Sheridan perjury trial opens on Monday

[Knotted]

So the trial's been in the news every night but no-one's commenting?

I don't think anybody here thinks that criticism of the media is the height of socialist activity. But since you seem to I'm surprised you haven't picked up on how crappy the reporting has been.

The Record:

Mr Bird replied: "You were the one causing pain, putting her through all sorts of things behind her back."

The Scotsman:

Mr Bird replied: "I think you were the one causing the emotional pain, putting her through all sorts of things behind her back."

Somebody's being sloppy.

Point of fact - I don't think any part of the media stakes much of it's reputation on accurate reporting. It almost goes without saying that Anvar Khan sexed up her story somewhat. I don't think you'll see plumeting sales for the News of the World as a result.

 

[q_w_e_r_t_y]

by Loki and R a Double B

""Liar liar pants ablaze, you sold the schemes a dream and lied to their face ...
the blaze that will trail in the wake of this callous failed misogynist slash alpha male,
can't believe I used to idolise him"

 

[DexterTCN]

Detective Fraser's testimony today.

When court reconvened this morning the first witness for the Crown was Detective Sergeant Gerald Fraser of Lothian and Borders police. DS Fraser told the court that he had 28 years service with the police and had played an "extensive role" on the case of Tommy and Gail Sheridan.


Alex Prentice QC, the Advocate Depute began by presenting to the witness telephone records obtained from the Scottish Parliament for Tommy Sheridan's mobile telephone. The witness was shown a record that Mr Sheridan's telephone was used to call a particular telephone number on two occasions on the 18th November 2006. These calls were timed at 18:43 and 19: 28. There was then a record of a call to voicemail at 20:44.


DS Fraser was then shown a portion of the "McNeilage tape" and the witnesses attention was drawn to the "timestamp" at the beginning of the video, 19:32 on 18/11/0. DS Fraser was then shown the tape's transcript and agreed this stated the time of the tape's conclusion as 20:32. The witness agreed that in the tape no use of a telephone is shown and further agreed that this fitted with the times of calls shown on the bill.

That's a bit confusing...there's people here been saying that the tape was kosher and that they've discussed it directly with the guy who's taped it. Now we seem to have direct evidence that it's fabricated. Back up by phone records and an answering machine (not sure why that's relevant as it seems to be after the taping) recording, no less, investigated by the police.

Mr Sheridan then asked DS Fraser if he would be "surprised" if a police officer would interview a witness in the presence of a journalist, the witness confirmed he would. Mr Sheridan then asked DS Fraser if he was aware that a member of the inquiry team, DC Wilson had spoken to Katrine Trolle at the home of Lorna Martin with Ms Martin present, the witness said he was not aware of that. Mr Sheridan then produced an email from Katrine Trolle to DC Wilson where she thanks him for bringing "Coffee and muffins this morning" and goes on to give the details of her Danish bank account. Mr Sheridan told the court that the defence had not been given any statement from DC Wilson about this meeting and asked if meeting a witness at a jounalists home was "improper" DS Fraser answered that it was "not normal"

Sorry? Here's an email with my bank details? That's not good. Can anyone offer a suggestion as to why she's sending her bank details to a policeman? Widows and Orphans fund?

The defence wasn't given this information? Well...it would be a bit awkward, wouldn't it.

Mr Sheridan then asked DS Fraser about the testimony in 2006 by Fiona McGuire, the witness told the court that after investigation it "appeared she was not telling the truth"

That's not good either, is it?

Could be a Merry Dexmas after all.

 

[Cobbles]

Could be a Merry Dexmas after all.

Hardly, Tommy's liable to drag out his "defence" with as much grandstanding and bluster as he can before the Judge intervenes so that this drags on into the new year (so that he can spend Xmas at home with his loving wife and the wean as opposed to in the Bar-L where he belongs).

 

[DexterTCN]

Having looked over it...the prosecution case now finished...they have not presented one piece of evidence. A NotW journo making claims, a bunch of political wannabees who it seems have all been given money by NotW. No mobile phone location records as were promised, no cctv (even of garages, shops), no corroboration of the best man's video (which now appears to be 100% fake as admitted by the police - even though a policeman testified on the stand that in his opinion it was Sheridan...oops).

Where were the 180 witnesses then?

