Split Thread: Murder of PC Yvonne Fletcher

[ricbritain]

As with most cover ups/conspiracy theory's I wonder just how many people would have to be involved in this one?

With Libya's history and the madness of Gaddafi I do not find it in the slightest hard to believe that the right man was convicted. I admit that my opinion is formed without spending hours and hours either reading the posts on here or researching.

Libyans also claim not to be responsible for the death of PC Yvonne Fletcher and the bombing of a German discos. Maybe they were set up there too.

I wonder if this falls into the category of 'always support the underdog/the big bad system can not be trusted'

Split from this thread.

Posted By:kmortis

[ricbritain]

Edited by kmortis:

Removed material not on topic for this thread

Libyans also claim not to be responsible for the death of PC Yvonne Fletcher and the bombing of a German discos. Maybe they were set up there too.

I wonder if this falls into the category of 'always support the underdog/the big bad system can not be trusted'

[Rolfe]

Edited by kmortis:

Removed material not on topic for this thread

Originally Posted by ricbritain

Libyans also claim not to be responsible for the death of PC Yvonne Fletcher and the bombing of a German discos. Maybe they were set up there too.

Don't know. Haven't looked in any detail at these cases, though I know doubts have been expressed.


Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Edited by kmortis:

Removed material not on topic for this thread

Quote:

Libyans also claim not to be responsible for the death of PC Yvonne Fletcher and the bombing of a German discos. Maybe they were set up there too.

Both have been claimed. The disco bombing has some Mossad explanation and Israeli frame-up. Sounds possible but somehow unlikely. Haven't studied that. The Fletcher case, as I gather (don't quote me, I only skimmed it), comes down to this evidence:
1) She was shot while standing within sniper range of the Libyan embassy, and a dozen other buildings
2) People were quite willing to believe the Libyans would do that (the madness, as always, explains everything)
3) Once the protesting Libyans were pushed out of country, a search of the embassy showed they left behind a box of just the ammunition used.

I don't like the math on that. Whoever pulled that trigger, it's pretty clear their intent was to force a diplomatic standoff between the UK and Libya, and it worked splendidly.

But that's a side-note, let's not get hung up on it. The fact is, there's really no case against Megrahi for the bombing of Flight 103. There was one, but it only looked good, and has been chipped away over the years. It legally stands, but the slightest legal tap (not allowed) would have it legally crumble.

[little grey rabbit]

Quote:

The official and generally accepted view that Fletcher was fired upon and killed by someone in the Libyan embassy has been disputed by a number of experts, including army ballistics officer Lt-Col George Styles and Home Office pathologist, Hugh Thomas. Prime Minister Tony Blair was questioned on this subject by MP Tam Dalyell in Parliament on 24 June 1997. The Guardian of 23 July 1997 reported a parliamentary speech by Dalyell concerned mainly with the Lockerbie bombing, but also referring to Fletcher's murder[13]:

"With the agreement of Queenie Fletcher, her mother, I raised with the Home Office the three remarkable programmes that were made by Fulcrum, and their producer, Richard Bellfield, called Murder In St. James's.[14] Television speculation is one thing, but this was rather more than that, because on film was George Styles, the senior ballistics officer in the British Army, who said that, as a ballistics expert, he believed that the WPC could not have been killed from the second floor of the Libyan embassy, as was suggested.

"Also on film was my friend, Hugh Thomas, who talked about the angles at which bullets could enter bodies, and the position of those bodies. Hugh Thomas was, for years, the consultant surgeon of the Royal Victoria hospital in Belfast, and I suspect he knows more about bullets entering bodies than anybody else in Britain. Above that was Professor Bernard Knight, who, on and off, has been the Home Office pathologist for 25 years. When Bernard Knight gives evidence on film that the official explanation could not be, it is time for an investigation."[15]

Participants who appeared in Channel 4's Dispatches documentary entitled Murder In St. James's highlighted such issues as the velocity of the bullet and the angle at which it entered Fletcher's body. Lt-Col Styles stated that a high velocity bullet from a Sterling submachine gun would have passed straight through her body at an angle of 15°, and Hugh Thomas rebutted evidence given by Ian West, the pathologist at the inquest, that the 60° angle of entry of the bullet could be explained by Fletcher's turning to the right or left. The film went on to allege that the anti-Gaddafi organisation Al Burkan, which was allegedly funded by the Reagan White House, had obtained a gun from the Hein terrorist group in West Berlin, and used it to kill Fletcher with a single shot from the sixth floor penthouse at 3 St James's Square - the building adjacent to the embassy. According to the film, the head of Al Burkan, Ragab Zatout, planned to overthrow Gaddafi and seize control of Libya's oil wealth after the severing of diplomatic relations, but his coup attempt on 8 May 1984 was thwarted by the Libyan army

From wikipedia.

It appears that the 60 degree angle of bullet entry is an agreed fact - which would to my mind make claims that a 2nd story shooter from the Libyan embassy unlikely.

[ricbritain]

So, am I to believe that with all the oil wealth of Gaddafi he could not have hired a legal team at least as searching as Rolfe?? Have you not noticed the pull Gaddafi has at his disposal when he is upset? Why in the world would he not just hire a Rolfe type person to clear the apparent pattsie? If it is so obvious that folk on here can put together a water tight case why was it not done?

As for five people being involved: that has to be wrong. Did five people do all the investigation work, including forensics, and taking all witness statements? Did five people convince all involved not to go after the actual real perpetrators be they Iranian, Syrian etc? I am sure there will have been dozens and dozens of people involved in researching this in the early days trying to find any lead, not just five. And you are saying that at each point one of those people found a clue to Iran or where ever they were just shut down?

