I remember seeing many people throughout the 80's wearing t-shirts with the emblazon 'Who Killed Blair Peach? Did You Kill Blair?' The murder in East London in 1979 of the teacher and peace activist has just been confirmed to be the work of the Metropolitan Police. The contemporary reports, released under the 30-year rule, have established that the police evidence of the time was falsified. The culprits have moved on but are still alive. Scotland Yard have said there will be no charges. Why not? Witnesses might be hard to trace but the report, and the background paperwork, date from 1979. This smacks of the ‘let’s move on and forget it’ brigade of New Labour and their London establishment-based cronies. ‘It was all a long time ago’ was never recognised before now to be a defence against murder (and, interestingly, war crimes) in Britain.The killers could be charged within a week.
Tuesday 27 April 2010
Did You Kill Blair Peach?
I remember seeing many people throughout the 80's wearing t-shirts with the emblazon 'Who Killed Blair Peach? Did You Kill Blair?' The murder in East London in 1979 of the teacher and peace activist has just been confirmed to be the work of the Metropolitan Police. The contemporary reports, released under the 30-year rule, have established that the police evidence of the time was falsified. The culprits have moved on but are still alive. Scotland Yard have said there will be no charges. Why not? Witnesses might be hard to trace but the report, and the background paperwork, date from 1979. This smacks of the ‘let’s move on and forget it’ brigade of New Labour and their London establishment-based cronies. ‘It was all a long time ago’ was never recognised before now to be a defence against murder (and, interestingly, war crimes) in Britain.The killers could be charged within a week.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
My mother was a teacher in Southall and I grew up in neighbouring Hounslow. On the first anniversary of Peach's death I took part in my first ever demonstration where we chanted the names of the six SPG officers who were said to have been hitting people with batons on the street where Peach died. The complete divergence between eye-witness accounts and the way in which the events were reported in the mainstream media had a lasting influence on me.
ReplyDeleteCarol,
ReplyDeleteThose names were well known at the time - I assume they are now living happily in retirement. But every one of them must have thanked his lucky stars when he saw the pictures of Mr Tomlinson's treatment that there were no cameras around in Southall.