Author Archives: davidhencke

Why Tom Watson is dead right to call for child abuse FBI

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Tom Watson MP: campaigning to get child sexual abuse cases investigated: Pic courtesy The Guardian

Tom Watson MP: campaigning to get child sexual abuse cases investigated: Pic courtesy The Guardian

Tom Watson, the MP who raised the historic child sex abuse issue that could involve politicians in the Commons, has this week called for the setting up of child abuse FBI.
In an article in the Sunday People and also on The Needleblog the MP forcibly questions why the National Crime Agency has failed to arrest any paedophile connected with an international ring or amorphous group.
Mr Watson told the Sunday People: “We’ve got an international policing operation that has netted hundreds of alleged paedophiles and the UK has failed to act on intelligence.

“This is completely unacceptable. It shows why we need a dedicated national team whose sole aim is to investigate allegations of child abuse.
“I think we need a proper team of officers who have investigative capabilities as well as powers of arrest.
“There are police officers who have been calling for it for years.”
Mr Watson’s call comes after the shocking news that ‘Project Spade’ had arrested hundreds of paedophiles -100 in Canada, 76 in the US and 164 in other countries
Almost 400 child sex slaves were freed and 341 alleged paedophiles arrested as part of the swoop.

I am not surprised about this. After observing the painstaking work the Metropolitan Police Paedophile Unit has done to unearth historic child sexual abuse cases dating from the 1970s and 1980s and the long time it is taking achieve results, I am not surprised.
The number of police officers working on this scourge is frankly pitifully low and I am amazed they have got as far as they have. The expertise in this area other forces have outside London is not brilliant either – and they are dependent on outside help.
But child sexual abuse does not always take place within the UK – indeed with the internet there is growing evidence that child sexual trafficking crosses the world. But I doubt David Cameron will want to commit any more public resources to stop it – he prefers to leave it to pressing, as he did today, for Google and Microsoft to take the lead in tackling child sexual abuse.

Phone Hacking Trial: Sun lawyer: “possible” that he gave advice to journalists on phone hacking, Old Bailey hears – Martin Hickman

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Lawyers are now under pressure at the Hacking Trial. Sun lawyer Justin Walford is pleading that he can’t remember whether he gave advice on phone hacking – rather like evidence given by the Murdochs to Parliament. But then he admits it is possible he did. As a former journo at the Guardian I know lawyers crawl over all copy before it is published, so his answers are at the very least rather interesting.

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Brooks arriving at Old BaileyDay 16:  A senior lawyer today said today that it was “possible” he had given advice to Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper group on phone hacking. Justin Walford, editorial legal counsel at News UK, who was being asked for a second time whether he had done so, went on to say: “I cannot remember.”

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Phone Hacking Trial: Sun political editor claimed evidence of non-existent affair between Home Sec and special adviser, court hears – Martin Hickman

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An extraordinary story of how surveillance and phone hacking were used to try and stand up a baseless story that former Labour home secretary Charles Clarke was having an affair. This time the ” victim” put an end to the tale by telling Trevor Kavanagh, then the Sun’s political editor, by refusing his offer to ” confess” and instead warning him that it was untrue and he would sue. Another murky look into the worst side of the tabloid world.

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Charles ClarkeDay 14:  The Sun’s political editor, Trevor Kavanagh, confronted a Home Secretary claiming to have “evidence” of a non-existent affair, the phone hacking trial was told today.  

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Phone Hacking Trial: Transcript and recording of Prince Harry’s voicemail found at royal editor’s home, jury told – Martin Hickman

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The scale of hacking by the News of the World into Prince Harry’s voicemail and his Royal aides is revealed after the police seized transcripts and recordings from the then Royal Editor Clive Goodman’s home. Another example of News International story searching at the time.

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harryDay 13 (cont):   The News of the World’s royal editor Clive Goodman had a verbatim transcript of a voicemail left by Prince Harry, the hacking trial was told today. The document and a poor-quality recording of the mobile phone message were seized by police from Mr Goodman’s home in south-west London in 2006, the court was told.

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Phone Hacking Trial: NoW paid glamour model up to £10,000 for information on celebrities, court hears – Martin Hickman

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More inside info on how the News of the World worked is revealed in today’s hearing – with cash payments to a supermodel running to thousands of pounds for inside gossip and info about celebs. She is a one time girlfriend of Calum Best, son of footballer George Best, whose mobile phone number is again on Glenn Mulclaire’s phone hacking evaluation list.

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Lorna HoganDay 13:  A glamour model was paid thousands of pounds a time by the News of the World to pass on information about celebrities she met in London nightclubs, the phone hacking trial heard today. Lorna Hogan, who had a two-month relationship with the reality TV star Calum Best, agreed she received sums of up to £10,000 for supplying the Sunday tabloid with ”gossip and information” about high-profile people.

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Phone Hacking Trial: Former NoW journalist emailed Sun colleague about phone hacking, jury hears – Martin Hickman

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The scale of phone hacking across the News of the World and the Sun is revealed in today’s hearing – with the admission that Greg Miskiw, News of the World news editor who has pleaded guilty to conspiring to hack phones, contacting a Sun journalist about hacking Heather Mills phone. Glenn Muclaire’s large hacking target list is said to have included Kate Middleton.

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Greg MiskiwDAY 12: A former News of the World news editor emailed a Sun journalist about the targeting of Heather Mills’ mobile phone, the hacking trial heard today. Greg Miskiw wrote to the employee of the NoW’s sister paper on 29 May 2006, days after Ms Mills and Sir Paul McCartney had announced their separation.

