ALASTAIR MACEWEN ASSOCIATES
'Staplewynds' Staple Hill Buckland St. Mary
Nr. Chard Somerset TA20 3QY
Tel: 082 342 562 (Office) 082 342 539 (Home)
VAT No. 407 6710 59
Rt. Hon Paddy Ashdown MP PC.,
Vane Cottages,
Norton Sub Hambden,
Somerset.
16th July, 1991
2
Dear Mr. Ashdown,
5 years on remand, Lorrain Osman
I am writing to you to express my alarm and concern about the above case and in the hope that you will use your considerable influence, here and in Hong Kong, to get something done about it.
You are not unaware of the appalling damage done to our judical and police system by the quashing of the verdicts in the Birmingham 6, Guildford 4 and Maguire 7 cases. In each instance the Appeal Court blamed corruption in the presentation of the evidence for the original mistake.
I virtually cannot believe what has happened in the Osman case, and that the man is still, after 51⁄21⁄2 years, on remand in Brixton. Firstly, the special prosecutor in the case has been jailed for 8 years for corruption. The key witness has been
disgraced in the courts. A cabinet minister in the Government that made the complaint against Mr. Osman has been linked to murder and a $50m bribe in Hong Kong. 65% of the evidence, including the minutes of board meetings of the board of Malaysias biggest bank has been lost forever'! The Malaysian government, which laid the complaint against Mr. Osman intervened, apparently successfully, in a related murder trial in Hong Kong, limiting both the evidence and the scope of the Police investigation. The then, Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Edward Yards, warned the Foreign Secretary that the Malaysian Attorney General had political motives in seeking the prosecution. Now the American courts have found that the Hong Kong authorities collected evidence illegally, and have suppressed what amounts to most of the remaining evidence against Mr. Osman.
More immediately, I understand that the metropolitan police staged and armed raid on Mr. Osmans wife and daughter in November, detained them illegally, and now claim that they, and the magistrate, have lost the evidence upon which they based the raid.
Alastair MacEwen
WILDLIFE PHOTOGRAPHY
Hilary MacEwen