Dear All
At present, there is a ‘sea of Nationalist’ madness doing
the rounds, we have the SNP Cllr Susan Aitken story, we have Pete Wishart
throwing in his hat in a bid to be the next Speaker of the House of Commons,
and of course the saga of ex SNP MP Natalie McGarry. If you are looking for
comedy, it has to be Pete Wishart’s bid to be Speaker, his majority is 21
votes. 21 votes is rather slim, but tradition is that major parties don’t stand
against the Speaker due to the nature of their role.
Is Pete Wishart, the right man for the job, does he carry a
sense of destiny about with him, has he earned the respect of his peers across
the House of Commons?
No, no and no!
As to Susan Aitken, her ‘story’ is even less appealing than
her looks, part of the Sturgeon clique. How she became leader is a mystery but
when you have no talent, you can walk into anything it seems in the SNP. Her current
trek is being reported to the Standards Commissioner, it seems on trying to
stir up a bucket of shit against Labour Cllr Frank McAveety has attracted a
storm of protest.
The award for a ‘Greeting Tragedy’ however must go to former
SNP MP Natalie McGarry. It seems that after pleading guilty, and getting two of
the charges against her dropped, she has lost a bid to withdraw pleas of guilty
over embezzling more than £25,600 from pro-independence organisations. It could
be that having pled guilty; the former law graduate has woken up to what guilty
means?
Guilty means guilty.
Guilty in her case should also mean severe curtailment of
social life, early to bed, no pubs, no clubs, no holidays, no gym, no internet,
limited TV and no hubby, no access to power assisted comfort, and before anyone
says ‘lightsaber’, I meant the other ‘toy’ that buzzes.
When McGarry appeared at Glasgow Sheriff Court , instead of being
sentenced to a lengthy spell in prison, her brief, Allan MacLeod, representing her
applied to withdraw the plea to a not guilty; His rationale was to claim there
was "undue pressure" on her to admit the offences.
So, where did this alleged undue pressure come from?
Apparently from the action of her former solicitor, former
counsel and the Sheriff, in Court you can hear almost anything, Natalie
McGarry’s pitch is that she is a victim but felt she had no choice other than
to tender a plea of guilty. Can you imagine what the Sheriff must have thought
about this tact, apparently he was not happy. The Sheriff Paul Crozier rejected
the motion spun out over almost an hour-and-a-half, and said he had
"listened very carefully to what was said".
Sheriff Paul Crozier said the court had "bent over
backwards" to help her.
Her brief, Allan MacLeod also added something to the
proceedings when he said:
“Her position to date is that while she accepts that her
financial organisation may have been lacking, somewhat haphazard, at no point
has she ever accepted that she dishonestly appropriated any of these funds.”
Natalie McGarry, pleaded guilty to two charges of
embezzlement when she appeared at Glasgow Sheriff Court on April 24.
To be clear that would be embezzlement from two organisations. But now with a
trusted legal eagle beside her, she is saying she is innocent…… remarkable.
Given her past history of a loud mouth and unable to shut
her gob, does her next defence tactic appear to be that she has a clone running
about the place?
The petrol on the flames wasn’t helped by McGarry’s lawyer
saying he wanted the sheriff to remove himself from the case, which her lawyer
later withdrew presumably as that panned rather badly with the Sheriff.
Apparently Sheriff Paul Crozier didn’t say, ‘we are all
in this together to the bitter end’.
Natalie McGarry pleaded guilty to embezzling £21,000 from
Women for Independence in
her role as treasurer of the organisation and also admitted embezzling
£4,661.02 in the course of her role as treasurer, secretary and convener of the
Glasgow Regional Association of the SNP. Given her background in law which
presumably covered business law, are we to believe that she is a cretin, given
she passed a law degree?
I have to say that through-out this case, the highlight that
sticks out for me is failing to transfer charitable donations to Perth and Kinross food
bank. The online commentary from ordinary on various news outlets is one of
anger and contempt.
The most poorest and vulnerable people suffered due to
Natalie McGarry’s actions, not my take, the director of the foodbank which is
why the calls for sympathy are bizarre.
Natalie McGarry didn’t come from a hard up family.
In law, you have a thing called mitigation post verdict
which gives your lawyer a chance to tell a sob story, her lawyer said McGarry
lived a "very isolated existence".
I don’t know about you but according to the press, Natalie
McGarry lives in Clarkston, last time I checked, it wasn’t anywhere near
Mongolia. Plenty of buses, trains, taxis going through there, nice parks,
libraries, shops. So “very isolated existence”, does her husband put her in a
box under the stairs when his pals come round?
We have also learned that she allegedly suffering from
post-natal depression, always good to stick in ‘I am a mother’, pulling on the
old heart strings on two fronts, motherhood and illness. I bet Sheriff Paul
Crozier has never heard that before, still to cement the illness claim, she is
said to be on medication, and is seeing a psychiatric nurse. Luckily for
Natalie, if she gets prison, she will meet plenty of people she can continue
with her medication, and get help for post-natal depression and access a psychiatric
nurse, so that takes care of these issues.
I think basically what Natalie McGarry is saying is that she
doesn’t want to go to jail.
Finally, I have said all along that ex SNP MP Natalie
McGarry deserves to be put in prison, I never got to name her in open court
regarding the case against Tommy Ball, but her downfall is overdue and
self-inflicted.
Sheriff Paul Crozier rejected her bid to withdraw the
guilty pleas saying “there can be no doubt what she was pleading guilty to”, I
would have allowed her to withdraw the guilty pleas and go to trial.
The Sheriff is within his rights to issue his ruling, and he
has clearly cited the time this case has gone on and that the court had
"bent over backwards" to help her. Natalie McGarry goes back to Court
on May 10th to find out her fate from Sheriff Paul Crozier. Natalie
McGarry shouldn’t get special treatment nor should she get beyond what the law
prescribes; just treated the same way as anyone else. I know a Sheriff in
passing; they said to me that the public would have a high expectation of
McGarry being jailed.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
2 comments:
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