Curious Coincidences

Or, it's all in the timing

The letter Sir Iain wrote (pdf) was released to the public under the Freedom of Information Act early on Friday afternoon. It clearly shows that Sir Iain lied about the way he responded to the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes. Here's one sentence I didn't emphasise in my previous post on this.

The investigation will be carried out by the Met's own Directorate of Professional Standards. [my emphasis]

There was no ambiguity in this letter. Sir Iain lied every time he claimed that there was (something he did on any number of occasions). The letter also appears to prove that Sir Iain acted unlawfully when gave the order that the IPCC would not be allowed access to the scene. Is anyone investigating this apparently unlawful behaviour?

Anyway, what's all this about timing? I'm not a journalist myself but I suspect that if you're looking for one on a Friday afternoon, the best place to start is the nearest pub. In fact, it is well known that Friday afternoon is a black hole for news. Saturday beckons like a lazy slob with a sore head and no-one is paying as much attention as they normally do. It's the perfect day to release bad news if you're up for a little damage control. (A wee while back, Tim at Bloggerheads illustrated how this works in Washington.) Of course, it might just be a coincidence in this instance.

But there's more. What happened the day after the letter was released? Well, a new photograph of one of the 7th July London bombers was made available to the press. Would you believe it? I mean, what are the chances of that happening, eh? So I'm wondering, did a single journalist at the press conference find out when it was that the police came to be in possession of this photograph? Do we know whether the police found it on Saturday morning and immediately called a press conference? Or, have they been waiting for an opportune moment to release it to the public?

Place your bets now. I think I know where I'd put my money.* Because you see, we must never be allowed to forget that there are evil terrorist maniacs trying to kill us in gruesome and painful ways. Facing a situation like this, it is obviously entirely acceptable for our public servants to be lying, manipulative, authoritarian scumbags. It's for our own good.

* I can't actually be sure though. Perhaps someone with a press pass could ask an intelligent question and report the answer once in a while.