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Fat Jon,
You said “we were told that DS Bailey was the first at the scene, and gained the exposure because he performed CPR”.
When and how were we told this? Do you have links? I have not seen either of these claims anywhere in the inquiry.You state again that you do simply do not believe that Bailey was poisoned in the manner described by the witness statements and by the oral evidence in the inquiry. Do you have any an alternative explanation with supporting evidence? If not, then your disbelief is referred to an argument from incredulity:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_incredulityI don’t give much weight to the CCTV of the couple walking with a red bag. Colours on CCTV are notoriously uncalibrated, so what the actual colour of the bag was is far from clear. None of the witness statements nor oral evidence in the inquiry mentions another couple around the bench in addition to the Skripals. Just because there was a reddish-coloured bag at the bench scene does not mean it was the same bag as seen on the person in the CCTV.
Having said that, I would very much like to see all the CCTV from the camera that captured the Skripals walking to and sitting on the bench. The inquiry showed a few seconds of footage, and it is of good quality, so we know it exists; I would like to see it from that point onwards to the point when they are taken away by ambulance. This would show whether or not anyone sprayed/attacked them on the bench, and would show how quickly the effects of the poisoning took effect, and would show without question who arrived and when, for all of the involved parties. I am a bit surprised that the inquiry does not refer back to the CCTV from this time, because there was frequent discussion about who was there, when people arrived, etc., and if they simply showed the relevant section of the CCTV it would be definitive and they would not have to reply on witness memory and witness statements.
I wonder if anyone has submitted a Freedom of Information Request for this CCTV footage?You say “Given that on leaving Zizzis we are told that the Skripals were beginning to feel unwell, and instead of doing the obvious thing and walking back to their car, driving home, and then going for a lie down; they think “No, lets walk in the opposite direction and sit on a public bench in the fresh air for 30 minutes, that should make us feel better”. ”
But if you walk from Zizzi’s back to the Sainsbury’s car park, that route does indeed go past the bench. See the map in the BBC article below. You can also check Google Maps. From Zizzi’s the route back to Sainsbury’s car park takes you over Bridge Market Walk, along the Maltings, past Superdrug and the bench, and the car park is just a minute or two up the path that follows the River Avon from there.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43643025Fat Jon,
You are skeptical that the officers who searched the Skripal house could became poisoned while wearing gloves. A plausible explanation for this is in the witness staement of MK26 on page 16: novichok was found on the inner surface of a glove, so novichok might have penetrated the glove.
“The level of contamination of the inner surface of this glove suggested penetration of the glove material by the
Novichok agent.”https://dsiweb-prod.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/uploads/INQ005923.pdf
Sorry Fortnite, but your arguing purely from the point of view that the current inquiry is the starting point for all comments on the subject is far too narrow for me. Have you been on the moon for 6 years? Do you know nothing of the media outpourings immediately after the Salisbury events?
Maybe you should go back to Craigs blog for 2018 and read all the relevant posts before attempting to demolish my arguments piece by piece?
And then try the Wayback Machine for the newspaper reports from March and April that year, although many of them which I bookmarked at the time now return a “page not found” error. I wonder why that might be? Someone with power seems to wish to airbrush certain articles from history?
Until that time I will not indulge your argument dismantling efforts any further.
And to start those of a Fortnite-supporting nature off on their voyages of discovery about the Skripals; after the 6 year sojourn on another planet, I have provided a link (below) to many of the relevant blog posts by Craig in 2018.
Read them carefully and only then compare the information gained in the weeks after the event with what has been said at the ongoing inquiry.
Fat Jon, my apologies, I do not wish to discourage you from engaging, but I do think it is worthwhile to challenge the claims. The intention is to gain the reasoning/rationale for a claim, and also links to the supporting evidence. With these things in the forum it is hugely beneficial to all readers, not just you and me.
I am well aware of there being huge media coverage since 4 March 2018, but I am also well aware that people should not necessarily believe what they read in the newspapers, especially during a fast-moving event. I am also aware that the witness statements given under oath in the inquiry are not necessarily the ultimate truth. But they are the most authoritative evidence we have, so it is reasonable to assign a higher level of confidence to them than to newpaper articles, the authors and owners being generally unaccountable.
I am especially interested that you have discovered Wayback machine articles which have since disappeared. Could you post some of these, please?
Fat Jon, you ended your last reply with “I will not indulge your argument dismantling efforts any further. ”
You claimed above that the Skripals, once starting to feel sick, should have walked from Zizzi’s to their car, and that for them to end up on the bench was in the opposite direction. But a simple look on Google Maps shows your claim to be completely wrong.If you are going to engage, you really need to up your game. You should at the very least be able to recognise when you have made a demonstrable mistake when it is pointed out. Sticking your fingers ion your ears and saying “I’m not listening!” might make you feel better, but it does not help the other readers of the forum.
