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Steve Missham and the BBC – stranger than fiction

Whilst I smelled a rat in the Steve Missham affair and subsequent events have proved me justified, I’m not feeling that smug because I can’t actually claim I saw the latest developments coming. They’re just too incredible.

What Missham has done is announce to the world that his alleged abuser didn’t look like, and therefore wasn’t, the politician he’s been accusing to all and sundry for days. The news media appears to accept this, and has gone on a frenzy of blame culminating in the “resignation” of George Entwistle this evening. The one person not apparently in the firing line is Missham, who’s fantastic story is the cause of it. The idea that he didn’t know what the person he was accusing looked like before his recent publicity spree stretches credibility beyond my limit.

Okay, the BBC clearly didn’t check its facts either but then again this is hardly uncommon. As I said last week, they’re always on the lookout for anything negative they an say about the Conservative Party, and I’d assume they’re even less likely to check facts in such a case.

This morning I heard George Entwistle being savaged by John Humpharies on Today. After several minutes I couldn’t take it, but they were still on when the snooze button had timed out. Entwistle was protesting that no one had told him anything. Sadly, I have to say I believe him. This evening he “resigned”, but received a year’s inflated salary as a pay-off. That’s a neat trick. Who else can choose to resign and have their employer’s pay him a year’s salary? Some mistake, surely.

Apart from the peer who’s been accused of the most horrendous crimes for no reason whatsoever, the other victims in this affair are children who have been abused, and those who will be in the future. We’re always hearing the mantra that children don’t lie about such things and should always believed. This was Missham’s main theme too. It goes along with the notion that no women would falsely claim to be raped. Privately, people who work with children and alleged rape victims will contradict this – some people will claim all sorts of things if they think it will get them what they want. Having such a high-profile abuse victim who was clearly not telling the truth is not going to encourage genuine victims of such crimes to come forward.

As to the crisis at the BBC, it’s long been the case that some of their journalists have exhibited bias and inaccuracy in reporting, especially at the local and national level. They’re now engaged in reporting, 24/7 on their favourite subject (themselves). When Entwistle resigned it was blamed on “shoddy journalism”, but what of the shoddy journalists? They’re still there.

I’ve just been watching speculation as to who’s going to take over as Director General of the BBC. The journalists are complaining that Tim Davie, the caretaker DG, has no editorial experience, and is also an outsider. Other candidates have been criticised for being non-editorial and non-BBC types. Entwistle was from a 23-year BBC Editorial background (as previous DGs) but has failed spectacularly, cut and run (or was he really pushed?)

Of course the BBC hacks want one of their own, but that’s the last thing the BBC needs.

 

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Tory Minister in child abuse scandal: A welsh rat

I’ve been listening on the BBC and reading in the tabloids about Steve Messham, a child abuse victim from a Welsh children’s home going on about how a senior Conservative politician was the centre of a peadophile ring. I smell a rat. He’s popping up every where, and in his latest interview he’s complained that the abuse took place under a “Tory” government and he’s now not getting his enquiry under another “Tory” government. He said nothing under the “Labour” government, and people using that kind of language have, in my experience, had a party political axe to grind.

It turns out he hasn’t actually complained to the police, or given any specifics of these allagations to anyone. Yet the BBC can’t get enough of him. In normal circumstances, someone like this would be ignored. Put up or shut up. However, to the BBC he’s a lifeline to take attention away from their own child abuse scandal. The icing on the cake for them is the “Tory politician” bit; music to the ears of certain BBC journalists.

Twitter is full of people praising Messham for his courage, and naming the politician he must be referring to (although somewhat unlikely).

The BBC is terrible about checking its facts, and this looks horribly like one of those cases of not letting facts get in the way of a good story, especially one with such perfect timing for them.

As to Mr Missham, I wonder what he’s thinking. After nearly a week of no substance, I’m wondering if this wasn’t a wheeze to jump on a rolling bandwaggon that’s now heading down hill with no brakes. He’s clearly enyoying the media spotlight but unless he delivers the goods (i.e. goes to the police), even the media pack is going to get bored, and when they do they’ll turn on him. I don’t suppose he has an exit stratergy. If he finally names someone, they’d better be long-dead or he’s going to be sued to kingdom come. Unless he’s right, but if he was, he’d have gone to the police already.

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My name is Elena and I live in small city in Russia.

You may have seen one or more of these in your inbox in the last few days:

Hello,
 
My name is Elena and I live in small city in Russia. I have a little daughter and no husband since he left us. Due to deep crisis recently I losted job and can not pay the heating bills for our home anymore. I finded your address at website and decided to write you from a public library. We urgent need heating because winter arriving and the temperature in our home is very cold. We can heat our home with a portable woodburner, but we unable buy it because it cost too much for us. If you own any old transportable woodburner from cast iron which you don’t use anymore, I pray you can gift to us and transport of it to us.
 
I hope for your answer.
 
Elena.

Okay – it’s obviously a scam, but it’s interesting as it’s getting through most spam filters. It actually originates from Tellas in Greece, from mail servers that aren’t blacklisted – although today it moved on to ADSL lines.

Reading the text, it’s  reminiscent of various “I’m a poor Russian in trouble” panhandles that appear annually at about this time of year. If you reply (it’s been tried) the person at the other end will suggest that instead of sending the stove you just send the money as she can buy one from the local market for a figure just under $200.

What I’m not so sure of is that the scammer is actually even Russian in this instance, as the language isn’t quite right. Russian speakers (in fact most East Europeans) are notoriously bad at using the definite or indefinite article (‘it’ or ‘a’) because it doesn’t exist in their language. This person fails to use it pretty consistently  thus sounding like a Russian trying to speak English, but slips up with “…buy it because it cost…”. She also has “…a little daughter…”. It suggests American, as a linguist friend pointed out, because of the use of “home” instead of “house” and “woodburner” instead of “wood burning stove”.

You might wonder why on earth the request is for a cast iron stove. Are the collecting them from scrap iron? Well, no – when you think about it, if you offer them a stove the shipping will be prohibitively expensive (they are heavy) so you can save money by simply sending the cash.

Anyone up on this kind of thing will  have been thinking “Valentin Mikhaylin” from the start. Okay, he changed the name to Elana in 2007 (or sometimes Valentin and his mother, Elana), but the stove story has been used for at least ten years. It has all the hallmarks, except one: This year the spams are getting through. This could be the scammer’s undoing – as everyone is receiving multiple copies it’s lost all plausibility in 2012. So what will 2013 be about, one wonders?