Dangling At The End of A Political Rope; Scottish Government Permanent Secretary Leslie Evans is looking highly likely to be the first political casualty of Alex Salmond inquiry, the question is, who will the hangman be, UK Civil Service or Team Sturgeon, one thing seems certain, when the trapdoor opens Evans is falling through it, is the smart play to jump first with her big fat government pension or spill her guts and use the Nuremberg defence?

Dear All 

President Harry S Truman made famous the quote, 'the buck stops here', Truman kept a sign with that phrase sitting on his desk in the Oval Office. The phrase refers to the notion that the President has to make the decisions and accept the ultimate responsibility for those decisions. In Scotland, the odious SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon isn't someone who accepts responsibility, far from it, she is the type of delusional leader who shrinks from accepting any  responsibility. Sturgeon is the type of person who would rather seek to blame someone else, and as we have seen from the Alex Salmond, she set herself up to be removed from what transpired early on. Of course, many people don't believe Nicola Sturgeon was someone who was sitting on the sidelines watching events. Gordon Dangerfield in his blog has come out and said that far from being a spectator, Sturgeon was someone on the pitch leading the team. 

Dangerfield wrote: 

"I don’t think Nicola Sturgeon was being truthful when she made this statement to the Scottish Parliament on 10 January 2019 about the complaints against Alex Salmond: 

“I did not know how the Scottish Government was dealing with the complaint, I did not know how the Scottish Government intended to deal with the complaint and I did not make any effort to find out how the Scottish Government was dealing with the complaint or to intervene in how the Scottish Government was dealing with the complaint.” 

I think it’s inconceivable that Nicola Sturgeon did not know of the complaints against Alex Salmond as soon as they were made in November 2017. 

I think it’s inconceivable that Nicola Sturgeon did not then direct personally the development of the unlawful procedure which was devised by her civil servants specifically to target Alex Salmond. 

And I think it’s inconceivable that Nicola Sturgeon was not closely involved in the unlawful handling by her civil servants of the complaints against Alex Salmond from the moment they were made." 

Gordon Dangerfield is not alone in doubting the word of Nicola Sturgeon. Many people have outright called her a liar, both inside Holyrood and outside. As the SNP Government seeks to delay and obstruct the Salmond Inquiry, the truth is that Nicola Sturgeon, her husband Peter Murrell and Sturgeon's Chief of Staff are very much tainted goods. You can certainly understand why the Scottish Conservatives have been saying for some time that Nicola Sturgeon must 'carry the can' for the Alex Salmond affair. And, just like you see in the movies, Nicola Sturgeon as the 'arch baddie' has no problem in pulling people in front of her to take the machine gun bullets. Just look at the 'mug' John Swinney who is fronting for her, now totally without honour, and a fucking disgrace to public office. At this point in the scandal, underlings are being lined up for the chop. Reports suggest that the Scottish Government’s top official, the Permanent Secretary Leslie Evans is a likely first casualty of the inquiry. The question is, does Sturgeon sack her, the UK Civil service sack her, or does Evans jump with her big fat pension? On that question, your guess is as good as anyone else's. One thing, I would suggest is that any chance of a public honour by the Queen or her heirs is a rather remote possibility. 

The notion of sacrificing underlings isn't a new concept, and as the SNP is staggering unoriginal, this is a road which they will probably travel down because, they are playing for time. They are like cornered rats desperately searching to prolong their existence by any means possible. The buck should stop at Nicola Sturgeon, but we shouldn't forget the scandal wasn't possible without the supporting players to aid her. Everyone of them who joined in the attempt to firstly stitch up an innocent man and then attempt to jail him should face criminal charges. Criminal charges, trial by jury and if found guilty, then these people should serve time in prison. I am sure that there are a stack of laws which could be applied here such as misconduct in public office. 

Misconduct in public office is defined as: 

A public officer acting as such; wilfully neglects to perform his or her duty and/or wilfully misconducts him or herself; to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public's trust in the office holder; without reasonable excuse or justification. 

Then of course, you have the issue of did people working against Alex Salmond attempt to pervert the course of justice? 

"If someone perverts the course of justice, they deliberately do something that will make it difficult to discover who really committed a particular crime, for example, destroying evidence or lying to the police. He was charged with conspiring to pervert the course of justice." 

What we have seen is that evidence given by various people connected to Nicola Sturgeon has turned out to be false. We know that various witnesses have been professional 'coached', and even then they haven't told the truth. The great thing about the truth is that it is simple, you repeat what actually happened. When you lie, you have to remember a complete new narrative and then try to overlay that over the truth. As we have seen in the Salmond scandal, sometimes the overlay doesn't work, it didn't work in the criminal trial against Salmond and it didn't work in the Salmond Inquiry. 

