| Topic: | The police action is a disgrace | |
| Posted by: | Robert Fish | |
| Date/Time: | 16/08/14 20:15:00 |
| First of all, I should say I'm uncomfortable with Cliff Richard's brand of evangelical Christianity and I cannot abide the music he has inflicted on the British public for more than 50 years (his early stuff was much more interesting). However, to be crucified publicly before any allegations have even been put to him is not my idea of British justice. Just how did the media come to cover the raid on his house? Were the police searching for specific evidence or was it a general fishing exercise, in which case a search warrant should not have been granted? The fact that they took away lots of bags of material suggests it was just a generalised trawl for evidence. It makes me think that the object of this highly-publicised exercise might not have been so much to gather evidence but rather to attract the attention of other possible "victims", who might corroborate the evidence of the original complainant (or might just jump on the bandwagon to extract compensation!). The idea of using the testimony of other "victims" to show propensity makes me very uneasy. Did the police make any serious effort to contact Richard, as they should have done before raiding his home? Did the magistrate that issued the search warrant ask the same question? Did the police satisfy him/her that there was relevant material on the premises? The safeguarding legal proprieties have been ignored in the post-Savile rush to judgment. |