£1.1 million spent by the police, up 21 officers at a time for over a year (?), the police hanging around Trolle with journos, Trolle emailing her bank details tp the police (come on...seriously...no-one thinks that's suspicious?), the treatment of Gail in a police interview....

Can't wait for the defence.

 

[Alan G]

Detective Fraser's testimony today.

That's a bit confusing...there's people here been saying that the tape was kosher and that they've discussed it directly with the guy who's taped it. Now we seem to have direct evidence that it's fabricated. Back up by phone records and an answering machine (not sure why that's relevant as it seems to be after the taping) recording, no less, investigated by the police.

I'm confused by the timeline you are quoting:

18:43 Tommy on phone

19:28 Tommy on phone

19:32 until 20:32 video being recorded

20:44 Tommy on phone.

Can you explain how this is direct evidence the tape is fabricated as you claim?

 

[DexterTCN]

I'm assuming it's from the location of the mobile at the time of the calls.

Also...I'm quoting the testimony in the court - if you think there's an error in the questioning you should spell it out yourself instead of questioning me. It would be nice if you had something more to say than merely comments on my posts.

As to regards the tape itself - I'm not sure if it's been presented as evidence by the prosecution. It doesn't seem to have been verified by anyone and, indeed, all sides have stated that it has been edited.

 

[DexterTCN]

It may also be that the 19:28 call lasted more than 4 minutes, which can be implied by the questioning. Again, it was Prentice QC that thought it was worth questioning the plod about it.

 

[Alan G]

You're implying a lot. You read that timeline and declared that there was direct evidence the tape was fabricated.

If for example the timeline was:
19:00 tape starts
19:10 tommys phone records show 10minute phone call
19:20 tape ends

and tape shows no phone call then that would be the case. I fail to see how the timeline is proof the tape is fake. Unless you have info about length of calls which contradicts this. But surely that would have been mentioned in court if it was the case no?

And the reason I commented on your post is because you said

That's a bit confusing...there's people here been saying that the tape was kosher and that they've discussed it directly with the guy who's taped it. Now we seem to have direct evidence that it's fabricated. Back up by phone records and an answering machine (not sure why that's relevant as it seems to be after the taping) recording, no less, investigated by the police.

And I was querying as I had not came to these conclusions based on the timeline presented and was curious if I had missed anything in what was reported.

 

[where to]

It may also be that the 19:28 call lasted more than 4 minutes, which can be implied by the questioning. Again, it was Prentice QC that thought it was worth questioning the plod about it.

is this the only thing you post about? do you have politics too?

 

[DexterTCN]

Don't you keep up, Alan?

Maggie Scott QC, acting for Mr Sheridan touched on the question of the video during her Friday afternoon cross examination of Caroline Leckie (see below) Ms Scott showed the end of a version of the tape which has an on screen timer and asked Ms Leckie what 62.24 minus 38.38 was (I assume to point out that the prosecution had not shown the whole recording)

Reporting of testimony Friday 8th October 2010. You should probably verify that yourself. There's 20 minutes missing from the tape. Would you like that at the beginning or at the end?

 

[Alan G]

Keep up with what?

I am not looking at the timeline and declaring the tape a fake because of it. But you declared it did, so maybe you should show the timeline and how that is "direct evidence that it's fabricated"

 

[DexterTCN]

Seems plain enough to me, I thought my last post explained it fine. By the way there's no point editing your posts to add additional info, you're better just making a new post.

 

[weepiper]

As for fabricated..... The defence begins....

The court later heard from two sisters, Joyce Drummond and Irene Lang, former SSP members.

They told the jury about a meeting they had with the party's Colin Fox in May 2006, where Mr Fox is said to spoken of a plot to "get" Mr Sheridan within the party and asked for their help to "clear out" his opponents.

Both witnesses said Mr Fox told them that at an SSP meeting in 2004, Sheridan had denied allegations that he had attended the sex club Cupid's, admitting only to a relationship with the journalist Anvar Khan "years ago".

The Crown has alleged that Mr Sheridan confessed to visiting the Manchester swingers' club at an SSP meeting in November 2004 .

The court heard Mr Sheridan's local SSP branch in Cardonald had asked for the minutes of that meeting to be destroyed.

The 2006 document claimed people were "entitled to a private life" without "Big Brother-style" intrusion.

Prosecutor Mr Prentice challenged Ms Lang on the reference to "destroy" the minutes or any document regarding "Comrade Sheridan".

She said: "There was a reference to that, but it was not meant literally."

