Blog entry 13th April 2017
Today (13th April), my solicitor visited. During this visit he took new mouth swabs from me so that new DNA tests could be run. The new test is much more sensitive and examines a wider range of 'bands' contained in a DNA reading. As soon as he departed from HMP Wakefield he was heading directly to the Forensic Access's lab at Oxford to deliver the samples.
Whilst he was here we were also able to discuss the full scope and implications of evidence that is still being withheld by Kent Police. Specifically statements and an item relating to a chemists. At my trial Kent Police and CPS refuted that any evidence existed of my being at a chemists during the crucial period in which Susan Kent was killed. This will have been significant in how the jury reached the guilty verdict given against me. Irrefutable evidence now shows that the police and CPS had and still have evidence that verified that I was at a chemists at the crucial time.
Had my jury known of the existence of evidence placing me at a chemists at the relevant time and, had they known that the police's DNA evidence was at best a partial match and not a full profile reading (over half the band readings were missing and others shared), it is pertinent to question if they would have reached a guilty verdict. Consequently, it is no wonder that Kent Police and CPS knowingly failed to disclose these evidence facts at the time of my trial. After all, to have disclosed it as they were required to according to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE), would have significantly weakened their case against me.
The problem I now face is getting the Legal Aid Agency (LAA) to fund the pursual of the withheld alibi evidence. My solicitor has had to threaten the LAA with a judicial review to gain the funding for the new DNA forensic testing. In this country justice does come at a price!