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Barry George's conviction
Reviews

From: QC
Category: Other stuff
Date: 02 July 2001

Review

But what is worse? 10 to one. No eyewitnesses, contamination of evidence. No picture of Dando, no gun. No gun. No evidence. An attention seeker, a sad case, never sick enough to attract the attention of the authorities - attention being the last thing he really needed. The Crown Prosecution Service heralds the brave new world of securing a conviction on the basis of purely circumstantial evidence. Your honour, he's a bit weird, he looks a bit shifty. The skill of the Daily Mail/Evening Standard sub-editors; the slyly constructed placard. Dando 'killer' 'as guilty as hell'. What defence can there be in single quotes? Barristers contorting for the media - the defence pulls out dramatic theories (in between conducting the Good Friday inquiry), the prosecution just plods away, insinuating, insinuating. And now wall-to-wall coverage, a one-hour dramatisation with Trevor MacDonald adding whatever gravitas he has remaining, and Nick Ross hinting gravely at what he knows, but the jury doesn't. Couldn't. The power of the suggestive media. How can the friends and family bow to the corruption and dilution of their grief? An entertainer died, suddenly and violently. The best argument for the death penalty yet?

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