Monkey's Uncle
I said in a previous post that I failed to see how PC Keith Wallis, who has been jailed for his role in the Plebgate affair, could possibly have been acting on his own - as a kind of 'lone gunman' in what looks suspiciously like a plot to remove a Government Minister.
So I was pleased to read this report in The Sunday Times which suggest that the net is tightening around others involved in this affair because it is perfectly clear that supposedly confidential information was deliberately leaked both to PC Wallis and the press.
And if that's not collusion, people working in concert to achieve a desired outcome, then I'm a monkey's uncle.
Plebgate police accused of lying
By David Leppard - The Sunday Times
FIVE Metropolitan police officers are to face secret “trials”, starting this week, amid claims they colluded to bring down the cabinet minister Andrew Mitchell.
The armed protection officers will face disciplinary hearings behind closed doors at Scotland Yard for allegedly lying about their actions in the Plebgate scandal.
The Metropolitan police and its commissioner, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, have consistently maintained there was no conspiracy. But in an email to Mitchell last week, the IPCC, the independent police watchdog, said there was evidence of collusion.
Crucial will be evidence that the one officer jailed over the scandal was not acting as a “lone wolf”. Telephone logs show that two other officers were in contact with him in the hours after Mitchell clashed with armed police in Downing Street on September 19, 2012.
Details of the alleged plot — and the apparent concerted attempts to conceal it from investigators — will be disclosed for the first time at the hearings. The media is barred from reporting on them, despite Hogan-Howe stating that he wanted all proceedings to be “transparent and open”.
The five officers, from the diplomatic protection group (DPG), were arrested during Operation Alice, the original criminal investigation into Plebgate. Four of them were never charged or prosecuted.
The exception was PC Keith Wallis, who was given a 12-month prison sentence this month after admitting his claim to have witnessed the incident had been false.
Wallis was off duty at the time of the encounter but belonged to the elite diplomatic protection unit that shares an office in Whitehall with some of the group charged with guarding No 10.
He sent an email to his local MP the day after the altercation, sparked by Mitchell’s desire to take his bike through the main gates in Downing Street. In it, Wallis claimed to be a member of the public who had been present and seen Mitchell swearing and using the words “f****** plebs”. He later confessed he was lying.
Wallis will be the first to appear at this week’s hearings. It is thought he will be found guilty of gross misconduct and sacked.
The focus will then shift to the role of the other officers.
After Wallis was jailed, the Met insisted it had found “no evidence to suggest that any officer involved in the incident at the gate was involved with PC Wallis or aware of the fact that he had contacted his MP in this way.”
However, in its email to Mitchell the IPCC said it disagreed with the view that Wallis had acted as a “lone wolf”.
Senior politicians say that if hard evidence of more than one officer being involved in a plot to stitch up Mitchell emerges, Hogan-Howe’s position may become untenable.
The disciplinary panels will hear evidence showing that two officers — Officers 5 and 4 — were in contact with Wallis during the critical hours after the Downing Street incident.
Officer 5 communicated with Wallis either by phone or email, but allegedly lied about doing so in a statement to investigators. There is also evidence of phone contact between Officer 4, who heard about the incident from a colleague on duty that night, and Wallis.
There is no suggestion that Officer 4’s colleague did anything wrong, but the link shows that, contrary to what the Met has suggested, there was a connection — albeit indirect — between the officers on duty during the incident and Wallis.
Equally significant is the uncovering by the IPCC of telephone data linking a woman — thought to be Officer 4’s girlfriend — to a phone call made to The Sun newspaper, which first reported the Plebgate story.
Both Officer 4 and the woman — who is not a police officer — were arrested over this alleged link. Both deny leaking the story to The Sun.
The disciplinary panel will hear evidence that, after learning of the Mitchell row, at least three DPG officers decided to leak it to the press.One is alleged to be Officer 3, a female gun guard who had been on duty in Downing Street at the time. She had been copied in to an email about the incident by PC Toby Rowland, the gate officer involved.
Mitchell claims Rowland invented the “toxic” word “plebs” which was entered into his email log of the encounter, but Rowland has been cleared of wrongdoing.
Officer 3 took a picture of Rowland’s email log on her mobile phone and sent it to Officer 2, who is alleged to have leaked it to The Sun but denies doing so.
