Listen, do you want to know a secret, do you promise not to tell..?

So, there’s stuff I can’t tell you, there’s stuff I won’t tell you and stuff I shouldn’t tell you. Eventually, after all that, there’s the stuff I do tell you.

You’d think I would be allowed to tell you everything. But there’s the law, like contempt of court and libel. There’s promises, there’s off-the-record, there’s ‘it’s only a rumour’, then there’s a basketcase-full of ‘no, I swear it’s true, no really, would I lie to you?’

Looking back over the past few months there’s been so much stuff I can’t impart. If I go back even further, there’s material I may never be able to print. Like the major drug dealer who got put away for quite a bit, who admitted to me he pretty much did dish out all the torture he was accused of doing but never, ever, stuck a certain something up someone’s Aris.
But back to recent-ish events, I can’t really tell you about two ‘organisations’ in our fair city who decided to get a bit tasty with each other. And possibly why. And how far it nearly got.
I can’t really tell you about who’s buying which business, who they’re linked to, what the person they’re linked to is up to and how frequently they’re linked to questionable people and questionable incidents.
And, despite all this hoo-haa currently in the media and legal circles and blog-world about worrisome links between the police and the media, my conversations with some members of Plod has to stay close to my chest. Sometimes it’s just gossip, sometimes it’s about silly cock-ups, sometimes it’s a bit more, but revealing it would compromise my source. Sometimes it’s a massive, monumental feck up which I try different avenues to publish my other means, but fail to do, due to lack of hard evidence. I’m looking at one currently, and it’s a doozy.

Then there’s who’s about to be nicked, or charged, who’s got a good brief, who’s got a duff one, who’s been found “not guilty” because their barrister was sharper than the CPS and got half the evidence struck out, which if the jury heard it they’d have absolutely, definitely have found them guilty, assuming the CPS hadn’t cut a deal or the judge decided he’d accept the deal rather than go to the expense of a trial. I mean, a jury? What’s the point, eh? It’s not like the justice system is based around trusting 12 people to have the common sense to hear the evidence and decide whether the person in the dock is guilty or not guilty, is it?
No really, I was in a court room not long ago and that happened. You’ll be seeing a person who’s pleaded guilty be sentenced for something that even the investigating officer has admitted to me they didn’t do. This person did something else, but by coughing to an alternative charge, they’ll be dealt with, a jury won’t be necessary and the troublesome expense of a trial will be saved for the public purse. The fact there’s no evidence at all for what they’re admitting is not the point… don’t you worry your pretty little head about it sweetie.
I know. But as the Bard of Barking said: “This isn’t a court of justice son, this is a court of law”…
So, why don’t I tell you?
Sometimes, I’d like to. But there’s reasons – perhaps I can’t stand it up. Perhaps it’d mean a whopping great libel action which means money we can’t afford. Or it’d mean a contempt of court, which means more money on legal fees, an embarrassing time in court and possibly an even more embarrassing time in prison. And I am no Andy Dufresne or Lennie Godber.
Sometimes, it’s best you don’t know.

Oh, you think?

Okay – sitting in the magistrates court for Vanessa George when they described what she did in graphic detail. Or in Crown Court to hear what child rapists Robert Rohleder and Darren Campbell did?
I can’t imagine you do want to hear the details, because I know I didn’t when I had to write it down in my notepad, because it comes back to your mind’s eye when you forget to block it out.
Or that a recently convicted rapist targeted a woman who was a prostitute, because her business wasn’t the reason she was targeted, she was targeted because she was a woman and she was there and she became a victim and what she does to get by from one day to the next is none of your damn business.
Yeah, yeah, so maybe you should be allowed to hear more, maybe you deserve to hear more. I agree, no really I do.

But it’s just that, well… there’s just some things I can’t tell you, there’s some things I won’t tell you and there’s some things I shouldn’t tell you…

And let’s be honest… there’s a lot of stuff you lot don’t tell me.

There’s also a lot of stuff the criminals don’t tell me.

And, hardly surprising this, there’s the stuff the police don’t tell me. Like when they get warned off from raising their concerns about the cuts to me, such as the 80 or so civilian investigators who are being tossed out the door next week, which will mean less investigators trying to solve the same number of crimes. Or they just don’t tell me stuff because they think I’m an interfering git, which is more often as not the real reason. Well, I mean they think it… not that I am an interfering git. Well, not all the time anyway.
So, y’know, it all balances out in the end, no?

And you didn’t hear that from me, right?