Legal Stalking

(This is an updated re-post of an article originally posted here in 2016.)

 

The law firm "Public Interest Lawyers" is to close and more than a thousand complaints which it has filed against British soldiers and marines will be reviewed and probably thrown out. See link to Daily Mail article. For more than a decade PIL instigated witch hunts against servicemen (and it was mainly men) on the basis of what are now known to be flimsy or completely bogus cases of human rights violations. Far from PIL being the victim of an establishment plot, the Blair, Brown and Cameron governments were completely happy to hang ordinary soldiers out to dry and they helpfully established two new investigative bodies to process all the complaints which PIL generated. It was only when judges described evidence from some of PIL's Iraqi clients as "lies" (very strong language for judges) -and the Brexit issue coincidentally swept a lot of human dross out of positions of high office in the United Kingdom government, that PIL was finally held to account. 

Whilst the Daily Mail is to be congratulated for having campaigned against the witch hunts, and for years the response of the liberal establishment to the Mail's campaign was to fatuously heap praise and honours (honourary doctorates and "solicitor of the year") on PIL's senior partner, Phil Shiner, the suggestion by some Mail columnists that Mr Shiner now be prosecuted for treason is probably inappropriate. The false cases represent a serious crime, primarily against individual soldiers and marines and the principle of Justice rather than against the State and the most appropriate charge would, therefore, be one of "conduct tending to pervert the course of justice." If Mr Shiner is to face a court himself, then it is only right that he should do so for what he did to individuals with rights of their own. Which was to persecute them using the law as a weapon, often for years, and almost always with the acquiescence of the successive governments that were willing to send those same individuals into harm's way. (Initially they were sent into harm's way with inadequate equipment, too, because the Blair government forbade the army to make detailed preparations for war because Mr Blair didn't want it to look as if war with Iraq was a forgone conclusion.)

A treason charge would only be appropriate if there was evidence that Mr Shiner acted deliberately to harm Britain as a nation by setting the courts against her soldiers, and even then it would probably need to have been on behalf of a foreign power rather than as a sort of personal hobby horse. So far, there is no evidence of this, though investigations into Mr Shiner have only just begun. 

However, it is true that if an officer of the Russian FSB or SVR had concocted a plan that saw more than a thousand criminal cases being sought against frontline British service personnel, making it seem as if the British Army was somewhat worse than the SS -and had that officer managed to get the British taxpayer to completely fund his destablisation campaign, then that hypothetical officer would receive warm praise and prompt promotion.


Update: 5th of October 2016.
The government of Theresa May has indicated that it will close loopholes in the Human Rights Act which have left soldiers open to malicious prosecution on the flimsiest of grounds. Most European countries had implemented the same basic Human Rights Act without exposing their soldiers to malicious legal action, so it has to be concluded that the governments of Antony Charles Lynton Blair and David Cameron intended that British soldiers would be so exposed.

Both Blair and Cameron denuded the British armed forces of vital resources whilst finding a constant stream of controversial and unwinnable wars for them to fight, and the net result was quite debilitating. It is only possible to conclude that a weakening and discrediting of Britain's armed forces was their objective. "Why" is an open question, but it might have something to do with a europhile agenda too radical to be admitted to in public. The early signs are that Mrs May will have no truck with that sort of thing, but it will take a while for the new government to accept that defence has been deliberately underfunded by a significant extent since about 1992. The turnaround has to start somewhere, though, and hopefully this is it.

Update: 3rd of February 2017.
Phil Shiner has been convicted of several professional misconduct charges. There are now calls for him to be prosecuted for breaches of the criminal law that could see him jailed, but this would require a lot more legal work.

 

Update: 2nd of October 2024. 

 Phil Shiner has pleaded guilty to three charges of fraud, in a sum over £3M. So Medawar's previous update, that criminal charges would require a lot more legal work, was something of an understatement. See embedded report from "The Art of Law" below.

Once the criminal proceedings are finally over with the sentencing in December, surviving victims of this man may be able to bring civil claims for defamation, but it is a pity and a glaring omission that no stalking charges have been brought or even, apparently, considered.

 

The Murder of Linda Muegge: Who was "Frank"?

 It is now about seventeen years since Linda Muegge, an animal welfare campaigner who also ran a food kitchen for disadvantaged humans and was otherwise active in her community in a positive way, was stabbed to death in her kitchen, in Fredericksburg, Central Texas, the killer attempting to burn the house down over her head to conceal the evidence. This failed for two reasons: a large amount of non-flammable plaster ceiling material fell on top of the body, preserving evidence of her wounds -and the local fire department were training nearby and were able to attend the scene several minutes earlier than would have normally been the case:

This is a link to a current Fox News article on the case:

https://www.fox7austin.com/news/fredericksburg-woman-linda-muegge-case-missing-in-texas

And this is a link to a blog article (one of several by the same author) posted many years ago by a friend of Medawar, reproducing a lot of articles and local background information not otherwise available online. If you have trouble reading the newspaper cuttings, they are posted as jpegs so you can download them and read them more easily in an image viewer that allows you to zoom in on the text:

https://vocct.blogspot.com/2010/12/muegge-murder.html

Here is the somewhat meagre but still useful article from the Texas Department of Public Safety (who, incidentally, are responsible for licensing private detectives. The State Troopers come under the DPS, too.)

 https://www.dps.texas.gov/apps/coldCase/Home/Details/8

 This murder has occupied the attention of both Medawar and VOCCT for oh so many years, and it is perplexing that the FBI have not yet solved this one because Agents from the San Antonio Field Office have so many friends and supporters in Fredericksburg.