My reference to the Yvonne Fletcher and disco bomb were supposed to be sarcastic. I didn't actually expect someone to come back and refute them. Do you not realize that to Arabs Mosad it responsible for everything that ever goes wrong, including most terrorist attacks perpetrated by Arabs. According to Libyans it is mossad that continues to kill civilians in Iraq,

Also, as I remember it Libya pulled their people out of the embassy before anyone had chance to interview them. The British government had it's hands tied as there was a threat of the possibility of British people coming to harm in Libya.

If I go to JFK threads or Moon landing threads am I likely to find you guys busy there too?

[dafydd]

At the time everyone in Britain believed that The Libyans did it. I still believe it.

[Rolfe]

There was a TV documentary that presented a different theory, and I remember reading an article saying the same sort of thing, but I have no idea how well that theory would stand up to a good debunking.

Something about the bullet having come from a higher elevation than the highest floor of the Libyan embassy.

I think.

Rolfe.

[Captain_Swoop]

Like there were no Planes involved in 9/11

[Rolfe]

Well, no, I'm pretty sure there hasn't been a serious television documentary proposing the theory that there were no planes involved on 9/11. (It was a Channel 4 Dispatches investigation, but I see YouTube has taken it down on copyright grounds.)

Not that that means there's anything in it of course, but it does suggest it's a smidgen higher on the credibility scale.

Rolfe.

[Captain_Swoop]

In your opinion.
Like the No Planes theory of 9/11 it disregards all the eye witness evidence from the event and years later tries to substitute a different reality by sewing doubt for their own ends.

Dispatches has always been crap.

[Rolfe]

I remember reading an article on this online some time ago. I can't find that same article now, but I have traced one which seems to be along much the same lines.

Originally Posted by Joe Vialls

Just four minutes later at 10.19 am a 3-shot burst of automatic fire rang out. Yvonne Fletcher was hit by the first bullet in the upper right back. Bullet entry angle was 60 degrees from the horizontal, with an exit wound visible below the left rib cage. If the entry and exit wounds are lined up with her known height, and her televised position when the shots were fired, the line of fire backtracks precisely to the top floor of 8 St James Square. No other building in St James Square is high enough or at the correct azimuth to facilitate the sixty degree shot. At the coronial inquest into her death, creative media deception "proved" that Yvonne Fletcher was killed by a shot fired from the first floor of the Libyan Bureau on her left-hand side, at only 15 degrees from the horizontal!

The continuous television video sound track records the crowd chanting, followed by a bullet strike on a human body, followed in turn by the sounds of three equally-spaced very fast shots. By far the most important point proved by the sound is that the camera microphone located outside the Libyan Bureau recorded the `whump' of the bullet striking Yvonne Fletcher before it recorded the sound of the three shots being fired. What this means in layman terms is that the bullet which killed her was supersonic, and was fired from a position more distant from the camera's microphone than Yvonne Fletcher herself. This analysis alone proves the shots could not have been fired from the Libyan Bureau under any circumstances.

The page is very hard to read (white on royal blue), but I think it's a fair summary of the most prevalent CT. I've got an open mind on it. Anyone want to try to address it on its merits (or lack of them), rather than just dismiss it on knee-jerk reflex?

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

In your opinion.

Well, yes, it's my opinion that Dispatches is higher on the credibility scale than no-planer twoofers.

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Like the No Planes theory of 9/11 it disregards all the eye witness evidence from the event and years later tries to substitute a different reality by sewing doubt for their own ends.

Well that's great. You'll be able to explain why it's all wrong then.

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Dispatches has always been crap.

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

In your opinion.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

In your opinion.
Like the No Planes theory of 9/11 it disregards all the eye witness evidence from the event and years later tries to substitute a different reality by sewing doubt for their own ends.

Dispatches has always been crap.

That makes me want to argue the point, but I'm not really ready to argue this point, which would take some more learning than I have time for. Maybe having a thread with others looking too makes it a cool thing to open up.

Capt. Swoop, Which witnesses saw anything that indicated which direction the shot came from? Do you actually know that? because I don't.

I'll reaffirm the questions I posed above - if those are the points in support, my opinion is it's a weak and even suspicious case for Libyan terrorism.

One source I found useful despite being by Joe Vialls is this:
http://vialls.homestead.com/yvonnefletcher.html
I'm not even going to review it now, but as I recall the basic points made are logical up to a point - his knowing who did it and where is classic Vialls - I kind of doubt that part. But this was his first investigation, and I'd suggest someone should actually debunk it if possible, rather than just dismiss.

In response to Disatches, et al., I'd have to see the evidence - anyone's - that established just which way she was facing when hit. Only then could any analysis of bullet angles have any meaning. Right? My suspicion is we don't know, and it's down to other evidence and/or prejudices.

I'll check back later and add some more thoughts.

[Rolfe]

I don't know anything about Vialls, except he's a crappy web designer. I remember reading a different article some time ago which was quite persuasive, but I can't find it now.

Of course lots of things are persuasive until they're subjected to rigorous scrutiny, but in my book "Like there were no planes involved on 9/11" doesn't cut it in the "rigorous scrutiny" stakes.

Rolfe.

