Wednesday, June 16, 2021



Institutionally corrupt

Over thirty years ago private investigator Daniel Morgan was murdered in London. The UK police repeatedly fucked up the investigation so obviously and blatantly that the government was forced to call a public inquiry. Now, after years of obstruction, it has finally reported back, finding the police to be "institutionally corrupt":

The Metropolitan police have been described as “institutionally corrupt” and its commissioner, Cressida Dick, personally censured for obstruction by an independent inquiry set up to review the murder of the private detective Daniel Morgan.

The findings of an independent panel inquiring into Morgan’s killing in 1987 triggered calls from his brother, Alastair, for Dick to consider her position, and denounced the actions of Britain’s biggest police force.

The panel’s findings were a victory for the 34-year long struggle for justice by the Morgan family during which they said they endured being “lied to, fobbed off, bullied [and] degraded” by those institutions they believed they had the right to rely on.

But within hours the Met rejected the report’s key findings, and dismissed Morgan’s call for Dick to consider stepping down. The two people who could oust the Commissioner – the home secretary and London mayor – let it be known she still enjoyed their “full confidence”.

So what's the point of an inquiry then? But of course, we already know the answer to that: to distract the public and make them think the government cares, while in reality giving it more time in which to bury the truth and ensure nothing changes. That key finding might as well apply to the entire UK government.

Meanwhile there's this bit:

Concealing or denying failings, for the sake of the organisation’s public image, is dishonesty on the part of the organisation for reputational benefit. In the panel’s view, this constitutes a form of institutional corruption.
There's a New Zealand body that this obviously applies to. And maybe we should be clearer about calling it what it is to discourage them from doing it in future.