The Coastline documentary (Final version)

The Coastline, part 1 out of 2


The Coastline, part 2 out of 2

Artistic documentary inspired by "Quatsi" trilogy and Tarkovsky style of filmmaking.

Producer Director - Veronica Frydel

COASTLINES - artistic documentary (Version 2)

Second draft version and ideas for the Coastlines documentary, this time with attampted opening/title sequence.

The Coastline, part 1 out of 2 (Version 2)



The Coastline, part 2 out of 2 (Version 2)

Opening Sequences for Coastlines (examples)

Examples of opening and title sequences for The Coastline documentary

Opening Sequence with the title- example 1:      

Opening Sequence with the title - example 2:     

The Coastlines - artistic documentary (Version 1) and Opening Sequences

First drafts and ideas for an artistic documentary Coastlines inspired by Tarkovsky and 'Quatsi trylogy' style of documentary making.

The Coastlines - part 1 out of 3 (Version 1)


The Coastlines - part 2 out of 3 (Version 1)



The Coastlines - part 3 out of 3 (Version 1)

Confessional interview video - William Middleton

-story by William Middleton

PART 1



PART 2



All this is Billy's side to the story that he had publicly said on the United Against Injustice public conference. After the conference I decided to ask him to repeat it for me again so that I could film it, he agreed, I have made a video out of what he said and transcribed it into a shorter form in article in other post IN HERE.

Migration through the South Coast of England Documentary

The art of alternative documentary making exploring the subject of migration of people through the south coast of England by using different styles of documentary making. 

PART 1


PART 2

My baby daughter died in house fire - by William Middleton

William Middleton tells me his tragic experiences

I am William Middleton. In 2008 I was accused of murdering my baby daughter and attempted murder of my son and step daughter.

After the fire, I returned home from hospital to my broken family in Shetland. One Saturday morning I was taken to the police station and arrested. They thought I started the fire. It was as if someone reached in and took the life out of me.

That was when I started to find out how rotten and corrupt the whole justice system can be. Everything that they did was designed to break me. They took me into a cell where they made me strip completely naked. I still do not understand why. It was degrading and humiliating. When they questioned me later I thought that all I had to do was tell the truth and everything would be alright.

They were aggressive and relentless, whenever I thought it was over, they would start all over again. They said, 'if you could think of anything else that could help us then we can maybe get through this quicker.'

Then I would be taken back to the very first question: 'Why did you kill Annalise?' 'This is Scotland,' they told me, 'We don't have to provide a solicitor for six hours.'

The officers interrogated me for all of six hours before putting me in a cell. My son's statement confirmed everything that I had been saying despite the fact that he was only three at the time. The prosecution told my legal team that if they wanted to use it, they would have to call him in court.

My niece (2) was staying over that night with two friends. They asked if I could get them some drink. I was not keen on the idea, but I agreed to get them two small bottles of WKD to share. Everybody was having a good time, just group of girls having girly chats. One of them said that she did not think that boys found her attractive so we all kept reassuring her and I made a silly comment that 'I would be'. I just meant to give her some confidence but my wife got upset about it and left the house to calm down. My niece (2) went after her. Before going to bed I texted my wife saying 'please just come back, I love you'.

The next thing I knew I woke up with the fire alarm going off. I could hear the children screaming. I could see smoke coming through the gap in the door from the hallway. I opened the door and could feel the heat and saw thick dark smoke. I went to the bottom of the stairs, looked up and could just make out Christina and James standing there. I shouted, 'you've got to get out!' Christina came down but James was scared stiff. I went up, grabbed him and got him outside. I said, 'I'm going back in to get Annalise'. Going back inside, I closed the door to keep James out. By now the smoke was much worse but I had to go up the stairs again. I think I made it to the top, but I could not breathe. My eyes were stinging and I was choking... I knew I was not going to make it. The last thing I remember is trying to pick myself up after falling down the stairs. Then I woke up in the hospital.

At one point the social workers told my wife that if she continued to support me they would put James and Christina on the Child Protection List. All designed to turn my own wife against me, and make her believe that I had done it.

They later offered to drop the charges and replace them all with one charge of Culpable homicide (1) with a recommended six year sentence. I refused.

It is easy to accuse somebody of anything, but it is very difficult to prove innocence.

I was eventually acquitted, and after I was released from court I set up a website called “Wrongly Accused Person” to try to help people who were going through the same as I did. There has never been a day that I felt I have done enough.

As long as I believe that somebody is innocent, I won't give up because I know how it is to be in that cell knowing that you haven't done it.

1) A killing of a person with either or both of intention or absence of intention.

2) Due to protection of vulnerable people her name cannot be shown

All this is Billy's side to the story that he had publicly said on the United Against Injustice public conference, After the conference I decided to ask him to repeat it for me agan so that i could film it he agreed, I have transcribed what he said to me and put it into an article above I have also made a video version of it in other post IN HERE.

Understanding the judgement - The philosophy of logical analysis

“Reality and existence is not a predicate” (Ref.1)

In philosophy ever since the time of Pythagoras there has been an opposition between thoughts inspired by mathematics and those by empirical sciences. Beginning from Plato, Thomas Aquinal, Spinoza, and Kant who represented the mathematical thought; Democritus, Aristotle, and the modern empiricists from Locke and these onwards who stand on the empirical sciences side. Comparing this to the modern analytical empiricism, differs from Locke or Hume because it incorporates developments of the mathematics and its logical technique which enables define answers in problem solving. We do however need to bear in mind that the scientific methods are not relevant to everything let’s take questions of value or moral choices or even a judgement, “things that are legitimately matters of feeling lie outside its province.” (Ref.2)

Kant’s famous critique of the so-called, ontological proof of God’s existence, he "correctly found the source of error of this proof in the fact that existence is treated as a predicate.(...) Reality for him is a category, and if we apply it in any way, and say of an objects that it is real this means, according to Kant, that it belongs to a collection of perceptions connected according to the same natural law.” (Ref.1)

“Morally, a philosopher who uses his professional competence for anything except a disinterested search for truth is guilty of a kind of treachery. (...) The true philosopher is prepared to examine all perceptions. When any limits are placed, consciously or unconsciously, upon the pursuit of truth, philosophy becomes paralysed by fear, and the ground is prepared for a government censorship pushing those who utter ‘dangerous thoughts’ (...). ” (Ref.2)

I place this thoughts as relevant in my research as having to take up re-examination of a guilty verdict by law is standing up against this censorship and danger of questioning the judgement that has been already approved.

In order to see why any not factual judgement which has been supported by speculative scenarios is questionable. Not only logic dictates it but also moral duty to question it.

Reason why I will be looking into psychology and philosophy of judgement is that I believe that to understand the verdict that took place in certain time, place, sociological surrounding as well as economical circumstances may unveil the reasoning behind the decision and even perhaps show directions leading into the verdict that was decided. It this way I will see what influenced the verdict and learn if there is any possibility of it being wrong partially because of these influences.


References and inspiration:
Ref. 1) Logical Positivism, A.J.Ayer (1959)
Ref. 2) Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy (1946)

Positivism and Educational Research - studying process of judgement

“Objectivity is of the essence of science, just as subjectivity is one of the essence of art. Natural scientists are natural objectivists ... But it is harder to scientific, hence objective, about human affairs than about the nature. (...) This is also why we often mistake opinions for data, value judgements for descriptive statements, and prophecies for forecasts.” (d Mario Bunge)

“The work of the logical positivists became known in the English-speaking world through the writings of A.J. Ayer and others, and it was the source of B. F. Skinners’s view that psychology should restrict itself to the study of behaviour. For only behaviour is observable.”

“To philosophers, positivism (including behaviourism) is a form of empiricism; and empiricism in turn is one of the two forms of foundationalist philosophy. The problems faced by positivism are merely variants of the problems that have surfaced with respect to foundationalism . The following schematic should make the relationships clear. “

Earlier this century philosophers like Ludwig Wittgenstein or Karl Popper argued that “observation is theory-laden: What the observer seen and what he or she doesn’t see (...)” the judgement of the observer will also be influenced by the background knowledge and the life experiences of the observer him/herself like “assumptions, hypotheses or even conceptual schemes that the observer harbours.”

It is worth exploring the concept of truth; I think it is safe concluding that the truth is rather something that people se as their truth and not always what is factually proven. And therefore we can say that there are multiple realities, individual truths that are created through individual beliefs and backgrounds. However we know that the belief and the truth are two completely separate things.