[Captain_Swoop]

Heard the bullet strike? right. As for the angle, a bullet strike at an angle wouldn't carry on in a direct line through the body. If it strikes at an angle it will deflect unless it passes entirely through soft flesh. Going through the back would cause deflection through the ribs. Basic stuff. What weapon is claimed to have been fired from the other side of the square from this roof? Pc Fletcher was hit by something like a 9mm, that's not a round capable of passing through her body from that range.
No Planes and Thermite in defence of gadaffi.

[Chaos]

Wait... if the shots heard are the same burst of which one bullet hit Yvonne Fletcher, that means they must have come from far away to have a measurable interval between the hit and the shots being heard. But if the shot came at a downward angle, wouldn´t that mean the firing weapon would have to be a long way up in addition to being a long distance away?

Just to throw some random numbers in here to illustrate my point:
If the bullet moves at 1500 meters per second and the sound of the gunshots moves at 1000 meters per second, then if the interval between the hit and sounds arriving is .2 seconds, the shooter must be 100 meters away, right? At a 60 degree angle, that means he´d have to be... what? 50 meters above the target? Sorry, geometry is not my strong point, but I don´t think 8th floor is high enough for that.

I think Captain Swoop makes a much better case for a more or less horizontal shot being deflected by ribs.

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry if my link was a duplicate of Rolfe's. Indeed, it is. Vialls has said a lot of weird things. He's not a 9/11 no-planer, but he did argue the planes were remote controlled by something called "Home Run." I looked into that a bit at one point and learnt a bit in the process, as well as noting his poor layout work, etc.

I'm reviewing the current stuff a bit now. I saw this:

Originally Posted by Vialls

Bullet entry angle was 60 degrees from the horizontal

Okay, duh. That could be shown to mean something. I was thinking radial angle, from which compass direction. That would be much more telling than the elevation, but unless she were lying down or standing on her head, etc., the horizontal angle is obviously a clue, if one that could only give us a range of possible floors of probably several different buildings.

ETA:

Originally Posted by Vialls

her televised position when the shots were fired,

That was established? Oh, this could get good. With all the available evidence, this could likely be proven one way or the other. Inside the embassy, or its grounds, or somewhere else? Does anyone know if there was ever an official investigation to prove the official case? Or was it left hanging?

I'll be back again.

[geni]

Originally Posted by ricbritain

So, am I to believe that with all the oil wealth of Gaddafi he could not have hired a legal team at least as searching as Rolfe?? Have you not noticed the pull Gaddafi has at his disposal when he is upset? Why in the world would he not just hire a Rolfe type person to clear the apparent pattsie? If it is so obvious that folk on here can put together a water tight case why was it not done?

Gaddafi is not entirely rational so trying to model his behaviour is kinda tricky.

A few things you have to remember. Handing over the suspects was part of Gaddafi's ticket to rehabilitation. No point in spoiling that by throwing in a bunch of fancy lawyers in with them. Secondly Gaddafi would assume that we would rig the trial (after all he would). Thirdly Gaddafi is paranoid (not unreasonably). Would you really expect him to trust a scotish lawyer (scotish law is non standard enough that you would need a specialist) not to side with the establishment?

[Caustic Logic]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Heard the bullet strike? right. As for the angle, a bullet strike at an angle wouldn't carry on in a direct line through the body. If it strikes at an angle it will deflect unless it passes entirely through soft flesh. Going through the back would cause deflection through the ribs. Basic stuff. What weapon is claimed to have been fired from the other side of the square from this roof? Pc Fletcher was hit by something like a 9mm, that's not a round capable of passing through her body from that range.
No Planes and Thermite in defence of gadaffi.

Originally Posted by Vialls

Bullet entry angle was 60 degrees from the horizontal, with an exit wound visible below the left rib cage.

But again, I'm just copying from a Joe Vialls web page. I however vote to pretend he went crazy after mapping out this situation (some great reference material listed, too bad I don't have it to double-check). So let's look at the claims in detail and verify or debunk them or whatever.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Heard the bullet strike? right. As for the angle, a bullet strike at an angle wouldn't carry on in a direct line through the body. If it strikes at an angle it will deflect unless it passes entirely through soft flesh. Going through the back would cause deflection through the ribs. Basic stuff. What weapon is claimed to have been fired from the other side of the square from this roof? Pc Fletcher was hit by something like a 9mm, that's not a round capable of passing through her body from that range.

I'm sure I've read a discussion of this which cited quite a lot of detail from the post mortem report. Have you read it?

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

No Planes and Thermite in defence of gadaffi.

Straw man. Nobody is trying to defend Gadaffi. Only to make sure the blame for his various alleged misdeeds is sitting with the right person. There's plenty to bury Gadaffi that isn't disputed. But just because he did a load of bad stuff doesn't automatically mean he did any particular piece of bad stuff you want to pin on him, without the necessity for examining the evidence.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Chaos

Wait... if the shots heard are the same burst of which one bullet hit Yvonne Fletcher, that means they must have come from far away to have a measurable interval between the hit and the shots being heard. But if the shot came at a downward angle, wouldn´t that mean the firing weapon would have to be a long way up in addition to being a long distance away?

As far as I can make out, that's the point. The CT says the shot was fired from a much taller building nearby.

Originally Posted by Chaos

Just to throw some random numbers in here to illustrate my point:
If the bullet moves at 1500 meters per second and the sound of the gunshots moves at 1000 meters per second, then if the interval between the hit and sounds arriving is .2 seconds, the shooter must be 100 meters away, right? At a 60 degree angle, that means he´d have to be... what? 50 meters above the target? Sorry, geometry is not my strong point, but I don´t think 8th floor is high enough for that.

