Blog entry 15th September 2012
Due to a lack of any effort by my solicitors Rajan Mawji and Riffat Hussain of Harrison Bundey Solicitors, and a complete refusal by them to respond to my letters of concern I have now lodged a formal complaint to the Legal Ombudsman. In addition, I have asked Guy White of Petherbridge Bassra Solicitors if he would consider taking on my appeal.
I find this position utterly frustrating as it means that yet again I am having to start the process all over. Simply because Rajan and Riffat could not be bothered to provide a competent and professional service for which they'll have claimed significant sums of public money in the form of legal aid. It also means that yet another one and a half years of my life has been wasted in prison for trusting a solicitor to do the job they promised they would do. Worryingly, my experience is not an isolated one.
Over the past 13 years I have met a number of prisoners who I genuinely believe to be wrongly convicted; David Mulcahy, Dougy Blastland, Michael Stone, Mark Sleightholme and Peter Knight to name five. All of us have endured empty promises from numerous solicitors eager to bleed legal aid funding dry but not very eager or adept at doing the work that is required. Until an independent audit body is set in place to review the work these so-called professionals perform on a yearly basis they will continue to rob the legal aid system blind. Who said that crime doesn't pay!
So, after 23 years the truth about the Hillsborough disaster is exposed after thousands of withheld pages of evidence is finally disclosed. What is revealed? An entire police force is corrupt to the core and will go to any lengths to hide it's criminal behaviour. Do not think that this is an isolated incidence that could not happen in these modern times, no matter what the current head of South Yorkshire police will try to convince the public of.
We only have to go back to the execution of Jean Charles De Menezes by the Metropolitan Police to see that similar police corruption is rife today. As at the Hillsborough disaster Met police colluded and changed their official statements and withheld crucial evidence to disguise their own criminality. Decades exist between the two events and hundreds of miles between the two forces involved, but the actions are the same.
For those of us who are wrongly convicted we are only too aware of how willing any police force is to withhold, destroy or lose evidence - even falsify it if it serves their purpose. See below:-
- Police
- Often
- Lie
- In
- Court
- Evidence
Lastly I wish to praise the people of Liverpool. For 23 years you persevered to prove that you'd endured an atrocious injustice at the hands of an institutionally corrupt police force. You have not only honoured the 96 innocent lives lost by clearing their names, you have proven why those in my position must keep fighting then injustice we endure, You have given us reason to believe and have hope that one day we too will have the truth told. Thank-you.