Charles Sanders Peirce defined the truth as “that upon which a person is prepare to act” and this seems like quite a logical perception of individual truth as people do act on things that they believe to be true as well even though that truth may not be a proven fact.

Lets take an example from 1492. Many people believed that our globe is flat and Colubcus believed it was spherical. This belief of spherical globe, even though as we know being a fact, was not taken as a general true fact until it was proven. And since travelling proved it to be so, it was then taken as a general proven truth - a fact. Also “because people strongly believe or imagine the world to be certain way, it has become colloquial to refer to ‘their ‘ realities.”

All the quotes above and inspiration are from:
Positivism and Educational Research by D.C. Phillips and Nicolas C. Burbules, (2000)

The Psychology of Judicial Sentencing

“Why should we not take the legal literature as it stands?
Why not accept the principals which the academic lawyers infer from the reasoning of senior judges?

The first answer to that question has little to do with psychology. It is that the (perforce) abstract and diffuse enunciation of sentencing principles offers limited scope for understanding sentencing in the individual case. “

It is quite logical that the rules and acts are there to set main example that would suit situations in general terms or main aspects like murder, theft or rape but because, understandibly there are so many different sitiations with various circumstances that are to be considered with every new case.

One of the reasons “for scepticism about judges’ expressions of sentencing principles does derive from the work of psychologists. The literature of cognitive psychology has shown, clearly and repeatedly, that people in general simply do not have enough access to their own thought processes for us to take their reasons seriously. “

“While skilled problem-solvers may not be able to tell us explicitly how they proceed while solving a problem, they are able to complete the solving itself. If we ask them to think aloud in written protocols, the analysis of the protocols might lead us to a formal description of what, in fact, is done. We have tried this. Rather informally, but the results were disappointing. The most striking result was that what was said while thinking aloud created a rather chaotic and unsystematic impression.”

In interviews with Crown Court judges (Fitzmaurice, 1981), one judge said: ‘When a judge passes sentence ... there are so many things which he has got to take into account ... it’s just in what I call the mental mixer of sentencing.’ This sort of description is echoed by judges interviewed by Ashworth el al. (1984): ‘Most judges described it as an instinctive process, using such terms as “instinct”, “experience”, “hunch” and “feeling”. ‘ In the authoritative Encyclopaedia of Crime and Justice, edited by Stanford Kadish (1983), Judge Marvin Aspen describes sentencing thus:


Sentencing is anything but simple task. Many diverse data must be considered by the judge: other material must be consciously excluded from the sentencing equation. After this tortuous process, the judge will render a reasoned sentence that is subject to one final ‘litmus’ test: is the sentence what is best for society? If it is, then judge has performed well.”

Having look into judgement process it is inevitable to study Oedipus complex. The Psychology of Judicial Sentencing by Catherine Fitzmaurice and Ken Pease from 1986 takes its look on the Oedipus complex trough Freud. From Sophocles’ play, “Oedipus kills his father, Laius, Freud argues, because of jealous wish to possess his mother. In Sophocles’ play, however, Laius is largely instrumental in causing his own death. He goads (in both senses) Oedipus, who retaliates with fatal results. Thus, in large measures, Laius’ death resulted from his own bellicosity. Despite this, Freud takes the story as an illustration of the son’s desire to kill the father. Popular culture as well as academic psychology has uncritically followed the conventional Freudian interpretation. Yet the conventional view fits the original story less well than does the alternative interpretation that Oedipus myth is (...) really about paternal envy and fear. (...) The interpretations can be the product of respect for power? Fathers are more powerful than sons. (...) Unconscious wishes are more safely located in the psyche of Oedipus than in that of Laius. What is meant by safety in this context?

Safety here means the confidence of not suffering guilt or ridicule, the confidence that the blessings of the powerful feeding hand. Consistent with this sort of interpretation is the fact that psychological research on decision-making in courts has tended to concentrate more on the decisions of jurors than on the decisions of judges (...). Perhaps judicial criticism of jurors by judges (...) has been more likely to be translated into funded research than has jurors’ criticism of judges. “

“Now going back to sentencing, "some judges regard the process of sentencing as uncomplicated. In the opinion of Lord Devlin, ‘In the majority of cases there is little room for choice. The judges has only to fix the appropriate term of imprisonment by applying the tariff to the circumstances of the case.’ “

Idea of false consensus bias comes from the fact that “people tend to generalise falsely from their own views to a belief in a consensus. They take their choices and judgements to be relatively common and appropriate to existing circumstances while viewing alternative responses as uncommon, deviant and inappropriate.”

Another psychological conclusion that I found after examples given through the study of this book which I completely agree with is that “people tend to ignore or to underlay the prior probability of out-comes and to emphasise unduly individual case information in making decisions. (...) People so much prefer to base their judgement on information about individuals that they will do so even when that information is fallible, and that doing so they will ignore information about overall probabilities which they could properly use.” This tells me in it's full sense that there can be a reasonable room for misjudgement and that person's background, beliefs etc whether that would be of a judge or a defendant can influence the verdict.

Other very straight to the point summary of what can be seen as some sort of form of influence of impure judgement in my eyes called the 'knew-it-all-along-effect’ which is “that a judge may, when sentencing someone with a previous record, reconstruct with inappropriate confidence the likelihood of the reappearance before the court, and may reconstruct the story about what explained the reappearance. It is argued that the effect of this would be to increase the severity of sentence imposed on those with previous records beyond the increase which would be appropriate on other grounds (...). “

Process of giving reasons for the judgement has also been explored, when the choice of reasons lies between few alternatives it is more likely to be trusted more. “If the judge has clear recollection of the facts of the case they may appear more clearly as justifications of sentence. If the reasons are well tried they will invite more confidence in their truth.” Then, “the relevance of the research is only indirect, because it deals with sentencers’ acceptance or rejection of the people’s preffered reasons rather than with the formulation of sentencers’ own reason. (...) These reasons included: having a mental blackout before the crime; being overcome by an irresistible urge; coming from neighbourhood where the behaviour was the rule rather than exception; cold deliberate choice (...) .”


All the quotes and inspiration
'The Psychology of Judicial Sentencing by Catherine Fitzmaurice and Ken Pease, (1986)'

Psychology of Crime by Craig Webber

"One cannot understand our present situation without an awareness of the past." And this is also why study of history of psychology of crime is also important when studying investigative journalism.

"The tensions that exist within criminology tend to split between the two dominant subjects that form its core ideas, sociology and psychology. Recently, these two subjects have viewed each other with suspicion and occasional contempt. Where sociology tends to place its emphasis on society and environment, Psychology situates its main focus within the individual. This often leads diametrically opposed explanations for phenomena and sometimes referred to as the structure/ agency debate."

"For some psychologists, poverty is the result of individual failure due to low IQ, personality or lack of positive motivation such as might be caused by depression. When these two approaches are contained within criminology not only are there the usual heated discussions but there is the added frisson of distract in another discipline's methods and theoretical foundations. Yet, fundamentally, the concern is with what causes crime."

"(...) The interconnectivity of sociology and psychology when both are brought together in criminology by looking at the way that the study of crime became increasingly 'scientific'. Moreover, the bipolarity of the structure/agency debate has developed into a more complex argument that posits an integration between the two extremes of structural determinism and the free choice of the agent. By way of setting out the argument early, W.I. Thomas in the first edition of the American Journal of Sociology in 1894 noted that sociology and social psychology were inseparable (Strauss 1964)."

According to Garland (2002) criminology as a 'science of crime' has been in existence foe about 120 years. "The term 'criminology' was created in the 1890s as a broader term than others such as criminal sociology or criminal psychology. The later two terms are too specific and separately bead within boundaries peculiar to their own traditions. Consequently, the discipline of criminology from the outset subsumed the concerns of other, more established traditions within its intellectual remit. As Lea has noted (1998), criminology can be seen not as a subject in its own right, but as field that academics from other disciplines can enter, such as economics, historians, geographers, psychologists and sociologists.(...) The focus tends to be on the question of what causes crime. How academics from different subjects do that is, to a large degree, based upon the traditions of their 'master' disciplines. Hence, Gerland has argued that '[i]ts epistemological threshold is a low one, making it susceptible to pressures and interests generated elsewhere'(2002:17). "

In it's book Craig Webber  talks about criminals to be "by and large, rational actors choosing to commit crime and therefore should be punished in proportion to the seriousness of the offence. Punishment should take the form of attempting to change the moral failures of the offender in prisons."