I think Captain Swoop makes a much better case for a more or less horizontal shot being deflected by ribs.

That would be extremely easy to determine from the post mortem examination. It's not necessary to make it up or speculate, it's necessary to find out what the PM report said.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

I think I found the article I read previously.

http://www.deepblacklies.co.uk/terminal_velocity_pr.htm

This says Vialls is wrong, but still thinks this was a False Flag attack.

I have no real idea, one way or another. I'd be interested to see an evenhanded discussion of the whole thing. The CT is quite detailed and referenced, and not completely implausible at first blush. It needs a detailed debunking by people willing to take it seriously and actually look into the claims.

"No it's got to be rubbish because it's a CT and all CTs are rubbish" doesn't do it for me though. Failing a competent debunking I'm inclined to give it a meh, maybe, who knows.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

No promises, but I'll tackle this to some degree. I found a Youtube video, app. raw news from '84.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdg0BGzKCmc
Yvonne is shown, as Vialls says, apparently at the enter of the police formation. It doesn't seem to show her exactly when she was hit, but she was positioned, as the other officers, facing the anti-Gaddafi side and back to the People's Bureau. If we presume she stood that way at the time of being hit, and no time to turn at the sound of the shot, then we could say something, in connection with the post mortem exam results.

We can also tell from this video that no such rigor was waited for that day. On the perhaps natural presumption the fire came from the bureau, Fletcher was moved out of sight from there. Others were hit, all on the anti-Gaddafi side. I think it said 11 injured, only three shots fired. Powerful bullets? Were they all recovered even, I wonder?

Later in the day, a giant tarp screen was erected to block the line of sight, police with guns drawn all day, creeping around. One Libyan journalist allowed to leave, frisked and found to be probably not a terrorist. That's a lot of presumption on display, and it seems all they had to do was never alter the perception set up from minute one.

I'm trying to map out the area now. Looks like the northeast corner of the square by Google maps street view. Here's Vialls' map, roughly upside down from true north, as indicated). He has Yvonne at about the center of the police arc, and the shooter on an upper floor (7th?) of a building off to the right - Enserch House (??), right across the street from Chatham House, it looks like. Certainly with the distance available, the shooter had to be high up. I'll look at the bureau building later and how tall it is - could even the roof account for 60 degrees just across the street?

If he's right about her injuries, from right shoulder to left abdomen, I think that's definitely a problem. The Bueurau was right behind her, and slightly to the left, by this map at least.

I'll also look a bit into what investigation was done - was it solved or left hanging? One person who found a relative lack of answers was Yvonne's mother, as mentioned in this letter from a Channel 4 person to Vialls.
http://vialls.homestead.com/files/Ch4_1.jpg

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I think I found the article I read previously.

http://www.deepblacklies.co.uk/terminal_velocity_pr.htm

This says Vialls is wrong, but still thinks this was a False Flag attack.

I have no real idea, one way or another. I'd be interested to see an evenhanded discussion of the whole thing. The CT is quite detailed and referenced, and not completely implausible at first blush. It needs a detailed debunking by people willing to take it seriously and actually look into the claims.

"No it's got to be rubbish because it's a CT and all CTs are rubbish" doesn't do it for me though. Failing a competent debunking I'm inclined to give it a meh, maybe, who knows.

Rolfe.

I'm inclined to go with Captain Swoop on this, since the CT seems to involve the super sekrit British/American agents sitting in their surveillance room waiting until a nut job in the Libyan embassy starts spraying the crowd with bullets, then calmly offing WPC Fletcher, because that would make all the difference.

I wonder how many days they sat there waiting when the Libyans disobligingly didn't start firing out of the window?

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Guybrush Threepwood

I'm inclined to go with Captain Swoop on this, since the CT seems to involve the super sekrit British/American agents sitting in their surveillance room waiting until a nut job in the Libyan embassy starts spraying the crowd with bullets, then calmly offing WPC Fletcher, because that would make all the difference.

I wonder how many days they sat there waiting when the Libyans disobligingly didn't start firing out of the window?

I know exactly what you mean. The CT specifically alleges a False Flag operation where Yvonne was deliberately killed by an SAS sniper in order to derail diplomatic efforts to stabilise relations between Britain and Libya. At least I think the allegation is that a British serviceman actually did the deed, though US involvement is of course postulated.

I'm looking mainly at the Guyatt version here, which differs from the Vialls one. He is suggesting that the Libyan anti-Gadaffi protest which started it all was itself a set-up, designed to provoke a reaction from those inside the embassy. That the idea was to provoke the Libyans into some action that would turn public opinion against Libya, and that shooting a policeman was a better outcome than shooting some random Libyan dissident in this respect. (Vialls suggests that Yvonne was deliberately placed in the centre of the police line, in the line of fire, presumably because she was the victim who would arouse the most public sympathy and outrage. If that was true, it would suggest quite a widespread conspiracy. Who would risk meddling to that extent, with the attendant possiblilty someone would squeal?)

How long would this have taken? The sooper sekrit listening post seems to have been there for a while, set up to spy on the Libyan embassy. The CT says they had bugs and agents inside the embassy, and were aware all the time of what was going on in there. They knew they had guns, and of what calibre. The day before the shooting, signals from Libya were intercepted authorising those in the embassy to open fire on the protestors. So the theory doesn't really necessitate an inordinate amount of hanging around waiting.

The core of the CT is really this paragraph, from Guyatt.