Officer 3 insists she kept all copies of the email and no one else had access to them. But this is allegedly contradicted by evidence from her phone, which indicates she had sent it to Officer 2.
The Met said: “We are aware of the public interest in these cases, but police misconduct regulations do not allow us to consider holding these hearings in public. The final Operation Alice report will be published once the misconduct boards are over, on the recommendation of the IPCC.”
PC Plod (12 February 2014)
The Guardian covers does a good job of explaining the story behind Police Constable Keith Wallis who has been jailed for a year for lying about Andrew Mitchell and the Plebgate affair.
What's not so clear, as yet anyway, is who helped Keith Wallis peddle these lies - because his story bore a remarkable similarity to the supposedly confidential report of the incident at the Downing Street gates which was subsequently leaked to the press.
The suggestion that Keith convinced himself into believing that he really was at the scene of the original incident is completely laughable - because how could he possibly have persuaded his nephew (another adult I presume) into sharing this delusion?
I think I would be inclined to charge the nephew as well for wasting police time in an investigation which has gone on for well over a year and cost the public purse over £250,000.
Plebgate row: PC Keith Wallis jailed for a year for lying about Andrew Mitchell
Twelve-month term for officer who admitted making false claim in row that led to minister losing his cabinet role
By Josh Halliday
Keith Wallis, the police officer who lied about witnessing the Plebgate row. Photograph: Sean Dempsey/PA
A Scotland Yard diplomatic protection officer has been jailed after he admitted lying about witnessing the Plebgate row that caused the resignation of a cabinet minister.
Constable Keith Wallis was sentenced to 12 months in prison when he appeared at the Old Bailey in central London on Thursday.
Wallis remained impassive and stared straight ahead out of the court dock as his sentence was handed down by the judge, Mr Justice Sweeney. He looked up at tearful members of his family as he was led by a security guard down into the court cells.
Wallis is the only police officer to have admitted wrongdoing over the Plebgate saga, which prompted a huge row and resulted in Andrew Mitchell losing his role in David Cameron's cabinet.
Sentencing Wallis, Sweeney described the officer's actions as a "betrayal" of police standards and said it had caused a "significant negative impact on public trust and confidence in the integrity of police officers".
The judge added: "This was sustained, and in significant measure, devious misconduct which fell far below the standards expected of a police officer."
The Independent Police Complaints Commission, which investigated the Plebgate saga, said in a statement after the sentencing: "The patchwork of evidence from emails, text messages and telephone calls does not suggest an organised conspiracy to bring down a Cabinet Minister."
However, the watchdog said there was clearly collusion between certain officer to "blow the whistle on bad behaviour toward one of their own" which ultimately led to Mitchell's downfall.
"The actions of PC Wallis – and the other officers responsible for turning a largely inaudible altercation lasting less than a minute into a national scandal – have not only caused injustice to Mr Mitchell, they have brought shame upon the police service," said IPCC commissioner Deborah Glass.
The Old Bailey heard earlier that Wallis, who served for 30 years with the Metropolitan police, wanted to be jailed because "he thinks everyone would be better off without him".
Wallis, 53, last month pleaded guilty to falsely claiming in an email to his MP, the Conservative deputy chief whip John Randall, that he had witnessed the confrontation at the gates of Downing Street on 19 September 2012.
The row erupted when Mitchell confronted another police officer, Toby Rowland, after he was refused permission to cycle through the main gate of Downing Street. Mitchell admitted swearing but has strenuously denied Rowland's claim that he used the word "pleb".
The Old Bailey heard that Wallis was "angry and intoxicated" when he falsely claimed to have witnessed the Plebgate row
Wallis listened without expression in the court dock as his barrister pleaded with the judge, Mr Justice Sweeney, to spare him jail, describing the officer's actions as a "sad and solitary piece of grave foolishness" by a man suffering from acute anxiety and depression over the death of his father some years ago.
The prosecutor, Zoe Martin, told the court that Wallis had told police after being arrested at his home in December 2012: "I knew I should have thrown myself under a train yesterday."
Described as a loyal foot soldier with 30 years' experience in the Metropolitan police, Wallis was part of the diplomatic protection office that shares an office in Whitehall with some of the group who guarded Downing Street at the time of the Plebgate row.
Wallis was off duty on the day of the incident, the court heard, but had picked up on "office gossip and rumour" about what Mitchell had said when he returned to work the next day.
