The Denis MacShane Prize 415


This is a genuine offer. I will pay £100 to any person who can provide a convincing reason why Denis MacShane’s expense fiddling, involving his creating false invoices, was not a criminal offence. Your argument does not have to be unanswerable – merely respectable. Up to three prizes will be given, for the three first and not essentially the same convincing arguments.

This competition specifically is open to employees of the Metropolitan Police and the Crown Prosecution Service; we would love to know their reasoning. It baffles me. I confess I can think of no single circumstance in this case that would prevent MacShane being convicted for theft and fraud. What is the answer?

Denis MacShane is a criminal. If he wants to try his chances with a jury, the libel courts are open to him and I am here.


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415 thoughts on “The Denis MacShane Prize

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  • Komodo

    More TalkTalk scam here; bloody scoundrels by all accounts.

    https://nodpi.org/2009/08/21/talktalk-sales-scam/

    Others: let’s just roll back the permissive society a bit all round, is all I’m saying. In my day we were taught not to talk to strange (sic) men. Being pissed at age 13 was strongly deprecated. Soho was full of shops selling schoolgirl outfits, too. Not simple. Needs thought rather than emotion. That’s me on this one. Take it or leave it.

    MacShane, lest we forget:
    http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/125703

  • Dreoilin

    I’m done with it.

    And as far as Denis MacShane is concerned, he *did* commit a criminal offence. I don’t see any way round it, other then by pedantic fiddling.

  • Dreoilin

    On Gavin Esler:
    His Wikipedia page carries this note:

    “This article may be an autobiography, or has been extensively edited by the subject or an institution related to the subject. Please help edit it to conform to Wikipedia’s neutral point of view, in line with the discussion on the talk page. (January 2011)”

    The Talk page makes for interesting reading:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gavin_Esler

  • Destoyer of Words

    “In 2003 Esler provided an alternate, British narration for the American PJ Productions’ film John Kennedy: Beyond Conspiracy. It is argued that the film does not provide a balanced view on the assassination, and the use of the widely respected BBC logo onto an American film has been viewed as attempting to give the film some otherwise lacking gravitas.”

    I am shocked. I saw that program and was convinced right up to this moment that it was a BBC production. I presume that ‘911: Beyond Conspiracy’ is also a US production with a BBC makeover. No wonder it was a big pile of steaming shit – it’s seeing this sort of crap that makes you realise that someone is trying to con you.

  • OldMark

    This thread has degenerated into something of a 3 way slanging match between Komodo/Nevermind/Technicolour. The spat has arisen I believe from an apparent unwillingness by the participants to discriminate, in this case between paedophilia and sexual predation.

    The nursery school abuser whose victim Technicolour knows is a vile paedophile (ditto the man Dreolin, with much candour and bravery, told us about yesterday). Jimmy Savile, ( and the gangs in Rochdale and other northern towns) are vile sexual predators. Paedophiles are sexually aroused by, and abuse, pre-pubescent children. Sexual predators, as the word indicates, seek out and prey upon inexperienced teenagers, principally because they are ‘impressionable’ and ‘easily led’, and thus easy sexual conquests. The youth of the victim is of primary importance to the paedophile, but only has incidental importance to the sexual predator.

    If these distinctions are ignored, confusion and misunderstandings follow- as this thread demonstrates.

  • Hang 'em High

    So, Lord McAlpine, Leon Brittan and William Hague have been buggering little boys in a Wrexham hotel and their chums and plod have been keeping mum. Proper proper disgusting. I’m totally ready to engage in violent revolt against this utter corruption which is systemic within government and our public bodies.

    Get the so called lobbyists out now – they promote this sort of thing in order to control these people.

  • Hang 'em High

    ‘He was an outstanding criminal lawyer, a good friend and a keen sportsman who enjoyed cricket, hockey and fishing.’

    A keen sportsman who enjoyed fishing but managed to drown himself in a stream? You have to be a special class of gullible to find that “not suspicious”.

    I thought cops were trained to be suspicious of everything and everyone, especially when dealing with an unexplained/unusual death. Even more so considering that its a very senior member of the judiciary who could have had any number of ex-cons looking for revenge.

    Total hogwash.

  • Chris Jones

    @Hang em high

    “So, Lord McAlpine, Leon Brittan and William Hague have been buggering little boys in a Wrexham hotel and their chums and plod have been keeping mum”

    … William ‘tortured cat’ Hague too you say Hang em high? Have you any direct links to back up these allegeations? If this is true of Hague, he would do well never to set foot in Wales,especially north again

  • Hang 'em High

    “Have you any direct links to back up these allegeations?”

