So Andy Wightman just won’t stop lying.
As we’ve repeatedly pointed out, Wings has made NO comments about the “workplace harassment” allegations made against Alex Salmond several years ago. We’ve only commented on the CRIMINAL allegations, and workplace harassment isn’t a crime. (It’s a matter for an employment tribunal, not the police.)
But the real question is WHY Andy Wightman is so doggedly attached to these two complainers that he’s determined to keep digging himself further into a hole of lies. And everyone knows what you tend to find when you start digging holes.
Wightman’s repeated assertions that these women are the victims of (extremely minor) wrongdoing appear to rest on his claim to have “interviewed” them.
And it’s worth taking some time to examine the circumstances of that interview.
They can be found here, from pages 133 to 143.
The tone is set at the very start.
The entire premise is that the complaints were true, even though the meeting took place a year after Salmond had been acquitted on every charge, including some which formed part of the initial investigation.
Over the next 10 pages it is plain that the committee was operating under this assumption, and therefore that they must have assumed – at least for the purposes of the meeting – that the verdicts in the criminal trial were a miscarriage of justice.
There is no sign that a single aspect of the complainers’ testimony was challenged or scrutinised in any way, even when it contradicted previously established facts. By way of example, on page 139 we read this:
Which doesn’t sound much like this, from months earlier:
It’s clear, then, that the interview was a wholly sympathetic hearing, not interested in establishing truth but in merely finding out how Ms A and Ms B felt about what had transpired. Indeed, the report’s introduction (on page 4) makes that exact point.
It was a point which had been stated repeatedly by the inquiry committee chair, Linda Fabiani, whenever the committee met.
(The sympathetic character of the hearing was emphasised by later comments from committee member Alex Cole-Hamilton, who revealed that he’d been “supporting a complainer privately” at the time in an apparent serious conflict of interest.)
So it’s difficult to tell what part of the interview Andy Wightman feels gives him grounds to repeatedly publicly question the fact of Salmond’s innocence, something which very obviously DOES “revisit” both the criminal trial and the “substance of the complaints” from the original Scottish Government investigation.
Because every part of Wightman’s tweet above is untrue. The investigation WAS concluded, albeit that its findings were later set aside for being completely crooked and biased against the former First Minister.
Of the nine allegations originally made by Ms A and Ms B which were the subject of the investigation, which were lettered from A to I, three were heard in the criminal trial (complaints C, D and I), and found to be untrue.
Of those which were listed in the original complaints but NOT considered strong enough to be brought to trial – a trial which, remember, DID showcase such charges as “pinging someone’s hair” and “recklessly opening a bottle of water in a car” – three more (B, E and F) were adjudged to be “not well founded” even by an investigation that was catastrophically and systematically biased against Salmond.
It seems reasonable to assume that allegations thrown out even by a completely bent investigation (and considered less heinous by police and prosecutors than opening a water bottle) would not be upheld by a fair one, which leaves only three.
And manifestly, none of those in any way amount to “sexual harassment”.
EVERY ONE of the allegations that could conceivably be considered to have a sexual aspect HAS in fact, contrary to Andy Wightman’s claims, already been investigated and dismissed, either by the original investigation or by the High Court jury.
All that’s left are accusations that – even if true, and all were denied – would be at worst cases of impoliteness: two mild and fleeting infringements of personal space, in public, and one “boss shouts at employee a bit” incident.
That might be why Wightman’s latest tweet slyly omits the word “sexual”. But after five days he still refuses to answer any of the questions from our original post on Sunday, and continues to smear Alex Salmond by insinuation and innuendo, as well as casting doubts on the integrity of the police, Crown Office and trial jury.
The most generous interpretation of his actions is an attempt to deflect attention from his own gross failure to properly and impartially fulfil his duties at the Parliamentary inquiry. The less generous interpretations, readers can consider for themselves.
