FOI Response about Hutton Inquiry Documents

This is the text of a Freedom of Information request I made about documents relating to the Hutton Inquiry together with the response to the matters raised:

Thank you for your Freedom of Information request, which was received at The National Archives on 2 February and later clarified on 8 February 2011:

1. Please inform me of the reference numbers of the reports of Dr Hunt to the Hutton Inquiry (You have previously told me that the reports are dated 19 July 2003 and 25 July 2003 and informed me of the dates they were received or logged at the Inquiry - this has been very helpful.  Thank you).
2. Please inform me of the dates of any statements, reports or other documents by the forensic biologist Mr Green, or his assistant Dr Eileen Hickey, that were submitted to the Inquiry and when they were submitted.
3. As in question 1 above please inform me of the reference numbers assigned to any documents submitted by Mr Green or Dr Hickey 

Clarification of request received on 8 February 2011: 

I have looked at the list of evidence on the Hutton website and it appears that not all of the evidence submitted is listed thereon.  For instance when I made an earlier FOI Request for all the reports made by forensic pathologist Dr Hunt two were found although I can only find what appears to be one in the evidence list.  I must ask you again to check through the evidence records and fully reply to my FOI Request of the 2nd February.

Following clarification of your request, this was forwarded to the Freedom of Centre to answer.  

The Freedom of Information Act 2000 gives you two rights of access when you write to us asking for information.  You have the right to know whether we hold the information that you are looking for, and you have the right to have the information given to you.  These rights may only be overridden if the information you are looking for is covered by an exemption in the Act.  

1. Dr Hunt provided a draft report to the Inquiry while waiting for toxicology results. The reference that Dr Hunt used for this report was SC:39/2003/cb. This was later given another reference COR/1/0001 to COR/1/0014 that the Inquiry used for this report.

Dr Hunt after receiving the results provided a final report. The reference that Dr Hunt used was SC:39/2003/cb. This final report is already available  in the public domain and can be accessed on-line from the Ministry of Justice website: 
http://www.justice.gov.uk/pathologist-report-dpa.pdf

When this final report was given to the Inquiry it was given a reference of COR/2/0240 to COR/2/0253. The Inquiry team also gave the same final report the reference TVP/1/0059 to TVP/1/0073. This reference number was published by MoJ 22 October 2010. 

It is not known why there is a change in the Inquiry reference number. Both final reports are the same except the change from COR to TVP.  It is possible that Dr. Hunt provided a copy of his final report both directly to the Inquiry and to Thames Valley Police who then also sent it to the Inquiry.
For the information already in the public domain, this is exempt information under Section 21 of the FoIA. The section 21 exemption, exempts information which is reasonable accessible by other means http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/library/freedom_of_information/detailed_specialist_guides/awareness_guidance_6_-_information_reasonably_accessible_to_the_applicant_by_other_means.pdf 

2 & 3. Following a search of the paper and electronic records transferred to The National Archives at the conclusion of Lord Hutton's Inquiry, I have established that the information you requested for this part of your request is not held by this Department.  

The transcript of Mr. Green's oral evidence to the Hutton Inquiry [http://www.the-hutton-inquiry.org.uk/content/transcripts/hearing-trans29.htm] explains that Mr. Green provided a spreadsheet to Thames Valley Police showing "a snapshot of where we are today showing what items have been examined, what has been found on them, which items were profiled, the results of those profile tests."  It further stated that Mr. Green had not yet put his evidence down in statement form because he was "finishing off the testing of that material."  Assistant Chief Constable Page would then come back to tell the Inquiry the results.  It appears to be for this reason that the information you have requested is not on the Hutton Inquiry's website.
In light of the above, this part of your request would perhaps be more appropriately addressed to Thames Valley Police: 

Freedom of Information Officer
Thames Valley Police Headquarters
Oxford Road
Kidlington
Oxfordshire OX5 2NX.



Regarding my first question the background to it can be found in an earlier post I made: http://drkellysdeath-suicideormurder.blogspot.com/2011/01/number-of-reports-submitted-by-dr-hunt.html



In brief confirmation was given of two separate reports having been made by Dr Hunt, the second of these having been assigned a "Thames Valley Police" or "TVP" number.  From the information above it seems that they were given a COR reference, "COR" I'm guessing stands for correspondence.  I am unable to find any "COR" documents in the "Evidence" tab.

A couple of quick points relevant to my question 1: firstly Dr Hunt is using the same internal reference for each.  Although obviously dealing with the same body I would have thought he might have added a suffix ( /1 and /2 say) to distinguish between them.  Secondly the writer of the FOI response is suggesting that the 25 July report may have been lodged as two copies - one from Dr Hunt and one from the police, if so why no evidence of two copies when the archive was searched.  I don't believe that Dr Hunt sent his report in anyway, that was the job of the coroner after he had sorted out the (incomplete) death certificate.  In the earlier FOI in the link above the first report from Dr Hunt was submitted and the second logged - a subtle difference!   Incidentally if you go to the "Press Notices" tab on the Hutton site you will see that the website was launched on 30 July 2003.

Moving on to my questions 2 and 3 and it will be seen that reports from Mr Green and Dr Hickey don't appear on the Hutton site!!  The implication is that Lord Hutton wasn't presented with the results of the 50 or so laboratory tests that Mr Green was carrying out nor any results of testing carried out by Dr Hickey.  There are already enormous question marks about the failure to remark on the lack of fingerprints on objects found in the proximity of the body, now it seems that other tests haven't been worthy of Lord Hutton's attention. 

In his evidence ACC Page goes to some length to itemise the places where samples were taken.  This is ACC Page's first visit with Mr Dingemans doing the questioning:

Q. And what tests were taken at the scene? Any swabs taken?
A. Yes, there was a very thorough swabbing of the body at the scene. Samples of all blood splattering were taken.
Q. Right.
A. Samples of every pool of blood were taken. Samples of every stain of blood on Dr Kelly's clothing were taken.  The items that I have mentioned, the knife, the Evian bottle, the watch, the hat, were all swabbed. The Evian bottle, the mobile phone, the watch were swabbed to establish whether there was any DNA present other than Dr Kelly's.

This being Hutton then of course there is no follow up question 'And the results of these tests were ... ?'

The failure to consider the tests is yet further evidence of the total inadequacy of the inquiry process.