    You need to read between the lines, but it is as clear as day who is being referred to here. There was only one welsh secretary that appointed Ronald Waterhouse to head the cover-up, and it was also he that set the limits of the inquiry, thereby keeping his name out the frame. It has been known for decades that Hague is a homosexual and there is a rumour he was abused by a senior Tory (Heath?) during the 70s.

    http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=19658&st=0

  • OldMark

    ‘don’t know how widely this has been reported –

    5th Nov – Girl, 8, revealed as Jimmy Savile’s youngest victim…’

    Oddie- a classic Daily Mail headline, to be sure- but most of the text beneath it concerns Savile’s affair with an 18 year old he met in Leeds when working as a club DJ.

    As Anna Raccoon ( a previous Duncroft resident, incidentally!) has pointed out, over the last month there has been a real ‘bandwagon effect’ over Savile since the ITV documentary was broadcast. His principal, and to date most credible accuser, would appear to have been a month short of her 16th birthday when ‘Uncle Jimmy’ demanded sexual favours from her-

    http://www.annaraccoon.com/politics/past-lives-and-present-misgivings-part-six/

  • thatcrab

    Old Mark wrote:
    “The spat has arisen I believe from an apparent unwillingness by the participants to discriminate, in this case between paedophilia and sexual predation.”

    I think you make a good point Old Mark, and i have a rather contentious possibly related one to make.

    A couple of threads back, a criminal or a tragic case from New Zealand appears, where a 14 year old school girl was found having social and sexual relations with 20 year old men, her parents were alarmed and the school and social services were involved to intervien: They assisted the schoolgirl in leaving her family home, and in legally divorcing her parents(!) to continue her relationships with the men.
    The girls family was extremely distraught to the degree that their son committed suicide. The case is described as an obvious paedophile ring at large in the New Zealand social and school system.

    However in New Zealand, although the age of consent is 18 – high by European standards, the police only prosecute on the advice of social services, who assess the situation to judge if abuse is present, if harm is being done.

    From my walk of life, 20 year olds performing group sex with 14 year olds, is abuse, and the idea of it does culturally revolt me. But i am aware of and accept the existence of, many other more liberal cultures than my own – within britain as well as beyond. Even within and around my own culture I have many female friends and aquaintances who expressed no regrets about seeking out and gaining sexual experiences with older men, when they were underage.

    The particular case in New Zealand seems to have harmed the family terribly who certainly did not share the relaxed attitude towards teenage sexuality that the school and councilor did. But if everyone in the region is generally relaxed and promiscuous about coming of age experience, and the girls social relationships were deemed to be friendly, i can see how a different culture could concieve that it was the parents who were unfairly worrying and bullying the 14 year olds normal advancement. Will that case send a message to other young men in New Zealand that they can treat underage schoolgirls as casual sex objects? Well not if the society and the social services is effective at looking out for them, according to their own values and taboos.

    It seems to me a better system, if it all possible, to have a specialist assessment of harm, rather than picking an age before which everything is harmful, and after which anything goes. Which is what we have here, and possibly the best we can manage in the UK. Especially when an age comes a couple of years early for many girls and a couple late for many others.

    Mistake and injustice arising from simplistic laws and judgements causes harm of its own as well as obscuring the worst activities at large.

  • Chris Jones

    @Hang em high – thanks for the link. Most people in Wales have known Hagues marriage to a Welsh girl was ‘a bit of a sham’ – to put it lightly. This in itself is obviously no crime but the other aspects you allude to obviously would be. Hague is allready in over his head,what with Libya and all- maybe the only chance for hima nd his ilk is a confessional amnesty as suggested by UK Column and Pie and mash films

  • Villager

    Another little reminder on Hague, an excerpt from Wiki:

    “In early September 2010, a number of newspapers including The Daily Telegraph, The Independent and Daily Mail published stories about the fallout from allegations surrounding Hague’s friendship with 25-year-old Christopher Myers,[67] a history graduate from Durham University whom he employed as a parliamentary special adviser. A spokesperson stated that “Any suggestion that the Foreign Secretary’s relationship with Chris Myers is anything other than a purely professional one is wholly inaccurate and unfounded.”[68][69] On 1 September 2010, Myers resigned from his position in the light of the press allegations.[70] The media stories led Hague to make a public statement,[71] in which he confirmed that he had “occasionally” shared a hotel room with Myers, but described as “utterly false” suggestions that he had ever been involved in a relationship with any man.”

  • Ben Franklin (head honcho CIA Office for Craig Murray Operations)

    39 Ben Franklin Says:

    ‘After watching FOX (brain bleach!) it’s seems the reluctant optimism, of which I am chief enabler, has reached the point where I am prepared to predict a landslide.
    The Trifecta Press has been walking it back for the sake of honor amongst thieves.’

