Harper in the hot seat
Wednesday 31st December 2008, 2:56PM GMT.
LENNY Harper came under fire in an interview on Radio 4 yesterday about the way he handled the historical child abuse inquiry.
But the former deputy police chief continued to defend his tactics, claiming that the willingness of victims to co-operate might have been affected if he had revealed earlier that there were doubts about whether ‘human remains’ had really been found at Haut de la Garenne.
He feared political attacks which might have deterred witnesses, listeners were told. By the end of the interview on the programme ‘Taking a Stand’, in which reporter Fergal Keane grilled Mr Harper about his publicity me-thods, he said that Mr Harper was looking ‘like a man under strain pinned to the ground’.
Mr Harper told him that he had just undergone an interview with a very experienced interrogator, and that it had not been very pleasant to be subjected to lies about himself in the national media from people he had respected.
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i have listened to the interview and mr.harper came across very well..
you can still listen to it on the bbc 4 web page.
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Except in certain areas Rico. He claimed not be have been emotionally involved – not what comes across in other interviews where he pronounced his belief in the truth of victims’ statements. A curious behaviour for the Senior Investigating Officer in any investigation.
He also got rather defensive when Fergal said that someone on Jersey had commented that he (Lenny) was out of his depth. I also felt that his comments about the investigation into “illegal” firearms on the island gave an interesting insight into the battle that preceded his passionate pursuance of the HdelaG allegations.
I would encourage other readers to listen to it and make their own minds up.
I wonder how these interviews effect the forthcoming legal action?
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It was a tough interview with no holds barred.
Lenny Harper came out of it well in spite of some areas where he appeared less than perfect.
He comes across as a man of principle if a little impetuous and, in the case of Jersey, apprehensive of the power of the forces ranged against him in his quest for justice.
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fascinating interview, although my memory may fail me on the detail. It is interesting to hear the claim (in general) that he had to proceed to gain the confidence of people making criminal allegations. Another gem was the perspective that newspapers releasing details of a police investigation would lose the confidence of people making allegations, whereas his press conference gained their confidence. it is an interesting perspective on how and why you police.
It was also interesting to see what happened when he was pinned down about the bit of bone. He argued that it was not appropriate to tell the public that the original fragment of human skull was no such thing, and justified that by saying that they had ruled it out of their enquiry ! Why would you rule a piece of human skull out of your enquiry, unless you knew it was not relevant ? And still he argued that it might be relevant, and that he shouldn’t have to tell the public.
The more such interviews Harper does, the better.
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I find this man irritating to listen to now. The fact is, he withheld information from the public and in doing so it has blown back up in his face. Also why was he digging for missing people without even a name of a missing person to start from? Listeners do have to decide whether this is the professional conduct expected from a £100k a year Jersey police officer. I think not.
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Freedom of information now !!
How can we know what really happened and form our own opinions ?
We have a right to know, it is not enough to be told that Lenny and our politicians will get it right between themselves and that we don’t need to see the actual documents and decide ourselves. If there is nothing to hide don’t hide anything !!
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It is funny that we are still hearing the words “cover up”! Yet nothing has been shown to the public by any so called whistle blower so far to back up this claim one iota! Therefore it is all rumour until somebody can prove otherwise.
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