Further more Webber mentions in his book that "(...) psychology has recently been confronted by a new challenge that some see as indicative of a move to a later or postmodern society. It has been argued that as indicative of a move to a late or postmodern society. It has been argued that there has been a shift away from individual causes of crime towards the statistical analysis of a group's risk factors. This has impacted on the way that crime and justice research is carried out.


It has been argued that the research for individual causes of crime fell out of fashion between the 1970s and 2000 (Gerlan 2001; Hudson 2003). David garland argued that the:
new policy advice is to concentrate on substituting prevention for cure,
reducing the supply of opportunities, increasing situational and social con-
trols, and modifying everyday routines. The welfare of deprived social
groups, or the needs of maladjusted individuals, are much less central to
this way of thinking. (2001:16)"

Criminologists have drown on the risk society thesis in literature by sociologists such as Anthony Giddens (1990) and Urlich Beck (1992), to analyse changes in the way that the tools of social control and justice became different. "Rather than focus on the risk factors on an individual, criminal justice has increasingly moved towards making judgments that are collective in focus and based on prediction (O'Malley 2001). This is a form of actuarialism, the kind of risk assessment undertaken by insurance companies to determine how likely it is that a car might be stolen."

"Moreover, in the risk society we are increasingly challenging the expertise of experts, such as psychologists or criminologists (Giddens 19900. Essentially experts cannot offer what society wants, security. This clearly impacted on the work of psychologists, but how profoundly it has undermined the core philosophy of the focus on individual differences is unclear. " Another valid point is that "in many ways, there is a contradiction within psychology anyway, since many theories attempt to categorise individuals into groups. Moreover, there are many criticisms of the risk society thesis, some point out that the perceived shift to a focus risk is nothing new. "

Fears over terrorism, for example, "are not exclusive to those living after '9/11'. (...) Since New Labor were elected in the UK in 1997 the much quoted phrase 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime has had a tentative, patchy but nevertheless significant effect. After the credit crunch and world-wide recession, the part- nationalisation of the banks and other parts of industry and the election of Democrat Barack Obama as American President, we may yet see a return to welfarism and away from the sense of risk so pervasive under President George Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair. It is also essential to look at the history of criminology and how it had shaped the views on judgment within criminal justice. "

Other reason why it is essential to look back in time on the history of criminological movements is to see what influenced and developed the thoughts that shape today's thoughts. Researching into these can help in understanding what are the reasons of crime and how much of the science and analysis of humans' behaviours and social and economical background influences the judgement about the person. And to understand how the judgments in court are driven it is important for me to get to know the history of Crime and how has it been studied so far.

"Criminology and psychology are regarded as disciplines that developed out of modern period. The major historical event that characterises this period is the move from an agricultural to an industrial economy." Modernism is characterised by the greater faith in objectivity, rationality and using scientific methods. "In sociology the application of the scientific method is termed positivism after the term coined by one of the earliest sociologists Augustine Comte whose most influential book

Cours de pholosophie positive

(...) set out the argument for a scientific form of sociology that provided a positive agenda for political change. Positivism can be split into two main forms, individual and sociological positivism.

Individual positivism has an assumption that behaviour is the result of individual, internal factors to the neglect of social factors. For example, individual positivists would not be concerned with issues like poverty in explaining why there is a higher rate of crime in groups who are poor. Instead, they might argue that the cause is lower intelligence based on Intelligence Quotient (IQ) scores in groups of people who are poor(...). The research methods are wide-ranging but tend to be those which can be verified by other researches using the same procedure so are likely to result in data that is statistical. Psychology, in general, has been regarded as being individual positivism, although there are some theories, such as some areas of social psychology, which focus to a greater extent on environmental factors."

Having mentioned individual positivism it is worth going back to its origins to gain greater understanding of its idea. Going back even into times of Darwin and the evolution of the species is relevant, because it is from these times that the thought on criminal tendencies that appear in some more than others have been brought up already.

"Darwin's theory that humans have evolved from earlier species began some people to speculate that maybe there were different types of human, differing from each other in such areas as intelligence and race. It was also argued that maybe criminals were also different to non-criminals. The initial research into this idea began with (…) phrenology. Phrenology is the study of the association between bumps on the skull and behaviour, with a raised area on the skull being thought to be indicative of more less of a particular character trait. Phrenology is often seen as an unscientific precursor to more sophisticated research into the identification of criminals."

"There are many discredited scientific ideas that criminology has studied. Phrenology is important because it helped shape scientific study of crime and influenced the work of the leading nineteenth-century positivist Cesare Lombroso. As a progenitor of positivist explanations for crime it can be credited with moving the debate in a radical direction, away from treating crime as a rational choice requiring the punishment of the offender towards seeing crime as a pathology to be treated. (…)"

"(...) From 1800 to 1830 phrenology was developed by psychiatrists and physicians into a 'scientific' system based on measurement and observation, but within 20 years there occurred a popularising of phrenology. (…) By the 1850 (…) the categorization of crimes into different causes opened up an area of research into the possibility of multiple and varied causations and in the idea of desistance from crime (…). "

Another research that began during the middle of the nineteenth century was "into the idea of psychopathy. It was necessary to explain why some people could commit heinous crimes, but not appear to be intellectually damaged. Before the term psychopath was coined, however, the term 'moral insanity' described someone whose behaviour lacks moral awareness of right and wrong but where their intellect had not been impaired. This term was replaced by Rush (…) with micronomia and anomia."

With the decline in phrenology, psychiatry, particularly in prisons and asylums began to take over the study of criminals. Rafter argued here that the term had metaphorical purpose "to describe almost anyone who did not fit what was then regarded as the norms to which people should be measured."
"As the cities grew and populations raised throughout nineteenth and early twentieth century the middle class fears of crime and disorder started to find answers in psychology and criminology. (…) In America the diagnostic tool for all behavioural disorders is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM IV) (APA 1994), however it has been criticized for a number of arbitrary categories that do not sufficiently delineate between behaviours. Such as example is its inability to distinguish a psychopathic disorder from conduct disorders (CD) and antisocial personality disorder (aspd). (…) Essentially, psychopathy is distinguished from cd and aspd as an emotional dysfunction that leads to a greater use of instrumental aggression, as opposed to reactive aggression. Instrumental aggression is characterized by the use of aggression for the purpose of achieving a goal, either financial or emotional, whereas reactive aggression refers to aggression that is caused by something. Therefore psychopathy is not adequately described in the American system of diagnosis and so its use as an explanation for why types of crime are committed is problematic."

In the Lombroso, the Positivist School, Garland noted that the ideas of Lambroso are not new and an extension of racial anthropology in the 1870s and the creation of categories such as genius or insane (Garland 2002). Lambrosso's approach became one of the dominant ideas that have set "the new science of criminology on route that was to be dominant for the best part of 80 years . Whereas phrenology suggested that people could change, and that there were finely tuned gradations in severity of behaviour, Lambroso presented a human as a fait accompli, readymade and without much hope of change, except long-term policies to prevent those identified as criminal from reproducing. "

"Lambroso argued that the criminal was an atavism, a throwback to an earlier stage of evolution. Lambroso, like many of his contemporaries such as A.M. Guerry and A. Quetelet , was interested in the emerging use of statistics. His work was about measuring the body to see if the body would give away any indication of criminality."

"Much research during the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century is essentially a variation on the same theme: crime is a stable trait that can be measured and which is either largely inherited or conditioned in early life and remains a constant influence. Crime is caused by internal mechanisms gone wrong. Crucially, this has little effect on the underlying the rationality of humans. Crime is not caused by humans acting irrationally since their underlying physiology or upbringing compels them to act in the only way they can. The legal system in the UK was set up, albeit unsystematic, to account for both those who rationally chose to commit crime and to take into account extenuating circumstances for those whose background suggested social or psychological pathology. The originator of psychoanalysis Sigmund Feud represents a conduit, or link between the constitutional theories of Lombroso and the later approaches of psychology to social learning and upbringing. His work also marks the beginning of questioning of this rationality, at the same time as critics suggested that psychoanalysis was not scientific. Chaos and disorder are thought to be under the control of humans, and yet humans were about to embark on a global war. "

Eric Hobsbawm, on the other hand argues that "there was a sense of unease about the achievements that could be made through positing a purely rational human actor or trying to understand the world solely though the application of scientific methods (Hobsbawm 1987). "

As we know according Sigmund Freud "human behaviour is directed not by reason but by underlying unconscious impulses and instincts." Also unlike Lambroso he focused on finding causes for "behaviour where no physical or chemical reason could be determined."