Quote:

A well placed and knowledgeable source has told This Writer that the fatal shot almost certainly came from the upper floors of No. 3 St. James Square - location of the secret joint MI5/CIA surveillance post. The operation was engineered to create public outrage that would have hardened the existing “soft” view of Libya by the British government. We were also told that the operation “planners” were concerned that deaths of Libyan protesters by Qaddafi’s own assassin, wouldn’t be enough to mobilise the government to take extreme retaliatory measures. Consequently, an additional target was chosen that was certain to inflame public opinion. Yvonne Fletcher was the sacrificial lamb.

Mmm, not very believable at all, I would agree. The agents provocateurs set up an anti-Gadaffi demonstration, that had to be policed, equipped a sniper with a weapon with bullets that matched the calibre of the Libyans' own weapons, and waited for the Libyans to start firing on the protestors. At that moment the sniper shot Yvonne to make it appear that she had been hit by the Libyan fire.

It's far-fetched, but not completely impossible. It's not holographic planes and voice-morphed telephone conversations and controlled demolitions. The more I look at it the less I'm inclined to believe it, but actually, my position is argument from incredulity, not actual evidence that it didn't happen.

Rolfe.

[little grey rabbit]

Originally Posted by Chaos

Wait... if the shots heard are the same burst of which one bullet hit Yvonne Fletcher, that means they must have come from far away to have a measurable interval between the hit and the shots being heard. But if the shot came at a downward angle, wouldn´t that mean the firing weapon would have to be a long way up in addition to being a long distance away?

Just to throw some random numbers in here to illustrate my point:
If the bullet moves at 1500 meters per second and the sound of the gunshots moves at 1000 meters per second, then if the interval between the hit and sounds arriving is .2 seconds, the shooter must be 100 meters away, right? At a 60 degree angle, that means he´d have to be... what? 50 meters above the target? Sorry, geometry is not my strong point, but I don´t think 8th floor is high enough for that.

I think Captain Swoop makes a much better case for a more or less horizontal shot being deflected by ribs.

Do british police officers come equipped with titanium ribs?

We can only assume that the pathologists did their job correctly. Assuming a rib can deflect a bullet, it must have left an impact.

The pathologists who queried the findings are experienced in assessing bullet wounds and behaviour of bullets. "Captain Swoop" here, is not.

[little grey rabbit]

Originally Posted by Guybrush Threepwood

I'm inclined to go with Captain Swoop on this, since the CT seems to involve the super sekrit British/American agents sitting in their surveillance room waiting until a nut job in the Libyan embassy starts spraying the crowd with bullets, then calmly offing WPC Fletcher, because that would make all the difference.

I wonder how many days they sat there waiting when the Libyans disobligingly didn't start firing out of the window?

There is no denying Guybrush Threepwood's logic here, which is undermined by only one minor flaw.

No one has ever proposed this daft scenario.

[Caustic Logic]

Originally Posted by Guybrush Threepwood

I'm inclined to go with Captain Swoop on this, since the CT seems to involve the super sekrit British/American agents sitting in their surveillance room waiting until a nut job in the Libyan embassy starts spraying the crowd with bullets, then calmly offing WPC Fletcher, because that would make all the difference.

I wonder how many days they sat there waiting when the Libyans disobligingly didn't start firing out of the window?

Wait ... who said the Libyans were shooting AND the sooper seekrits? I think only three shots were heard, all in one burst, direction unknown, presumed from the embassy, but allegedly inconsistent with the noted injuries to Fletcher's torso.

just to expand ...
The article Rolfe linked to quoted the pathologist's report - 60 to 70 degrees from horizontal, so from a high level. Street view on Google maps shows the top floors/roofs of the two buildings aren't that different. The bureau is the really classic white building behind the cops at the video's beginning. Enserch is the slightly taller brownstone two buildings to the left. & floors to 4 1/2 is a tad deceptive when the floors are all different heights. If one could fit for height, the other might, IMO.

But the article also asserts the inquest ruled on a first floor (2nd floor in US) nest, and the same pathologist swore there that the angle was 15 degrees only.

Quote:

Immediately, a number of inconsistencies were evident. Foremost was the original findings of Pathologist, Dr. Ian West, who wrote in his autopsy report: “…the angle of the bullet wound track indicates that she [WPC Fletcher] was shot in the back by a person situated at a considerably higher level… the track would indicate that she had been shot from the upper floors of an adjacent building [to the Libyan People’s Bureau].” Dr West noted that the bullets entry track was consistent with an angle of 60-70 degrees. During later evidence given at the inquest, West changed his mind. Now he agreed with Police investigators that the bullet had come from the first floor of the Libyan people’s Bureau - signifying an entry wound of only 15 degrees. This unusual change in heart was to prove vital.

Reviewing the evidence, Prof. Knight found Dr. West’s amendments strange. “I can’t understand it,” he said. Hugh Thomas, former Chief Consultant to the British Army in Northern Ireland - and an acknowledged expert on gunshot wounds - concluded that Dr. West’s testimony at the inquest was “rubbish.” Adding that it was “facile” and a “nonsense,” he concluded that the updated scenario West painted for the Coroner was “impossible.” Backtracking over the Post Mortem report, Thomas was convinced that the bullet that struck WPC Fletcher must’ve come from the upper floors of an adjacent building. Totalling five floors, the Libyan building simply didn’t have a high enough elevation for the killer shot.

And then there's the right-to-left angle. These things matter greatly, but I haven't got a fix yet on just where she was and facing which way. And of course, are these citations from Vialls and Guyatt reliable? Anyone have an idea how you'd double-check just what line was ripped through her torso? That's key.

