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*Angel* · Joined: 30 May 2007 Posts: 86

Rebus star Ken Stott makes dramatic appeal over mystery death of student

Oct 19 2008 By Douglas Walker

http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/...-death-of-student-78057-20817500/

It is truly hope in the air and we are so greatful that Ken want to help.

Take care stay strong!

*AngeL*

*Angel* · Joined: 30 May 2007 Posts: 86

Rebus bids "to solve" mystery of girl´s death

Oct 20 2008 By Douglas Walker

Today in Daily Mail

kevin donald · Joined: 29 Oct 2007 Posts: 195

The Kilmarnock police are confident of a positive outcome?

http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/...n-is-missing-gran-78057-20840325/

Are the going to bring in a cracker style approach again.

Guje · Joined: 29 May 2007 Posts: 24 Location: Sweden

Wick couple to join Edinburgh justice walk
Published: 28 November, 2008
A WICK couple who believe their 24-year-old son was murdered are to take part in next week's Silent Walk for Justice in Edinburgh.

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Hugh and June McLeod will join scores of people from throughout Scotland who claim to have been let down by the legal process.

The McLeods, of Nicolson Street, are aggrieved at shortcomings in the investigation of their son Kevin's death at Wick harbour in February 1997.

How he died remains a mystery but his family are sure he was the victim of foul play and are campaigning for those responsible to be brought to justice.

Those taking part in Thursday's walk will gather at Edinburgh Castle esplanade before marching down the Royal Mile and on to the Scottish Parliament.

They will place pictures of their loved ones and light candles before mounting a silent vigil outside Holyrood where they hope to hand information on their respective cases to justice minister Kenny Mac-Askill.

Mrs McLeod (56) said yesterday: "It's terrible that we have got to go to this length to highlight our fight for justice for our loved ones.

"The more families that can come along the better.

"It will be very emotional because everybody lost someone in tragic circumstances and is having to fight for justice over what happened to them."

The walk has been arranged by Swede Guje Borjesson (54), who is campaigning over the unsolved death of her daughter Annie. The 30-year-old, who had been working in Edinburgh, was found washed up on Prestwick beach in December 2004.

Meanwhile, earlier this month Northern Constabulary re-interviewed a witness in relation to Kevin McLeod's death.

It follows fresh information the family provided to the force about an assault on Kevin shortly before he ended up in the water.

Kevin's uncle Allan McLeod said yesterday: "We have since received further information which we believe to be very significant.

"We firmly believe that if this is fully investigated, it will bring the people we believe are responsible for his death to justice."

Work commitments prevent Allan McLeod, from Alness, joining Thursday's walk but he said he would be there in spirit.

"Too many families in Scotland have been denied justice over the deaths of loved ones because of flawed police investigations," he said. "I hope that Mr MacAskill will sit up and take note of this and do what he can to address the injustices being highlighted in Thursday's walk."

Guje · Joined: 29 May 2007 Posts: 24 Location: Sweden

BBC NEWS Scotland Glasgow, Lanarkshire and West Swedish woman's death remembered
Sunday, 30 November 2008

Swedish woman's death remembered

Police concluded that Annie Borjesson had taken her own life
The mother of a Swedish woman who was found dead on a beach in Ayrshire three years ago will attend a memorial service for her in Prestwick later. The body of Annie Borjesson, 30, was discovered on 4 December 2005 on the shore close to Prestwick Airport.

Police concluded that she had taken her own life but her family believe she could have been murdered.

The service for Ms Borjesson is due to take place at South Parish Church in Prestwick.

Her case has been highlighted on the website "A Search for Justice".

It states that during the autumn of 2004 Ms Borjesson studied English in Cambridge, before returning home to Sweden.

She travelled to Edinburgh in February 2005 to work.

When her body was discovered, she had been due to travel back to Sweden.

'Criminal act'

Ms Borjesson's luggage contained her Swedish passport and two library books, which she were to be returned to a library in Sweden.

She also had an appointment with her hairdresser in Sweden the following day.

After Strathclyde Police concluded that Ms Borjesson had taken her own life, her mother Guje and others travelled to Scotland to make their own inquiries.

They maintain that the information supplied by the police did not match their own, which pointed to a possible criminal act.

Ms Borjesson's family and friends are convinced that she may have been murdered and want the investigation into her death re-opened.