Freud argued that "every mental process, every thought or emotion had a meaning, even if that meaning was not consciously intelligible to the individual." Even unintentional actions had a reason for him. Freud's psychoanalysis challenges the positivists' quest of "psychology to identify single causes for crime and in their place presents a more complex theory of humans. We can see in this, arguably, the first signs of the retreat from the aetiology of crime towards the more pragmatic attempts of contemporary psychology, and all other forms of governance, to attend to the risk and not the cause of crime."

Among forms of sociological positivism Durkheim's work is mentioned here, "his work is anomie. This literally means without norms. Anomie develops when social systems go through major changes. A norm is the usual way of behaving. Durkheim termed this the conscience collective or collective consciousness. (...)The relationships we have with other people normally keep our behaviour in check. But, significant social change disrupts those relationships."

Studying into concepts of disruptions, "crime is deemed to be a deviation from the norm. There is an altruistic, welfare-oriented element to these approaches in that deviations from the norm are not held to be in the control of the individual, but instead outside their rational control. This is either as a consequence of internal mental deficits of some kind in individual positivism, or else the consequence of social structural factors such as the economy, religion or poverty in the sociological variant. Since the causes are not in the control of the individual, or group, and that crime is therefore not seen as being a rational choice, then punishment is not deemed to be appropriate."

What is more, "crime tends to be regarded as pathological, as an illness to be treated rather than a moral failure to be punished. Moreover, such approaches tend to posit causes which are regarded as necessary for the activity to take place. Without the cause, the activity would not occur."

Moving onto late modern approaches to the theory of crime, "in criminology, the way law developed over time and reflected different moral debates lead to a contrast between those who believe the positivist trait believe those who discussed above, and that crime is socially constructed, changeable and not real, the labelling, symbolic interactionist or social constructivist tradition."

Then, during the modern and postmodern times questioning of the positivism started. Eysenck, controversially in my view created opinion that some people are biologically predetermined to be criminal because of their personality. He justified this idea by the psychology of potential criminals' brains, their extroverted personality and law cortical arousal, as if "their brains ticked over too slowly". And to compensate for that these people would find other ways to fuel with excitement. And this excitement could by crime.

Searching further into theories of psychological approach to a criminal mind, in the chapter about period of 1970s I found another very interesting information that "the mad person is driven mad by crazy families and the madness is a rational response to mad situations, a breaking through of the restrictive chains of rational society and the restrictive envelope of the industrial demands on time and labour."

Moving from learning about the history into study of the mind, it is worth looking into personality disorder.
“(...) Some authors maintain that that there is evidence that many serial killers are psychopathic (...). An inability to empathise or sympathise with the suffering of the other people and an inflated opinion of their own self-worth tends to characterise psychopathic individuals."

My attention was drown specifically into interesting discussions in the book about the interests of the potential offender's enjoyment. The focus is often turned into one type of interests that the offender could enjoy, stressing on the factors like military, the occult, heavy metal music, use of pornography and martial arts. But it is rightly pointed out that such conclusions are open to interpretation and are socially influenced by factors like right wing or religious morals. And " the amount of media devoted to such sensational interests, from the television through to the Internet, would over-predict the amount of violent crime committed if there was a causal effect. There are simply not enough offences to validate a causal link with sensational interests."

Looking further into the mind of the murderer, the "definitions including those of Holmes and Holmes (2002) and Ressler, Burgess and Douglas (1988) tend to equate serial killing with a motive that has no pecuniary or direct vengeful motivation and in the majority of cases there is a sexual component also. “ One particular type of a killer's profile drawn my attention relevant to my research was the so called mission serial killer. Which is not defined as psychopathic, "but like the vision serial killer tends to go after a certain category of people, for example, homosexuals, an ethnic group other than his or her own, women, etc. The mission serial killer is propelled not by voices but a perceived mission to eradicate the world or area of such people." It is often that certain personality trait is associated with the criminal activity, such as Eysenck's extrovert.

Another part that is of the interest for my research is, criminal profiling.

I also found another very interesting statement when looking into the British approach to offender profiling, David Canter (Liverpool University) is concerned that the approach of Investigative Psychology has at its core of traditional American forms "the making of inferences based on little evidence." His approach to "offender profiling is to apply psychological principles to the investigation of crime. (...) Through analysing the way that different offenders move between the crime site and their home, Counter argues it is possible to make some generalisations that are helpful to investigators. Since a profile is used for crimes where there is little evidence that would help link the victim to the offender," Canter says that psychology is far more helpful than the current preoccupation with high profile serial crimes like murder or rape.

Other very crucial point was that “criminal activity may well be an extreme reflection of non-criminal activity (Canter 1995). Crime scene behaviour that reflects elements of an offender's general lifestyle may be useful for investigators because it may be that people might notice such behaviour. Here, Canter makes links to a criminological theory called Routine activities Theory (RAT) that posits the need of criminologists to fuss on the crime event and the role of the victim in that event (Cohen and Felson 1979). By doing this, attention is shifted away from why some people commit crime whilst others do not and instead focus on crime prevention. Very important pinpoints stated here is that "for a crime to occur there needs to be three factors coinciding in time and space. The first is a motivated offender; the second is suitable target and finally the absence of capable guardians able to prevent the offence taking place."


"The argument that crime is linked to the routine activities of everyday life kinks into Counter’s approach because Canter is less concerned with motivations than with the crime scene themes that might practically help investigations."


“The discovery that the offender may offend near to their home is not new to criminology. (...) A group of criminologists who called themselves left realists carried out victim surveys and came to simple conclusions. Crime was mainly intra-class and intra-race. That is, crime was committed within the same socio-economic and ethnic group. Offender and the victim are similar."

"One of the problems of the idea of a profile is that a statistic and flexible approach that may only have relevance for early stages in an investigation. " And it of course leaves room for incorrect judgement. It is an academic study and I believe that following the logical and factual approach as future journalist it can be taken into hypothetical suggestions and help in discovering facts but the danger is to waste time of going into investigating incorrect hypothesis. Reasonable level of scepticism should be kept with using the speculative approaches to anything if there are no facts involved that would support the theories."

For example, "a British study by Alison, smith and Morgan (...) presented police officers with a 'bogus' offender profile designed to be deliberately ambiguous but based on a real murder and a description of the characteristics of an offender. The respondents split into two groups and each were asked to rate the accuracy of the offender profile to the offender. One group was presented with a description of a convicted offender and the other group were presented with description of a fabricated offender designed to have characteristics the opposite to that of the real offender. (...) The majority of the police officers said that the profile would be a useful tool for an investigation and just over half of the forensic professionals thought it would be useful. Despite the different characteristics of the offenders the majority of the respondents felt that the profile was accurate. Useful analogies as to why profiles may be seen as accurate even when they contain ambiguous statements that could apply to many people are horoscopes."

"Eye witness testimony is a major tool of the Criminal Justice system and accounts for many convictions. (...) With advances in the use and reliability of forensic science, in particular DNA testing, many cases of innocent people convicted on the basis of eyewitness testimony have come to light after forensic tests proved their innocence (...). "



All the quotations  and inspiration:
Psychology of Crime, Craig Webber, 2010

Language, Truth and Logic - Understanding the judgement system

POSITIVISM AS LEADING PSYCHOLOGICAL MOVEMENT FOR LOGICAL JUDGEMENT
"For a consideration of any dispute about a matter of any taste will show that there can be disagreement without formal contradiction, and that in order to alter another man's opinions, in the sense of getting him to change his attitude, it is not necessary to contradict anything that he asserts. Thus, if one wishes to affect another person in such a way as to bring his sentiments on a given point into accordance with one's own, there are various ways in which one may proceed. One may, for example, call his attention to certain facts that one supposes him to have overlooked; and, as I have already remarked, i believe that much of what passes for ethical discussion is a proceeding of this type. It is, however, also possible to influence other people by a suitable choice of emotive language; and this is the practical justification for the use of normative expressions of value. At the same time, it must be admitted that if the other person persists in maintaining his contrary attitude, without however disputing any of the facts, a point is reached at which the discussion can go further. And in that case there is no sense in asking which of the conflicting views is true. For, since the expression of a value judgement is not a proposition, the question of truth or falsehood does not here arise.

