Monday afternoon, 1st October, Old Bailey London, Day 18 of the Inquest into the Westminster Bridge terror attack of 22 March, 2017. This is a no-jury Inquest, who needs a jury after all?

See here   and here – read these to refresh your memory, also me surveying the bridge a week later with the Kent Freedom Movement couple. Transcripts of the Inquest hearing are available here.

A PC who claimed to have been present described the first impact or collision, when Kurt and Melissa Cochran were hit at 2.40 pm, standing next to a tourist kiosk. The car mounting up onto the pavement at that point was travelling at 32-36 mph he estimated. [I just can’t see this – slow traffic on the bridge road, going uphill, mounting up onto the kerb: max ten mph or so I’d say.] Kurt C. allegedly pivoted right over the bridge and hit the steps below.

Then 25 yards further on Mr Rhodes (?) was struck and dragged under the car; then the car had to return quickly onto the road owing to the yellow sign standing on the pavement in the middle of the bridge, which it did not want to hit (NB This was never mentioned in the newspaper reports). He later died in hospital.

It drove back onto pavement and hit Aysha Frade so she landed in the bus lane. The driver put his brakes on when he realised this, and she somehow ended up under the bus’s rear wheel. The car window-pane was damaged by that time.

The CCTV showed Andrea Christie being hit near centre of bridge, then she slid along the wall and fell into Thames, and died later in hospital. A tyre of the car burst as it mounted the pavement. It impacted pedestrians. A body panel fell into the cycle lane. It finally hit a stone pillar of the railings and came to rest, with major frontal damage. (Michael Brown in a white van says he saw this) The pathologist said her body did not hit the wall but just fell over the edge. Then PC Richard Clark came on, a Forensic Collision Investigator. He used CCTV footage to determine speed of the car. We were shown CCTV from south end of the bridge, with car on pavement (NB we the public have never been shown this!) and hardly any traffic on the road. It was allegedly travelling at 32-36 mph at point of Kurt C. impact. Film taken from the bus showed Aysha Frade.

We expect ‘clues’ to be left in the car, and this time instead of a Koran or passport, we’re given a map of Britain on which is scribbled such phrases as, ‘Hatred motivation,’ ‘Mum,’ ‘Exciting opportunity’ (20 September, Evening Standard) This all seems rather contrived and for public consumption.

 

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Prof Michael Frayn of the Met SO15 investigation discussed the body armor worn by PC Keith Palmer who was stabbed. He showed chain mail body armour worn, but somehow the knife got round it.  He showed us the two knives used, an 8″ kitchen knife and a smaller hunting-knife.

 Attending this event at the Old Bailey, I sensed I was only person there who had doubts as to whether the whole thing had really happened – not a position I like being in. I was allowed to sit up in the balcony but instructed not to draw any pictures or take notes. The court transcripts can be perused online, and readers will wish to weigh up the evidence on this matter.

There was no shortage of CCTV alluded to, which showed various things, even though we had earlier been assured that none was available. We heard how the car mounted up onto the pavement to hit Kurt and Melissa Cochrane travelling at thirty miles an hour, which I reckon was not feasible, as earlier discussed – drove along it, and then came off the pavement to avoid the yellow sign on it, in the middle of the bridge. But, none of the papers had originally given that as its path, in their diagrams of the event. One would have difficulty in finding any MSM source which even mentioned the fact, that a big yellow sign was blocking the alleged path. Why did this only appear at the Inquest, and was it because of myself and the Kent Freedom Movement highlighting it on a video? After passing that sign and still doing thirty miles an hour, the car mounted up again, to hit some more people.  

After passing the yellow sign the car hits Ms Aysha Frade, who goes under the bus: I had rather thought this event was nearer to the southern end of the bridge, ie before the street sign. If you lookat he video I did with the ‘Kent Freedom Movement’ on the bridge a week later, we clearly position the spot where the bus stopped with the mannekin underneath the back wheel, as well before the yellow sign.

If we are to picture this middle-aged, sedate, plump gardening fellow, none of whose neighbours could picture him as committing violence – if we have him driving a car on and off the pavement, at thirty miles an hour, wrecking the wheel and finally smashing up the entire front of the car by crashing it into a railing for no reason – then would he not have just driven straight over the yellow street-sign? It would have readily folded up and lain on the ground, or been knocked out of the way. If he is slamming into pedestrians one after the other, why would he avoid so light an object? He had supposedly driven over the bridge a few days before to prepare himself.

