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00:00weaponized against dissidents. But first, former British Transport Police Superintendent Tony
00:06Thompson has been exposing the shocking miscarriage of justice surrounding Clive Freeman, a former
00:12soldier who spent 36 years in prison for a murder he insists he didn't commit. Tony joined me on
00:20Bring the Fire in March to talk about the case and that interview is available on Iconic.com.
00:26Now, Tony is back today to give us an update on Clive's case and it seems things are moving
00:32forward. Tony, thank you so much for joining us. Can you give us a little background on Clive's case
00:38just for those that are perhaps unfamiliar with it? Well, when Clive was appearing at the Old Bailey
00:47at the Central Criminal Court in London in May 1989, the prosecution alleged that Clive had lured
00:55a homeless man off the street and taken her into a flat where Clive had been sort of temporarily
01:02living, murdered him by a technique that had been used in the case of Burke and Hare in 1828 in Scotland
01:11and then fled the country with the purpose of executing a policy of insurance which he'd taken
01:20out some time before, left the country, he was arresting in Australia and brought back. So that
01:27was the, it was described as one of the most extraordinary murder cases to ever appear before
01:31the Old Bailey and when you look at the facts you can see how they wrote it up in the day. But
01:38further investigations over many years, in the last three years I've been working on the case,
01:44have debunked all the theories and the, all the different allegations that were put by the
01:50prosecution. But Clive, for reasons associated with his military background in Rhodesia, didn't
01:58give evidence on his behalf because he had an alibi, or he thought he had an alibi, that he was
02:03staying in Central London in the Earl's Court area about probably about an hour's journey from where the
02:10alleged defence was committed. So that was, that was the background. So it was an allegation that
02:15he'd taken out the policy of insurance, looking effectively for a body double, lured this guy off
02:21the street, killed him by a technique that didn't leave any marks and then fled the country. So that's,
02:26so that's it. It's, it's quite an intriguing case. Well, we spoke in, I think it was March, March the 9th,
02:34if my memory serves. And obviously you went into great detail about the case in that conversation,
02:40which you can watch now bring the fire on Iconic. And obviously at that point you were
02:46really fighting to, to, to try and get an appeal. It seems that's what's happened from what I was
02:53reading in the mainstream press. What is the situation now with, with, with Clive?
02:57Well, a week ago yesterday, I had the, some fantastic news from the Criminal Cases Review
03:04Commission or sort of short circuit to CCRC, as they're known, to say that they have on the sixth
03:10attempt, referred the case to the Court of Appeal. So they've accepted that the, there are grounds to
03:17show that the conviction was unsafe and they've, they've placed it at the moment on the grounds of
03:22the pathology evidence. So what, what we're basically saying is there wasn't a murder at
03:28all. So you can imagine the, hopefully it's still going to go to the Court of Appeal and
03:32hopefully there'll be sufficient grounds now for them to overturn the, the murder, the murder verdict
03:38and the arson as well, because there was, it was suggested that Clive had tried to burn the body.
03:44There was some smouldering in the flat, but the flat wasn't an inferno. So it's going to go to the
03:49Court of Appeal, which is great. This is the sixth, sixth attempt. And the CCRC did have
03:56a lot of the evidence back in 2000. So there's questions to be asked of them, but at the moment,
04:01it's the sort of celebrating the, the euphoria of a referral. Now, last Monday, so Monday last week,
04:08I got the news. Clive wasn't expecting it. I knew that some news was coming out. So I had
04:14a raid arrangements to the prison where he currently resides. And I went and gave him
04:19the good news and he gave me the biggest bear hug I've ever had. And it was a quite an emotional
04:25moment. So I should say, I can't imagine what, what, what would it mean? If this goes to appeal
04:31and you know, they, they acquit Clive, they say, you know, you've been a wrongly imprisoned for over 30
04:37years. What would that mean for Clive? I'm assuming immediate release, but surely then,
04:43as you, you mentioned there, that there's got to be some, some questions answered.
04:49Well, there's, there's, there's a number of things that would happen. I mean, one of the things I'll
04:52be pushing for would be a judicial, a public inquiry, a statutory inquiry to find out how this was allowed
04:59to happen in the first place. Because, you know, the, what you'll have is a man 30, well,
05:04he's in his 38th year of prison for a no crime, as we'd call it in my police days. No, no crime was
05:11committed. So here he was, we're not looking for anybody else that may have committed a murder.
05:16We're saying that a man was in prison for over, for nearly 38 years or probably over 38 years
05:20for the time this reaches the Court of Appeal for no offence. I mean, that's absolutely astonishing.