In such cases as these one does indeed arrive at something that approaches a definition in use; but there are other cases of philosophical analysis in which nothing even approaching a definition is either provided or sought. Thus, when Professor Moore suggests that to say that "existence is not a predicate" may be a way of saying that "there is some very important difference between the way in which 'exist' is used in such a sentence as 'Tame tigers exist' and the way in which 'growl' is used in 'Tame tigers growl,'" he does not develop his point by giving rules for the translation of one set of sentences into another. What he does is to remark that whereas it makes good sense to say "All tame to say "All tame tigers exist" of "Most tame tigers exist." Now this may seem a rather trivial point for him to make, but in fact it is philosophically illuminating. For it is precisely the assumption that existence is a predicate that gives plausibility to "the ontological argument"; and the ontological argument is supposed to demonstrate the existence of a god. Consequently Moore by pointing out a peculiarity in the use of word "exist" helps to protect us from a serious fallacy; so that his procedure, though different from that which Russell follows in the theory of descriptions, tends to achieve the same philosophical end.

I maintain in this book that it is not within the province of philosophy to justify our scientific or common-sense beliefs; for their validity is an empirical matter, which cannot be settled by a priori means. At the same time, the question of what constitutes such a justification is philosophical, as the existence of "the problem of induction" shows. Here again, what is required is not necessarily a definition. For although I believe that the problems connected within induction can be reduced to the question of what is meant by saying that one proposition is good evidence for another, I doubt if the way to answer this is to construct a formal definition of "evidence". What is chiefly wanted, I think, is an analysis of scientific method, and although it might be possible to express the results of this analysis in the form of definitions, this would not be an achievement of primary importance. And here I may add that the reduction of philosophy to analysis needs not to be incompatible with the view that its function is to bring to light "the presuppositions of science." For if there are such presuppositions, they can no doubt be shown to be logically involved in the applications of scientific method, or in the use of certain scientific terms.

In saying that the philosophy is concerned with each of the sciences, in a manner which we shall indicate, we mean also to rule out the supposition that philosophy can be ranged alongside the existing sciences, as a special department of speculative knowledge. Those who make this supposition cherish the belief that there are some things in the world which are possible objects of speculative knowledge and yet lie beyond the scope of empirical science.

But this belief is a delusion. There is no field of experience which cannot, in principle, beyond the power of science to give. We have already gone some way to substantiate this proposition by demolishing metaphysics; and we shall justify it to the full in the course of this book.

With this we complete the overthrow of speculative philosophy. We are now in a position to see that the function of philosophy is wholly critical. In what exactly does its critical activity consist?

One way of answering this question is to say that it is philosopher's business to test the validity of our scientific hypotheses and everyday assumptions. But this view, though very widely held, is mistaken. If a man chooses to doubt the truth of all the propositions he ordinarily believes, it is not in the power of philosophy to reassure him. The most that philosophy can do, apart from seeing whether his beliefs are self consistent, is to show what are the criteria which are used to determine the truth or falsehood of any given proposition: and then, when the sceptic realises that certain observations would verify his propositions, he may also realize that he could make those observations, and so consider his original beliefs to be justified. But in such a case one cannot say that it is philosophy which justifies his beliefs. Philosophy merely shows him that experience can justify them. We may look to the philosopher to show us what we accept as constituting sufficient evidence for the truth of any given empirical proposition. But whether the evidence is forthcoming or not is in every case a purely empirical question.

If anyone thinks that we are here taking too much for granted, let him refer to the chapter on "Truth and Probability," in which we discuss how to validity of synthetic propositions is determined. He will see there that the only sort of justification that is necessary of possible for self-consistent empirical propositions is empirical verification. And this applies just as much to the laws of science as to the maxims of common sense. Indeed there is no difference in kind between them. The superiority of the scientific hypothesis consists merely in its being more abstract, more precise, and more fruitful. And although scientific objects such as atoms and electrons seem to be fictitious in a way that chairs and tables are not, here, too, the distinction is only distinction of degree. For both these kinds of objects are known only by their sensible manifestations and are definable in terms of them.

One may attempt to deduce the preposition which one is required to prove either from a purely formal principle or from an empirical principle. In the former case one commits the error of supposing that from a tautology it is possible to deduce a proportion about a matter of fact; in the latter case one simply assumes what one is setting out to prove. For example, it is often said that we can justify induction by invoking the uniformity of nature, or by postulating a "principle of limited independent variety." But, in fact, the principle of uniformity of nature merely states, in a misleading fashion, the assumption that past experience is a reliable guide to the future; while the principle of limited independent variety pre-supposes it.

We shall see, when we come finally to settle the conflict between idealism and realism, that his actual conception of the relationship between material things and sense-contents was not altogether accurate. It led him to some notoriously paradoxical conclusions, which a slight emendation will enable us to avoid. But the fact that he failed to give a completely correct account of the way in which material things are constituted out of sense-contents does not invalidate his contention that they are so constituted. On the contrary, we know that it must be possible to define material things in terms of sense-contents, because it is only by the occurrence of certain sense-contents that the existence of any material thing can ever be in the least degree verified. And thus we see that we have not to enquire whether a phenomenalist "theory of perception" or some other sort of theory is correct, but only what form of phenomenalist theory is correct. For the fact that all causal and representative theories of perception treat material things as if they were unobservable entities entitles us, as Berkeley saw, to rule them out a priori. The unfortunate thing is that, in spite of this, he found it necessary to postulate God as an unobservable cause of our "ideas"; and he must be criticised also for failing to see that the argument which he uses to dispose of Locke's analysis of a material thing is fatal to his own conception of the nature of the self, a point which was effectively seized upon by Hume.

But first of all we ought, perhaps, to justify our assumption that the object of a "theory of truth" can only be to show how propositions are validated. for it is commonly supposed that the business of the philosopher who concerns himself with "truth" is to answer the question "What is truth?" and that is is only an answer to this question that can fairly be said to constitute a "theory of truth."

It may be objected here that we are ignoring the fact that it is not merely propositions that can be said to be true of false, but also statements and assertions and judgements and assumptions and opinions and beliefs. But the answer to this is that to say that a belief, or statement, or a judgement, is true is always an elliptical way of ascribing truth to a proposition, which is believed, of stated, or judged. Thus, if I say that the Marxist's belief that capitalism leads to war is true, what I am saying is that the proposition, believed by Marxists, that the capitalism leads to war is true; and the illustration holds good when the word "opinion" or "assumption," or any of the others in the list, is substituted for the word "belief." And, further, it must be made clear that we are not hereby committing ourselves to the meta-physical doctrine that propositions are real entities. Regarding classes as a species of logical constructions, we may define a proposition as a class of sentences which have the same intentional significance for anyone who understands them. Thus, the sentences, "I am ill," "Ich bin krank," "Je suis malade," are all elements of the proposition "I am ill." And what we have previously said about logical constructions should make it clear that we are not asserting that a proposition is a collection of sentences, but rather than to speak about a given proposition is a way of speaking about certain sentences, just as to speak about sentences, in this usage, is a way of speaking about particular signs.

Reverting to the analysis of truth, we find that in all sentences of the form "p is true," the phrase "is true" is logically superfluous. When, for example, one says that the proposition "Queen Anne is dead" is true, all that he is saying is that Queen Anne is dead.

This point seems almost too obvious to mention, yet the preoccupation of philosophers with the "problem of truth" shows that they have overlooked it. Their excuse is that references to truth generally occur in sentences whose grammatical forms suggest that the word "true" does stand for a genuine quality or relation. And a superficial consideration of these sentences might lead one to suppose that there was something more in the question "What is truth?" than a demand for the analysis of the sentence "p is true." But when one comes to analyse the sentences in question, one always finds that they contain sub-sentences of the form "p is true" or "p is false," and that when they are translated in such a way as to make these sub-sentences explicit, they contain no other mention of truth.

"What makes a proposition true or false?" And this is a loose way of expressing the question “With regard to any proposition p, what are the conditions in which p (is true) and what are the conditions in which not-p?" in other words, it is a way of asking how propositions are validated. and this is the question which we were considering when we embarked on our digression about the analysis of truth."

In chapter exploring critique of ethics and theology A.J.Ayer explores synthetic propositions and it comes to the conclusion that before it justifies views on all synthetic propositions saying that they are empirical hypotheses one more objection has to be met. "This objection is based on the common supposition that our speculative knowledge is of two stint kinds-that which relates to question of empirical fact, and that which relates to question of value. (...) "Statements of value", which is both satisfactory in itself and consistent with our general empiricist principles. We shall set ourselves to show that in so far as statements of value are significant, they are ordinary "scientific" and that in so far as they are not scientific, they are not in the literal sense significant, but are simply expressions of emotions which can be neither true nor false."

