- RSW 03 Page 6 -
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In December 1988 Brian Parsons, a building worker from East Devon, was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. It was a crime he did not commit. At the time of writing (December 1998) Parsons is waiting to hear whether he will be released on bail after the case was finally referred back to the Court of Appeal.
On November 28 1987 the rural calm in the tiny East Devon village of Shute Bottom was shattered when the body of 84-year-old Ivy Batten was discovered by a relative at her isolated home.
She had been struck with a hammer and brutally murdered. Her phone lines and electricity cables had been cut.
The outcry from the public and intense media interest in the case meant the police were under pressure from the start to secure a quick conviction.
A week after the body was discovered gloves and a hammer thought to have been used during the murder were found in a field near the murder scene.
A month later, in January 1988, the case was featured on the BBC's Crimewatch programme.
Three days later police went to a building site in East Devon and arrested Parsons while he was at work.
It is not clear why they ever suspected Parsons, who lived close to Ivy Batten and knew the murder victim.
He had earlier given a statement about vehicles he had seen in the area following an appeal for information from the police.
Officers picked up a work jacket belonging to Parsons and took his car in for examination.
Fibres from the murder gloves were apparently found in the pocket of the jacket and in the glove compartment of his car.
A police log of the movements of these gloves was later "lost" by Devon and Cornwall police. More than a decade later another police force would severely criticise the way police handled this evidence. The implication was clear - the gloves were planted.
Ten months later the case came to trial and despite Parsons protesting his innocence the case against him appeared overwhelming. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to life. An appeal soon afterwards failed.
Stephen Nunn, the solicitor acting for Parsons, refused to let the case drop.
For the next decade he battled, unpaid, to get the case re-opened. In the meantime the officer in charge of the case, John Essery, was rewarded for his services to justice. He was given the Queen's Police Medal; an honour reserved for the country's finest officers.
The work of Stephen Nunn led to local and national media coverage of the case.
In 1995 a Channel Four documentary Trial and Error cast serious doubt at the conviction. A study of Ivy Batten's electricity meter - it had been read the day before the murder - showed the power lines to her bungalow could not have been cut until the early hours of the morning of November 27. Parsons was at home with his parents at that time and could not have committed the murder.
The evidence was devastating for the police but instead of throwing in the towel Chief Constable John Evans criticised trial by television and said he would launch an inquiry.
A two-year investigation followed and not surprisingly Devon and Cornwall police cleared itself of any wrongdoing.
The then home secretary Michael Howard refused to refer the case back to the Court of Appeal in 1996.
Clearly the police were well aware by now that Parsons was innocent. Many had known all along. But it served the interests of justice to keep an innocent man in prison rather than admit the system is fallible, let alone corrupt.
Chris Mullin MP highlighted the problem the police faced when he raised the issue in Parliament in 1996.
Criticising the role of assistant chief constable Keith Portlock, who conducted the inquiry into his own force, Mullin said: ``He is making no secret of the fact that he sees it as his duty to maintain the conviction of Brian Parsons at all costs and what's more he is being particularly brazen about it.
``It's not hard to see why, because if Mr Parsons is innocent then the fibres from the gloves that led to his conviction were obviously planted by a Devon and Cornwall police officer - and that is a possibility too awful for Mr Portlock to contemplate.''
The decision to keep Parsons in prison came right from the top of the force.
But eventually Devon and Cornwall were forced to hand over the case to Hampshire police, which published a devastating 6,000-page report into the case in December 1998.
It listed a catalogue of corruption in the way officers had handled the case including:
The suppression of 160 pieces information.
The reliability of the forensic evidence crucial in the conviction.
The failure to pass on evidence to the defence which would never have led to a trial.
The "misleading" evidence given by John Essery - the Queen's Police Medal winner.
When the Criminal Cases Review Commission - the body set up to look at miscarriages of justice - read the report it immediately referred the case back to the Court of Appeal.
At the time of writing Parsons is waiting to see whether he will get bail ahead of the appeal which looks certain to finally clear his name.
When he heard the news Parsons, speaking from prison, said: "I know I didn't kill Ivy Batten but I have still spent 10 years in prison and nobody cares about it out there.
I just want it to happen now. If it doesn't happen then there is something seriously wrong with this system."
Something is seriously wrong with the system.
There are lessons to be learnt from what happened to Brian Parsons. He asked for help and he didn't get it. He was left to rot in various jails with only his solicitor showing any interest in the case.
A well-organised defence campaign could have helped to free him earlier. His parents tried to set one up but it was ignored.
There are lots more people like Brian Parsons in prison all over the country.
Socialists have a responsibility to fight for their freedom.
Miscarriages of justice are not isolated legal cases. They are a product of a decaying system which puts profit before people.
Building defence campaigns brings people into the struggle. They raise questions about the role of the police and whose interests so-called justice really serves.
Defence campaigns which are organised on that basis can be part of the wider movement which will one day sweep away the present system and lead to real justice and real freedom.