They had a witness to the car hitting the railings: a Mr Michael Brown. But we wonder, why were there no witnesses available when the event was being reported? One witness present on the scene ‘Stephen’ interviewed by the Sun right after the event, said he had not seen any car drive along on the pavement.

Here is the eight-inch knife shown to the Inquest ‘believed to be bought by Massoud’ (a strange phrase) – clearly different from the one photographed on the cobbled stones of the House of Commons and seen in all the papers as the murder weapon.

I listened to a detailed analysis of the deadly 8″ knife (on October 1st), how it was able to  penetrate the protective ‘chain mail’ shirt worn by of PC Keith Palmer  and I nearly believed it all. No really I would have done, if only these two knives had not been totally different. You’d have thought they could at least keep their story straight over the murder weapon. 

During the attempted rescue of PC Keith Palmer, there is emphasis upon the massive loss of blood – but we did not see any in the photos, one of the more suspicious features of the story. Then ‘one of the doctors then grabbed the heart directly and started squeezing it.’ (17 September, section 16) But, we the public had only been told that the MP Tobias Ellwood was trying to pump the chest to resuscitate the fellow, in vain. Had such drastic open-heart surgery been performed, so quickly, should not someone have told us? The endeavor was abandoned because too much blood was being lost. We the public never saw PC Fletcher’s face or anything that could identify him, during this terrible final phase: and I challenge anyone to go into Google images and find any blood around the images of what was supposedly PC Keith Palmer’s demise. Cutting through the ribcage and grabbing the heart sounds more like an Aztec ceremony than modern medical practice.

We’re told that ‘London’s Air Ambulance’ was called at 14.43 and then landed at 14.56, was quickly escorted by police and led through the gates (NB no, I reckon it landed at 2.50, this time was shown by Big Ben as it landed). Around 3 pm Keith Palmer’s heart stopped. No-one saw any medics disembark from that helicopter  or return to it, did they? Given that a large hospital was just across the Bridge, and the ambulance arrived at much the same time as the helicopter, we don’t really get the point of this.

Report of 4th October hearing, by Nutta Frayde

2 pm

The jury was made up of four Afro-Caribbeans, one Han Chinese, one possible eastern European/Muslim and four Caucasians and I think one other, a total of 11.

There was good visibility of two large screens. A senior Metropolitan police officer was in the witness box and rarely spoke except to say yes in answer to questions from two lawyers and once from the coroner. There were several suits in the court, I assume police officers. The jury members seemed uninterested. There were four journalists, only one of whom was making notes. Presumably journos are exempt from the restriction on making notes, if journos is what they were.

On leaving the building, the security officer (not the same one referred to above) told me it was highly unusual for an inquest to take place there. The coroner is also the most senior one in England and Wales.

Anomalies, not in any particular order

  1. We were shown a moving and still image of one of two close protection officers (CPOs) pointing an automatic pistol, I think a Glock, quite close up. This was the most spectacular anomaly as his forefinger was horizontal and alongside the receiver/slide, the finger position adopted when not operational and when on exercise or standby, not when dealing with an armed threat i.e. his finger was not on the trigger or inside the trigger guard, which is standard practice for safety. At this point NB he was supposedly engaging Massoud. The officers’ faces were blurred, so even if acceptably as stated, for their anonymity, the video was clearly modified. Other clips were also opaqued, Moon orbiter style.

  2. Regarding Aysha Frayde. We saw three videos, one from inside the bus, one apparently on the side of the bus and one from the bus to the rear. Her “body” seemed to be behind the bus, not under it. Also, the bus appeared to move forwards after the incident, leaving the body behind it in any case, not trapped under it. Two of these videos showing what appeared to be Miss Frayde’s body were clear enough and seemed consistent in this regard. Whether body or dummy I can’t say.

  3. We were shown several videos of the car driving along the bridge. It noticeably swerved to avoid the yellow sign.

  4. We saw several impacts with pedestrians but all were distant and blurred. I was reminded of the Times Square hoax in which stunt men and women were used. There is no denying the imagery was dramatic and would work well on the TV screen for impact but with the ability to record and analyse at leisure I suspect videographic anomalies would be found. Shadows seemed indistinct on the pavement. No victims’ bodies were seen clear or close enough to ascertain whether real people were involved or dummies had been used.

