July 16, 2001
An
Unlikely Serb
A London court case has an
interesting link to the bombing of Belgrade
NO
HERO
Barry
George
was not a pleasant man. Of limited intelligence, he lived in squalor
and was a pathological liar. He was also obsessed with guns, and
a brute towards women. In short he was the local weirdo, just the
sort of person you would fit up for an unsolved murder.
SUDDEN
DEATH
And
then there was the unsolved
murder: Jill
Dando, a popular television presenter, had been shot once in
the forehead. It was a clean shot. After a year, the police had
found no one. The pressure was intense, Jill Dando was very popular
and besides she looks a bit like Princess Diana. The police decided
to charge Barry George.
CONVICTED
A
month ago Barry George was convicted of Jill Dando's murder. For
such a serious crime, there was remarkably little evidence. Barry
George was a "loner" who stalked women (although he never killed
them, and had never stalked Dando). The man was a pathological liar.
He wanted to be a singer and had an interest in guns. His motive
was notoriety, although he still protests his innocence. And look
at him, just look at him, he's a nutter. That was the crux
of the prosecution's argument. There was also a small
trace of gunpowder in his coat pocket. This could have
come from the gun that had shot Dando, but it could have come from
any one of 20% of the other guns in the world. Like the ones stored
in the photography room in Hammersmith police station. Where Barry
George's coat was stored. Unsealed. That, folks, is the smoking
gun that links Barry George to Jill Dando. No positive identification
of being in the area at the time. Indeed a witness stated that he
was in a social security office at the time of the murder. No confession
or boasting. No evidence discovered in the painstaking search of
his flat, a dirty place, because nothing was ever thrown away.
THE
BELGRADE CONNECTION
So,
who could have killed Barry George? One popular theory is that it
was a Serb
gunman. Jill Dando had screened a piece on the Kosovo refugee
crisis. The Serbs were, as in anything made by the state controlled
BBC at the time, portrayed as sub-human deviants, racially programmed
to kill. At the same time, NATO had bombed the television station
in Belgrade, for spewing out propaganda to the masses. Was it a
great leap of faith to see this as a Serb revenge attack? The Detective
in charge of the case did not think so at first and neither did
the senior barrister in charge of Barry George's defence. I am more
sceptical, but it raises questions.
BUT
WHY?
Why
would the police wish to get the wrong man? There are conspiracy
theories, centering around the obvious fact that no government wishes
its citizens to believe that the consequences of a government's
actions abroad will be visited on its citizens. Personally, I suspect
a different motivation: the police simply had to find somebody and
Barry George was the somebody. Whatever has happened, this is likely
to be seen as a gross injustice. A government that can break the
law abroad continues its practice at home.
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