A belated Happy New Year to everyone
There has been a distinct lack of activity on the site for two reasons a) We have had to deal with a Legal issue arising from people discussing a case before it was heard in court and b) Admin and I have been extremely busy with other matters. We are hoping to re-activate the Forum within the next week. It will only be available to members at first.
Flowers in Gods Garden is being published on April 30th
but it will be exclusively available via www.truecrimepublishing.com approximately two weeks before that date. The book is being published in Hardback and will cost £10 plus P&P.
The six part Faces TV series is currently in production and it looks as if it will be aired in June 2012. Faces Part two (the book) will not now be published until October/November 2012.
I am currently working on three books. Wayne Barkers Autobiography: Born Fighter (All you have in the end is your story) Billy Clare's Autobiography Psycho Sinner Saint? And a book about the Liverpool Underworld based around Jeanette Burke's case titled: Once Upon A Time In The `Pool.` (possibly Once Upon A Time In Liverpool.
Next month Faces the Cafe opens in County Durham. It is a large traditional Cafe themed around the Faces project. I am currently trying to arrange a Faces photo Exhibition in Manchester but since the riots establishments are not keen to host events they think is linked to crime. I think the London Exhibition is being held in March. (The Faces TV people are organising it as the wrap party for the series)
We are all looking forward to the site becoming active again, speak soon, Bernie
Spare a thought for Dave Courtneys wife and child, how can ANYBODY even pretend to admire the wife and child beating loser.
Jennybean Courtney
Can everyone stop congratulating me on Dave being home. He went to jail for racially abusing me and beating me n Courtney up. We r no longer together, obviously. He'd like people to believe that he was locked up in connection with our sons murder, I can, with my hand on my heart, swear to u all that there is no connection between Dave and Gensons murder. He couldn't kill anyone let alone our son. Beat up women and children, yes, murder, definately not. As for someone doing it for him, there is no-one on this earth that would go out of their way to honour anything like that for him, trust me, I lived there with him. Aint nothing but Facebookers and a lot of people he don't actually like that he has it with. Trust me. I made tea for the lot of em. I just want to focus on the murderer of my son being brought to justice. Nothing else actually matters.
Peace
Jennybean
25/01/12 - Probe into use of supergrass in Leigh murder
By Jon Austin, Essex Echo
THE use of a supergrass by Essex Police to secure a murder conviction following a gangland execution has come under scrutiny.
In December, 2006, Ricky Percival was convicted of killing Dean Boshell at the Manchester Drive allotments, Leigh, in February 2001.
The conviction came after Damon Alvin, who was originally charged with the murder, agreed to testify against Percival to get himself acquitted.
Now the Government-funded Criminal Case Review Commission, which investigates potential miscarriages of justice, is investigating the safety of Alvin’s evidence alongside a number of unconnected cases, to see if there are any grounds for appeal.
The commission is also examining three convictions of former police officers found guilty of corruption on the basis of supergrass evidence.
There are also concerns the whole system of using such witnesses is so discredited it is unworkable after senior officers described it as like “dancing with the devil.”
The commission is taking into account the fact Percival passed an official lie detector test at Swaleside Prison on the Isle of Sheppy, Kent, when he denied the murder.
The case of Percival’s conviction is believed to be unique in that Alvin, a career criminal, was due to stand trial, but said he wanted to change his account and agreed to turn Queen’s evidence the night before.
There are also concerns his evidence, which put Percival away for a minimum of 26 years, was largely uncorroborated.
The commission will also look at concerns about police funding of supergrasses.
It is alleged in the case of Alvin that Essex Police spent at least £35,000 in five-and-a-half months on the convicted drug dealer, who had a record for violence and burglary and a known involvement with firearms.
The Observer newspaper said documents it had obtained showed expenditure included giving him £7,125 to buy a car, £468 for a laptop and £82 on an enclosure for his tortoises while he was being looked after by the police. Alvin was given a new identity as part of the witness protection programme and he and his family were relocated.
The newspaper also alleged the force facilitated the sale of his home while he was in prison from which he benefited by more than £190,000.
Essex Police refused to comment.
Speaking to the Observer, Percival said: “I still cannot really believe what happened to me. When I first came into prison I was in some kind of intense shock: I couldn’t sleep, I was having nightmares, I was turning it all over in my mind – how could this happen in the British justice system?”
His mother, Sandy Percival, added. “My son has done wrong, I know that, but he is not a murderer. There is no proof he did any of these things. It is all Alvin’s word against his.”
22/01/12 - Supergrass convictions face legal challenges
Murder and police corruption convictions fast-tracked to appeal court as questions are raised about reliability and the cost of cultivating criminals
Guardian
A series of supergrass convictions are being investigated for possible legal challenges amid growing concern over the safety of using such criminal witnesses and the millions of pounds spent to cultivate them.