  5. We saw two videos of the car hitting the wall, which it seemed to do at a fairly low speed, leading to a slight jolt on impact. These were both at a range of at least 100 yards, maybe more and were indistinct. Would an airbag have activated? Is there any airbag dust on Massoud?

  6. Crowd behaviour in several videos, about three short clips, is odd. People are shown running across the road to the car, perhaps as you would if you observed a crash, to help. However, what looked like an organised group of people seem to self herd and run and around the corner, past the gates, for no apparent reason. I can’t see why some people would run to an incident scene and others would run from it. From all the real YT road incident vids I have seen, people tend to gawp at such incidents. And NB rubbernecking syndrome.

  7. Several people from this group seem to enter the courtyard, including Massoud. Thus the running crowd seems to include Massoud. This is highly odd.

  8. Inside the courtyard, there appear to be about 12 people, about half police officers in high-vis jackets, two CPOs in plain clothes, and the rest appear to be members of the public or office workers. Two of these civvies run not away from Massoud as you might expect but alongside or after him. Plus presumably at least one occupant of a moving car exiting the inner barrier and at least one (woman?) pedestrian or spectator inside what appears to be a semi-opaque plastic temporary covered walkway alongside the courtyard road but inside the courtyard wall.

  9. We see a video or still of two officers in high vis jackets close up but not their faces. We are told the nearer of the two is Palmer. This is after the frenzied attack we see from a distance, blurred, in a separate clip, but there is no blood evident. He is walking upright and normally. The frame is very clear.

  10. The frenzied initial attack on Palmer is mysterious as two officers in high viz jackets just stand and watch a few feet away. This is the same distant, blurred video I refer to above.

  11. I am mystified as to how Palmer gets up and walks or runs to what becomes the second incident area beyond the inner barrier. In two frames shown previously by the press, Massoud is shown injured or dead further on from Palmer. However, in the video in court Massoud is following Palmer and his colleague when he is supposedly shot by one of the two CPOs. (Unless the previously released images are looking towards the main gate, which I don’t think they are).

  12. The senior Met officer in the witness stand confirmed all the cameras or videos have date and time stamps, that they all agreed and that they are synched centrally. In actual fact, some of the stills and videos on the screen didn’t have date or time stamps but of course we could have been looking at versions modified for court use.

  13. The presenting lawyer stated a large quantity of video footage was available but they had only shown relevant stills or clips. It therefore seems strange to me that there was limited close-up material and what was presented was long range and slightly blurred. Having seen cameras in use in local government and police monitoring centres, I know how high resolution they can be and how they can zoom onto a button several hundreds of yards away, literally! I have seen this demonstrated in a control centre, using people in a crowded high street to demonstrate. This was in the early 1990s. On the outer door I recall a notice stating members of the public should never be allowed access. Thus I am quite confident that in the Houses of Parliament and its environs they have the best technology available and have had it for decades. I am also suspicious that whoever monitored the cameras, which would have been monitored centrally live, didn’t zoom.

  14. One of the video clips taken from the opposite end of the bridge shows a small white van heading towards the Surrey bank doing a U turn and then following behind the car. I assume U turns are forbidden on Westminster Bridge, itself an anomaly. Whoever did this was quick thinking or working to a plan. Perhaps it contained Anonymous and his sheet of chipboard.

  15. A second presenting lawyer noted in some detail, asking for a re-run of some slides, that everything happened in a matter of seconds, about 19 seconds. I’m not sure what his game was, but the short timescale is a bit unusual, when say compared with the Woolwich incident. Whoever did this one wanted it short and sweet.

  16. The shadows of pedestrians in the bridge sequences reminded me if the 7/7 Luton railway station photo in which people seem to be floating for want of a better word. I think video trickery is less likely in the other clips which involve real-time acting.

  17. There was a view of something dropping into the Thames but the splash seemed much smaller than in the long range clip shown originally on TV. The TV/Internet clip also shows a second splash but I don’t think this occurred in the clip we saw in court.

Conclusions.

I remain unconvinced the incident or sequence of events happened as described. Indeed, I have discovered more anomalies as the result of attending, in addition to the ones we are all aware of, which naturally wouldn’t make it into court. As regards the car on the bridge, this is the biggest surprise so unless it is all video trickery, must either be real or staged.

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