All above is either direct quotation from the book or rephrased points that I found of the most value in my study of Investigative Journalism research into psychological part of judgement.Language, Truth and Logic by Alfred Jules Ayer, (1967)

Interview with SALLY PALMER from BBC Knowledge Magazine

I interviewed Sally Palmer from BBC Knowledge Magazine.
This was part of our assignment for the third year Magazine Journalism module. I took an approach to find a magazine that would interest me and produce content that I would be interested in personally or even be eager to work for myself. I decided to go with a little bit of unconventional looks for the interview make it artistic and use cut aways from the magazine purely for the visual effect and learning new editing tricks.

BBC Knowledge Magazine looked perfect for this task.

I wanted to find out how the process of making a magazine looks and how did her day as an editor of this particular magazine is. I was curious about the history of the magazine and what was her drive for working within Magazine industry. I was also interested about her view on celebrity coverage of other magazines as BBC Knowledge is made for a completely different audience. I wanted to know her reasons why she had gone into Knowledge type of magazine content rather than celebrity orientated magazine. Another subject I touched on in the interview was the future of print magazines in light of everything going online and is video based and finally as a future graduate I wanted to find out what sort of advice could she give for young graduates of journalism or freelance writers.

As Sally says on the front page of the online website for the magazine BBC Knowledge Magazine's international publication is "for everyone who is curious about the world we all share – the natural life that inhabits it, the history that has shaped our lives upon it, and the science that is propelling us onward into the 21st century.


Each issue, the best science writers explore life, the Universe – everything. The world’s leading historians explain the past and tell us why it all matters. And wildlife experts file reports from points right across the planet." 

Getting Media involved into investigating an alleged miscarriage of Justice

Press are the eyes and the ears of the public, to whom they report said Lord Bingham (ref.1) and The Public interest is the main priority for a journalist to pursue their inspiration, “the information’s value to society is argued to be particularly high, or potentially so.” (ref.1)McNae also gives that Lord Bingham said that “the proper functioning of a modern participatory democracy requires that the media be free, active, professional and enquiring” and that is as long as when working for the public interest (certain information is valuable to the society).

The press is free in UK and journalism can be therefore called "‘the fourth estate’ - the body of professional who police the criminal justice system and act as the public’s eyes and ears - 'a bloodhound as well as a watchdog' ”. (ref.2) And court reporters exercise watchdog role on the justice system having at the same time not much more than the same rights as citizens of this country protecting them in difficult or controversial situations surrounding some of the reporting techniques.


Thanks to freedom of expression, everyone (including press) in UK has a right to communicate information and ideas. Without this right Democracy wouldn’t exit. Textbooks like McNae give that until 2000 UK had ‘residual’ rights – making people free to do whatever law does not prohibit. Before the constitution embedded from European law the law was set by law-jury trial and the rule against prior restraint. After the European Convention of Human Rights was adopted directly into UK law human rights became codified (incl. Freedom of Expression).


Two provisions in section one of the convention - article 8 (which establishes a right to privacy) and article 10 (which is a right to freedom of expression) are of special concern to journalists. Journalism itself is intimately related to Human Rights and the rule of law in a free society, with free speech and the right of the citizen to express themselves to the public good. (ref.2)


Privacy Act in Convention (Art 8) did not previously exist within UK law but constant changes to adjust UK conventions to Human Rights act led to developments within case law. The case law is the system by which reporters of previous cases and the judges ‘interpretation of the common law can be used as a precedent where the legally material facts are similar’.


For journalists the most important part of the Convention is Article 10 Freedom of Expression thanks to which “Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall not include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority.” (ref.1)


Journalism and law are closely related professions. "Criminal law such as contempt of court places grave restraint on what journalists can write or broadcast and presents a constant danger of imprisonment or fines. (ref.2) A professional journalist needs to be very familiar with branches of the law. The law is important to journalists not only because it is a fantastic source of news but also it is a constraint on the actions of journalists. Press can see this aim to be of such principle that sometimes the forms of obtaining that information can be questionable (undercover journalism). Within this idea hides the main conflicting idea of obtaining information that is created because of two opposite sections within the European law, Freedom of Expression and the Privacy Act. (ref.2)


Within the law of Defamation, libel and slander “strikes a balance between the media being free to express wrongdoing and individual being able to defend reputation from baseless attacks.” (ref.1) Contempt of Court Act 1981 restricts reporting in the court and this could be also seen as restriction on freedom of expression (recent example: Coroners & Justice Bill 2009 & Counter Terrorism Act 2008, McNae's, ch1.).


Another type of restrictions put on press are so called Injunctions (recent example: Lilly Allen who complaint about press crossing the line and disturbing her right to privacy). Injunctions are “stopping publication when media organisation plans to air matter which an individual argues will breach his/her privacy or duty of confidence owed to it.” (ref.1)


Acting in the Public interest is supported by The Freedom of expression law and Qualified Privilege or Absolute Privilege in certain circumstances. “Under the European Communities Act from 1972 the UK is part of European Union, EU treaties and other EU law are thus part of UK law. “(ref.1) After World War II, Western European nations signed a treaty creating the Council of Europe which was a body that would promote individual freedom, political liberty, and the rule of law.(ref.1) This council’s rules led to a further treaty, The European Convention for Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECtHR), which includes fundamental laws like right to life, freedom off torture or freedom of expression. The European Court of Human Rights was created to which individuals can take their case to this court to argue that a signatory nation has failed to protect them from, or to sufficiently compensate them for , a breach of Convention right by a public authority. (ref.1)


The Human Rights Act 1998 that came to force 2 October 2000 increased influences of the Convention and the ECtHR on UK courts because the act integrated the Convention into UK law. The UK does not have a written constitution or "fundamental law". Going back to ancient rules of services of law, in England there is still a common law tradition and the constitution is based on historic documents (eg the Magna Carta); there is also statute law (Acts of Parliament) and case law (the actual decisions made by judges and juries). Case law is a general term used when speaking of sources of law.

CRIMINAL LAW deals with offences against society as a whole (such as murder, violence in general or blasphemy) or offences against another person which - (although they may also be a civil-type dispute between people) are abhorrent to society as a whole. Examples include fraud, dangerous driving, robbery, murder, rape and other types of violence or threatening behaviour. The Crown Court Prosecution (CPS) decides whether the case will be brought to the court.


Few last points to that are certainly worth mentioning are that it is incredibly important for journalists to not only have a wider knowledge about the legal systems and the constitution in the country they are practising their profession at but also to stay alert to challenges from the sides of unreasonable or unlawful restrictions on their freedom. They have to remember that there are two constitutional bulwarks that protect freedom of expression in UK such as jury trial and rule against prior restraint. And last but not least for a journalist to remember is to follow the Code of Ethics that should guide journalists in their work.


“ The issue of alleged wrongful convictions has been inextricably bound up with the UK’s media for the last century. “(...) The media and this important issue have formed a powerful and dangerous partnership. “ Dr Eamon O’Neil (Ref.3)


There are many instances of the press and the issue of wrongful convictions coming together. Conan Doyle. “His two most famous cases involved George Edalji and Oscar Slater: a half-Indian living in England, and a German-Jew living in Scotland. (...) Conan Doyle found himself supporting and publicising both cases widely. The author’s standing and reputation catapulted the cases into the public eye and support for them slowly grew until both were satisfactorily resolved.The involvement of the great writer, the press and the public showed that there was an appetite amongst society for acknowledging that the criminal justice system sometimes gets it wrong and convicts the innocent of crimes they did not commit. (...)" (Ref.3) Canon Doyle’s exposure of the Edalji case helped bring about reform of the justice system itself and contributed to the formation of the Court of Criminal Appeal in 1907.


(...) a notable aspect to Slater case however, was the fact that Conan Doyle was attracted to the case after reading a (...) book written by lawyer named William Roughead, a much overlooked person in the whole saga. It was that humble document, which systematically dismantled the case against Slater, which was the spark that ignited the eventual firestorm.” (Ref.3)


When there is the individual claiming wrongful conviction there is the mystery of the case itself which is served up for public consumption through the press. “There is usually a central victim who readers can also identify with; there is the tantalising possibility that the establishment – in the form of the police and justice system – got it “wrong’ which is always of interest to most open societies; there is the high-profile supporter of the case (...) who adds credibility to the case, redressing the moral balance when dealing with someone the system has already convicted and locked-up; there is the opportunity for wider society to jump onboard (...) all of the aspects that create a great story and attract attention of the public becomes worthwhile. “ (Ref.3) All of these parts from “an attractive package for journalists, editors and readers and therefore it is no wonder wrongful convictions and the press often form an intoxicating marriage.” (Ref.3)


The times that have been famously remembered that have exercise the legal system by miscarriages of justice are shown in a short film called: Reeling in the Years 1974-3, which shows two of the cases that I would like to talk about. The case of The Birmingham Six and the case of The Guilford Four (Ref.12 & 13). The Guildford Four case has been brought to the history and a film has been made ‘In the name of the father’ that has kept this glorious moment of justice winning over in our memories.