05:26So there must be an inquiry to find out how that was allowed to happen and how the Criminal
05:32Cases Review Commission rejected evidence on five previous occasions, which I've sort of
05:38represented it and shaped it up. But the evidence right back at the day of the trial, the week of
05:43the trial was, was, was there. And very soon afterwards, lots of specialists came forward and
05:50said, you know, the man wasn't, the man, you know, there was the, the evidence does not support the
05:56prosecution case. So, and then of course, there's the issue of how do you compensate a man who's had,
06:03he was 45, I think, when he was imprisoned, and he's now just had his 82nd birthday in July. How do
06:10you compensate anybody financially or otherwise? And he's, he's not very well, I mentioned before,
06:16he's still got the prostate cancer. And he's talking about restarting his medication, which he'd
06:24stop because he said, you know, what's the point? He's now full of optimism, although there's a way
06:30to go, but we're in the, you know, we can see the finishing line for him. So working out compensation
06:36will be a big issue about how do you compensate that. He wants to go home and see his family in
06:43South Africa and in Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia, who he hasn't seen for over 30 years. So there's
06:50lots of things that he wants to do. And I've, you know, he's, he's now got some hope,
06:54and hopefully, with, you know, we're in the right direction to get him out.
07:00Well, he is now he's had you helping him. Do you know what I mean? I remember speaking to you
07:07before, and you were saying how the, this isn't even a rarity, is it? There's lots of people within
07:13the UK prison system that, you know, probably haven't done the crime that they're serving time for,
07:19which is extraordinary. But you're right in what you're saying there. How do you compensate
07:25someone for 38 years imprisonment? I mean, you could think of like monopoly figures of money,
07:30and it still wouldn't mean anything, not really, because he's missed so much, isn't he?
07:35Absolutely. And he's, he's seen people convicted of the most horrendous crimes over the years come in
07:42and go out. But because he's maintained his innocence, he's still there. And one of the problems,
07:48which is a wider problem. And so hopefully, some of the lessons from this will spill over
07:53to help other people. And the parole board, when they're considering whether a prisoner is suitable
08:00for release, they must pass what they call the public release test. Do they pose any risk to the
08:05public if they're released, particularly in cases of violence and sexual offences? And that's quite
08:12understandable, of course. But, you know, looking at Clive's parole board dossier,
08:18because he won't attend any of the courses, saying, I'm not a criminal, I don't need to admit
08:24my guilt when I'm not guilty. And you can understand that. But there's no way at the moment you can get
08:30past the parole board without attending these courses. Now, I wrote last year to the Secretary of
08:37State under the previous administration to say, look, this just isn't right. But nothing's happened
08:42so far. But I'd say on the back of this and hopefully Clive's release, we can get some changes
08:48made that will benefit the wider prison population who may be in a similar position to Clive.
08:56It's extraordinary, isn't it? By maintaining your innocence, you're basically guaranteeing that you
09:01stay in prison for an indefinite amount of time. I mean, that takes courage, doesn't it,
09:05it's only for him to do that. Because like you say, in theory, you know, you can just go,
09:08oh, God, okay, yeah, I did it. I feel really bad for it. I've been in for 20 years.
09:12Yeah, I've served my sentence, right, I'm off. So to stand there and say, no, I, you know...
09:18It's quite astounding. He made a commitment, he said to his wife who died, gosh, back in 1999,
09:28that he wasn't going to leave until he's admonished. And this is the process that everybody has to go
09:35through, particularly when you've got an indeterminate sentence. So particularly life
09:38imprisonment for murder, the judge will set the tariff. Clive was given originally 13 years,
09:45the Home Secretary in the day reviewed it, increased it to 15 years, but he passed his tariff,
09:51you know, over 20 years ago. And if he decided to go for parole, he would have been out. The judge,
09:57even if there was a murder, the judge described the actual murder, the actual offence as a
10:03non-violent process, because they said the person who died had been plied with drink and was basically
10:12incapable of defending themselves. So that was the allegation. So this wasn't somebody who'd been
10:17butchered with an axe or whatever. This was, you know, obviously death is a death if it's a deliberate
10:24one. But in the context of some of the cases that we've seen over the years in the UK, this was
10:31probably, you know, a very, very low level one in terms of the use of violence. So he should have
10:38been out. And a lot of people, and Clive's talking about cases where people have denied what they've
10:44done, but they've taken the parole route, taken the courses and are out and have rebuilt their lives
10:50and have been able to challenge their conviction from the outside. Clive decided not to do that.
10:56But he's, you know, incredibly resilient.
11:01Oh, absolutely. Well, Tony, thank you so much for joining us. Hopefully, I mean, hopefully,
11:06you know, justice is served. And one day, it would be nice to actually speak to Clive, actually getting,
11:11you know, his experience, you know, straight from the horse's mouth, for want of a better phrase.
11:16You know, maybe, maybe the two of you could come up. We'll see. Fingers crossed. He's not even out
11:19yet. I'm going to get a bit ahead of myself. But fingers crossed. And thank you for all the work
11:24you do. It's amazing, mate. Thank you, guys. Thank you very much. British community leader and former
11:30police officer Keith Tordoff is here to discuss the current state of police.
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