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Phone Hacking Trial: “Just say I love you and it’s 25 grand”, Mulcaire heard saying on Blunkett tapes – Martin Hickman

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The avarice of £100,000 a year Glenn Mulcaire – who has already pleaded guilty to phone hacking – is revealed as he twice targeted the private love life of Labour Cabinet minister David Blunkett in this latest sordid episode in the hacking trial.

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Glenn MulcaireDay 11:  A private detective who hacked voicemails for the News of the World recorded himself saying over a message left by a Cabinet Minister: “Just say ‘I love you’ and it’s 25 grand.”  Glenn Mulcaire made the remark as he eavesdropped a message left by David Blunkett for a woman with whom he was developing a close friendship.

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Would Michael Gove have unwittingly given Sir Cyril Smith freedom to set up a “paedophile friendly” school?

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New disclosures from my excellent Exaro News colleague Nick Fielding reveal that paedophile MP Sir Cyril Smith backed taking the troubled Knowl View special school in Rochdale out of local authority control.
His story based on hitherto unseen official papers shows that Rochdale Council narrowly missed losing local authority control of the school where children were sexually assaulted and the MP was a governor and a regular visitor.
Martin Digan, a care worker at Knowl View, tried to blow the whistle about the abuse. He had just become acting head of care at the residential school for boys with learning difficulties and behavioural problems.
He told Exaro: “It was Smith who was pushing for the school to be controlled by its governors – outside of the local council’s control.”
“It would have become nothing short of a sweetshop for paedophiles.”
Luckily in 1992 under the Tory government of Sir John Major that would have been extremely unusual and the scheme came to nought.
Fast forward 20 years and such a move is commonplace and nobody would question it. Would a present Tory education secretary now refuse such a proposal for Sir Cyril Smith like Jimmy Savile was an extremely popular and respected figure at the time and nobody publicly knew anything about his appalling private life? I doubt it.
But the reason I have singled out Michael Gove is that he is actively opposing any statutory reporting of child sexual abuse to the police by teachers or other people in authority in the schools system. He has said so in a letter to his former Cabinet colleague Cheryl Gillan.
This to me seems madness when at the same time he is freeing up the education system and allowing anybody to set up a school and wants every school out of local authority control as soon as possible. He is also encouraging unqualified teachers.
Now either Michael Gove takes the view that teachers are so decent that they could not possibly harm any child ever or he doesn’t really care what happens. I doubt he is one of the small minority of Tory libertarians who believe child sex is fine. In my view after studying the very duplicitous and nasty way some paedophiles behave,he has opened the door to make child sexual abuse more prevalent in the education system and put more children at risk. He could soon get a rude awakening, far worse than the present troubles at a badly run Al-Madinah school in Derby.

How love cheat Andy Coulson turned over David Blunkett- Hacking Trial

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andy coulson -turned over David Blunkett Pic courtesy: Press Gazette

andy coulson -turned over David Blunkett Pic courtesy: Press Gazette

Details of how the police discovered highly personal messages between David Blunkett and Kimberley Quinn in a News International lawyer’s safe were revealed at the hacking trial today.
A report by Martin Hickman on the Hacked Off website also shows how Andy Coulson faced up David Blunkett – knowing possibly they had hacked phones of close colleagues – and was happy to intrude into Blunkett’s private life.
He reports: Transcripts of “deeply personal and intrusive” messages between Labour politician David Blunkett and his lover Kimberly Quinn were found in a safe at Britain’s biggest newspaper group, the hacking trial heard today.
Prosecutor Andrew Edis QC, told the jury that a series of mobile phone messages left for the publisher by the then Home Secretary were recovered from News International lawyer Tom Crone’s safe.”
…”Mr Blunkett had left voicemails on Mrs Quinn’s mobile phone in July 2004, in the weeks before the News of the World revealed the relationship in a front-page splash. A “draft” story about the affair, in which the writer chief reporter Neville Thurlbeck had used the children’s character’s Noddy and Big Ears in place of Mr Blunkett and Mrs Quinn, was also discovered in Mr Crone’s safe.”
Later Coulson faced up Blunkett.
Martin Hickman reports: “The court was later played a tape of a 20-minute meeting between Mr Coulson and Mr Blunkett on 13 August 2004 in which the journalist asked the politician to confirm the affair.

During the meeting, which took place two days before the story was published and which Mr Blunkett recorded, Mr Blunkett maintained that his private life should stay private. He asked Mr Coulson: “You’re asking me to say I’ve had a relationship with a married woman?”

Mr Coulson responded: “I want nothing more.”

One can only admire the audacity of a man putting down a Labour Cabinet minister in the very year he ended a six year clandestine relationship with Rebekah Brooks ( then Wade). The real salacious story seems to be their relationship which of course was not to be published. Obviously not in the public interest. Luckily for them nobody tapped their phones.

Secret Murdoch recording : Exaro nominated in 2013 British Journalism Awards

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Exaro has been nominated for the the ‘breaking news award’, marking the ‘best story of the year’ in the 2013 British Journalism awards.
The tale which came from one of my sources revealed what Murdoch really thought about the phone hacking and bribery scandals and disclosed his fury about the police investigation.
There is also a tale on this site.
The story put together under Mark Watts, Exaro’s editor, was a team effort with a lot of input from Alex Varley-Winter.
Separately Fiona O’Cleirigh has been nominated for her series on Coiste for the ‘new journalist of the year’. The story was about £1.3m EU aid being given to an ex IRA prisoners group.
The full list of nominations are on the UK Press Gazette’s website.
AS you can see there will be stiff competition from the nationals but last year Exaro did achieve a breakthrough when I won Political Journalist of the year for the exposure of Ed Lester’s tax arrangements while he was head of the Student Loans Company.