These two are a laugh and a half. It wasn't a 'reference as the central part of a mtion they wewre mdistributing at a Glasgow all members meet ingjust before the trial in 2006. There was no doubting what destroy the minutes meant when it was raised at the meeting.

 

[Fedayn]

That was me posting the above.

 

[DexterTCN]

The jury will surely consider whether they've received payment from anyone while weighing the testimonies of everyone.

Did I hear that their were more women than men in it? Don't really want to google 'ts trial jury'

The evidence came across as not the strongest. Certainly not the joined up, self-referential evidence from many of those testifying for the prosecution.

Balanced out, however, by the evidence of Hugh Kerr and Alan Brown the other day.

 

[Fedayn]

The jury will surely consider whether they've received payment from anyone while weighing the testimonies of everyone.

Did I hear that their were more women than men in it? Don't really want to google 'ts trial jury'

The evidence came across as not the strongest. Certainly not the joined up, self-referential evidence from many of those testifying for the prosecution.

Balanced out, however, by the evidence of Hugh Kerr and Alan Brown the other day.

The issue regarding Joyce & Irene is obvious, if there was no details in the minutes why call for them to be destroyed, why even think they need destroyed? It's not really difficult to see why they wanted that course of action is it?!

Hugh Kerrs 'evidence' was no more than 'the women had it in for Tommy'. There was no actual corroborated evidence. Like many in the party I have personal experience of his 'evidence' because he claimed my old SSP branch hated him because we voted for someone else in an election other than him. That was the sum total of his 'evidence'.

As for Alan, sound bloke and a good union rep in my union. However even his evidence merely contradicts aonther witnesses evidence who said he was at the festival but on the Saturday night. If so why was this this evidence not used at the original trial??

 

[DexterTCN]

Katherine Trolle, iirc, said there wasn't a festival on that night and that the note in his (TS) diary was merely code for the Cupid trip. The Cupid trip that Trolle and Khan said was in a car that made at least 3 stops in the Strathclyde area (Trolle, Khan, 2 men) going down to Manchester with a rest stop (Khan and Trolle testimony iirc) and no cctv evidence from speed cameras, petrol garages etc. No mobile records were presented from any of the witnesses or the prosecution for that date. No credit card receipts, cashline withdrawals - no actual evidence.

21 police officers on this case, mind.

Kerr testified that he was present when a bug was found in TS car. Kerr testified that he had not taken any payments from the media for his testimony, unlike the large majority of the prosecution witnesses, many of whom actively sought payments from notw and others. Regarding payments there's still no reason given for Trolle emailing her bank details to a policeman - the same policeman (I think) who was interviewing people and taking statements in the presence of a journalist.

Mobile phone records were presented showing that TS had made a number of calls during the time of his alleged taping by McNeilage but that McNeilage has edited those bits out of the tape. That would be pretty unarguable evidence, can I suggest that the tape's been edited precisely because the police/notw new about the timing of those calls from their (the police) use of the HOMES computer system (testified by DS Fraser).

Can't wair for Coulson and Mulcair next week, although I ca't see Mulcair saying anything, he has a notw noose around his neck already.

 

[Fedayn]

Katherine Trolle, iirc, said there wasn't a festival on that night and that the note in his (TS) diary was merely code for the Cupid trip. The Cupid trip that Trolle and Khan said was in a car that made at least 3 stops in the Strathclyde area (Trolle, Khan, 2 men) going down to Manchester with a rest stop (Khan and Trolle testimony iirc) and no cctv evidence from speed cameras, petrol garages etc. No mobile records were presented from any of the witnesses or the prosecution for that date. No credit card receipts, cashline withdrawals - no actual evidence.

21 police officers on this case, mind.

Kerr testified that he was present when a bug was found in TS car. Kerr testified that he had not taken any payments from the media for his testimony, unlike the large majority of the prosecution witnesses, many of whom actively sought payments from notw and others. Regarding payments there's still no reason given for Trolle emailing her bank details to a policeman - the same policeman (I think) who was interviewing people and taking statements in the presence of a journalist.

Mobile phone records were presented showing that TS had made a number of calls during the time of his alleged taping by McNeilage but that McNeilage has edited those bits out of the tape. That would be pretty unarguable evidence, can I suggest that the tape's been edited precisely because the police/notw new about the timing of those calls from their (the police) use of the HOMES computer system (testified by DS Fraser).