In the film Who Bombed Birmingham an example is shown when the outcome of investigative work of journalistic genius becomes heroic was the work of Chris Mullin on the Birmingham Six case. It shows how “a brilliant, exemplary and genuinely imaginative piece of investigative journalism (...) can lead to sections of the tabloid press (...). Only with hindsight can we see that their fight with him wasn’t legal, factual or even journalistic – it was purely political. (Ref.3)


Six men were arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment after the bombing in Birmingham in 1970s. IRA seemed to be the instigator but what the IRA insisted was that none of the sentenced six were their members. Two of the public houses were bombed by the IRA, 21 people were killed and 162 injured, 6 people were convicted and had been in prison since 1974. A Granada film is a reconstruction of examining of their case by three journalists since 1985 giving the story of the Birmingham six. The journalists kept on knocking on the doors and they did not give up until the truth won. The journalists noticed inaccuracies to do with the times of interrogation by the police and started questioning the course of the investigation that had put the six men into prison. As we can see on the film, the men were brutally beaten and assaulted. Journalists find a clue in ‘playing cards’ and interview men in prison later they decided to run a simple DNA test that proves that the test carried out on the Birmingham six may have been misleading . (Ref.11)


The journalists see a clue in the fact that the men are severely beaten up on their faces as they can see from the pictures, all six men were abused in prison. Looking into the bombing routine - bombings Chris comes to the conclusion that there were four people responsible for the bombing, 2makers two planters and “we have agreed that you are one of them” says the journalist to one of his interviewees. Chris now needs the planters to make the application for an appeal stronger. Chris finds the guy who put the suitcase with the bomb under the table in the pub and later on he publishes a book ‘Error of judgment’, it doesn’t get men out of the prison but it makes the governing bodies start to question things again (Home office 1986). During the questioning Chris keeps his sources covered fulfilling his journalistic duty. Police says to him that they never said that the imprisoned 6 were members of IRA even though that he knows that in evidence they said that the Birmingham 6 was. Further material is being broadcasted, possibility of the DNA judgment to be wrong and mistreating by the looks of the prisoner’s faces. After two programs had been published and book by Chris Muller, 1987 the case goes into the court of Appeal and the case is investigated again as the case has been taken to the court of appeal. 1987 in court, while being questioned, the police officer denies all the allegation on violence used on the Birmingham six and inaccuracies within the schedule of questioning them but the turning point is when the police woman who has previously given a false statement (because she was being threatened) came back to court and said in front of the judge and jury how she witnessed one of the defendants to be physically assaulted, she also heard what was said “This is what we do to the fucking murdering bustards”(Ref.10). Then the forensic scientist who examined the original samples of the defendants’ DNA is called a witness and his statement proves that his judgment then was wrong. In the meantime Chris Mullin goes to the house of the man who he believes to be ‘the young planter of the bomb’ and challenges him to deny what Chris believes to be true. He says that the six couldn’t tell the police where the bombs were as they didn’t know because it was him who knew it. (Ref.11)

The appeal fails but Chris does not give in. It took until the 1991 for the court to admit that they had the wrong men The Birmingham Six spent 16 years in prison before found not guilty and was released.


“Journalists are ethically bound to investigate any claims of innocence for themselves. They are at the most part, trained not to sign up to anyone’s campaign. They are also trained to be professionally sceptical” which does not mean that they are disinterested but maintaining professional balance of open possibilities to clearly see factual evidence and use them effectively to their best potential. “ (Ref.3) Mullin’s enemies were willing to castigate him in order to annihilate the merest possibility that the public would ever know that the Establishment had wrongfully convicted six Irishmen whose only crime was being who they were in the wrong place and at the wrong time. Lesser journalists would have cracked under the pressure and it is to Mullin’s everlasting credit that his truth did eventually come out.” (Ref.3) In this example “the tabloid newspapers not only published erroneous facts before the trial which could have swayed a jury but they went further and called for capital punishment to be brought back. Reading headlines from that era suggests that the newspaper editors had taken leave of their senses and were happy to urge the readers to literally lynch the accused (and as it turned out innocent) men at the centre of the firestorm.” (Ref.3)


Other more recent examples like Barry George “show that certain sections of the media are still willing to frame the facts in a certain way to suit their preconceived agendas. As Dr Eamon O’Neil admits himself he had plodded around editors more times trying to interest them in possible wrongful convictions stories and the numerous outcomes would be suggestion just to interview gangsters because ‘that’s more glamorous’ and he would be often be told that certain criminals claiming innocence ‘must have done the crime because ‘they look like they are guilty’. (Ref.3)


Other great examples of effective investigative journalism are Ludvic Kennedy's great series of BBC team at Rough Justice or more recent Guardian ‘Justice on Trial’ series was a great work of British investigative journalism and as Eamon points out “socially-engaged journalism at its best. (...) Powerful because it comprehensively conveyed the depth of complexity of wrongful convictions in their entirety.” (Ref.3)


There is always the other side of the coin in getting media involved, as I must point out.


Just like being a solicitor or a judge being an investigative journalist is also a profession and with every profession comes desire of financial award at the end of the investigatory route, it is worth keeping in mind that “press does get on board an alleged miscarriage of justice case and uses its considerable resources to investigate and publish on the case. “ Eamon also admits that the “urge to print a hot story on a miscarriage of justice can often overpower the need to call a lawyer and ask whether immediate publishing was a good idea.” (Ref.3) Also remember that “reporters are now under the greater pressure to produce more articles in shorter times than ever before. Publishers and editors seem to believe in the magical powers of technology to make their journalists be in two places at once and never make mistakes. This means that alleged wrongful conviction cases which demand time and resources to examine, are pushed to one side. “ (Ref.3)


Professional and real journalists like Eamon would always aim to put the fullest version of facts before the reading and viewing public, but there are also other priorities that the journalist have to fulfil. He also emphasises that it is a “fact of life” that it is good “to build a strong and open partnership with the press. He has witnessed himself, as he says, to have the crucial witnesses telling him important facts which they would otherwise have denied or acknowledged of hours before to the police officers, criminal defence lawyers and case staff from the CCRC. As he points out, as a journalist, there is “no legal powers to compel a witness to speak out”.


Sometimes journalists are seen as “the last court of appeal for many of the spectrum of witnesses who want to have their say.” (Ref.3) And last but not least, form of well fulfilled role of journalist makes it the last chance if everything else fails, “then well-placed pre piece can undoubtedly shunt a possible wrongful conviction case forward. (...) So the occasionally light-beam of attention from a journalist can jolt the system into action.” (Ref.3)


To conclude, journalist can of course be of great help to challenge a claim of wrongful conviction and reach their aim of “best obtainable version of truth”, but as Dr Eamon says, stay open to the journalist working on an alleged wrongful conviction sometimes turning up something which challenges your position as it is just like lawyers of defence or prosecution it is their job to dig deep in factual evidence.




References
Ref. 1.McNae's Essential law for Journalists (20th Edition)
Ref. 2. Media law and ethics, notes for week 1 of Media Law and ethics module by Chris Horrie
Ref.3. Claims of Innocence, An Introduction to wrongful convictions and how they might be challenged Michael Naughton with Gabe Tan (2010)
Ref.11) Who bombed Birmingham?
Part1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbTqTbmMgkQ  
Part2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNCGyaS3oPk&feature=related  
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpPW2LjkYnE&feature=related  
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXMUuyEgbb8&NR=1  
Part 6 (which is the following part after part 4 on youtube): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XstdO1PY5gQ&feature=related  
Part 7: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu9isCmV-rs&NR=1  
Part 8: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YBqyYOjCcQ&NR=1  
Part 9: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIO0lClllzI&NR=1
Part 10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nY70XT_Muo&NR=1  
Part 11: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WhtXQo5EC4&feature=related
Ref.12) Reeling in years 1974-3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_OFo7Crigs&NR=1&feature=fvwp
Ref.13) The Guilford Four, In the name of the father : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgUWn0gVpq0&feature=related

Methods for investigating claims of Innocence (evidence of facts) - studying investigative Journalism

In their book Claims of Innocence, An Introduction to wrongful convictions and how they might be challenged Michael Naughton and Gabe Tan give fantastic guidelines listing few steps to how to approach an alleged miscarriage of justice.

