What we do know
though is that at least one policeman lied; he wasn’t even there but gave a
statement reporting what he had “heard”.
(Although, of course, the fact that he wasn’t there to hear what was
said doesn’t actually conclusively prove that it wasn’t said either!)
To an extent I
have some sympathy with Mitchell, who lost his job as a minister and was
disgraced for something which he (in all probability) didn’t actually say: and
all on the evidence of a policeman prepared to lie. I might have even more sympathy if he’d been
a little more forthcoming with his own version of events; but in legal terms it
isn’t up to him to prove his innocence, it’s up to others to prove his guilt. To date, they have utterly failed to do so.
There’s another
question here though, and that’s about how and why the police came to concoct
evidence (there must surely have been more than one of them involved - who told the absent witness what he was supposed to have "heard"?). It all seems to have been done so casually –
it must surely raise a question about how common a practise this is.
I would not
wish to suggest that all police are corrupt and dishonest; that is patently not
the case. However the knowledge that most
people are more likely to believe a policeman than a defendant in the dock – or
even more so than a politician – is likely to be a temptation which occurs to
more than one policeman, and in more than one set of circumstances,
particularly if they “know” what happened and are merely ensuring that the
miscreant gets punished.
Mitchell is in
the fortunate position of having the public profile, and the support from the
media, to get to the bottom of the matter.
All power to his elbow in that endeavour, but I’d be even more
supportive if those less able and privileged who had suffered from a similar
approach came forward and were given the same opportunity.
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