After finishing his shift at 2pm, Wallis consumed a significant amount of alcohol before returning to his home in West Drayton, west London.
When he returned home he sent an email at 9.52pm to his MP, the then deputy chief whip John Randall, in which he said he was disgusted to hear Mitchell use "gutter language" and show "yobbish and loutish behaviour" towards police officers.
Wallis claimed in the email, which the prosecution said was littered with capital letters and grammatical errors, that he had witnessed the incident along with his nephew, who mistakenly thought that Mitchell was Boris Johnson.
He signed off by saying he did not wish for Mitchell to be sacked over the incident, but that he wished to register his displeasure and realised that "nothing will come of this letter".
But after sending the email events "got completely out of hand" and he did not have the mental capacity to come clean, his lawyer, Patrick Gibbs QC, said.
Wallis continued to maintain that he had witnessed the incident, even when his claim became central to a Downing Street inquiry into the affair. The court heard that, as the pressure on the officer grew, he even took his young nephew to a meeting with Randall to back up his story.
Wallis only admitted he had not seen the incident when confronted with Downing Street CCTV footage during his first police interview.
The officer was disconsolate and apologetic during two police interviews. "I 100% convinced myself I was there. I visualised myself standing there," he told the interviewing officers.
"I thought in a strange way I was backing up my colleagues. I wasn't. I was doing the wrong thing and it's all exploded. I was doing the wrong thing. I don't know why."
He apologised to all of the parties involved, telling officers interviewing him: "I've let everyone down … All I can say is I'm really, really sorry. Really sorry."
In a statement issued after the sentencing, the Metropolitan police chief Sir Bernard Hogan-Howesaid that Wallis would now be subject to a misconduct process.
Hogan-Howe said: "PC Wallis's actions have clearly fallen way below the standards that me, my fellow police officers and the public demand.
"I expect my officers to serve the public without fear or favour. Where officers break the law they must expect to be held to account and answer for what they have done.
"Yesterday, I apologised personally to Mr Mitchell that an MPS officer clearly lied about seeing him behaving in a certain manner. Today, I apologise to the public for PC Wallis's behaviour."
A further seven Metropolitan police officers are facing disciplinary action over the affair, including four who will be subject to gross misconduct hearings in March over claims that they leaked information to the media.
Scotland Yard has said previously that Wallis, who has offered to resign from the force, would face a misconduct hearing at the conclusion of the legal proceedings.
Mitchell has also initiated libel proceedings against the Sun, arguing that he has been defamed by reports that claimed he used the word "pleb".
The suggestion that Keith convinced himself into believing that he really was at the scene of the original incident is completely laughable - because how could he possibly have persuaded his nephew (another adult I presume) into sharing this delusion?
I think I would be inclined to charge the nephew as well for wasting police time in an investigation which has gone on for well over a year and cost the public purse over £250,000.
Plebgate row: PC Keith Wallis jailed for a year for lying about Andrew Mitchell
Twelve-month term for officer who admitted making false claim in row that led to minister losing his cabinet role
By Josh Halliday
Keith Wallis, the police officer who lied about witnessing the Plebgate row. Photograph: Sean Dempsey/PA
A Scotland Yard diplomatic protection officer has been jailed after he admitted lying about witnessing the Plebgate row that caused the resignation of a cabinet minister.
Constable Keith Wallis was sentenced to 12 months in prison when he appeared at the Old Bailey in central London on Thursday.
Wallis remained impassive and stared straight ahead out of the court dock as his sentence was handed down by the judge, Mr Justice Sweeney. He looked up at tearful members of his family as he was led by a security guard down into the court cells.
Wallis is the only police officer to have admitted wrongdoing over the Plebgate saga, which prompted a huge row and resulted in Andrew Mitchell losing his role in David Cameron's cabinet.
Sentencing Wallis, Sweeney described the officer's actions as a "betrayal" of police standards and said it had caused a "significant negative impact on public trust and confidence in the integrity of police officers".
The judge added: "This was sustained, and in significant measure, devious misconduct which fell far below the standards expected of a police officer."
The Independent Police Complaints Commission, which investigated the Plebgate saga, said in a statement after the sentencing: "The patchwork of evidence from emails, text messages and telephone calls does not suggest an organised conspiracy to bring down a Cabinet Minister."