Today, one word in the FBI's updated article on this murder strikes Medawar as a bit of a clue, which those agents really should have been able to follow up on. That word is "Frank" and it is the name used by an individual who Linda complained of, to police, some years before her murder. She did not feel safe with Frank on her land or in her house, and she only knew him because he had been introduced by a mutual friend. See:

https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/vicap/homicides-and-sexual-assaults/linda-muegge

The method of approach to the victim is not typical of an ordinary stalker or sex-pest. It is, however, how undercover officers and private detectives tend to do it. SVR and FSB agents also prefer to be introduced to a target rather than to introduce themselves, but the agency involved might be closer to home than that.

It is unlikely that the killer himself was a private detective, because that would be unprofessional as well as illegal and setting a fire to "destroy evidence" is not a favoured technique with professionals because it tends to give investigators an unambiguous timeline which can be more dangerous than just leaving the deceased to their own devices until discovered hours or days later. But since Frank appeared at the beginning of a years-long campaign of harassment, the killer might well have been one of Frank's clients, or an associate thereof. (Well-planned killings tend to have several layers of separation.)

Now, at the time there was a licensed private investigator, based in Fair Oaks (between St Antonio and Fredericksburg) who did quite a lot of work for the great and good of both cities and most of them (and several local FBI agents, police officers and Texas Rangers) knew him as "Frank"  even though that was not the name on his business card. He also claimed to be a former FBI agent and this claim was verified by senior agents in the San Antonio Field Office, although, interestingly, one State Trooper who asked FBI Headquarters to confirm this (in connection with complaints about the private investigator's license) was told, quite clearly and firmly, that the private investigator was NOT a former FBI agent.

It's almost as if the FBI as an institution is currently searching in vain for information already known to many of its former agents!

It could be very embarrassing for the killer, whoever he is, if Medawar had an image of that investigator's business card, would it not?

"Cyber Stalking Leading to Death" will get you life in jail!

 There has been a successful Federal prosecution for this crime, details now released by the FBI. It is worth noting that this was effectively also a gangstalking case insofar as the primary defendant was found to have had help on the night when things progressed to the actual killing and, given the intensity of the stalking (and blackmail attempts) which preceded this, it's quite likely that he would have sought to share the workload before this.

(Note to police, FBI and NCA: if a victim is alleging offences that seem like an impossible amount of work for a single offender, you must give weight to the possibility of conspiracy and/or common purpose as well as that the victim is simply mistaken. The latter course will only reduce your workload and help your career if it is really true: if the victim turns out to be correct you've just blown away your career, reputation and pension. The safest course is to check for this kind of thing, because it's always going to be more common than suggested by official statistics (which are primarily designed to get your political bosses re-elected).

No mention is made of sentences for the two known accomplices, which may indicate either that they still face further local charges in Independence, Missouri, or that they felt the need to cut a deal with the Federal authorities. Had they been proved to have assisted with the cyber-stalking phase of the case, they could easily have faced the same penalty. 

This highlights the enormous risks being run by anyone playing even a minor role in stalking, gangstalking and cyber-stalking offences, because simply by doing what you are told by the sort of person likely to become head of such a gang, you are making yourself legally responsible for the actions of someone not in their right mind!

There's more than one Federal law these days that can be used to prosecute such cases, depending largely on whether or not the abuse of computer technology was involved (bugs, spyware, tracking devices, and tracking apps on the victim's phone all count and not very many stalking gangs fail to use at least one of those!) Even when it's all done by word of mouth, it's still a conspiracy to deny rights and when that results in death (or kidnapping) the penalty can be life imprisonment or death, if the current administration is minded to permit the latter.

In the United Kingdom there is no such thing as a Federal crime; just varying degrees of severity or public interest which might divert a case from Crown or Sheriff's court to the Old Bailey or the Court of Sessions. But there is a an over-arching principle that participants in a conspiracy share responsibility for what the conspiracy does and there is also a law of Common Purpose, which requires even participants in a spontaneous offence to share responsibility for its outcome. Beyond that, a gang member can be and often is, charged with "assisting an offender in..." whatever the crime was. 

The cosy feeling of security in being a gang member or going along with workplace bullying is a legal illusion, because by doing so you make yourself responsible for the final outcome of that activity, however dreadful that might be. And the dreadfulness of the outcome is determined by the most psychopathic or sociopathic personality within the gang, or workplace. Everyone accosted by a bully or participant in a feud of any kind, needs to ask themselves the simple question: "what's the worst thing this person might do?" before doing anything that might help them do it.

There's probably at least a dozen followers in jail for every leader who managed to get himself jailed rather than letting someone else go to jail for him.

Bob Dylan: "don't follow leaders, who rob the parking meters!"

New Year's posts by Victims of Organized Crime in Central Texas

 VOCCT has posted two blog articles for the new year, see:

https://vocct.blogspot.com/2024/

Her remarks about lies are important, because stalkers, organised or otherwise, tend to depend on lies above all other means of manipulation.

Recently in the UK, several police officers (including some of Chief Officer rank) have been exposed as rapists and paedophiles. All of them protected themselves with a web of lies. If you are a policeman and you start tripping over lies told to you by your colleagues, your duty to the public is to find out just what is not only hidden but also enabled by those lies. If the lies you are hearing might seem innocuous and even tolerable, what about the thing that is being enabled by those lies? Might not that thing be something no reasonable person could possibly accept? Perhaps it might be as well to check on that before potentially implicating yourself by turning a blind eye!

There are multiple scandals associated with the pandemic which readers have just survived and so many others didn't, but all of those scandals revolve around individuals for whom lying was, and still is, the first resort.