As well as SNP Leader Nicola Sturgeon needing to resign, her husband, SNP chief executive Peter Murrell, and her chief of staff Liz Lloyd are said to be headed for career changes. You could say, what they really are looking for is an escape route while in power, and controlling the levers of power, Nicola Sturgeon can hold off the dogs. Once she releases that power, there is no guarantee that the very "machine" that was turned on Alex Salmond wouldn't be turned on her and her gang. You can see their problem, how do they jump off the burning boat when the waters are full of blood and are shark infested? You can understand what the SNP plan is, it is to attempt to get to the short campaign as an island in the sky from which they will attempt to make this election about independence. This strategy is just another act of deception, done for several purposes, one of which is to try and get a pro Sturgeon supporter in place as a replacement leader. And, yes, we are talking about Angus Robertson, former Westminster MP. Could you imagine the irony and the virtual spitting in the faces of Scots if Angus Robertson and his vile odious wife became the new SNP power couple? Robertson's wife, Jennifer Dempsie has to be blunt, got a history. 

An extraordinary part of the scandal which you should home in on is that Sturgeon told the Holyrood parliament that Alex Salmond first told her about the matter on April 2, 2018, and that the Government’s procedure for handling formal complaints had stopped officials from telling her. What was left out of that statement by Sturgeon was the Scottish Government’s draft policy did initially allow Sturgeon to be told by her officials. This part is the nub, this was only changed after Ms Sturgeon and Ms Evans held a previously secret meeting about it on 29 November 2017. The procedure was then as if by a miracle rewritten on December 5, 2017 to say that the First Minister should only be told of complaints once an internal investigation had concluded. The November 29 meeting was omitted from the Scottish Government’s official timeline of events given to the inquiry, so we have had lies being told, and also evidence withheld. You can make your own mind up and guess why the November 29 meeting was omitted. The open record states that on November 29, 2017 “the first respondent [Ms Evans] met with the interested party [Ms Sturgeon] to discuss development of the proposed procedure”. 

You can see why Leslie Evans is being lined up to be pushed under the bus, she is the weakest link, she is also someone who also could be in very serious trouble. She is like the lamb who is waiting to be staked out for the wolves while pondering her fate in the holding pen. Why is she not staked out already, well, it's too early, but given the mentality of Sturgeon's poisonous mind, you would imagine it's already been discussed how to use her as a shield. I don't know if you ever saw the movie, Robocop 2, there is a scene as the end, where a Sturgeon like character fears for their safety from jail. One of the underlings, then dreams up a scenario and says, 'don't worry sir, if there is evidence, we will find it', which is code that something will be manufactured against the patsy. Do the SNP already have 'patsy' evidence on Scottish Government employee Leslie Evans? 

I would think so. 

Conservative MSP Murdo Fraser said: 

“The First Minister’s inner circle including her husband and senior officials have serious questions hanging over them in relation to their own conduct. However, Nicola Sturgeon cannot use them to hide behind. She must stand up and take responsibility for the SNP Government’s failings as they investigated her predecessor. She promised to be fully co-operative with this inquiry but has been obstructive at every turn. We see yet more questions over what she knew and when about the allegations against her friend and political mentor of over 30 years. She seems determined to fool everyone by failing to be transparent. This whole affair stinks to high heaven and the truth must be heard. Whatever is concluded from this inquiry, it is imperative that is Nicola Sturgeon who carries the can for the shambolic failings of her Government. If she’s found to have broken the Ministerial Code, then she must resign.” 

Liberal Democrat MSP Alex Cole-Hamilon added: 

“You would have to be a very bold civil servant to decide not to notify the first minister of these allegations, at a time when the changes to the complaints procedure which took her out of the loop had not yet been completed.” 

No one seriously believes that Nicola Sturgeon didn't know, of course there are people who are delusional, but as they are either too stupid, part of the cover up or just indy daft, they are the fringe. In every single major scandal Nicola Sturgeon's default fallback is that she knew nothing, are we to believe with her Stasi watching everyone, that she knew nothing all the time? Remember the Sturgeon's SNP collects information on people within the party and also their political opponents. And all of this is collected to be used against people. They call using it 'deployed', because they see people as enemies. This type of military jargon is apparently used a lot by them. 

Finally, I wouldn't want to be in the shoes of Leslie Evans, you see she must have known or should have known that the SNP leadership couldn't be trusted. She should have never acted the way she did, and now there is a reckoning coming. She is now an island in the sky, no friends, no help coming her way, who is ending her career? Will the hangman be from the UK Civil Service or Team Sturgeon? The UK Civil Service will no doubt make her end quick, Team Sturgeon on the other hand, well they will probably be like John C Woods, the Nuremberg hangman who fouled up so many executions. When the political trapdoor opens Leslie Evans may find herself dangling on the end of the political rope being slowly strangled. Who knows, maybe Nicola Sturgeon will sit and watch it with a bowl of strawberries and cream? 

Yours sincerely 

George Laird                                                                                                                                The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University