However, the watchdog said there was clearly collusion between certain officer to "blow the whistle on bad behaviour toward one of their own" which ultimately led to Mitchell's downfall.
"The actions of PC Wallis – and the other officers responsible for turning a largely inaudible altercation lasting less than a minute into a national scandal – have not only caused injustice to Mr Mitchell, they have brought shame upon the police service," said IPCC commissioner Deborah Glass.
The Old Bailey heard earlier that Wallis, who served for 30 years with the Metropolitan police, wanted to be jailed because "he thinks everyone would be better off without him".
Wallis, 53, last month pleaded guilty to falsely claiming in an email to his MP, the Conservative deputy chief whip John Randall, that he had witnessed the confrontation at the gates of Downing Street on 19 September 2012.
The row erupted when Mitchell confronted another police officer, Toby Rowland, after he was refused permission to cycle through the main gate of Downing Street. Mitchell admitted swearing but has strenuously denied Rowland's claim that he used the word "pleb".
The Old Bailey heard that Wallis was "angry and intoxicated" when he falsely claimed to have witnessed the Plebgate row
Wallis listened without expression in the court dock as his barrister pleaded with the judge, Mr Justice Sweeney, to spare him jail, describing the officer's actions as a "sad and solitary piece of grave foolishness" by a man suffering from acute anxiety and depression over the death of his father some years ago.
The prosecutor, Zoe Martin, told the court that Wallis had told police after being arrested at his home in December 2012: "I knew I should have thrown myself under a train yesterday."
Described as a loyal foot soldier with 30 years' experience in the Metropolitan police, Wallis was part of the diplomatic protection office that shares an office in Whitehall with some of the group who guarded Downing Street at the time of the Plebgate row.
Wallis was off duty on the day of the incident, the court heard, but had picked up on "office gossip and rumour" about what Mitchell had said when he returned to work the next day.
After finishing his shift at 2pm, Wallis consumed a significant amount of alcohol before returning to his home in West Drayton, west London.
When he returned home he sent an email at 9.52pm to his MP, the then deputy chief whip John Randall, in which he said he was disgusted to hear Mitchell use "gutter language" and show "yobbish and loutish behaviour" towards police officers.
Wallis claimed in the email, which the prosecution said was littered with capital letters and grammatical errors, that he had witnessed the incident along with his nephew, who mistakenly thought that Mitchell was Boris Johnson.
He signed off by saying he did not wish for Mitchell to be sacked over the incident, but that he wished to register his displeasure and realised that "nothing will come of this letter".
But after sending the email events "got completely out of hand" and he did not have the mental capacity to come clean, his lawyer, Patrick Gibbs QC, said.
Wallis continued to maintain that he had witnessed the incident, even when his claim became central to a Downing Street inquiry into the affair. The court heard that, as the pressure on the officer grew, he even took his young nephew to a meeting with Randall to back up his story.
Wallis only admitted he had not seen the incident when confronted with Downing Street CCTV footage during his first police interview.
The officer was disconsolate and apologetic during two police interviews. "I 100% convinced myself I was there. I visualised myself standing there," he told the interviewing officers.
"I thought in a strange way I was backing up my colleagues. I wasn't. I was doing the wrong thing and it's all exploded. I was doing the wrong thing. I don't know why."
He apologised to all of the parties involved, telling officers interviewing him: "I've let everyone down … All I can say is I'm really, really sorry. Really sorry."
In a statement issued after the sentencing, the Metropolitan police chief Sir Bernard Hogan-Howesaid that Wallis would now be subject to a misconduct process.
Hogan-Howe said: "PC Wallis's actions have clearly fallen way below the standards that me, my fellow police officers and the public demand.
"I expect my officers to serve the public without fear or favour. Where officers break the law they must expect to be held to account and answer for what they have done.
"Yesterday, I apologised personally to Mr Mitchell that an MPS officer clearly lied about seeing him behaving in a certain manner. Today, I apologise to the public for PC Wallis's behaviour."
A further seven Metropolitan police officers are facing disciplinary action over the affair, including four who will be subject to gross misconduct hearings in March over claims that they leaked information to the media.
Scotland Yard has said previously that Wallis, who has offered to resign from the force, would face a misconduct hearing at the conclusion of the legal proceedings.
Mitchell has also initiated libel proceedings against the Sun, arguing that he has been defamed by reports that claimed he used the word "pleb".
