Let's face it. Melanie Shaw is being held at Sodexo High Security Prison in Peterborough. She has been in custody since her trial at Nottingham Crown Court on 25 July 2014. According to members of the public who attended the first trial, Nottinghamshire Police and the Crown Prosecution Service failed to present any substantial evidence against Melanie for arson and criminal damage.
An update on Beachwood child abuse victim and whistleblower Melanie Shaw – her suffering illuminates the state of the nation.
Let's face it. Melanie Shaw is incarcerated at Sodexo High Security Prison in Peterborough. She has been in custody since her trial at Nottingham Crown Court on 25 July 2014. Members of the public who attended the first trial have reported that Nottinghamshire Police and the Crown Prosecution Service failed to present substantial evidence against Melanie for arson and criminal damage, and that in mumbled communications with the judge the Crown Prosecution Service promised to complete their evidence in the near future. Melanie was represented by a solicitor.
At a further court hearing at Nottingham Crown Court on 27 August 2014, the same judge, Judge Gregory David Dickinson QC, removed the public from the open courtroom and then presided over a secret “directions” hearing. Melanie was not present.
An application for bail was made at Nottingham Crown Court on 4 September 2014 but was apparently “withdrawn” when Judge Dickinson called for a psychiatric evaluation. It is currently believed that issues with legal representation have delayed the provision of a psychiatrist. Melanie was not present at the hearing. Court was closed to the public.
Melanie was cruelly led to believe that a further hearing would take place at Nottingham Crown Court on Friday 12th September 2014. No such hearing was scheduled at the court. But was there no hearing or was it a secret hearing? In the UK justice system it is hard to tell. It is also hard to find out as Child Protection Services are unwilling to reveal any details of the case. Including simple questions like “Can you confirm that legal representatives from Child Protection Services attended the hearing?” Why are they so nervous?
Alison Saunders, the Director of Public Prosecutions, is clearly not interested in the CPS's abuse of Melanie Shaw; her stated priority at the Independent Commission of Inquiry is “stalking”. Meanwhile Janine Smith, the Deputy Chief Prosecutor for Nottinghamshire, who must bear heavy responsibility for Melanie Shaw's imprisonment, sent a letter dated 11 September 2014 praising her organisation. The letter said: “I understand your dissatisfaction with the decision to prosecute Mr Shaw, but I can assure you that this decision was taken in accordance with the (Prosecutor's) Code”.
Bizarrely, section 3.3 of the Code clearly states that the CPS should seek to identify and where possible correct weaknesses in the evidence and, subject to the threshold test, promptly halt cases which do not meet the evidentiary stage of the full Code test. This means that after 54 days the CPS has been unable to produce conclusive evidence against Melanie Shaw and is therefore locking this abuse victim up in a maximum security prison, viewing her as a threat.
Again, we ask, what are these people so afraid of? There is only one answer: that what Melanie Shaw witnessed and evidenced of despicable child sexual and physical abuse, suicide and possibly murder terrifies the establishment and the British government. She must be silenced. Threats made to Melanie's supporters in recent weeks lend credence to this assertion, as do threats made to key supporters of Melanie when she first blew the whistle on the abuse at Beechwood to Nottingham police.
The next court date to swim in the murky pond of British justice is October 13th 2014. Rumor has it that this is a plea bargain hearing. By then, abuse victim Melanie Shaw will have spent 81 days in prison – not bad for someone who has yet to be found guilty of any crime.
Having been fired from an incompetent law firm, Melanie decides to become a litigant and represent herself in a lawsuit. Intelligent, eloquent, and with an accurate memory for names, places, and dates, she is more than capable of representing herself.
Melanie Shaw is of course not only a victim of child abuse, but also an incredibly brave whistle-blower on child abuse. Her statement to Nottingham Police in 2011 led to the launch of Operation Daybreak, which investigated around 100 child abuse victims in Beechwood and many more in Bracken House on Thames Road, Bulwell on Beechdale Road, Ranskill Gardens, Bestwood, Wood Nook, Beechdale and Risley Hall in Derbyshire. This resulted in perhaps 1000 new cases of abuse in addition to the 1400 in Rotherham. Matt Tapp controlled the media for Operation Daybreak.
What was she rewarded for her courage in coming forward as a vulnerable woman who had suffered more than most of us can imagine? Under the aegis of Sodexo Peterborough Prison and its CEO Debbie White, Melanie was bullied by prison staff and inmates, her long-term medication was withheld or reduced, her treatment for leg ulcers was stopped, she was put in solitary confinement, starved of food and her mail was intercepted. Not bad for Sodexo Legal Services, who boast of “preventing the next victim” and “changing lives for the better” whilst of course making a profit. Not bad for Child Protective Services, who boast, under Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders, of helping to protect vulnerable victims.
Melanie Shaw was abused as a child by her family at home and then in what was called care at Beechwood Children's Home in Nottinghamshire. As soon as I re-read this passage, the word abuse caught my attention. It was a natural word for me, having heard first-hand some of the abuse Melanie suffered: rape, physical and sexual assault, psychological bullying. Parts of the truth she had kept inside, as too painful to bring to light. Extreme abuse that would make people in the middle of England sicken.
It is also strange how suddenly, as more and more cases of abuse come to the public's eyes and ears, the mainstream press and media distort our words and blur the meaning and understanding. The children become “residents.” Cruel and vicious abuse becomes “child exploitation.” Did the boys who were routinely raped within days of arriving at Beachwood as a way to habituate them feel exploited? Melanie reports that the boys were frightened, distraught and traumatized. The older girls tried to comfort them. The girls suffered the same.
It seems to me that the media is playing tricks to undermine abuse and our awareness of it. In the public sector, authorities in Rotherham and Nottingham are spouting neologisms like “past abuse”, “lessons learned”, “compensation”, “moving forward”, “child protection services have moved forward and are now working”. This hypnotic rhetoric is a lie. The people, authorities and charities tasked with protecting children have not simply failed. Paedophiles are infiltrating, using the services we believe are there to protect them to ensnare and abuse them. Of course, it is people who commit crimes, not institutions. A crime is a crime, whether it be physical or sexual abuse or misconduct in public office. So why are we always told that the problems are all in the past, that lessons have been learned and we can move forward? The answer is simple. Newspeak aims to move us towards “compensation and cover-up” rather than thorough police investigations, courts, juries and full criminal justice. Ultimately, what the victims want is justice and closure, not the cheap settlement of £10,000 each offered by Nottinghamshire authorities.
“In the end, the despicable treatment of brave Melanie Shaw was facilitated and carried out by a collaboration between Nottingham City and County Council, child protection teams and charities, child protection agencies and legal teams, and Nottinghamshire Police. Melanie found out in Operation Daybreak that the police lied about their investigation. She also said the children were murdered by 'suicide'. No wonder they want to silence her.”
Her testimony is corroborated by another Beechwood victim, Mickey Summers, another brave whistleblower who was told by Nottingham authorities that his records had been lost. Coincidence? It may be a coincidence, but does it really matter, since the government has already kept Beechwood's records secret for 75 years?
But if we, the people, allow this blatant, twisted and criminal corruption of justice, it is our children who will suffer. I am not willing to say that the industrial abuse of children in the UK and the obvious and continuing cover-up of that abuse by MPs, the police, the courts, the UK Government and those in power, unless stopped, will lead us back to the dark ages of Nazi Germany or Stalinist Russia. Who will deal with this? There is only us – the decent, ordinary, good people of the British Isles – who need to cry out for this sickening disease of those in power, of Westminster and of society to be exposed as soon as possible.