    This is cross-posted from an American blog I comment at. My balls are swinging there, so I thought I might have them smited by a cricket bat, just as I might from a baseball bat. Then again, I could be right.:)

  • Jives

    @ Ben Franklin,

    Rounders is also an English/Irish game where a bat is still used.

    It is closer to baseball than cricket i believe.I’m sure you know this but just sayin’…;.)

  • Jives

    @ Dreoilin,

    Thank you.It’s a long road but I’m getting there..:.)

    All the best to you and yours.

  • Mochyn69

    @Mark Golding – Children Of Conflict
    3 Nov, 2012 – 9:58 pm

    Mark, you’re wanted over on the al Hilli thread. Could you drop by there sometime and offer your latest opinions?

  • oddie

    beano is an interesting character, according to his friend in the International Business Times today:

    Nicholas ‘Beano’ Levene: My Friend the £32m Financial Fraudster by Julian Kossoff
    These are the hard facts. Nicholas Levene (Beano to his friends, of which I am one) is a crook, a wrong ‘en, a “more front then Brighton” conman, who has just been found guilty of a £32 million fraud and sentenced to thirteen years in prison. Back-of-the-envelope calculus by people close to the case reckon another £30m-£150m is still unaccounted for…
    Beano’s life was also threatened and for over 18 months he couldn’t leave home without the escort of an ex-Israeli Army minder…
    Meanwhile, it is said that if he were to set foot in Israel, he would be a dead man…
    The platinum lifestyle took the rest. The £3.4m palatial villa in Israel, the £800,000 on two bar mitzvahs, the school fees, the Chagall sketch, the Filipino help, the presidential suite, private jet hire, the £10,000 for the Tory party and a very generous helping of charitable donations…
    Shortly, afterwards, when Beano was 14 – just as the teenage kicks were kicking-in – the family emigrated to Israel: More dislocation, more insecurity, more loneliness. To compensate he embraced the sub-culture of the street Israeli, aggressive and smart.
    When he returned to London in the mid-eighties these traits made him an ideal recruit to the finance capitalism revolution…
    Perversely the more he was corrupted the more religously observant he became – make of that what you will. His generous donations to Jewish causes meant several rabbis became his intimates.
    One wrote to the judge in a plea for mercy. He concluded by quoting King Solomon: “For there is none so righteous upon earth who only does good and never sins.” (Ecclesiastes 7:20).
    Unfortunately, Beano’s sins have been proven to be too big and he had to fall.
    http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/401667/20121105/nicholas-levene-beano-fraud-city-stockbroker-financier.htm

  • Mary

    Stance on Syria
    The Guardian, Monday 5 November 2012 21.00 GMT

    We agree with Lindsey German’s response (There is no hypocrisy in our stance on Syria, 1 November) to Jonathan Freedland’s condemnation (Comment, 19 October) of Stop the War Coalition for its stance on Syria. As natives of Iraq, we never flinched from campaigning against Saddam’s ruthless regime, but we were also against the US-led 13 years of sanctions and 2003 war – acts that led to the death of more than a million Iraqis. Stop the War was founded in 2001 to campaign against wars of aggression and sanctions – now imposed on the Syrian and Iranian peoples. Though opposed to Saddam’s regime, Stop the War rightly focused on Britain’s role in US-led war preparations. Today, it adopts a similar stance on Syria, where the US, Britain and Saudi rulers are backing armed factions and undermining the people’s struggle for democracy. Further intervention could lead to a death toll similar to that in Iraq. Freedland and all of us should heed Mahatma Gandhi’s lament: they do everything for us except get off our backs.
    Sami Ramadani
    Sabah Jawad
    London

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/05/stance-on-syria (links to the bracketed items within)

    Have you noticed that Freedland is getting a few programmes on the BBC? A backstop for when the Guardian goes phut and his income there dries up?

  • Phil

    I also agree with technicolour.

    I recall an artist having nude photos of her kids removed from a gallery by the police a few years back. They deemed it pornographic. It’s how you look at it.

    @Jives, all the best mate.

  • oddie

    OldMark –

    i merely excerpted part of the headline, and was not pointing to the 8-year-old, but to the fact that

    “29 current and former BBC staff under investigation for alleged sexual misconduct – three times the number originally thought”

    which was obvious from the asterisks.

    btw i don’t understand the concern with whether or not alleged victims were or weren’t above, below or just reaching the age of consent. many of the alleged victims were in institutions (incl hospitals) and should have been protected.

    and the MSM hasn’t even delved into the mortuary visits.

    it’s the perfect time to expose the worst kind of sexual predators and their networks. so many have played lip service to being appalled, so let’s see who does and doesn’t push for a wide-ranging, independent inquiry into the BBC, the other Institutions including NHS, and the politicians. that’s a start.

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