Love, Paul Gambaccini By Paul Gambaccini

Summary

Reviewer Name: Jonathan Nicholas 4.38 am 29th October 2013: \'You are under arrest\'. I\'ve said the same thing to many people in my thirty years as a front line copper, very often in the early morning, almost always the preferred time of day for a \'big job\' like this. The police take away bags of his property, computers, all his diaries. From that moment on Paul describes in intricate detail his descent into anger, frustration, and a gradual loss of faith in the British justice system. Bewilderment at who would make allegations against him. He\'s held in a police cell for four hours, and endures a six hour interview. At first he is advised to say \'no comment\' to all questions but understandably thinks it\'s ridiculous to do this with apparently innocuous questions, so he talks. He co-operates because he has nothing to hide. Like the rest of us he believes in justice and naively thinks he can rely on his innocence to save him. He was bailed. Time passes. He begins to unravel. He is dropped by the BBC. He decides not to court media attention. He starts getting angry. He notes friends who distance themselves and friends who support him. I noted in the margin of the book whenever the word \'anger\' appears. It gradually increases. He finds out the Met police are actively touting for business by ringing people asking if they\'ve ever been a victim. \'Don\'t you need evidence?\' someone asks, \' No we only need two people who agree.\' Paul\'s accuser is just one person who is apparently corroborated by one other. Meanwhile two Met detectives fly to California ( nice job if you can get it!) and New York, and even Australia to make enquiries about the case, all of course at public expense. There\'s a witness in Paris they don\'t bother to visit. Maybe it was too close to home and the weather wasn\'t good enough? The costs to Paul also begin to mount. £40,000 already and it\'s only December, at a time when suddenly nobody wants to employ him. Also in December 2013 comes the ultimate insult. The Labour Party under Ed Miliband drop him like a hot brick, after being a lifelong supporter and fundraiser. This doesn\'t surprise me. \'The heroism of leaders from Clement Attlee to Neil Kinnock has yielded to cowardice\' he says, as he rips up his membership card. As time goes on Paul loses faith in the police, \'I no longer look to the British police for any civility or decency\'. Oh dear. He finds solace in music, listing his most listened to songs in both pop and classical. Frequently listened to is #9 Dream by John Lennon \' is it just a dream...\' No Paul, it\'s a Kafkaesque nightmare! He notes \'It\'s remarkable how police officers of the witch-hunt, fine people as individuals, do such harm as a unit\'. More time passes. He has nightmares ( about killing coppers!) and loses weight. He has to sell some of his coveted record collection to raise money for his legal costs, while all the time not knowing what will happen to him. He\'s rebailed again. He goes to the USA and has to ask the Met for his passport back. He\'s horrified to find \'Impending Prosecutions\' on a record. He hasn\'t even been charged! By April 2014 his legal expenses reach a staggering £100,000. He discovers as with the Labour Party, the left wing press drop him too; he is astonished to find the right wing press are supportive of his plight and other celebrities caught up in the witch hunt and later cleared: \'the left wing newspapers continue to support injustice\' he says, with The Guardian coming in for particularly harsh criticism. He is rebailed yet again. More broken promises from the CPS. Suddenly he gets a phone call. \'No further action\'. After 11 and a half months and spending £200,000 on legal costs, it was all over. But then the CPS have another gratuitous attack on him by mentioning the ages of the two \'victims\', a purely vindictive and unnecessary swipe. Someone should hang their head in shame. At the end of it all what do we learn? That Britian is teetering on the edge of becoming a police state? That \'national treasures\' such as Tony Blackburn and Stephen Fry really are treasures for resolutely sticking by Paul all through his nightmare, a nightmare that even the CPS admitted they only had a measly 3% chance of a successful prosecution. Luckily Paul may have now been instrumental in helping to change the law relating to unlimited bail, which can only be a good thing of course. It\'s interesting to note that the Home Affairs Committee requested the CPS send a written apology to Paul; by August 2015 no such apology had been received. Such pure arrogance. So do I have any observations, as a retired British front line copper of thirty years experience? Of course: Firstly, a crime nowadays doesn\'t need a cooperative victim. Coppers have to give crime numbers to ridiculous things even if there\'s no complainant. You wouldn\'t believe it. I was almost sacked for not filling in a blank form. I was always told by magistrates that they would refuse warrants for \'fishing operations\' and custody sergeants refused bail for \'fishing operations\'. Clearly celebrities are different. As for the police advertising for victims; police forces now advertise their own \'grass on a colleague hotline\', which apparently is very busy. The same travesty of justice is widespread INSIDE the British police today; complaints against officers are presumed true until proven otherwise. This could be a good reason for coppers themselves being able to reconcile their conscience when nicking innocent people. Cops are being disciplined, suspended for years, and sacked for the most trivial of reasons, but this is all to reduce the pay bill, and not for any reasons of justice or transparency. It\'s still shameful though, as was Paul\'s treatment. Something rotten going on. Anyway, it\'s a great book. I can\'t recommend it enough, everyone should read it. Well done Paul, and great to hear you back on the radio! Jonathan Nicholas, author of \'Who\'d be a copper?\'