Plebgate

Kerguelen

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21985955

Well, well, well.

The plot thickens.

I suppose all those who were so quick to condemn Andrew Mitchell will be reconsidering their positions now that the video evidence doesn't support the media witch-hunt?

No...?

Didn't think so.

bails87

Didn't he admit that he swore at the police officers?

There may well have been some lying/collusion between the police and the Sun (surely not ) but his half hearted denials: "I didn't use the exact words attributed to me" didn't help.

Edit: that article says he denied swearing at them, I thought I'd heard him say before that he had.... who knows!? Mitchell and the police obviously, but neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Kerguelen

bails87 wrote:

...neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Both sides are bad, but it's obvious which side you're taking.

hubgearfan

This whole affair: what a massive waste of time, money and effort over nothing! UK society seems to be getting sillier and sillier!

rick_chasey

So the Met isn't playing entirely fairly?

Now there's a surprise...

pdw

bails87 wrote:

Edit: that article says he denied swearing at them, I thought I'd heard him say before that he had.... who knows!? Mitchell and the police obviously, but neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Yeah, I think that's just typically shoddy news.bbc reporting. I think he was pretty quick to own up to swearing - even the previous articles linked from that one include that admission.

Given what we know now, I suspect that the officers involved were deliberately attempting to wind him up by stopping him from using the gates that I presume that he used every other day. When they succeeded in getting him to swear, they figured that they could grossly exaggerate what he actually said, and that he'd be out of a job long before any of dear press bothered to separate the facts from the fiction.

Sadly they were right. Irrespective of what you think of Mitchell or his policies, this is an appauling way to treat people.

bails87

Kerguelen wrote:

bails87 wrote:

...neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Both sides are bad, but it's obvious which side you're taking.

I'm not taking sides, unlike the person who started the thread....

CiB

bails87 wrote:

Didn't he admit that he swore at the police officers?

There may well have been some lying/collusion between the police and the Sun (surely not ) but his half hearted denials: "I didn't use the exact words attributed to me" didn't help.

Edit: that article says he denied swearing at them, I thought I'd heard him say before that he had.... who knows!? Mitchell and the police obviously, but neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Tosh. The whole case against Mitchell was that he'd called the police Plebs. He'd vigorously denied this whilst openly admitting to swearing, which was a side issue as the story was entirely built on the use of the term pleb, the use of which proved that Tories see themselves as being above those that protect them apparently.

Fast forward to C4's expose of the collusion between police and their relatives, and the CCTV that didn't so much 'cast doubt on the story' (c) BBC but show it to be a complete fabrication, that crowds of onlookers were 'visibly shocked and taken aback at Mitchell's outburst' when the area around the Downing Street gates was devoid of anyone except one chap ambling past with his bike.

It's a p!ss poor state of affairs when the police can take it upon themselves to make up a story to bring about a result that suits their own agenda, even though we shouldn't be surprised, given their previous on making up evidence to fit up the accused.

bails87

What's tosh? That"denial" was all he said on the matter for ages. In fact from a quick google the reports of him admitting to swearing are all 'reportedly' or 'a friend claimed' rather than from the horses mouth.

I think if you look through some of my other posts you'll see my criticism of the unhealthy relationship between the press and police (Hillsborough, Forest gate, de menezes, etc), so don't think that I'm taking their word as gospel.

I was just saying that as someone who wasn't there I can only rely on what is reported, and when the most robust denial is "I didn't use those exact words" it's hard to see someone as entirely innocent. Personally I think the swearing is as bad, if not worse than, the p-word..... if I swore at the police i'd probably be arrested, after all.

Like you say, for the press, the use of 'pleb' was a bigger deal, and if that was made up then yes, they've got a lot to answer for. But like I said, I'm well aware of the press and police doing each other's dirty work.

It's a mess all round tbh. Man who should know better swears at police. Police change the story. Press report made up version without checking. Other press then find out that the first lot of press and the police are lying but the bloke in the middle of it has already been got rid of because his boss hasn't got the chutzpah to say "let's wait until we know what happened".

One way of looking at it was the press reminding Cameron how difficult they could make life for him if they wanted to, a timely shot across the bows before Leveson....

itboffin

who cares ...?

really

Stevo_666

daviesee

itboffin wrote:

who cares ...?

really

I don't care about the initial event. Only the naive don't know that all MPs are full of their own self importance.
I do care about the police lying and the press presenting fiction as fact.

Kerguelen

bails87 wrote:

Kerguelen wrote:

bails87 wrote:

...neither of them can be trusted to be entirely honest.

Both sides are bad, but it's obvious which side you're taking.

I'm not taking sides, unlike the person who started the thread....

Oh, hilarious.

At least you got to take a shot at the big bad Tories, that'll solve all out problems won't it.

Drfabulous0

You really have to doubt what is reported in the media and shown on CCTV. Many years ago I was attacked and threatened with a gun but overpowered my assailants and beat them up. I was subsequently arrested and charged with various offences. At my trial the police produced badly edited CCTV footage of me beating up three guys and wielding a pistol. If my defence team had not obtained the original footage. which showed something entirely different, I would most likely be serving a heavy sentance (you know, like a 3 month community order).

Wrath Rob

daviesee wrote:

itboffin wrote:

who cares ...?

really

I don't care about the initial event. Only the naive don't know that all MPs are full of their own self importance.
I do care about the police lying and the press presenting fiction as fact.

This. How can you not care that the police can present something wholly inaccurate as fact which causes someone to loose their job and reputation (however positive or negative that is)? What if it was you? Or your someone in your family?

We rely on the police to uphold the law, not to break it by fabricating evidence.