177
(i)
Jon's Press Release
95.
In his statement to this Commission, Fulton gave his reasons for speaking out:-
50
"The Attorney General referred to me as Inspector XYZ. I felt that I was mis-represented in that article in two respects:— (a) He said that I had made a statement to the effect that I did not consider that John MacLennan had been framed-up. (b) That I had refused to make a statement to Mr. Astin. The Attorney, as will be apparent from his release, made this
remark in his letter to Elsie Elliott of the 2nd of February 1980.
(a)
Whilst this was true at that time, the Attorney was putting out his release in June 1980 when he should have known of:—
That I had made full statements regarding the frame-up issue on the 31 January 1980, 15 February 1980 and 22 May 1980 to Messrs. Pelly, Moorfoot and Over respectively, and whilst I still felt that MacLennan was not framed-up, beneath the semantics the SIU had asked me to instigate a criminal offence by John MacLennan.
(b)
I had in fact on the 15 February 1980, after I gave the signed statement to Mr. Moorfoot, been over to Mr. Astin's office to explain why I did not give him a statement earlier and Mr. Astin had said that he perfectly understood the situation and felt that the statement I gave to Mr. Moorfoot, which he looked at, would suffice for his purposes. This meeting, I assume, must have been conveyed to the Attorney.
By not referring to these later matters, I felt that the A.G. had mis-represented me.'
""
96. I have still to consider the approach made by Attorney General on 2 July 1980 to Mr. S. A. Burns, an Assistant Solicitor of Messrs. Johnson, Stokes and Master, a firm of Solicitors representing Fulton. On 2 July 1980, Fulton's Solicitors drafted a press release which was sent to Police Headquarters for clearance in accordance with police procedure. A photocopy of this draft was duly given to the Attorney General by the Police for advice, for he personally telephoned Mr. Burns sometime in the afternoon of the same day. The Attorney General said that he was telephoning both in his capacity as adviser to the Commissioner of Police and in his own personal capacity. The Attorney General said that he thought it was irresponsible to release such a press statement and he asked Burns whether he had considered if the statement might not constitute a contempt of court. He also stated that, in his view, the draft statement, if published, could constitute a libel upon him personally, and he asked whether Burns had considered this aspect also. Burns said that he had considered both aspects. It is an indication of Burns' independence and strength of character that he said to the Attorney General that he did not think the statement was either a contempt of court or a libel. But he promised to re-consider the draft in the light of the Attorney General's comments.
court...
97. Mr. Burns explained that he had considered and actually looked up the law which was that “a contempt of is only committed if criminal proceedings are pending which at the earliest is at the date when an arrest is imminent."51 He added that "pending" to his mind meant an arrest being imminent. On the 2nd of July, he was not aware that an arrest was "imminent"52; indeed he did not know of the CAPO investigation. Burns also did not consider the draft statement to be libelous because it did not say that the Attorney General had an intention to mislead.
98.
As the approach by the Attorney General to Burns arose from Fulton's draft public statement, it is necessary to quote the following passages in the draft:-
99.
53
"In that statement, the Attorney General referred to a letter written by him to Mrs. Elliott on 2 February this year in which he stated, inter alia, that our client had made a written statement which denied that he was asked to ‘frame' anybody.
The statements of the Attorney General and Mrs. Elliott, taken together suggest that our client had made serious allegations of impropriety concerning the conduct of individual members of the SIU and had subsequently withdrawn those allegations. This is not the case and our client is concerned that his involvement in the matter had therefore been misrepresented.
When our client was first interviewed by the Coroner's Officer he was asked whether he considered that the SIU were 'framing' the late Inspector MacLennan. It is true that our client said that he did not think that this was the position and this remains our client's belief to this day . . ."
The draft went on to say:——
"We are instructed therefore that whilst it is true that our client was not asked to 'frame' Inspector MacLennan (i.e. concoct false charges against him), he was asked to 'set-up' Inspector MacLennan . . .”
100.
The Attorney General in fact received a photocopy of this draft from Mr. Quine, the Director of Operations of the Police, late in the afternoon of 2 July 1980. His immediate reaction, as he stated in his evidence, was:-
54
"I looked at that press release, and it concerned me, specifically, because I thought that if that press release were released there was a danger of with Fulton there occurring exactly the same thing as had happened with the Foreman of the jury: that there would be allegation, counter-allegation, press interviews, television interviews. We had, for instance, Mr. Whitely being shown apparently climbing into MacLennan's flat-all that sort of thing. I could see that if this were released it seemed to me there was a possibility of the thing zipping out of control.”
50
See Commission File A, pages 98P-98Q.
51
See Transcript page 3533.
52
1
See Transcript page 3534.
53
Commission Exhibit No. B107 is reproduced in full at Appendix 49.
54 See Transcript page 11606G.
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