[Caustic Logic]

oh, I see that was alleged and I missed it.

A separate order, supposedly heard, that shooting was permitted/ordered, from the embassy, on the protesters. And then there's shooting, and a lady cop is hit by accident and oops, bad order ...

or a sniper add-on to the above to make the oops happen ...

or a propaganda fake transmission add-on to a sniper who was able to injure 11 and kill one with only three shots ...

or other, insert logical possibilities here ...

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Originally Posted by Caustic Logic

Wait ... who said the Libyans were shooting AND the sooper seekrits? I think only three shots were heard, all in one burst, direction unknown, presumed from the embassy, but allegedly inconsistent with the noted injuries to Fletcher's torso.

just to expand ...
The article Rolfe linked to quoted the pathologist's report

Yes, that article, this bit...

Originally Posted by David Guyatt

The automatic weapon used inside the Libyan Bureau - a 9 millimetre Sterling sub-machine gun - was not silenced. The sharp sounds of it’s eleven rapid-fire rounds being discharged were caught on BBC videotape and analysed by an audio expert for the Dispatches team. An additional videotape was also analysed. It proved to be critically important. Taken by an amateur, the film caught the sound of a “duller” gunshot two seconds after the Libyan gunman ceased firing. The evidence was irrefutable - a twelfth bullet had been fired. What started off as a conspiracy theory in Australia, was fast becoming a conspiracy fact in London.

Alleges 11 shots from within the embassy + one more from elsewhere.

It's Guyatt's theory, I just find it implausible.

[Rolfe]

Looking in detail at the two versions, as far as I can see Vialls is alleging that the Libyans fired no shots at all and the whole thing was orchestrated from elsewhere, while Guyatt alleges the Libyans did fire, but a sniper was waiting for that to happen and fired almost simultaneously to ensure Yvonne was hit.

The more I read about Vialls, the more Caustic Logic seems to be right that he's a bit of a mad conspiracy theorist. On the other hand, orchestrating the whole thing actually makes more sense than waiting for the Libyans to open fire spontaneously. Which was a brain-dead stupid thing to do, the way to deal with that protest was to ignore it. But then Gadaffi isn't known for conspicuous sanity, and nobody seems to be disputing the intelligence that he did authorise his people to open fire.

The evidence about the angle of the bullet doesn't go away when the post mortem report is released. First the pathologist says it was 60 to 70 degrees, then he changes his mind so that his report matches the police story.

Originally Posted by Guyatt

Immediately, a number of inconsistencies were evident. Foremost was the original findings of Pathologist, Dr. Ian West, who wrote in his autopsy report: “…the angle of the bullet wound track indicates that she [WPC Fletcher] was shot in the back by a person situated at a considerably higher level… the track would indicate that she had been shot from the upper floors of an adjacent building [to the Libyan People’s Bureau].” Dr West noted that the bullets entry track was consistent with an angle of 60-70 degrees. During later evidence given at the inquest, West changed his mind. Now he agreed with Police investigators that the bullet had come from the first floor of the Libyan people’s Bureau - signifying an entry wound of only 15 degrees. This unusual change in heart was to prove vital.

Reviewing the evidence, Prof. Knight found Dr. West’s amendments strange. “I can’t understand it,” he said. Hugh Thomas, former Chief Consultant to the British Army in Northern Ireland - and an acknowledged expert on gunshot wounds - concluded that Dr. West’s testimony at the inquest was “rubbish.” Adding that it was “facile” and a “nonsense,” he concluded that the updated scenario West painted for the Coroner was “impossible.” Backtracking over the Post Mortem report, Thomas was convinced that the bullet that struck WPC Fletcher must’ve come from the upper floors of an adjacent building.

Nothing about anything deflecting from a rib, just a change of opinion. Was he right first time or second time? The expert from Belfast seems to think first time. And Vialls has a lot of stuff about how Yvonne's injuries were too severe to have been caused by the type of weapon the Libyans allegedly used. Guyatt seems to be saying much the same thing.

Vialls then says that the Libyans in the embassy were allowed to leave the country, unmolested, with 18 unsearched diplomatic bags. Following that, the embassy was thoroughly searched by a specialist military team looking for booby traps and weapons, and nothing was found.

Originally Posted by Vialls

It was not until 2 May 1984, five days after the extensive military search, that the Metropolitan Police suddenly "found" 4,367 rounds of 9-mm and .22 calibre ammunition, 7 pistols, two Sterling pistol grips and two Sterling magazines in the Libyan Bureau. On the face of it, Mr. Plod had suddenly become much more skilled at finding concealed weapons and ammunition than the premier military explosives clearance team.

Who was fooling who? If the weapons and ammunition were Libyan property they would certainly have been loaded into one of the 18 Libyan diplomatic bags which left the country unopened.

Well, if there's anything in this lot, there are unanswered questions. The trouble is, we only have Vialls and Guyatt to go from as far as I know. If any of the original documentation is available, I don't know about it.

So I don't know how to make up my mind, on what is available at the moment. Argument from incredulity says the whole thing's just a conspiracy theory and the truth is the obvious version. But I don't think we have the wherewithall to debunk the CT completely.

Rolfe.

[little grey rabbit]

Ignoring Viaills et al.

"Lt-Col Styles stated that a high velocity bullet from a Sterling submachine gun would have passed straight through her body at an angle of 15°, and Hugh Thomas rebutted evidence given by Ian West, the pathologist at the inquest, that the 60° angle of entry of the bullet could be explained by Fletcher's turning to the right or left."

