The Deputy Head Teacher Falsely Accused ...
Daily Mail
Beaming in his black bow tie and dinner jacket, solicitor David Greenwood clutched his glass-engraved award. Unkind souls might have called it the ‘2012 ambulance-chasing solicitor prize’. Officially, he had been presented with it by TV personality Patrick Kielty as the Eclipse Proclaim Personal Injury Lawyer Of The Year. For the past 14 years, Mr Greenwood, a partner at the big Yorkshire law firm Jordans, has specialised in fighting for compensation for victims of child abuse. For this, his firm has received millions of pounds from the taxpayer in legal aid. With the issue of child abuse at the forefront of public concern as a result of the BBC’s Jimmy Savile and Lord McAlpine fiascos, the ceremony two weeks ago finally gave Mr Greenwood the recognition he has always believed he deserved. But behind Mr Greenwood’s grin, a Mail on Sunday investigation can today reveal the truth behind the ambulance-chasing lawyer’s victory. Far from being a cry for justice, it instead represents a benchmark for a modern culture of ‘witch-hunt’ persecutions. His biggest-ever case involves the alleged abuse of about 150 former pupils of St William’s approved school on Humberside. Our wide-ranging investigation shows:
Approved school at the heart of claims St Wiliam's, in the village of Market Weighton, was an approved school (later known as a community home), whose pupils had been convicted of criminal offences and were sent there by the courts. It closed in 1994. Staffed both by lay people and members of the De La Salle Brotherhood, a Roman Catholic order, it usually had between 80 and 100 inmates. Some had committed very serious crimes, including murder. For many years, the Home Office cited St William’s as a showcase for what could be achieved with the most difficult youths. The first police inquiry into alleged abuse took place in 1982, when Noel Hartnett, the deputy headmaster, reported to officers that a boy had been to see him in a state of distress. He said the boy had described being sexually assaulted by the then principal, James Carragher. For Mr Hartnett, coming forward against his own boss required courage. He said: ‘I informed my superiors what I intended to do, and when I did so, I was told I could be fired.’ The police took a statement from the boy, but he later withdrew it and the case was dropped. It was a further 11 years before the same pupil, by now an adult, contacted police again, because he had seen a news item about an abuse inquiry at a different school. This time, they took his complaint seriously. Other former pupils also contacted them. In 1993, Carragher pleaded guilty to a series of indecent assaults and was jailed for seven years. 'Trawl' for victims led to trial fiasco In 2001, Operation Aldgate, a much bigger inquiry, began into St William’s. It lasted three years. This time Humberside Police did not simply wait for alleged victims to approach them. They placed advertisements in the local media and tracked down former pupils, encouraging them to make allegations against members of staff – the method known as a ‘trawl’. Many had gone on to commit crimes as adults and were in prison when they saw the police. By 2001, many such trawl investigations had taken place across the country, amid a wave of publicity. It had become widely known, especially among prisoners, that those who said they had been abused as children could claim large sums in compensation. But in 2002, the Commons Select Committee on Home Affairs issued an authoritative report that warned of the dangers of trawl investigations. It said they could lead to false allegations and the most serious miscarriages of justice. Operation Aldgate was a fiasco. The only man to be convicted was Carragher. He is still serving his second prison sentence, this time 14 years. Five other men were acquitted of all charges. One of them was Mr Hartnett, who had been falsely accused of physical, although not sexual, abuse. The judge at his trial said he left court as an innocent man, without a stain on his character. Police investigation damned by inquiry In the wake of Operation Aldgate, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) launched an inquiry into its conduct. Carried out by officers from West Yorkshire Police, its eventual report in 2010 was damning, making 400 major criticisms. Aldgate, it said, had not been ‘robust’. Officers had believed accusers’ stories without checking them and had adopted an over-credulous ‘mindset’ that had led them to hound innocent people. There had been a ‘failure to pursue reasonable lines of inquiry which could have helped prove/disprove witness and suspect accounts’, and a ‘failure to seek corroboration in respect of allegations made’. The IPCC made 126 recommendations for future abuse inquiries nationally to ensure such mistakes were not repeated. His '£2m' in legal aid for class action While the IPCC was taking Aldgate apart, Mr Greenwood was already on the lookout for clients. He and his firm have a ‘franchise’ contract with the body which grants legal aid, the Legal Services Commission (LSC), to represent alleged abuse victims in compensation claims in the civil courts. Even before the last of the Aldgate trials collapsed in 2004, he wrote to Humberside Police. In his letter, obtained by The Mail on Sunday, he said he hoped to confirm the LSC had appointed him ‘co-ordinating solicitor’ for former St William’s pupils. He said he needed details of all the suspects the police had investigated, and what charges had been laid. ‘This will greatly assist our claimants,’ Mr Greenwood wrote. Being appointed co-ordinating solicitor in a large group or ‘class’ action can be lucrative. Despite repeated messages and emails, Mr Greenwood refused to comment to this newspaper. But legal sources estimate that with St William’s alone, his firm has been paid more than £2 million. His website states he represents abuse victims from a further 80 schools and children’s homes. Mr Greenwood had another method of gathering clients. From 2004 until 2009, he placed adverts headed ‘Compensation’ in Inside Time, a monthly newspaper given out free to prisoners. ‘Were you at St William’s care home [sic], Market Weighton?’ he asked. If so, any reader who had been abused should contact him: ‘It is important that potential claimants enforce their legal rights as soon as possible.’ The advertisements worked. By 2010, Mr Greenwood had more than 100 clients, all claiming they had been horrifically abused at St William’s. The class action was in full swing. There was a series of hearings to determine who could be sued, which ended only last month in the Supreme Court, with a ruling that any liability would be spilt between the De La Salle Brothers and the Catholic diocese of Middlesbrough. That September, Mr Greenwood again contacted Humberside Police – but this time, he was asking to supply information rather than receive it. He had, he said, obtained fresh evidence of offences at St William’s, which they must investigate. He held meetings with Detective Superintendent Colin Andrews, one of the force’s most experienced detectives, who was to become head of Operation Reno. ‘He said he had a number of files alleging offences from rape down to assault,’ Mr Andrews said. 'Bogus' allegations that didn't add up The police were wary. Some of the allegations arising from Operation Aldgate had collapsed when it emerged that six men, who had been serving time in the same prison, were using the same solicitor – not Mr Greenwood – when they first told their stories to police. According to the IPCC report, this lawyer refused to co-operate with police when they tried to discover whether there had been collusion, fuelled by compensation claims, and Mr Andrews was determined this must not happen again. He told The Mail on Sunday: ‘We had an agreement that Mr Greenwood would fully co-operate with us. That was the basis on which we took this on.’ As Operation Reno got under way, four of the men who had already been acquitted ‘without a stain on their characters’ again found themselves suspects. But the allegations were now much worse. In 2004, Mr Hartnett had been accused of physical abuse, but now it was claimed he had committed multiple acts of the worst kind of sexual abuse – some in the company of Carragher, the very man he had once reported to detectives. Mr Hartnett was suffering from the lung condition pulmonary fibrosis, but was determined to fight back. The De La Salle Brothers gave him the statements served by Mr Greenwood for his civil action, and asked him to analyse them. He compared them with attendance and employment records, and the records of the many previous inquiries. He was able to show that some of those making allegations were lying as they were not even contemporaries of their supposed abusers. Others accused people who did not exist – or made claims which could easily be refuted from other, verifiable facts. Mr Greenwood had been given full legal aid for these ‘victims’ – and there is a rule that solicitors must conduct a thorough ‘merits test’ to ensure claims are well-founded. But Mr Greenwood is used to obtaining damages without clients’ stories being tested in court. His website states: ‘Over 98 per cent of abuse cases handled by Jordans are settled out of court, making it very unlikely that it will be necessary for you to go to court.’ The Mail on Sunday has checked Mr Hartnett’s documents and confirmed that his claims are accurate. However, the law that protects the identities of sex-offence victims means we cannot name those who made apparently bogus allegations. Genuine victims 'now lose out' Having lived for 18 months under the cloud of being paedophilia suspects, Mr Hartnett and the others found not guilty in 2004 have now been told there will be ‘no further action’ against them. Meanwhile, Mr Andrews confirmed that several of the supposed victims are now being investigated for fraud and that more are likely to be arrested. And, concerned that the allegations were inflated, Mr Andrews took advice from the Crown Prosecution Service. Some of the ‘victims’ had given several statements to Mr Greenwood and his colleagues and ended up making claims that bore little resemblance to their initial stories. Again, The Mail on Sunday has examined these in detail, but the law prevents us from giving examples. The CPS ruled that if anyone was charged, Mr Greenwood would have to disclose everything his clients had said, and when they said it. This would also have to be given to defence lawyers in the event of any trials. Then Mr Greenwood dropped his bombshell. Not only would he not co-operate himself – despite his alleged agreement with Mr Andrews – but he also contacted all his St William’s clients, advising them also not to co-operate. Asked why by The Mail on Sunday, he replied by email, saying: ‘I do not wish to speak to you or anyone associated with Noel Hartnett.’ The result is that the lawyer who started Operation Reno has now wrecked it. Had he not, 53 separate case files would now have been ready for the CPS to decide whether to bring charges. All have now been withdrawn. Thousands of hours of police work have been squandered. Mr Andrews said: ‘These cases have collapsed. We still have some others to pursue where the alleged victims are not Jordans’ clients. But I find it extremely frustrating. We investigated in good faith and the law firm has pulled the plug on us.’ That, he added, meant that genuine victims ‘will never get a chance to tell a criminal court what happened’. As for Mr Greenwood’s alleged threat, according to Mr Andrews, to bring a complaint of harassment if the police did try to speak to alleged victims: ‘It’s the first time I’ve been threatened by a lawyer for doing my job.’ When the clear examples of probably fraudulent allegations first came to light, Cedric Sander, a retired head teacher and senior Ofsted inspector who lives on Humberside, asked the LSC to investigate. It refused, on the grounds he is not directly involved in the case. He has now sent a dossier to the Solicitors Regulation Authority, claiming that Mr Greenwood has breached its ethical rules by failing to act with integrity and in the interests of justice. On Monday, the SRA confirmed his complaint is being ‘assessed’. Once again, Mr Greenwood refused to comment.
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