Crucial are ensuring the retention of evidence and case documents, team will have to ensure of the retention of material by the police, Forensic Science Services (FSS) and by solicitors.

Few good tips there were that if “you are still seeking to challenge your conviction even after you have lost in your appeal or the CCC has refused to refer your case back to appeal courts it is vital that you make a formal written request to the relevant police force for all material relating to your case to be retained.” In case of FSS, “All items submitted by the police to the FSS will normally be returned to the police upon completion of the laboratory examination except in circumstances where the samples are thought to pose a potential hazard (e.g. biological samples such as blood), or, where an agreement has been reached with a relevant police force/organisation for the FSS to retain them, or part of them, under specialised storage conditions, for reference purposes or for possible future re-examination using improved techniques.

The FSS will maintain a document audit trail in relation to retained and destroyed material. The FSS will retain [keep in their possession] material for 30 years as a matter of course in serious cases” including the the murder . This 30 year period do not cover items of perishable nature, like body fluids for example. A “Notification of Intention to Destroy Items of a Perishable Nature' will be sent to the defence team prior to destruction which lists the items that the FSS are intending to dispose of. “ In light of this alleged victims of wrongful convictions should instruct their defence team to respond to the FSS ' Notification of Intention to Destroy Items of Perishable Nature' and request to the FSS for the destruction to be stayed – stopped.” It is also stated here that in addition o above, “ a formal request to the FSS should be made for other non-perishable materials to be retained beyond the minimum retention period.” In situation when the materials have been destroyed it is still possible that material taken from the item has still been retained. Further advise is given here that “it is worth contacting the FSS to ascertain the specific items and samples that they still hold in relation to your case.”

Retention policy with forensic science providers other than FSS is within General Specification Schedule 6A Items 3.22-3.26 Storage, Retention and Disposal, further on it was advaised again that “it is recommended that it be requested in writing to the forensic science that the police need to be contacted is that once a forensic science provider has finished with a case, most exhibits will be sent back to the police. However, certain items such as microscope slides , DNA extracts , acetate sheets containing fibre tape lifts etc will be retained by the forensic science provider for a variable amount of time.” an example of a case study given here is the conviction of Sean Hodgson who was imprisoned for murder of Teresa De Simone in 1979 because FSS had incorrectly declared that “all exhibits in the case were destroyed when the first request for DNA testing on the samples was made”. He served 27 years in prison before his conviction was overturned “when DNA testing of the semen sample collected at the crime scene did not match his profile.”

It is also important that the solicitors are also instructed “in writing not to destroy their files, including instructions and briefs, attendance notes and correspondence sent to third parties on their behalf.”

As an important starting point to investigation it is crucial to learn trial proceedings and examin how the jury decides on convictions which I already did go through the law aspect in two of my other posts when looking into law aspects of Criminal sentencing and jury decision making as well as focused on studying specific crime (murder) and different asoects of defence:

Criminal Law– Smith and Hogan, studying Investigative Journalism
Criminal Law by Alan Reed and Ben Fitzpatrick, chosen aspects- studying Investigative Journalism

The trial scripts and judges summing up are very important and probably best starting point before going deeper into specific areas of the case like for example DNA evidence or handprints. It is good to recognise what wa sthe Prosecutions' and Defence case for the defendant.

In Prosecution's Case, as Michael and Gabe point out it is significant to learn what is the prosequtions's version of what happened and what were the evidence supporting this version and what evidence was produced to undermine the defence's case. They also give advise to construct a list of all the proseqution witnesses who testified in court or whose statements were read out in court, and the evidence given by each of these witnesses. It is a key factor to understand evidence that led to the conviction and look for evidence undermining it or as Gabe and Michael say "disprove it tottaly". The same thing should be done for defence case just studying how the prosecution case was undermined by the defence and all the rest to do with the statements but corresponding to the defence. To stand up arguments against prosecition "evidence needs to be found that contradicts their statements or testiminios."

It is also equaly significant to "to get grips with how the police investigation was conducted, how the evidence was obtained, and whether there is evience that could support your case at trial which was not disclosed by the prosecution or which was ommited by the defence team." As an Inocence Project team that re-examines the case "you have to actively find evidence that undermines the prosecution's case and/or produce new evidence that could positively establish that alleged victims of wrongful conviction are innocent ot the crime that they have been convicted of."

When looking at the witness testimonies it is worth looking into things like whether the evidence given to the police is consistent with the evidence that the witness gave in court; "if a witness provided more than one statement, and the evidence which incriminates the alleged victim of wrongful conviction only came out in the later statement, it is crucial to question why the witness did not provide the evidence in his or her earlier statement(s). " Other thing to be done in course of examinations are looking into unused materials like witness statements perhaps there was something in there that that could contradict the witness's evidence or even find out if any of the witnesses had ever had a history of making false allegations.

Further on, loking into witness evidence, eyewitness identification evidence "featured in the prosecution's case at trial and you think that eyewitness might have been genuinely mistaken, (i.e. you are not claiming that the eye witness lied to the police or in court) the following pointers could assist you in proving that the eyewitness identification evidence is unreliable (...).”

Identififation procedure also has to comply with the Police and Crim inal Evidence Act 1984, particulary the Code of Practice for the Identification of Persons by the Police officers (Code d). Other significant tip is that “the witness should not see suspect on any photographs or description of the suspect prior to the ID parade.” Or even “could the witness have heard or heard any describtion of the suspect from the media prior to making the identification?” All these are vitally important, Michael and Gabe also give website that helps with other aspects of identification issues on Crampton, S. (2005) ‘Identification Issues’. (www.unitedagainstinjustice.org.uk )

Other aspect of giving statements is confesions, “if an alleged victim of wrongful conviction is convicted on basis of a confession, and s/he now [is] claiming that confession is false, the following pointers might assist in showing the unreliability of the confession:”
- all police interviews with suspects have to be audio recorded,
- if a person is forced to make a false confesion – check if police compied with the provisions set out under the PACE (Code of Practice C) (including the alleged victim of wrongful conviction)
- if the alleged victim of wrongful conviction is a vulnerabl suspect or suffers from mental or physical disability, check if the proper procedures for interviewing vulnerable suspects were adhered to.
-Does the confession contain describtions like how the crime was committed which do not fit with the evidence ,
- “At which point did the confession emerge? Are there any inconsistencies in the evidence given by the alleged victim of a wrongful convicton in the course of the police investigation? Did the alleged victim attempt to retract their confession in the course of the police investigation?”
-check how long was the alleged victim of wrongful conviction retained in custody before making the confession?
-Was the confession made in presence of the solicitor
- “if the alleged victim of wrongful conviction is alleging that the confession was fabricated by the police, send the statement for analysis by forensic psychologist. There might be words or forms of expressions contained in the statement that does not fit with the age/or educational background of the alleged victim”
-“if the alleged victim might have an undiagnosed mental or personality disorder which could make him/her vulnerable to making a false confession, arrange for a diagnosis by forensic psychologist.”

All above is vital, I will be dealing with more Forensic issues in separate chapter, which I will publish soon.

Finally, last but not least to end this post it is worth adding fue more quotes from Michael and Gabe’s book regarding solicitors. In the centre of all major wrongful conviction cases that Michael and Gabe cited in their book are “defence solicitors who were committed to the plight of the alleged innocent victims and dedicated themselves to assisting them to overturn their criminal convictions.

Such criminal appeal solicitors are vital in attempts to overturn alleged wrongful convictions. They can use their legal powers to ask for, and obtain, disclosure of evidence, challenge decisions made by authorities such as Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) or the police, ensure that correspondence to prisoners is confidential and not opened before it reaches them, obtain affidavits from witnesses who want to prove alibis or retract their incriminating statements, they can commission new tests to be conducted to produce new evidence that can call safety of the conviction in question, they can make the application for the appeal or to Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC).”

*All quotes and information are from:
Claims of Innocence, An Introduction to wrongful convictions and how they might be challenged
Michael Naughton with Gabe Tan (2010)

*My other posts created on basis of this book:
SEE HERE - Claims of Innocence by Michael Naughton and Gabe Tan – studying Investigative Journalism