2

Tony B

I’m finding it rather hard to belive that a supposedley asture politician, A Put himself in the position were he could have been compromised, surley even the most average computer user knows the importance of security B He has left it till now to produce the evidence of such alleged smearing. C Any journalist would be stupid enough to delibratley and openly attempt to pervert justice.

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4

Flymo

@2 From a person sat on the fence getting splinters I would say in response:
A. Now having the opportunity\confidence to stand up and say what they believe is to be the truth with evidence to back his stance up.
B. There are differing levels of security in IT as well as differing levels on knowledge amongst IT users.
C. Perhaps the journalist wasn’t aware that the situation would lead to events like this. But a journalist changing the facts to enhance a good story? Wouldn’t be the first time.

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6

Edna Cloud

I know exactly what it is like to have someone attempt to smear your reputation, after entries on the Blog of a certain well known politician. The term “Hoist with one’s own petard.” springs to mind. However instead of L.H. bleating about the investigation in to allegations of child abuse, he should have quietly conducted his enquires and only presnted his findings to the media once there was absolute proof.

There may very well have been major issues with the physical and sexual abuse of children in the Island. Nobody can deny that a complete, thorough and ehtical investigation was necessary. This would have obviously been warranted, if bona fide complaints had been received by the police. The problem was with L.H’s publicity stunts, which were unnecessary and would have increased the potential for false allegations to be made.

S.S.’s mistake is in continuing to back the wrong horse – or is it to flog a dead horse?

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8

card one

get real Stuart, it was the KGB that did it!

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10

Hobgoblin

It can’t be much fun being Senator Stuart Syvret when you know that the UK police, Jersey police, the Judiciary, the Attorney General, the Baliff, States Members, senior civil servants, the BBC, CTV, JEP and countless others are all conspiring together to pile injustice upon injustice on him.
All this paranoia is taking place at the expense of the tax payer who is paying his salary. Shouldn’t he do the decent thing and stand down from the States and then he can be paranoid in his own time.

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12

Hannah

Perhaps you will all realise one day that you have a lot to “Thank” Senator Syvret for, far from being paranoid he has more sense than the rest of them put together.

I just hope those doubters have got the courage to apologise and withdraw the allegations they make against him when the walls begin to crumble away.

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14

joker

Mad foetus makes a good point. The only problem with the Communications Unit is that they don’t do enough to ensure smooth media management – personally I’d double their budget so they can do a proper job. States members need representation through experienced press officers – every major jurisdiction uses them to prevent cock ups embarrassing individuals and Jersey like we saw with the Haut de La Garenne saga.

Some people are naive enough to think people in positions like States members should be self taught when knowing how to deal with the media and are obviously clueless as to how manipulative the media can be. Trust me – the likes of Paxman will eat anyone without proper and constant media preparation for breakfast.

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16

samual ross

You should not have a need for a communications unit or a budget for it…

Reporters should not be waiting for some spinned up sanitised version of what they say happened, rather than digging for information and using their wits to find out for themselves.

Honestly this Island is so backward at times but slowly and surely it is walking up and smelling the cappuccino (Camp coffee if your still entrenched it your dogma.)

Gone Stuart grind them down son!!

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18

ZBD

Mad Foetus # 13 “Truer Words Were Never Spoken” I also agree with ‘Head in a Cloud’ # 6. Lenny Harper’s press strategy on the major investigation was well out of order. There may or may not have been justification for the way the investigation was conducted, but the press releases were unnecessary and in my view damaging to the whole enquiry. Senator Syvret must surely see that his continued bleating about this subject does no good the Island he is supposed to serve.

Nobody outside the police can be sure about the strengths and weaknesses of the evidence available to the police. The investigation may have been totally warranted, however Mr. Harper shouldn’t have revealed so much about what was occurring, until he had absolute proof of what had been discovered. In doing so he potentially prejudiced his ongoing investigation.

Stuart Syvret’s intentions may have been honourable, but I feel that he and Mr. Harper went about things the wrong way. Using Edna’s term, stop flogging a dead horse. A wise man should know when to keep quiet.

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20

Civil Serpent

TBM Coconut shells? What coconut shells?

The item in question has NEVER been officially found to be a coconut shell. It contained collagen (which, I understand, coconut shells do not have). An unqualified lab assistant commented that it “looked like a coconut shell”. That does not make it a coconut shell. I thought it looked like a bit of an old shoe’s insole but that doesn’t make it one.

So TBM your comment highlights exactly how the Coms Unit have twisted a lab assistant’s observation into a ‘fact’ and fed it the media for people like you to believe. Congratulations.

Less said about the sawn, burnt children’s bones the better for it would not fit into your anti-Syvret agenda too well would it?

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22

Tony B

Me sit on a fence? No chancce! I have never hiddden my views on Mr Syvret. Especially following his broadcast on Radio 4 some time ago. It made me ashamed to be a Jerseyman! If any person has done more to muddy the waters over the Haute De La Garrene fiasco it is him. At the time of any investigation those involved in the hard work of gathering eveidence, that must be presented to an unbiased jury, if any justice is to be achived should be alowed to get on with it not have to put up with a background of rampant grandstanding!

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24

ZBD

Civil Serpent # 20. How do you know for sure what the forensic tests revealed? You seem to be repeating what Lenny Harper said on S.S.’s Blog. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the investigation are are, continually going on about it helps nobody – Few people outside those involved in the investigation will be in possession of the facts.

Surely if the fragment of what was said to be part of a skull, really was a significant find, the forensic scientists would have given their view to the press by now.

