SUNDAY TIMES 14.12.08
Tory MP Damian Green's 'bungled' leaks case faces axe
David Leppard
Scotland Yard is preparing for the criminal case against the Tory MP
Damian Green to be dropped because senior officers believe it may
never reach court.
Sir Paul Stephenson, the acting Metropolitan police commissioner,
last week discussed with senior advisers the option of abandoning the
case.
Two Met insiders said the Yard expected the case to be dropped
because of the bungled and possibly unlawful way in which his House
of Commons office was searched. Either the police would drop the case
or the Crown Prosecution Service would withdraw it when Green
answered bail in February.
Green, the shadow immigration spokesman, was arrested last month by
detectives from the Met's counter-terrorist command. They were
investigating a series of leaks of politically embarrassing documents
from the Home Office.
Green was questioned for nine hours about allegations that he had
conspired to commit "misconduct in public office".
Police had been called in by the Cabinet Office after Sir David
Normington, permanent secretary at the Home Office, said the leaks
could potentially jeopardise national security.
Christopher Galley, 26, an assistant private secretary to Jacqui
Smith, the home secretary, was also arrested. He is accused of
passing documents to Green which were later published.
The Yard operation led to a political furore with opposition MPs
claiming ministers were using the police to plug leaks that
embarrassed them but did no harm to national security.
Part of the Yard's problem is that the raid on Green's Commons office
may have been unlawful because it failed to follow correct procedures.
Keir Starmer, director of public prosecutions, was told of Green's
imminent arrest only 10 minutes before it happened. He is understood
to be privately aghast that the Met took the decision to arrest Green
and search his Commons office without taking proper legal advice.
Stephenson himself is understood to have come to the view that Green
should not have been arrested in such a dramatic way but should have
been invited voluntarily to attend a police station for questioning.
The Met's decision on whether to abandon the case will hinge on the
results of an independent inquiry by Ian Johnston, chief constable of
the British transport police. His report is due this week.
================
SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 14.12.08
Police think CPS will block charges against Damian Green
Scotland Yard believes that prosecutors are almost certain to block
charges against Damian Green, the Conservative immigration spokesman.
By Andrew Alderson, Chief Reporter
Senior sources at the Metropolitan Police are convinced that in
recent days the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has "raised the bar"
over the amount of evidence needed to prosecute the senior Tory MP,
who is at the centre of an investigation into the alleged leaking of
confidential information.
The prospect of charges being brought against Mr Green appeared to
recede last week when a report suggested that Met officers had
breached guidelines and good practice, and may have been heavy handed
in their approach.
The interim report from Ian Johnston, the chief constable of the
British Transport Police and the man called in by Scotland Yard to
conduct an independent scrutiny of the Damian Green affair, said that
the Met had acted legally, but claimed that senior detectives had
weakened their cause by the delay between the arrest of Christopher
Galley, the alleged Whitehall mole, and the subsequent arrest of Mr
Green eight days later.
Mr Green was questioned for nine hours and had his homes and Commons
office searched after being arrested on November 27. He is suspected
of receiving leaked documents.
Eight days earlier - on November 19 - Mr Galley, 26, an assistant
private secretary at the Home Office, was arrested at his home at
dawn and taken to Paddington Green, the most high security police
station in Britain. He is suspected of leaking the information.
As disclosed by The Sunday Telegraph, Scotland Yard is proceeding
with the case against Mr Green in consultation with senior lawyers
from the CPS. But one police source suggested that it is now feared
CPS lawyers lack enthusiasm for pressing charges - although he
stressed they have not yet seen all the evidence against Mr Green and
Mr Galley.
"The report [by Ian Johnston] was relatively bland," said one senior
source. "It was certainly no show-stopper resulting in us having to
drop the case. But the real issue on whether or not there will be
charges will not resolve around how we have handled things but,
instead, it will centre around the public interest test.
"Because of what has been said and done - and because of the whole
hoo-ha over this - the bar has been raised. The CPS will be wanting a
higher percentage chance of getting a prosecution than they would
have done before."
Scotland Yard has said that Mr Green was held "on suspicion of
conspiring to commit misconduct in a public office and aiding and
abetting, counselling or procuring misconduct in a public office".
But Mr Green's defence is likely to be that he was acting in the
public interest.
Mr Johnston, who chairs the Association of Chief Police Officers
crime committee, will present his full report on the Damian Green
affair this week. Neither the interim or full report will be made
public in case it prejudices the case against the two arrested men.
The arrest of Mr Green has led to tensions between two of the men who
have applied for the vacant job of Metropolitan Police Commissioner,
succeeding Sir Ian Blair.
Sir Paul Stephenson, the Acting Commissioner, was told of the planned
arrest of Mr Green in advance and challenged Bob Quick, the head of
anti-terrorism at the Yard and the man who ordered the arrest, over
the wisdom of the move. After the controversy over Mr Green's arrest,
Sir Paul called in Mr Johnston to scrutinise his force's handling of
the operation.
The position of Michael Martin, the Commons Speaker, remains in
doubt. Labour and Tory MPs have publicly and privately criticised his
role. Bob Marshall-Andrews, the Labour MP, said that Mr Martin had
lost the confidence of the House after he allowed police to enter the
Commons without a search warrant, and should now go.
Police were called in to investigate a series of embarrassing Home
Office leaks due to fears that national security could be
compromised, the UK's top civil servant said last week.
Sir Gus O'Donnell, the Cabinet Secretary, insisted he asked Scotland
Yard to launch a probe because there was a danger that "quite serious
stuff" could have been made public.
Giving evidence to the Public Administration Committee, Sir Gus said:
"When we started the inquiry the reason for it was we were worried
certain information was getting out that was potentially very
damaging to national security. [Like Home Office incompetence on
immigration ? Come off it! -cs]
"To have access to some other things that had come out in the
newspapers, the kind of person (who) would have access to that
material might also have access to some quite sensitive stuff."
Sir Gus also revealed that Scotland Yard could be called into the
Treasury to investigate the leaking of highly-sensitive financial
information.
government itself? -cs]
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