The strange thing is why Dickens didn't seem to follow up on the lack of action over his dossier. He obviously went to a lot of trouble to prepare it, he hands it over and then...nothing. Why didn't he kick up a stink? The easy answer is that he was heavily leant on, but that seems too simplistic. Wouldn't his family have gone public after his death?

Ah the old "double switched generation" ploy eh?

You probably wont be surprised at all to learn that my wifes family had such an example, we spent many a Christmas working out whether xxx was a nephew or an uncle or both.

Must remember not to hit the tablet screen so hard when double posting.

Is that anything like the old "double post" ploy?

Having just read the list of names allegedly involved at the Elm Guest House I can probably guess what happened to the dossiers. Some very powerful, famous and wealthy people.

People just love a conspiracy theory.

The 1980s, the time when even the most obviously gay entertainers were still in the closet was also the time when a powerful ring of blatant rent boy abusers were running the country.

Dickens was a politician on a crusade. The fact that he used parliamentary privilege to save himself from a court case for slander shows how much faith he had in his evidence.

Dickens might have had a list of suspected paedos. He might have had a list of some victims too. But there's unlikely to have been anything that was anything other than conjecture. The cops will have gone and questioned some of the victims, the victim might have agreed to press charges. But then when the police asked the victims to tell the stories again the allegations would have changed so much that the cops knew they weren't a fit witness.

Harris, Hall and Clifford were mainly convicted on the fact the jury chose to believe the crying 50 year old women who said they were abused as kids. The jury chose to not believe the 84 year old man who insisted he didn't do it.

But if/when the accuser is a former rent boy and drug addict and the alleged attacker is a married Sir or Lord who has household names step forward as a character witness the same desire to believe the alleged victim isn't going to be there.

The Bill Wyman case is an awkward one as they met/lived in Spain where the age on consent is lower (14 I think) even though they were both British. I am guessing under those circumstances that the local Spanish law applied thus Wyman wasn't prosecuted.

dr_feelgood wrote:The Bill Wyman case is an awkward one as they met/lived in Spain where the age on consent is lower (14 I think) even though they were both British. I am guessing under those circumstances that the local Spanish law applied thus Wyman wasn't prosecuted. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... pt-14.html Nothing about Spain in that. IMO the reason the police aren't willing to do anything is because they wouldn't be able to make a case. Mandy Smith was a young party girl who did pretty damn well out of knowing Wyman. I doubt that she would give evidence against Wyman and I'd guess that she'd be willing to lie openly to make sure he wasn't convicted. I think the only way that the police would take the case on is if Smith actually chose to make a complaint to the police. I think Wyman would be in trouble if she ever did go to the cops but even that would be a hard case to make. The police and CPS just don't want anything to do with this IMO. And rightly so.

dr_feelgood wrote:The Bill Wyman case is an awkward one as they met/lived in Spain where the age on consent is lower (14 I think) even though they were both British. I am guessing under those circumstances that the local Spanish law applied thus Wyman wasn't prosecuted. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... pt-14.html Nothing about Spain in that. IMO the reason the police aren't willing to do anything is because they wouldn't be able to make a case. Mandy Smith was a young party girl who did pretty damn well out of knowing Wyman. I doubt that she would give evidence against Wyman and I'd guess that she'd be willing to lie openly to make sure he wasn't convicted. I think the only way that the police would take the case on is if Smith actually chose to make a complaint to the police. I think Wyman would be in trouble if she ever did go to the cops but even that would be a hard case to make. The police and CPS just don't want anything to do with this IMO. And rightly so.

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote: Harris, Hall and Clifford were mainly convicted on the fact the jury chose to believe the crying 50 year old women who said they were abused as kids. The jury chose to not believe the 84 year old man who insisted he didn't do it. But if/when the accuser is a former rent boy and drug addict and the alleged attacker is a married Sir or Lord who has household names step forward as a character witness the same desire to believe the alleged victim isn't going to be there. I tend to agree with that. There is a short but interesting article about the fallout from the Harris case which links to a Daily mail article and paraphrases a Times one due to it being behind a paywall here: http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/jul/07/rolf-harris-dailymail

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote: Harris, Hall and Clifford were mainly convicted on the fact the jury chose to believe the crying 50 year old women who said they were abused as kids. The jury chose to not believe the 84 year old man who insisted he didn't do it. But if/when the accuser is a former rent boy and drug addict and the alleged attacker is a married Sir or Lord who has household names step forward as a character witness the same desire to believe the alleged victim isn't going to be there. I tend to agree with that. There is a short but interesting article about the fallout from the Harris case which links to a Daily mail article and paraphrases a Times one due to it being behind a paywall here: http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/jul/07/rolf-harris-dailymail

I have to agree with the final comment made on the article and think it applies to the vast majority of famous charlatans.