In one of a string of cases being examined by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), a career criminal who was accused of murder turned supergrass on the eve of his jury trial. Damon Alvin went on to provide uncorroborated evidence which convicted another man for the killing.
The use of Alvin was unique, prosecutors said, the first case where a murder charge had been dropped against a defendant who went on to give testimony that jailed another man for life.
Essex police spent tens of thousands of pounds on Alvin, and allegedly facilitated the sale of his home while he was in prison from which he benefited by more than £190,000. But intelligence showed the property had been bought from the proceeds of his criminal career and the money was liable for seizure under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
Essex police refused to comment on the issue.
The Alvin case is being investigated by the CCRC for possible referral to the court of appeal amid claims that the whole system of using such witnesses is so discredited as to be unworkable.
The commission is also examining three convictions of former police officers found guilty of corruption on the basis of supergrass evidence.
The CCRC has fast-tracked their inquiries into these convictions, such is the concern over their safety.
The Guardian understands at least two more murder convictions are shortly to be submitted to the commission in applications that focus on the unreliability of evidence from criminal supergrasses.
Karen Todner, who represents the three former police officers, said: "I think there should be court of appeal guidelines on supergrass evidence. The use of such evidence has now been so discredited that I don't think there should be any future prosecutions that solely rely on it."
The new challenges come after a senior police officer likened the use of supergrasses to "dancing with the devil" and follow the collapse last year of three high- profile cases which cost tens of millions.
Documents obtained by the Guardian in the Alvin case show Essex police spent at least £35,000 in five and a half months on the convicted drug dealer, who had a record for violence and burglary and a known involvement with firearms. The expenditure included giving him £7,125 to buy a car, £468 for a laptop and £82.68 on an enclosure for his tortoises while he was being looked after by the police. Alvin was given a new identity as part of the witness protection programme and he and his family were relocated.
The man convicted on his evidence, Ricky Percival, 32, has been protesting his innocence for six years. He passed a lie detector test in prison last year and has passed the results to the CCRC.
The CCRC is fast-tracking an examination into the convictions of three former Metropolitan police officers, Thomas Kingston, Thomas Reynolds and Terance O'Connell, who were jailed over drug-related corruption in the south-east regional crime squad. The legitimacy of supergrass evidence is central to their case.
During an anti-corruption inquiry by the Met, Kingston and Reynolds were convicted in 2000 of conspiracy to supply a class B drug while O'Connell was convicted of intending to pervert the course of justice, on evidence provided by another officer who turned supergrass, Neil Putnam. Putnam had pleaded guilty to drugs offences for which he received a reduced sentence in return for his testimony.
The collapse of the case against two other officers was one of the high-profile failed supergrass prosecutions last year. Christopher Drury and Robert Clark were cleared of corruption charges after the Crown Prosecution Service abandoned their retrial when a drug dealer who had given evidence against them rescinded her testimony.
Eve Fleckney, who testified against Clark and Drury at their first trial when they were jailed for 10 and eight years for drugs offences, said she had no recollection of any criminality involving the two former detectives. Fleckney told the court that anti-corruption officers had threatened her with a long prison sentence unless she co-operated. "Sometimes they would be nice and sometimes horrible. They'd shout. I felt under threat. They controlled my life." Clark and Drury are now seeking compensation and damages from the Met.
Last year a £30m case against three men for the murder of the private detective Daniel Morgan was brought down after evidence from three supergrass witnesses was found to be dangerous and totally unreliable. The star witness, Gary Eaton, a career criminal with psychiatric problems and convictions for bribing police, blackmail and firearms offences, was found to be a pathological liar. The trial judge ruled he had been "prompted and coached" by a senior police officer in the case.
An attempt by the CPS to use Eaton in a separate trial for conspiracy to murder failed when another judge ruled he was "not just unreliable, but highly dangerous".
Police spent more than £70,000 on Eaton over 11 months and he was rewarded for his testimony, with 25 years being cut from the jail sentence he would have received for his own crimes. He has since been released.
Kevin Winter, a lawyer with close knowledge of the use of such witnesses, said there remained serious concerns about the supergrass process. "These people are ultimately self-serving and self-motivated," he said.
"Many are alleged criminals themselves whose credibility, integrity and reliability are very much suspect and subject to all sorts of concerns. The whole notion of relying solely on that person's testimony to send someone to prison for a very long time raises matters of great concern.
"There has to be the greatest scrutiny given to testing that individual and their credibility, the integrity of the whole process comes down to that."
The Association of Chief Police Officers lead on crime, Jon Murphy, and other senior officers have expressed concerns at the cost of using such witnesses and the reliability of their evidence. Murphy likened their use to "dancing with the devil".
