David Fletcher claims that he was not in
Cambodia at the time of the alleged rapes – 15th and 22nd
March 2009. The only evidence of this that stood any chance of standing up in a
Cambodian court was to be found in Mr Fletcher’s passport.
Ambassador Mark Kent of the British Embassy
in Bangkok, knowing this to be the case, destroyed Mr Fletcher’s passport and
hence evidence of his innocence.
The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office
has now provided two different explanations as to why and how Mr Fletcher’s valid
passport came to be cancelled and then destroyed. In one version it was a
‘mistake’ and in the other, in accordance with standard Embassy protocols.
Neither version of what happened to the passport withstands close scrutiny.
Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond refuses
to answer any questions at all in relation to Mr Fletcher’s passport. And
Freedom of Information requests for documents relating to the fate of Mr
Fletcher’s passport have been turned down.
On 17th Nov, three weeks after
judges in the Phnom Penh Municipal Court promised Mr Fletcher a ‘re-trial’ they
reversed their decision and said that he was not entitled to one because the
paperwork was not delivered to the court in time.
The woman David Fletcher allegedly raped,
Yang Dany, was sent out of Cambodia by the NGO (Action Pour Les Enfants) so
that she would not available for cross-examination, had their been a trial, and
not available to speak with the media. She has sent to China by APLE but there
is a suggestion, pure speculation at this point, that she has been trafficked
to China.
How many other men are in jail as a result
of allegations as demonstrably false as those leveled at David Fletcher
perpetrated by APLE? And why is it that the British Embassy provides financial
support to a non government organization engaged in the pursuit, persecution
and prosecution of innocent men in order to keep up a high arrest and
incarceration rate?
David Fletcher was on day 21 of a hunger
strike on the day I met him. He saw a glimmer of hope when I began to advocate
on his behalf in September 2014 but that hope has evaporated. He has been
abandoned by the British government and abandoned by human rights organizations
in Cambodia.
At the age of 70 David realizes that he
will not leave jail alive and would prefer is death to come sooner rather than
later.
For anyone interested in how this matter
has unfolded (and with the patience necessary!) should start at #1 and read
through to # 44.
Mr Ang Vong Vathana
Minister of Justice
Samdech Sothearos Road
Sangkat Chaktomouk
Daun Penh
24th Nov 2014
Dear Mr Ang Vong Vathana
re David John Fletcher
In 2011 David Fletcher, a citizen of the United
Kingdom, was convicted of the March 2009 rape of 17 year old Yang Dany in Phnom
Penh.
Mr Fletcher’s 2011 trial was held in secret. He was
unable to attend the court proceedings. He was not legally represented. He was
not able to present evidence in his defense or to call witnesses. The media
were not allowed to report on the case.
The medical report presented to the court, prepared
after Mr Fletcher had been charged with
raping Yang Dany, made it quite clear
that Yang Dany remained a virgin.
I have enclosed a copy of the doctor’s report.
The alleged victim, Yang Dany, has admitted to
myself in a filmed interview, and to two other journalists, that she was not
raped by Mr Fletcher. This is confirmed by her mother, Kheang Sekun and by the
medical report presented to the court.
Despite the lack of evidence that rape had
occurred, despite Yang Dany’s intact hymen, Mr Fletcher
was sentenced to 10 years in jail by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court. The judges
accounted for Yang Dany’s virginity by asserting that her hymen must have grown
back. As you will be aware this is physiologically impossible.
Mr Fletcher has now been in jail for a total of four and half
years. He has never once been
interviewed by the police or by an investigating prosecutor.
On 27th Oct 2014 three judges in the Phnom Penh
Municipal Court informed Mr Fletcher that he was entitled to a re-trial and
that this would occur in the near future. The date for the re-trial was set for
20th Nov. but when Mr Fletcher arrived in court that day he
discovered that the judges had reversed their decision to allow him a re-trial.
He was not allowed to present the judges with any evidence, he was not allowed
to call witnesses, he was not even allowed to make a statement to the court.
All that happened in this ‘hearing’ was that the
main judge read out many documents from previous court hearings and then
announced that he and his fellow judges would take a break for 15 minutes
before announcing their decision regarding a ‘re-trail’. Fifteen minutes later
the judges returned to the court and the main judge read a five page document
in which he outlined the reasons why Mr Fletcher was not to be allowed a
retrial. It was clear that this document had been prepared before the court
proceedings.
