allison morris

The Bar Standards Board and Bart Simpson

The BSB does not believe in the presumption of innocence nor in the right to silence.

In the saga which is known as “Peter Sefton Q.C. and Carmen Mazo” they have denied both rights to me.

I’m sure it’s not because I’m a Paddy. I think.

Firstly, they produce an inaccurate article from the Daily Telegraph and ask me to explain myself.

Secondly, they tell me that if I don’t explain myself , it will be a further instance of professional misconduct.

So, while our clients charged with , say, fraud, can say “prove your case” and when allegations are put by police in interview can say nothing , no such benefit is offered to members of the English Bar.

If the BSB had made the most cursory enquiry it would have found the answer to their question. Even the Irish News, minus Allison Morris, could solve the puzzle. How difficult could it be?

For my part, threatened with a further charge of professional misconduct, I resorted to that hero of our times, Bart Simpson.

“It wasn’t me, I didn’t do it.”

Let’s see what Chief Wiggum of the BSB has to say.

The past isn’t over

“The reason the past cannot be dealt with is that it isn’t over”. A pithy statement by Eamonn McCann.

Let’s imagine in what civilised country the murders of two pensioners in 1990 by a terrorist organisation would be variously regarded by the Chief Constable as “a legacy issue” or by the pro-GFA press as  ‘the past”.

Just a note of caution here. Every government seeks, by whatever means , to shape events and opinions. History tells us that the British target journalists. See Kim Philby, working for the Observer and the Economist. Frederick Forsyth , also a spook. How many of our ‘respected’ journalists are working for the state, being fed information and shaping stories to suit their masters? How many have skeletons which have been dangled before them by the spooks? Each time you read an article in the local press or on TV , ask yourself, who wrote it and why.

I digress. Crimes such as the murder of my parents in 1990 would be relentlessly pursued  by the Israelis.

Well, twenty five years and more on the past isn’t over, no matter what the state tells Dr Maguire , the Police Ombudsman.

No matter what the OFMDFM told the Victims’ Commissioner, when they appointed her.

I will be returning to that august body in my next blog.

Four things you didn’t see by today

On 28th March I predicted that, before today,  you would not see a female High Court Judge, an apology from the Irish News re Winkie Rea , disclosure in the Kingsmills case and a Willie march in Dublin.

Four out of four isn’t bad.

I’m sure Dec will fulfil his promise to the Assembly soon, though , given the apparent separation of powers , so loved by constitutional lawyers and almost entirely absent here, I’m not sure why he had to make that promise and where that takes us. Look out for ‘the people’ [that is the assembly]  taking over the disciplining of lawyers and their appointments to the Bench. Will this break the stranglehold of the big flagship grammar schools? Don’t hold your breath!

Poor old Willie is battling two states, not one. If he thinks that the Republic is likely to disclose more than his beloved Queen, he is living in a dream world.

Re Winkie, the fight is not yet over.

Touts are everywhere

Way back, when the occupying power, as James Galway describes it, decided to recruit pro- agreement people and place them in law , administration, business and other key places, they must also have thought about journalists and politicians .

Our local journalists are keen to write articles about  who might have been a tout, loyalist or republican but how many of them are state agents? Imagine the access they have to the inner workings of the terrorists. See Kim Philby’s career. When the SIS ‘ditched’ him , they sent him to Beirut under cover as a journalist for the Observer and the Economist. So, shall we have an article , outing journalists or is that beyond the Pale?

Politicians. Most of Sinn Fein/IRA lost the opportunity for education by being banged up. The loyalists, on the other hand availed of third level education. A favourite fishing ground for Box and SIS is Oxbridge. Who went there?…No! Surely not!

Let’s think who else would be useful. A lawyer! They have access to all sorts of information. Perhaps someone transgressed and men came at dead of night and said, “well Paddy/ William, no more will be heard of this little problem but we’d like some information from you, from time to time”. Such information, about their clients, from a barrister or solicitor, would be priceless. What would be the reward? Judicial office?

Then there is that mass of mostly dead wood who inhabit  all sorts of NGOs. Check out their bios and you will find that they are re-cycled at an alarming rate. What they have in common is “sit down you’re rocking the boat”. For this view the NIO and the OFMDFM rewards them handsomely. Frank Cushnahan comes to mind for a reason that I can’t quite put my finger on. Many rose without a trace  from the University of Ulster. Sport NI is just the tip of the toxic iceberg.

So, come on you journos, let’s be having you!

Kafka is alive and well

Readers of this blog and of the press  may be aware of certain difficulties I have experienced with the Bar Council. These, as they are at pains to point out , are matters that the public can come and hear about. Hence I am making them public to you. I have now been provided with a folder of prints out of my blog. They want me to take these to Dr Paul Miller and ask him to opine as to whether or not in the circumstances , I am really  “cured” and fit to practise as a barrister. This route has apparently been taken because Allison Morris and her employer , the Irish News,  have complained about my response to her article about me in their paper, an article which I believe was Sinn Fein/IRA inspired. The Bar Council then printed out all my blogs.

Included in folder , and flagged up,  is one I wrote about my friend , the late  Jack Kyle, a man whom I admired greatly. Jack wrote to the Irish Times on 26 July 1966 and delivered a stinging criticism of  Paisley and his views. I commented on this:

“Jack expresses views that have been discarded by all sides in a headlong rush for money and power. Maybe I’m just getting old but I regret his passing and the loss of his values”

I have no idea what the Bar Council’s objection is to this blog but no doubt I , and you, should you choose to attend the public hearing, will find out in January  from Frazer Elliott Q.C. who appears for the Bar Council and who will, no doubt produce some evidence from a professional medical person to support his case.

Of course it may just be as simple as my face doesn’t fit in the new dispensation [proceedings against the Lord Chief Justice?]. It has been accepted by Elliott in the last public hearing  that I have had an exemplary thirty year professional career at the Bar. So what’s not to like…….?

Martin McGuinness mass murderer

A big thank you to the Irish News and Allison Morris for publishing my allegations of murder by Martin McGuinness. If you will bear with me I will develop  this in the next few days. I’m sure that the editor of the Irish News will follow events with excitement.

A big shout out too , to Allison’s  dissident IRA partner Fernando Murphy [do you hear the drums ,Fernando?]

One can only speculate on the provenance of today’s article.