The police have persisted with using supergrass or "assisting offenders" because they believe that in difficult to solve cases, where their investigations are met with a wall of silence as a result of gang loyalties and threats of violence, there is no alternative.
When the use of such witnesses with formalised in 2005 by the Serious Organised Crime Act, the-then home secretary David Blunkett argued that giving criminals who inform on others shorter sentences for providing information was essential to tackle the growing business and organised crime.
But the system is shrouded in secrecy. Since January 2006, 158 criminals have been recruited as witnesses across England and Wales. A freedom of information request by the Guardian – requiring details of where they were used, the outcome of the trials and the number of cases won on appeal – has been refused by the CPS. Repeated requests to the CPS for more details on the cases have also been turned down.
A CPS spokeswoman said no more details could be released because of the danger of identifying individuals involved.
22/01/12 - How supergrass Damon Alvin turned the tables in gangland murder case
Police protect informer who escaped trial by fingering drug dealer Ricky Percival
Guardian
By the time Dean Boshell's blood-soaked body was found in allotments on the outskirts of Leigh-on-Sea in Essex, rigor mortis had set in. He had been shot once in the head before the killer fired twice more into his temple.
The death of Boshell, a 24-year-old petty criminal and police informant, in February 2001 took detectives from Essex police into the heart of the violent and feuding criminal gangs that competed for control of the drugs scene around Southend. When a conviction for Boshell's murder was eventually secured, they made legal history with their use of unprecedented supergrass evidence.
Prosecutors described the case as unique: the first time a murder charge had been dropped against one individual, who then went on to become the crown's star supergrass witness against another man who was ultimately convicted.
Six years on, however, the activities of Essex detectives and prosecutors, and the lengths they went to in order to convict someone for the murder, are coming under scrutiny – along with a string of other convictions which have relied solely on the uncorroborated word of supergrasses.
In the murky world of the supergrasses, most of whom are criminals who snitch on former friends to cut their own jail time, the case of Damon Alvin is unsurpassed. He started his criminal career in his early teens and by his mid-20s was running a mini drugs empire from his dormer bungalow in Benfleet, Essex.
Over the years he had been convicted of several offences and been in and out of prison. He had convictions for violence, burglary and drugs offences, and police intelligence showed he was a skilled liar who was involved with firearms.
It was during one of his frequent spells in jail that Alvin met Boshell and the pair became close; but the relationship was not on equal terms. According to court papers, Alvin treated Boshell as a gofer, while the younger man looked up to him as a brother.
When Boshell was found dead on a cold morning in February 11 years ago, it was a sign to police that rivalries between groups of criminals engaged in supplying drugs in the region had boiled over. Detectives turned first to known associates of the dead man: Alvin, and another known drug dealer, Ricky Percival.
Percival had built a drug-dealing business around individuals he met within the Essex bodybuilding scene, according to legal sources close to the case.
But during a frustrating inquiry, which for years seemed to go nowhere, it was Alvin that the police focus returned to repeatedly. Arrested three times in three years for the murder, he was often pressed to talk and name others who might have been involved, but always refused. In 2003, after he had been arrested for supplying 1kg of cocaine, detectives recruited him as an informant in their efforts to disrupt local drug gangs, according to court papers.
After his third arrest, detectives charged Alvin with the Boshell murder on the basis of mobile phone evidence which proved his alibi for the night was a lie.
The mobile footprint revealed Alvin had driven to Southend to collect Boshell on the night he died – something he had never mentioned. Percival and two others were charged with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice; the police alleged they had made up an alibi for the night.
What happened as Alvin faced his murder trial is now being scrutinised by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC). Two weeks into the trial at Chelmsford crown court, while lawyers were arguing about admissible evidence, Alvin indicated he wanted to change his story.
He spoke out after a successful application by the prosecution to admit into evidence police contact sheets which would reveal to a jury that the dead man was a police informant, who had been passing information to detectives about Alvin for several serious offences – thus providing a murder motive.
The trial was halted and in interviews with the police, Alvin accused Percival of being responsible for Boshell's death. Alvin admitted for the first time that he had been at the allotments on the night of the murder, but said he had stood by as Percival first threw bleach in the victim's face, before shooting him dead. Alvin also implicated Percival in a string of other crimes he himself was suspected of, and later admitted to, including the attempted murder of three people in a gangland feud.
The police will not comment on the case but are likely to argue that Alvin – facing possible conviction for a crime he had not committed – finally agreed to inform on the individual responsible at the 11th hour.
Percival, however, says Alvin did his deal with the police to escape the murder charge and in doing so fingered an "innocent" man.
