10th May 2023
The Metropolitan Police fail and fail again in respect of the murder of Daniel Morgan.
Some of these failures were in the five botched police investigations and the often accompanying corruption.
But some of these failings are in how the Met has dealt with the disclosure of materials to the Daniel Morgan inquiry, which reported in 2021.
In the report, the panel said (emphasis added):
“There was not insignificant obstruction to the Panel’s work. At times the contact between the Panel and the Metropolitan Police resembled police contact with litigants rather than with a body established by the Home Secretary to enquire into the case, and to which the Metropolitan Police had promised to make ‘exceptional and full disclosure’.
“The Panel concludes that, despite the express commitment by the Metropolitan Police in the Terms of Reference to support the Panel’s work, the Metropolitan Police did not approach the Panel’s scrutiny with candour, in an open, honest and transparent way, making exceptional and full disclosure of relevant documents. The way in which material was disclosed or withheld had the effect of making the Panel’s work more difficult.”
And so, to the surprise of absolutely nobody, the Met has now admitted to substantial material non-disclosure:
We have apologised to the family of Daniel Morgan after documents were found.
Some of these should have been disclosed to the inquiry into his murder.
We are working with others to fully understand the impact.
You can read more here 👇https://t.co/b6qtiazYYD
— Metropolitan Police (@metpoliceuk) May 10, 2023
If you are gullible enough to accept the Met’s explanation for this delayed disclosure at face value, do note that there has been no reason given for why materials found in January are now only being acknowledged in May.
(Also note the deft and vague “number of years” – the appointment of the panel was announced in 2013.)
There can be no good reason for the non-disclosure of these materials and for the delay in admitting they exist.
This is simply a continuation of the evasive and obstructive non-disclosure practices of the Met throughout this whole matter.
The Met did not like – and do not like – the concentrated scrutiny that comes with an inquiry such as that conducted by the Daniel Morgan panel.
The Met would much prefer to deal with the short attention spans of time-poor and story-hungry media.
The problems identified by the Daniel Morgan panel, which I set out in this video, are still present in the Met.
Our thoughts should be with Alastair Morgan and the Morgan family at this latest let-down.
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Pedant alert- doubt or dealt
But some of these failings are in how the Met has doubt with the disclosure of materials
I think in sounds not visuals – and so near-homonyms can be lethal. Sorry. Corrected.
Also if you bear in mind that the Met moved out of the Victoria Street New Scotland Yard some years ago, it seems very very implausible that this locked cupboard was moved “as is” to the new site and has only just been opened.
Well, quite.
Were the documents found at the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard’?
Any poetry found with them?
Only Vogon poetry
One ought to be shocked, but one is not. The Met seems irredeemable. What is shocking is that at every turn this Administration seeks and succeeds in giving the Police ever more powers over the rights of the individual. T
And lo and behold, the Met couldn’t wait to use their few-days-old-new-powers to arrest and keep in cells until the small hours the Republican protesters who had been liaising with them for months.
And why did they sit on these papers they “discovered” in January? We know some of them are not very bright, but apparently they are so slow it took them two days to read each page of the documents. Lie upon lie. Obfuscation upon obfuscation. Deceit upon deceit. And they expect the general public to trust them? If ever I come across them, for whatever reason, I shall make sure I record their identification numbers. They make the innocent, guilty and the guilty, innocent.
Thanks for writing the David.
Poor Alastair keeps hoping this case is finally over after 36 years but it never seems to end.
Best wishes,
Kirsteen
Nice article, consider this, South Wales Police “lost” evidence in the Cardiff Three case, ex DCS Fiona “Grenfell” McCormack “mislaid” thirty crates of evidence in the Daniel Moran murder. Can an institution be corrupt? An individual can.
“Can an institution be corrupt?”
There is something of an analogy here with the institutional racism question — which (very seriously pondered) judgement the Met senior officers have recently rejected, of course.
As with the racism, I see no problem with the idea that an institution has become corrupt, in the sense that a very wide spread of its members, especially its leaders, and associates, have developed habits of thought and reaction and response that are geared to the self-preservation of the institution, and rejection of criticism. And this at the expense of behaving correctly, honestly, openly, in the service of its public role and responsibilities.
It is all utterly dismaying.
Expect some interesting developments in the Stephen Lawrence murder case.
The Morgan panel’s report says (page 1114, para 492) “The Panel began work in September 2013 but did not begin to receive the investigation documentation held by the Metropolitan Police until January 2015”
The move to (new New) Scotland Yard was in November 2016. Were many locked filing cabinets moved across without anyone checking the contents?
Cressida Dick rejoined the Met in April 2017. And then this locked filing cabinet was found in January 2023, on the seventh floor, where the Commissioner (and some others) have their offices.
Is it entirely coincidental that new information has emerged twice shortly after Cressida Dick has left the Met – she left in December 2014 to join the Home Office, and left again in April 2022? (Clearly it was not just her – the panel’s report gives details of the obstructive approach of the Met to the panel’s request for access to the Holmes database, from 2013 until 2020.)
It may be instructive to explore (a) when these documents were created, (b) where they have been held since then, and (c) who had access to them before January 2023.
What’s the appropriate behaviour for the Chair of a completed inquiry in this situation?
Maybe all new senior appointments to this august body should have some new clauses in the terms of employment.
“i. Being suspected of, or being subject to an investigation the officer will not be permitted to take early retirement and may be required to serve in excess of contract years until the said investigation is completed.
ii. Being found to have hindered an investigation by whatsoever means, the officer will forgo all rights to a pension from the police service.”
Too many times serving officers are permitted to retire early and grab the public money, leaving no means of sanction for those that have done wrong.