Usually if children go missing, parents, relatives or friends would have noticed something and reported it to the authorities or said smething to the national media by now.

All Mr. Harper has done, with the support of Stuart Syvret, is create what is known to criminologists, as a ‘moral panic’. The fear of crime is often a long way from what has actually occurred, is occurring or what is ever likely to occur.

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26

Flymo

@22 You have clearly got it wrong as I was saying that I am sat on the fence not you. Examination of the detail is all important.

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28

Born Warrior

ZBD 24
…”Usually if children go missing, parents, relatives or friends would have noticed something and reported it to the authorities or said something to the national media by now”….

I find this rather a naive comment coming from an ex-policeman.
During that particular period in Jersey’s history (and I must say things are much the same now) people came and went continuously and no-one asked any questions. And the reason many children were in care was because they had no “caring” relatives, so it was easy for them to slip (or be pushed) through the net and be lost forever.

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30

Civil Serpent

ZBD #24

You are correct Dave that I am repeating what Mr Harper has said. I do so because of the constant use of the term coconut. The more people who call it a coconut, without any evidence to prove that it was, the more it becomes accepted as a ‘fact’, as the previous poser had demonstrated.

You are correct in saying “Few people outside those involved in the investigation will be in possession of the facts”. That is why I am repeating the explanation of a person who was involved in the investigation and so is in possession of said facts. You, like me, do not have the facts as we did not work on the case.

In any event you are entirely missing the point of my post. The point was that the Coms Unit cynically allow such (mis)information to propogate, particularly when it has a sensational aspect to it which can be used to great effect to trash a person who they consider should be trashed. The coconut point was simply an illustration of how negative propoganda can be used when required.

If the item was actually proven to be a coconut and that the sequence of events are such that Mr Hasrper should be critised for failing to spot the problem then fair enough. However, I do think that it is unfair to allow such a trashing of someone’s professional reputation to be based on unfounded and erroneous misinformation.

How would you feel if the many years of your police service was rubbished over something which you knew was wrong?

I believe in fair play that’s all. I am not in any moral panic.

Perhaps the way to put all of this to bed is to have the scientists formally tell us what it was and when Mr Harper knew about it. That would shut up either the pro or anti Harper camps.

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32

ZBD

Civil Serpent # 29. I agree that the way to settle all this, would be to have the scientists disclose what they told the enquiry team – the question is why hasn’t someone lept to Mr. Harper’s defence?

You mention fair play; making sensational comments in the press, before alleged offenders have appeared before a jury, is not fair play. Neither was it fair play to infer that other professionals – including other police officers – hadn’t done their job? I will of course concede two wrongs do not make a right.

I can not criticise Mr. Harper’s investigative abilities – I never met the man; however I will retain my stance on the inappropriate press strategy which in my view is what harmed his credibility.

On the topic of creating a moral panic, I wouldn’t expect someone from your background to be influenced in such a way. It is those outside policing who are most likely to experience this phenomenon.

Born Warrior # 27 I don’t believe I am being naive; rather you are being cynical. There may have been rotton apples in the child care system – as indeed there are in any organisation. However many of those employed in the Children’s Service were and still are committed to the welfare of children and if children did disappear, I am happy someone would have noticed and reported it. As it stands today, there is no proof of anyone disappearing – in the interests of justice, I hope the scientists will soon speak out, to put this ongoing debate to an end.

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34

truthseeker

What those who would condemn this gentleman….would do well to consider is that anyone who had gone against or stood up to this rotten establishment that squander and blow Zillions of quids safe in the knowledge that the suckers…yes us the taxpayer will compliantly cough up again… would have also been painted as an enemy of the state, the tax here is spiraling out of control in direct relation to the uncontrollable spending which is why they now want unbridled immigration to pay for it all as it’s a runaway train…whatever S.S. has said and done and I agree he has allowed himself to get blown off course here and there…be glad people that someone opposes these, quango feeding politicos and there blood sucking civil service. anyone earning less than 100k a year now will get continually screwed for tax ad infinitum.unless there is radical change and soon.

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36

JULIE

On the topic of children going missing I was recently told a very disturbing story by a local man.I think it was in the late 1950′s or early 60′s that he had a relative(cousin perhaps?) at Haut de la Garenne whom he used to visit fairly regularly until one day the child was not there.The child had simply vanished and despite quite rigorous investigations no-one seemed able to supply details as to where she had gone.Thirty years later the person was found to be alive and well and had in fact been taken overseas to live with another family member.So yes it is possible,or was in those days,for a child to “go missing”
The waters have been well and truly muddied over the whole HDLG episode and it appears that people who dislike Stuart Syvret have decided that nothing bad ever happened there and that the whole investigation was a waste of time and money.I fear it is not that simple.

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38

Belta

This man is insufferable. He has never once produced the ‘proof’ he claims to have in relation to the various allegations he has made over the years… never! How people can still have faith in him I don’t know.

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40

Big Bean

In response to Julie@36, if everyone believed every story that we were told we would believe that little green men fly around in the space ships at night and that fairies dance at the bottom of my garden.

However, you are right that there is little doubt that some pretty horific things happened at HDLG. I don’t know whether anyone was killed or not, but it is clear that abuse took place.

You are also correct in saying that there are people who dislike Stuart Syvret.

However where you are wrong, is it’s not because we don’t believe that awful things happened at HDLG a long time ago, but it’s because we know they did, and now, thanks to the conduct of Syvret and Harper, any real chance of seeing justice are virtually nil.

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