Peter Hughman, a solicitor who has acted for Percival, said: "There is something strange in relying on uncorroborated evidence from a person of simply appalling character."
Eight days later, the Crown Prosecution Service sent Alvin a letter announcing the Boshell murder charge was being dropped. He became the crown's star supergrass witness against Percival, and entered into a deal with police and prosecutors which required him to confess all his criminality.
Over five and a half months, Essex detectives spent 94 hours interviewing Alvin. In December 2006, after an 11-week trial, Percival was convicted on the basis of Alvin's evidence of the murder of Boshell and given life with a recommendation he serve a minimum of 28 years in prison.
Today Alvin is living under a new identity, having been relocated following two and a half years in jail for a string of offences he admitted as part of the agreement he entered into with the police.
Over the months he was held in a safe house during his supergrass interviews, police documents show officers spent nearly £35,000 on him – including £7,125 towards a new car and £468 on a laptop. He received money to top up his mobile phone, pay parking fees and buy an enclosure for his tortoises.
Alvin also benefited to the tune of £190,000 from the sale of his house, allegedly facilitated by the police while he was in jail. Land Registry records show the property changed hands on 22 November 2006 for £250,000. It is understood there was a £60,000 mortgage on the house. A source close to the process said: "The police were always in the background of the sale."
Under the Proceeds of Crime Act, the Essex force could have seized the money from the sale, but no seizure was made and the proceeds went to Alvin.
Now 32, Percival is serving his life term at a B category prison, Swaleside in Kent, from where he has been protesting his innocence for six years.
Percival – who learned to read and write in prison – told the Guardian: "I still cannot really believe what happened to me. When I first came into prison I was in some kind of intense shock: I couldn't sleep, I was having nightmares, I was turning it all over in my mind – how could this happen in the British justice system?
"They had to put me on medication because I was suffering from such anxiety and shock. And today it still feels the same, the shock is as raw.
"What makes it even harder is that anyone who has a good understanding of my case says: 'How did a jury convict you?' "
Percival's claims of innocence were bolstered recently when he passed a lie detector test – the results of which are being considered by the CCRC.
Much derided in the past, the accuracy of polygraph tests has improved so much that they are being evaluated by at least one police force, and the Association of Chief Police Officers could extend the trials across the country.
Percival, who admits he played a major role in the Essex gangland drug world, lost his appeal last year. The court of appeal said the case was unique, in that it "relied for its essence on the evidence of a witness, Alvin, who had been charged but acquitted on the same murder as that on which Percival was tried … [The case] stood or fell on Alvin's evidence."
But after considering the case, the judges ruled that there was a "richness" to Alvin's story which made it believable, and they refused the appeal.
Those close to Percival say this "richness" comes from the months in which Alvin studied the papers from the case while on remand. Evidence in court documents reveals that prison officers said Alvin's cell resembled a police incident room, papered with case documents, timings, maps and testimonies.
"Damon Alvin used his year on remand to develop this false story which guaranteed his freedom," said Percival's mother, Sandy. "The records of his statements to police show his story has changed several times. Our argument has always been: show us the corroborative evidence that supports Alvin. There isn't any.
"My son has done wrong, I know that, but he is not a murderer. There is no proof that he did any of these things, it is all Alvin's word against his. If I thought my son was a murderer, I would never stick by him."
Documents held by the CCRC highlight another key challenge to Percival's conviction. Under the terms of the witness protection scheme Alvin entered into, he had to confess all his criminality. Yet court papers show he did not reveal one key element to his criminality that could breach the protection agreement he entered into, and which raises questions about his credibility as the crown's star witness.
Alvin failed to tell police he had previously lied in court – potentially perjuring himself – in order to gain a reduced sentence for possession of 1kg of cocaine.
Facing a seven-year sentence, Alvin fabricated a story that his life was under threat from four unnamed gang members, court papers show. To colour his story, he arranged for his wife and mother-in-law to cut out letters from newspapers to create threatening notes, and told another family member to send him a wreath at home, to supplement his claims.
He also used hospital records from an injury he received during a domestic row as evidence that he had been attacked.
Alvin's story was enough to convince a judge at Basildon crown court, who gave him a reduced sentence of 30 months for the drug offence.
Hughman said the CCRC should examine the whole issue of supergrass evidence, and called on the court of appeal to issue guidance on such witnesses. "There should be a continued public interest and questioning about using people who are so manifestly unreliable to secure convictions, even if the authorities are particularly anxious to convict certain people. It doesn't make for safe convictions."
The CCRC said it was still examining the case and would not comment. The Guardian made repeated requests to the CPS but it also refused to comment on the case. Detective Chief Superintendent Liam Osborne, of Kent and Essex serious crime directorate, said he would not comment while the case was with the CCRC. |
