Stephen Kay was originally arrested in what turned out to be a botched high-profile raid on Lune Street back in September 2010 after a number of drunken phone calls made to police by Nathan Wilkinson saying he wishes to provide intelligence on people he had fallen out with that are dealing drugs in the area, Wilkinson him self a heavy drink and drug user with a history of drink driving and domestic abuse began rambling on about a man that was questioned along with a number of other people about an incident on crime watch in 1999, he claims he knew who was responsible. Wilkinson and Kay were arrested but Wilkinson later admitted he made the calls to get at Mr Kay for sleeping with his ex-girlfriend. The original arrest led to the evacuation of around 80 people and major disruption to the Lune Street area of Lancaster as suspicious devices were thought to be found. The devices turned out to be harmless film and military memorabilia that Mr Kay kept in a hallway display cabinet. Both  Mr Kay and Mr Wilkinson was then released without charge. The officer in charge of the enquiry, Sergeant Clive O'Beirne was left humiliated and his reputation now damaged, O'Beirne, desperate to get him self selected to work on the then upcoming Hillsborough inquiry and end his career working on a high profile case , adopted a “Dirty Harry” style of policing. A conviction was needed at any cost.

 

Mr Kay then contacted a journalist asking for the facts to be made correct after it was wrongly published that the police had found an “arsenal of weapons”

 

Mr Kay was arrested again in August 2012 and charged after the police approached Wilkinson and asked him to make a fresh statement and to become a prosecution witness. A second witness would also be needed, Robert Mayor, a neighbour of Mr Kay's, manufactured a statement  claiming Mr Kay admitted the offence to him. At the first trial Mr Kay was found not guilty of sending an explosive device, the trial then collapsed when Mr Mayor who has previously had a sexual relationship with a 15 year old schoolgirl and was now the partner of a serving police officer was proved to be an unreliable witness. A second trial was then called. Mr Kay was found guilty with circumstantial evidence alone by a majority verdict at retrial after LHD solicitors of Lancaster failed to obtain court transcripts from the first trial allowing witnesses to change their version of events. Despite this failure in the court process Mr Kay was found guilty and sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court.

 

Speaking after the sentencing Sergeant Clive O'Beirne said: “We are really happy with the sentence given today and hope it shows that, despite the incident taking place 14 years ago Lancashire Constabulary will never forget about a case and all major crime will continue to be reviewed and re-investigated until we find out the "truth".

 

I would like to apologise and thank everybody for their patience and co-operation during this investigation, particularly during the disruption caused by the first raid on Lune street.

 

A number of witness statements that were never shown to the jury have now come to light and this has cast serious doubt on the conviction, these statements were never used in court and were not made available to the defendant, the statements show other motives previously denied in court, it allows the incident to be timelined and shows how little work went into the preparation of the defence.

 

Speaking about the conviction Mr Kay says "This case has never been about public safety, innocence or guilt or who has done what, the raid in 2010 disrupted a lot of people and cost a lot of money, this conviction is about justifying that, to do so they lied about danger to the public. Sergeant Clive O'Beirne and other police officers behaved like gamblers chasing their losses and they were willing to do anything to get a conviction. There is always a danger of allowing convictions on circumstantial evidence alone. The evidence is often cherry picked. It is important that when giving a statement to the police that people check that what is in the statement is what they have actually said before they sign it”.

 

The problem I have got now is that the way the law is, it doesn't allow people to appeal on unused evidence regardless of the importance of that evidence. If your solicitors missed it there's nothing you can do about it.

 

It says something when Joanna White, Senior Crown Prosecutor, says  “ there was no direct evidence of Kay committing the offences”  so she  commissioned a report from a clinical psychologist. This is a clinical psychologist paid by the police/CPS that has never met me and has never even spoke to me, A  clinical psychologist producing a report based solely on what a policeman has told them. The compelling evidence she talks about is the statements given by Robert Mayor who invited me out for a drink with himself and his girlfriend just three days prior to him making his statement, proven to be an unreliable witness in court, and the partner of a police officer, looking back this was clearly entrapment. and then Nathan Wilkinson who made a number of drunken phone calls to the police telling them that he is a “substance user” and a heavy drinker,  It is clear that when psychology is used in crime, it means there is no evidence so psychology is a way of manufacturing some.