Do we take from that the absence of a documented exit wound? Surely this would suggest that West's later change of heart was not honest?

[Caustic Logic]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

But then Gadaffi isn't known for conspicuous sanity, and nobody seems to be disputing the intelligence that he did authorise his people to open fire.

I'd dispute it. It's a stupid as hell thing to do in broad daylight in London. Stupid, stupid, and I don't buy that even Gaddafi's insanity ordering it would really compel the people there to do it. It's a logical possibility, sure, but I can't see just accepting it as the kind of thing to expect.

The shoot-the-protesters order might be just as trustworthy as the found ammunition.

I lean to Vialls so far on the mechanical side, and Guyatt on the political side.

And why was the police story that the fire came from the first floor, instead of the top floor or roof? I'd guess because, as the Guyat story says, their alleged intel was that these weapons were stored on the first floor. That's not a good guess, I confess, but if it introduces a serious contradiction with the pathologic evidence, we should ask why.

Quote:

So I don't know how to make up my mind, on what is available at the moment. Argument from incredulity says the whole thing's just a conspiracy theory and the truth is the obvious version. But I don't think we have the wherewithall to debunk the CT completely.

Rolfe.

Completely rational response. I agree a full debunk is in order. I for one could really use it, as I'm really in the pull of this "woo." It's good stuff.

Also, I see there were actually 11 (or maybe 12?) bullets fired, in three busrts, not just three shots. My bad on all above points in err ...

[Rolfe]

It's interesting in political terms, as it all ties into Libya's pariah status. (As an aside, isn't it weird to see footage from almost 30 years ago of Libyan protestors shouting "Gadaffi is a terrorist, Gadaffi must go!")

It's so difficult to know just what Gadaffi did do. UTA 772 seems to have solid evidence behind it. Arming the IRA is another one. And I think there's a lot of more local stuff that isn't much talked about in detail. However we also know that there was a pretty concerted effort within the CIA to smear Gadaffi as well. Cannistraro was part of that. I doubt if we'll ever know the truth to be honest.

It was the Fletcher murder that caused the sanctions on Libya, that Megrahi was smuggling stuff past in the mid to late 1980s, and was the reason he said he had the coded passport in the Abdusamad name.

Then there was the bombing of La Belle Disco, and I have no freaking idea whether Gadaffi really did that or if it was just pinned on him because he was convenient. Reagan's government seemed to like doing that, from accounts I've heard.

Reagan announced he had definite proof it was Gadaffi's operation, and launched the air raids against Tripoli and Benghazi, that killed Gadaffi's infant adopted daughter.

And that's supposed to be why Gadaffi bombed Pan Am 103. Except I don't believe a word of that part.

The only conclusion I'm coming to from this is that an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Well let's see.

The plain vanilla version

A group of anti-Gadaffi protestors mount a demonstration outside the Libyan embassy in London. Someone in the embassy lets off a burst of rifle fire against the protestors, injuring several. PC Yvonne Fletcher, who was policing the demonstration and thus standing between the demonstrators and the embassy with her back to the latter, was killed.

Problems with the plain vanilla version

The act of opening fire on that demonstration seems completely irrational. Demonstrations like that in London all go the same way. People stand around with placards waving their arms and maybe shouting, then they go home. Rinse and repeat. After a while they get tired of it. There is absolutely no conceivable gain to Gadaffi from opening fire on the protestors, and everything to lose. Even if he hadn't killed a cop, starting a shooting war on a London street while live TV news cameras are running isn't the way to win friends and influence people.

The angle of Yvonne Fletcher's fatal wound is hugely anomalous. Just going by the verbal description of the injuries, a very elevated position for the sniper is implied. In addition, the extent of the injuries is far more severe than would be expected from an uncomplicated bullet going straight through. That was one extremely nasty piece of ammo. We don't know why the original pathologist changed his mind about the angle of the shot, so that his report matched the police theory. His revised version doesn't square with the description of the injuries, and it's almost impossible to imagine a position she might have been in that would have caused that trajectory through her body.

There are people making claims about the sound-tracks of the live news camera revealing different things about different shots and so on. These are contradictory, with Vialls claiming Fletcher was killed by the first shot of a burst not from the embassy which was deliberately aimed at her (with no fire from the embassy), and Guyatt claiming that the shot that killed her appears as a silenced gunshot just after the burst of unsilenced fire from the embassy.

The handling of the affair seems very strange, with the Libyan occupants of the embassy allowed to leave freely, taking 18 unsearched diplomatic bags with them.

After their departure no weapons are found in the embassy by a military search team, which is hardly unexpected given the 18 unsearched diplomatic bags. However, a few days later the police discover weapons and ammunition in the embassy, including ammunition of the calibre that killed PC Fletcher.

So what is the interpretation?

At the moment, I don't know. Vialls's version is the more plausible as regards execution, in that it doesn't require the Libyans to open fire at all. Thus the operation would be entirely under the control of the conspirators. In addition, if the object was to kill a policeman, this would be more certainly achieved by targeting her with the first shot than by shooting after she might have started to react to an initial burst of fire.

However, in that version none of the fire came from the embassy at all. There were a lot of people around, including more police and a bunch of journalists. Is it likely that nobody would have been aware of where the sound of the shots originated?

Although the pathologist's change of mind seems inexplicable, we have to bear in mind that he did revise his opinion to a shallower trajectory. (Upper right back, right lung, liver, pancreas and left elbow - huh?)