Guje · Joined: 29 May 2007 Posts: 24 Location: Sweden

Dear All

Article about Annie today in the Sunday Times, by Gillian Harris.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article5337116.ece

Guje.

scotkaz · Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 525

No interpreter ... so police asked accused's girlfriend to translate his rights

By John Bynorth, Home Affairs Editor

SCOTLAND'S LARGEST police force has been accused of breaching the human rights of a Czech waiter who was found drunk behind the wheel of a car, by asking his girlfriend - the only defence witness - to translate crucial documents relating to his rights before he provided a blood sample.

Strathclyde Police could not find a qualified interpreter for several hours after Michal Mohelnik, 25, was taken to Stewart Street police station in Glasgow for a follow-up sample after he was breathalysed and initially found to be one-and-a-half times the legal alcohol limit for driving.

They asked his Czech girlfriend, Jitka Minkova, who had accompanied him to the station, to interpret and translate forms relating to his rights because they feared his blood alcohol levels would drop below the legal level, making it impossible to bring a case.
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Minkova told the Sunday Herald her English was only "basic" at the time of the incident two years ago, and added that she was under the impression her boyfriend would be held for longer if she did not assist.

Mohelnick was fined £200 at Glasgow justice of the peace court on February 6 after being found guilty of being drunk in charge of a vehicle. Officers found him at the wheel of Minkova's parked car in the city's Sauchiehall Street.

Language expert Professor Guillermo Makin claimed Strathclyde Police may have breached Mohelnik's rights under article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

It states that anyone who cannot understand or speak the language spoken by the police is entitled to the free assistance of an interpreter. Makin said Minkova was not qualified to interpret.

Scotland, unlike England and Wales, does not have national guidelines on the use of interpreters, which has led to criticism over the use of unqualified migrants by agencies to interpret for the police and in the courts.

Minkova, 29, said: "The police should not have used me as an interpreter. I wasn't happy to interpret, but Michal had been arrested in a strange country and I wanted to help. I didn't think I could refuse and thought they would keep him longer if I did.

"I understand basic English, but they asked me to translate the forms about the blood test. I later had a letter informing me witnesses were not supposed to be in contact or talk about the case."

Chief Superintendent Ewen MacLellan, of Strathclyde Police's community safety and criminal justice unit, said the court had accepted that using Minkova was fair "to all concerned", although the force does have arrangements for a 24‑hour interpreting service.

He added: "There are occasions, extremely rarely I would add, where an interpreter is unable to immediately attend and where there is a time imperative, as in drink-driving investigations such as this one, when we may have to resort to other means to translate the procedural form to a suspect.

"The overriding considerations are the suspect understanding what is being asked of him or her and ensuring fairness to the person or persons involved."

scotkaz · Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 525

UK doctor examines al-Habashi for fitness to travel

By John Bynorth, Home Affairs Editor

A BRITON who claimed to have been tortured at Guantanamo Bay by the FBI with MI6's complicit knowledge could return home early this week after meeting with UK officials in the prison camp yesterday.

Benyam Mohammed al-Habashi, 30, was assessed by a British Embassy official and Metropolitan Police doctor to establish if he was well enough to withstand the long journey aboard an RAF plane to be reunited with his family.

The decision is the only obstacle between the Ethiopian-born man and freedom after four-and-a-half years at the detention centre which US President Barack Obama last month ordered to be shut.

Al-Habashi claimed he was tortured during interrogations carried out by FBI agents and Pakistani officials, which he said MI6 knew about, and falsely confessed to involvement in a radioactive "dirty bomb" plot.

The High Court in London two weeks ago refused to release the CIA dossier on the case on the grounds the US had threatened to withdraw co-operation in terrorist cases if the details were made public, thus putting UK people at risk.

Al-Habashi, who lived in West London, visited Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he was arrested after his passport was found to be invalid, following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The Sunday Herald was the first newspaper to highlight his case, in October 2005. Clive Stafford-Smith, a human rights lawyer and director of the human rights charity Reprieve, is optimistic al-Habashi will be released "early" this week. He is on hunger strike and is reportedly being force-fed twice daily to keep him alive.