Can't wair for Coulson and Mulcair next week, although I ca't see Mulcair saying anything, he has a notw noose around his neck already.

But where am I saying there was? There's no cctv evidence that TS was in Glasgow neither, it's, yet again, people saying one thing and others contradicting them.

Allll it is is evidence that he made calls, not that he isn't in the tape or wasn't being taped.

Of course Kerr said that, but so could a large number of SSP members who weren't paid. By Kerrs logic that makes their evidence just as credible as his.
The 'large majority' of prosecution witnesses were paid? I have to say I don't know, if that is the case you can prove this I take it? And, as I said, Kerr could provide no evidence about the alleged campaign waged against TS, it's just his claim.

 

[DexterTCN]

I wasn't arguing with you as such, Fed - I was just throwing back other bits of testimony. There's no reason for the jury to think that Kerr is more or less trustworthy than the prosecution's witnesses. Apart from the fact that the NotW, loser in the original case, has doled out an awful lot of money to certain people, Khan demanded what? an editorship or something (bartered down iirc) to get evidence against TS? McNeilage £200,000, Trolle originally denied getting offers from notw. These people are the main prosecution witnesses.

The police have spent millions and had up to 20 officers on the case at times, where is the evidence beyond reasonable doubt?

I think Trolle originally swore that Cupids was 2001 and then later changed that to 2002. Trolle got muffins and Gail got accused of IRA training down the station.

 

[Fedayn]

I wasn't arguing with you as such, Fed - I was just throwing back other bits of testimony. There's no reason for the jury to think that Kerr is more or less trustworthy than the prosecution's witnesses. Apart from the fact that the NotW, loser in the original case, has doled out an awful lot of money to certain people, Khan demanded what? an editorship or something (bartered down iirc) to get evidence against TS? McNeilage £200,000, Trolle originally denied getting offers from notw. These people are the main prosecution witnesses.

The police have spent millions and had up to 20 officers on the case at times, where is the evidence beyond reasonable doubt?

I think Trolle originally swore that Cupids was 2001 and then later changed that to 2002. Trolle got muffins and Gail got accused of IRA training down the station.

And Khan also refused to do wht the NotW asked re phoning him up.

Well i'm assuming the jury will decide what is and isn't beyond reasonable doubt. Having been in court there's been times when imho TS has made some very telling points and also when Prentice has made some very telling points.

 

[DexterTCN]

The Rosemary Byrne evidence was massive...and uncontested...

She, Sheridan and another were paying for the party through credit cards and loans.

 

[belboid]

charges dropped against Gail

 

[DexterTCN]

I wonder what the jury will make of that, after the heavy-handed shit by the police.

I think the defence has been pretty good in the main.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

charges dropped against Gail

That's all of the charges against Gail and a number of the charges against Tommy dropped since the prosecution began.

 

[belboid]

just one charge left against him, isnt it?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

just one charge left against him, isnt it?

I'm not actually sure. I know that all of the charges against Gail are gone, and the charges against Tommy related to the Moat Hotel and also the charge related to Colin Fox are gone. I don't know how many counts remain against Tommy.

 

[DexterTCN]

So, to the jury, will it look like the prosecution held out the charges until the very end to fuck her up?

The Trolle evidence is pretty damaged after she said that the Festival (or whatever) was code for the sex party, the neutrals have mostly agreed with the Sheridans, the dropping of charges based on Fox's allegations pretty much says 'ignore what this man says'. NotW complicity, NotW payments to so many people involved here.

Some are partisan, others see meta.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

I'm not actually sure. I know that all of the charges against Gail are gone, and the charges against Tommy related to the Moat Hotel and also the charge related to Colin Fox are gone. I don't know how many counts remain against Tommy.

I think there is only one charge of perjury still standing against TS and that is it. The trail is supposedly going to finish by the end of this week.

 

[Fullyplumped]

There are six remaining charges of perjury against Tommy Sheridan, according to the Advocate Depute in his closing speech to the jury today.

The politician remains accused of lying during his successful defamation action against the News of the World in 2006. He was awarded £200,000 following the civil case he launched after the Sunday tabloid printed an article claiming he was an adulterer who visited swingers' clubs. Sheridan originally faced more than a dozen claims of lying under oath at the start of the trial.

Five allegations, one of which was broken down into two sections in the indictment, were withdrawn today and six now remain.