The reasons for refusing Mr Fletcher the right to a
‘re-trial’ had nothing to do with the facts of the actual case. The reason
given was that some documents from Mr Fletcher were not delivered to the court
in time. This was not the fault of David Fletcher but of the prison officials
who failed to deliver them on his behalf. This has been acknowledged by the
prison but this acknowledgment was part of the evidence that the court refused
to even look at.
Mr Fletcher is 70 years old. He realizes now that
he will die in jail and has decided that he would prefer to die quickly, on his
own terms, and with as much dignity as is possible under the circumstances. He
has commenced a hunger strike to the death.
I am appealing to you, Mr Ang Vong Vathana, to
grant Mr Fletcher the right to a fair trial as outlined in the Cambodian Code of Criminal Procedure. I request that Mr Fletcher be released on bail and be
given an opportunity to prepare his defense in a properly constituted court of
law.
yours sincerely
James Ricketson
David Fletcher's impending death with pose an interesting dilemma for Licadho, Ad Hoc, the British Embassy, the newspapers and NGOs. Do they believe that David Fletcher is entitled to a fair trial or not? If they believe that he is, they cannot remain silent. If they believe that he is not they can of course remain silent and will do so. If they are moral cowards who believe in David Fletcher's right to a fair trial but do not want to say so in public, they will be complicit in his death. On the surface it may seem like suicide but in reality it will be murder.
ReplyDeleteDavid's death, if the Minister of Justice does not intervene, will be the result of many small but not insignificant stab wounds. The first cuts were delivered by Peter Hogan of Khmer440 and those who saw destroying his life as a blood sport. Scott Neeson, self-proclaimed secular saint, delivered the next lot of cuts - accusing David Fletcher of 'grooming little girls' whilst having no evidence that this was true. The British Embassies of Cambodia and Thailand, clearly believing that where there was so much smoke there must be fire, accepted unquestioningly the narrative presented to them by Hogan and Neeson and, without bothering to check dates or to give Fletcher the benefit of the doubt, decided to join in what had, by now, become a witch hunt. Working closely with Thai authorities Mark Kent, Ambassador to Thailand, arranged for David Fletcher to be arrested in Thailand - despite his having committed no offence in that country. Imagine the shock the horror, for poor Mark Kent, when he discovered, on looking at David Fletcher's passport, that he was not in Cambodia at the time of the alleged rapes! Imagine further how he must have felt when he discovered, in Sept 2010, that Yang Dany ws a virgin and could not possibly have been raped by David Fletcher. an Ambassador with integrity would have said, "We made a mistake, we must rectify it." An Ambassador with no spine, more concerned with not wishing to have egg on his face than with Mr Fletcher's well-being comes up with quite a different solution to the problem of his own making: DESTROY THE EVIDENCE. If this results in an innocent man dying in jail, so be it.
ReplyDeleteI hope, Ambassador Kent, if you are reading this and have any kind of moral conscience, that you might have at least some twinge of regret that you have made a major contrition to the destruction of David Fletcher's life and played no small part in his untimely death
I wonder why the F.C.O. and British Embassy are so eager to turn a blind eye? The corruption within Cambodia's legal system is all too obvious and should be vigorously countered by a western "democracy". Poor David Fletcher, to give his life away to such an evil system and he an innocent man.
ReplyDeleteThe FCO in general and the British Embassy in particular is turning a blind eye because to acknowledge the truth of what has taken place here would result in egg on a lot of people's faces. The British Embassy sponsors APLE and cannot be seen to be providing British tax-payer monies to an NGO that sets up innocent men in order to keep up its impressive arrest and conviction rate. It cannot have escaped the notice of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office that for some years now many clouds have hovered over APLE's modus operandi in Cambodia and I can only presume that the likes of Ambassador Mark Kent believe it to be a price worth paying if innocent men like David Fletcher die in jail if this sends a message to real pedophiles to steer clear of Cambodia. There is a paradox here. The more successful APLE is in jailing pedophiles - real and imagined - the less likely it is that pedophiles will see Cambodia as a place to realise their evil intents. And the less real pedophiles there are in Cambodia in the future, the more APLE will need to find innocent men whom it can frame in order to justify its continued existence.
DeleteWould you presume that the Minister of Justice isn't corrupt and paid off by APLE also?
ReplyDeleteI am presuming nothing. I am clutching at straws. At some time a senior Cambodian official is, it is to be hoped, going to refuse to be corrupt.Perhaps now is that time. Some day the same will apply to the NGO 'community' that has, to date, remained silent about legal and human rights abuses practiced by NGOs themselves. I had hoped that Dr Kek Pung might be the person to say, in public, "Mr Fletcher is entitled to a fair trial" but she has not.
ReplyDeleteAs I say, I am clutching at straws!