"I sincerely hope it will happen in the next few days," said Stafford-Smith. "We have had lots of false starts, but I think it will happen this time. Two British officials were in Guantanamo Bay meeting with Benyam yesterday where they were making sure he is medically fit to travel."

Stafford-Smith added that the delay in releasing al-Habashi was caused by a review of each case to decide whether they should be released without charge or prosecuted, and how such a trial would proceed, but that the British man had received "expedited consideration" ahead of the other 241 inmates.

He added: "The delay has been paradoxical in that, in his executive order, Obama created a process where they could get their case reviewed. Getting his case reviewed has been the delay."

A Foreign Office spokesperson said: "A team of British officials have left Miami airport today Saturday to visit Benyam Mohammed in Guantanamo Bay.

"The visit will make preparations for his return, should the ongoing US review into Guantanamo Bay detainees confirm a decision to release him. The team includes a doctor."

Stafford-Smith said: "Al-Habashi's personal plan is to go somewhere very quiet and get his head together. What he has been through has been horrific."

Al-Habashi, who first came to the UK when he was 16, had been seeking refugee status when he was arrested. In Karachi, he said that the FBI told him he was a leading al-Qaeda agent. When he said that he could not even speak Arabic, they threatened to take him to an Arabic country to be tortured. He said two MI6 officers came into the room afterwards, offered him tea, and warned that he would need "a lot of sugar" and that one of the agents told him he would be tortured by Arabs.

He was later beaten with a belt and had a gun forced into his chest by Pakistani security staff. He was moved to Morocco, where he spent 18 months and was regularly attacked with a scalpel. He also suffered prolonged sleep deprivation, was drugged and forced to listen to music non-stop, made to watch pornographic movies and had naked women thrust in front of him.

Angeline · Joined: 02 Oct 2008 Posts: 145

I read, just the other day, that there are children being held in Guantanamo Bay - one was just 13 when he was detained 7 years ago??

It's worth noting, as well, that Mr al-Habashi is deemed to have been "detained" in GB for four and a half years, but has actually been held for 18 months in Morocco, after being arrested in Karachi, tortured, beaten etc - how long has this man really been held, without trial?

Like most of the others, around 7 years. The 13 year old kid is now a 20 year old...what? We can't call him a man, he most certainly isn't a kid any more, and given the horrors that we know have been allowed there, he has, most probably, been stripped of the last vestiges of humanity.

If it weren't so serious, I'd have laughed at the figure of 241 "other inmates" - what they are referring to here, I believe, are the 241 "high" or "higher" profile inmates whose cases are receiving some attention. The rest are either dead, ignored, or being left to rot.

Reminds me of a song:
Where have all the flowers gone..long time passing,
When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn?
_________________
As long as one heart still holds on, then hope will never really be gone

scotkaz · Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 525

Feb 21 2009 By Jamie Beatson

WITNESSES in serious criminal trials will be allowed to give evidence anonymously under new government plans.

They will give judges new powers to protect victims of crime and other key witnesses when they testify in murder, drug or organised crime cases.

The proposals, aimed at ending the threat of violence and intimidation, were outlined yesterday by justice secretary Kenny MacAskill.

They are set to be included in next month's Criminal Justice and Licensing Bill - and were welcomed by Victim Support yesterday.

But leading lawyers warned it could deny some a fair trial.

The new orders, which the Scottish government say would be used only in "appropriate" cases, are among a series of measures to support victims of crime.

The Bill will allow more witnesses to give evidence behind screens or in front of cameras.

It will also propose making it easier for courts to issue non-harassment orders to protect witnesses.

And it will allow courts to significantly raise compensation awards to victims if an offender has "come into money" - such as a lottery win - after the original order was made.

Addressing a Victim Support conference, MacAskill said: "The Scottish Government is committed to supporting victims of crime and working with communities, voluntary organisations, local authorities and across borders to build stronger and safer communities for us all."

But Ian Duguid, QC, head of the Faculty of Advocates' criminal bar association, said: "I wonder whether it would be compatible with human rights legislation.

"If an accused doesn't know the identity of the accuser, it will create a problem. You won't be able to challenge their account. Not knowing could impact on a fair trial."

David McKenna, head of Victim Support Scotland, said the moves would give, "greater protection for the victims and witnesses of crime."

Common law in Scotland already allows witnesses to give evidence anonymously but the power is vague and rarely used.