him to lock himself in the bag. No evidence of drugs, alcohol or poison has been found.

A spokeswoman for the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency said: We are unable to help with identifying any cars with diplomatic number plates.'

A Whitehall source said police were investigating the case.

The Russian Embassy declined to respond.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...z1UyID14Mu

[Jan Klimkowski]

I know it's from the Mail but -

Russian Embassy car spotted near 'body in bag' spy's home days before he was murdered

Cars registered to the Russian Embassy were spotted near the home of a British spy just days before his body was discovered in a locked holdall at his London flat.
The unexplained presence of Russian diplomats in the area will add to suspicions that the MI6 officer was killed because of his work.

Pretty much every "fact" in this Daily Mail story can only have come from intelligence sources. It's simply been channelled through "a former KGB agent who fled to London 12 years ago after defecting to the West and who lives near Mr Williams's former home".

The first narrative from SIS was that Williams was a secret S&M loving sexual freak, who liked dressing in women's clothing and died during an auto-asphyxiation game gone wrong.

My position is that the evidence presented in this thead suggests that, on the strong balance of possiblities, those claims are deliberately planted lies.

The second narrative involved the "mediterranean couple" who allegedly visited the intelligence safe house to visit Williams. Amazingly, rather than CCTV, Scotland Yard offered e-fits (artists' impressions).

Then evidence appeared suggesting that the "mediterranean couple" also featuing in the Kensington coffee bar mystery which Scotland Yard had investigated as enthusiastically as the Murdoch corruption and phone hacking cases. In other words, Scotland Yard decided not to investigate this matter.

So, something has gone drastically wrong with that faux legend.

The third narrative involves "former" counter-intelligence agent Trowbridge Ford, some time member here. I regard that tale as slightly more sophisticated disinformation, with elements of truth shining like diamonds in a cowpat.

The fourth narrative is "the Russkies did it".

On available evidence, I consider this as false as the other three kites floated by British intelligence, who remain the number one suspects in the murder of Gareth Williams.

[Malcolm Pryce]

The made-up detail in this story is laughable.

A former KGB defector happens to live near Gareth Williams and is seemingly in the habit of recording car numbers on his daily walk to the shops. He logs Russian diplomatic cars and then later when he reads about the case it suddenly occurs to him that they may have been involved. And, with quite remarkable powers of recall, recollects that the driver of one of those cars was aged about 35 - 45 with a brown moustache!

Really sloppy work by those Russian assassins - to go about their business in cars with diplomatic plates from the Russian embassy.

[Magda Hassan]

Don't suppose those Russians might have been there keeping an eye on their former employee to see what he was doing and to give him the occasional evil eye? :captain:

[Magda Hassan]

And, with quite remarkable powers of recall, recollects that the driver of one of those cars was aged about 35 - 45 with a brown moustache!

I've seen that man too!

[Peter Lemkin]

MI6 spy Gareth Williams was training to take on a new identity eight months before he was found dead, it was reported.

And a close friend also insisted he was not gay after detectives suggested the 31-year-old may have died at the hands of a mystery bondage sex partner he met on London's gay scene.

Sian Lloyd-Jones, 33, told the Mail on Sunday [this past one!] that before he died, Mr Williams was studying for a new identity as he visited her central London flat.

She said: "He said he was learning his new identity. It was all so relaxed. He often came round with his work. That night he came over with his box file and started going through it. He had two passports."

And she said Mr Williams was a straight man who was looking for a girlfriend.

She said: "He was open with his family, and if he was gay and had any temptations he would have spoken about them, especially to his sister. Hand on heart, there were no innuendos about him."

She added: "He cherished the time he had with his sister and with me and he wanted that with other girls."

Police have said it would have been impossible for the dead man to lock himself in the holdall where his naked body was found.

And they have revealed that forensic evidence indicates other people were in his Pimlico flat who they have been unable to trace.

But Scotland Yard said it is impossible to say whether Mr Williams was already dead when he was put in the bag or died from suffocation once zipped inside.
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Whatever became of the investigation that was to take place?~!