It's perfectly possible the Libyans did carry out the shooting, left with all the evidence, and then some bright spark at the Met decided to plant some more.

It's just anomalous, whichever way you look at it. Gadaffi is and was perfectly capable of shooting down protestors (as we well know), whether or not there is a cop in the way. But why open fire under these circumstances? And what was really going on with the trajectory of the bullet and the possibly planted evidence?

At the moment, I don't know.

Rolfe.

[geni]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

The act of opening fire on that demonstration seems completely irrational. Demonstrations like that in London all go the same way. People stand around with placards waving their arms and maybe shouting, then they go home. Rinse and repeat. After a while they get tired of it. There is absolutely no conceivable gain to Gadaffi from opening fire on the protestors, and everything to lose. Even if he hadn't killed a cop, starting a shooting war on a London street while live TV news cameras are running isn't the way to win friends and influence people.

However thats only an issue if you think the firing was on the orders of Gadaffi rather than some hothead at the embassy itself.

Quote:

There are people making claims about the sound-tracks of the live news camera revealing different things about different shots and so on. These are contradictory, with Vialls claiming Fletcher was killed by the first shot of a burst not from the embassy which was deliberately aimed at her (with no fire from the embassy), and Guyatt claiming that the shot that killed her appears as a silenced gunshot just after the burst of unsilenced fire from the embassy.

Standard JFK type claims. Best ignored.

Quote:

The handling of the affair seems very strange, with the Libyan occupants of the embassy allowed to leave freely, taking 18 unsearched diplomatic bags with them.

Cold war so obvious violations of diplomatic protocol wasn't a game people wanted to get into.

Quote:

After their departure no weapons are found in the embassy by a military search team, which is hardly unexpected given the 18 unsearched diplomatic bags. However, a few days later the police discover weapons and ammunition in the embassy, including ammunition of the calibre that killed PC Fletcher.

Depends on what the two groups were looking for. Military would more likely be looking for boobytraps.

Quote:

At the moment, I don't know. Vialls's version is the more plausible as regards execution, in that it doesn't require the Libyans to open fire at all. Thus the operation would be entirely under the control of the conspirators. In addition, if the object was to kill a policeman, this would be more certainly achieved by targeting her with the first shot than by shooting after she might have started to react to an initial burst of fire.

Maybe but bringing in the SAS is a classic sign of someone with an overactive imagination. If you are already working with the CIA having them bring someone in makes a lot more sense than risking SAS memebers reacting badly to orders to shoot a police woman.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by geni

However thats only an issue if you think the firing was on the orders of Gadaffi rather than some hothead at the embassy itself.

That's a very good point. Some idiot with no political savvy and a career death-wish gets hacked-off with the demonstration and lets off a burst of fire. Maybe there was more than one, didn't the official version mention more than one shot at once?

That would make the story about the intercepted telexes ordering the use of firearms a bit of a complication though.

Originally Posted by geni

Standard JFK type claims. Best ignored.

Well, yes and no. Vialls managed to convince the C4 Dispatches team that there was something in the theory. So a bunch of TV sound engineers gave the tapes a pretty close going-over. I don't like "argument from incredulity" as the only counter to a CT. But I don't know of any way to verify how valid the claims are. I note Vialls is claiming one thing and Guyatt something quite different.

Originally Posted by geni

Cold war so obvious violations of diplomatic protocol wasn't a game people wanted to get into.

Even so, calmly letting everyone inside the building where the murderer of a British cop was hiding leave the country with no questions asked is, well, unexpected.

Originally Posted by geni

Depends on what the two groups were looking for. Military would more likely be looking for boobytraps.

Indeed they were. But they were also looking for weapons in general and it seems a bit unlikely a thorough search even for boobytraps could have missed the amount of munitions the police discovered.

Originally Posted by geni

Maybe but bringing in the SAS is a classic sign of someone with an overactive imagination. If you are already working with the CIA having them bring someone in makes a lot more sense than risking SAS memebers reacting badly to orders to shoot a police woman.

That's Guyatt. Vialls seems to have a different take.

My own thought along those lines is that the motivation for the alleged false flag seems very weak. I'm just not getting any sense of an imperative that would explain something as extreme as deciding to kill a policeman for propaganda effect against Gadaffi. Reagan wanted to stay on fighting terms with Libya for electioneering purposes? It was all designed to facilitate UN sanctions being imposed on Libya?

All this video analysis, you'd think some twoofers would have had a go!

I'd like to hear a reasonable explanation of the angle of the bullet track though.

Rolfe.

[Chaos]

How about this as a counter-argument:


Official Story: Someone from within the embassy fired the fatal shots
This would mean that the someone in questions is an extreme moron, whether or not aiming at a policewoman was intentional. It would also mean that the idea that the fatal shots were fired from above are based on an (honest or willful) misunderstanding of the autopsy report, which is not exactly an extraordinary assumption with CTers.

CT Version: Someone from within the embassy fired, but the fatal shots came from elsewhere
This would also means the someone in question is an extreme moron, AND it would mean that whoever fired the fatal shots counted on there being an extreme moron in the embassy.

Conclusion: The official story needs fewer unlikely assumptions to make sense.

[Chaos]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Even so, calmly letting everyone inside the building where the murderer of a British cop was hiding leave the country with no questions asked is, well, unexpected.

Even so, if the British had orchestrated the whole thing, they would have had to act as if they believed the murderer was hiding in there. So I don´t think a false flag operation makes that part of the events more plausible.