Inquiry Coverage 12 Nov 2024
Here are a list of things that stuck out to me in this video. Would love to hear other people’s comments and thoughts of these things. The times given are the times in the youtube video.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1dFzbR2ktI
01:04:00 The legend in the diagrams showing the results of testing for Novichok around the scenes has been partly redacted. The QC says that the redacted text shows the levels of the substance found. I an curious why it was necessary to redact these numbers. Is it a security issue for it to be known that, for example, 5 micrograms of A-234 was found on table #37?
My own answer to this is: yes. With these precise measurements of novichok concentrations, this knowledge could be exploited by future attackers by guiding them on how much novichok is needed to make a poisoning effective.
My skeptical answer is: these figures were redacted because it might reveal just how inaccurate and uncertain the measurements were; or that the legend text reveals they were in fact testing for a substance that was not novichok (fentanyl for example).01:14:27 The diagram of the BMW shows a very high level on the accelerator pedal. I am struggling to understand how the pedal could become contaminated from Sergei’s hand.
My own answer: There was possibly novichok on the pavement underneath the door handle, Sergei stepped in it, and then the sole of his shoe transferred it to the pedal.
My skeptical answer: that there was a lot of cross-contamination caused by the team carrying out the tests, in the same way that a lot of cross-contamination happened inside the house.01:56:40 The spreadsheet of areas of interest in the house shows that the kitchen sink and items found in the sink were not tested for novichok (recorded as “No analysis”). Why would they not test anything in the sink, when poisoning by ingestion was one of their initial hypotheses (due to Sergei’s extensive vomiting)?
01:58:52 Commander Murphy says “…clearly we had a preferred hypothesis…”. The preferred hypothesis he is referring to is that stated by the UK government, that Russia carried out the attack with novichok. I see this as his admission and recognition of the pressure to agree with the government.
02:07:00 DSTL said that the novichok-positive swabs in house was likely secondary contamination from the officers investigating the house. Is it not possible that the car door handle was Ground Zero, and that the house door handle was touched by Skripals when they went out to the car then back inside before they went to town?
02:11:40 The QC appears to be leading the witness by suggesting “is this how the theory of the front door handle came about?” I am uncomfortable with the style of questioning. And Murphy’s answer is suspicious – he does not simple say “Yes”; he gives a waffling answer which doesn’t answer the question, and ends by saying “where the contamination was coming from, and this lead to discussion with Porton Down”. This to me suggests that the police deferred to Porton Down for the explanation or narrative to use.
I find it odd that in the dozens of initial samples taken inside the house and in the BMW, they were testing door handles, levels, etc., but they did not seem to test the outside door handle of the house until days later. Have I just missed something, or is this correct? If so, how could they possibly have forgotten that?
02:15:00 They tested the driveway under the car door handle, but they did not seem to test the door panels underneath the door handle. If the novichok was applied to the handle, and they suspected it dripped onto the ground, then it is reasonable to expect that it might also have dripped down the door panel.
In the sample testing document, they did a number ofd tests on the Skripal’s clothing. I’ve always thought that if I used a door handle that had some liquid on it, then I would immediately wipe my hands to dry it off, either on my trousers (front quads) or sleeve (forearms). But none of the clothing tests appear to have tested these specific areas. I wonder why not?
https://dsiweb-prod.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/uploads/INQ006050_2-317.pdf03:02:50 And to finish on a light note: I couldn’t help a juvenile chuckle when Mr Straw says “a room there with a toilet with a number 2 in it”…
Readers of this discussion might be interested in this article, which raises some interesting questions concerning submissions to the inquiry.
https://english.almayadeen.net/articles/analysis/the-cia-mi6-skripal-conspiracy-exposed
Fat Jon, thanks for posting that link, it’s a great resource.
This reminds me of another journalist who has written extensively about the Skripal incident is John Helmer on his Dances with Bears site.
While Helmer does raise some great questions and posts links to other articles, I find some of what he says questionable. For example, in his latest article “BRITISH OPERATION KISS” he states
Yulia Skripal has testified that the poison attack took place when she and her father were sprayed as they were eating lunch inside Zizzi’s Restaurant. They then walked outside, felt ill, sat down on a city bench, and collapsed.
Yulia Skripal’s evidence indicates the attackers were British.Yulia Skripal has testified
Yulia did NOT testify. She blinked in response to a doctor’s questions.she and her father were sprayed as they were eating lunch inside Zizzi’s
She apparently blinked “yes” when asked “were you sprayed in the restaurant?”. To me this is not clear whether she meant Zizzi’s or The Mill, as both venues are restaurants.the attackers were British
Even if we assume that Yulia’s blinked responses were correct and the Skripals were sprayed, then nothing about her blinked answers indicate any British involvement. To me it is entirely plausible that Russian agents could have done so.So in this case, Helmer has inflated a small piece of evidence, and has made a statement of fact that is simply not warranted. So while his articles are interesting, they should be taken with a large grain of salt, and any claim she makes should be carefully verified against the evidence.
