Daily Mail - 23.08.2019

Daily Mail, Friday, August 23, 2019 Page 29

‘Grenfell ghoul’ cleared

af ter evidence blunders

Daily Mail Reporter

Judge’s fury as key interviews

with police are only revealed

as she is about to give verdict

A PROPERTY millionaire

who filmed an effigy of

Grenfell Tower being burned

was cleared yesterday after

blunders meant key evidence

had not been revealed.

Paul Bussetti, 47, was accused of

‘making a mockery’ of the 72

victims of the inferno after a video

of the bonfire was posted on

YouTube last year.

In the clip, a group of men and

women laugh and shout ‘help me’

and ‘jump out of the window’ as the

cardboard effigy and its figures are

engulfed in flames.

Prosecutors argued the video was

grossly offensive and fuelled by racist

humour, insisting the figures on the

side of the model depicted black and

Muslim occupants of the tower.

But as the judge was preparing to

give her verdict, at the end of a nine-

month criminal investigation, it dra-

matically emerged that two key

police interviews that supported the

defence had never been disclosed to

Mr Bussetti’s legal team.

Mr Bussetti, co-owner of an £8mil-

lion block of flats in south-west Lon-

don, had told Westminster magis-

trates’ court the incident was intended

as a joke. He said the figures on the

side of the effigy were actually mock-

ing versions of his friends.

The father of two was charged

with sending an offensive communi-

cation after sharing the video to two

WhatsApp chat groups.

A second video was filmed by another

partygoer, Peter Hancock, and this

was also shared with friends. One of

the two videos was then leaked on

YouTube, sparking outrage.

Yesterday, Chief Magistrate Emma

Arbuthnot cleared Mr Bussetti

because she could not be sure that it

was his video on YouTube.

The judge was deeply critical of

Scotland Yard and the Crown Prose-

cution Service over failures to disclose

key evidence to the defence. The

maker of the effigy, Steve Bull, and Mr

Hancock, had both told the Metro-

politan Police that the model figures

were intended to depict their friends.

Mr Hancock also told officers that

he had filmed the bonfire and sent

that clip to friends. He has never

faced criminal prosecution and was

not called to give evidence.

Upon hearing the fresh evidence,

the judge cleared Mr Bussetti

because the prosecution had failed to

prove the case against him.

‘I can’t be sure the video relied on

by the Crown is the one taken by the

defendant’, she said. ‘I can’t be sure

the cut-out images are not his friends.

I’m just appalled at the disclosure in

this case.’ Judge Arbuthnot said it

was only the vigilance of prosecutor

Philip Stott that had averted a

‘potential miscarriage of justice’, as

she demanded a full explanation.

Defence barrister Mark Summers

QC said in light of the revelations:

‘[It is] outrageous that anyone know-

ing this sat through the cross-exami-

nation and let it continue.’

During the trial, racist messages Mr

Bussetti, from South London, had

received and shared were shown. But

Mrs Arbuthnot said they were not

enough to ‘fill the holes’ in the prose-

cution, and he denied being racist.

The fiasco comes after a string of

sexual assault cases collapsed when

evidence emerged at the last minute.

You can’t quill me that easily!

Blind hedgehog stolen by van

thieves is found four days later

GIVEN that he had been

kidnapped and left on his

own for four days, you

would expect him to be

feeling a bit prickly.

But Stephen the blind hedge-

hog is already back to his usual

self after being reunited with

his owners.

‘As soon as he heard my voice

he came straight to the front of

the box and put his nose in the

air,’ said Frank Tett, 80, after

his pet hedgehog was found

near a park in Leeds.

He had feared the worst when

Stephen was taken along with

his van on Saturday morning in

Leeds. But on Wednesday his

wife, Veronica, 78, received a

call to say the hedgehog was

alive and well. Mr Tett said: ‘We

had both come to the realisa-

tion that he was probably dead.

Miracles do happen. I think he

had been watered and fed a bit

because he was not starving

when we collected him.’

Mr Tett said he had travelled

thousands of miles with

Stephen – who was sprayed

with chemicals and blinded this

year – to shows and markets to

raise money for Andrew’s

Hedgehog Hospital, which the

couple run from the village of

Appleby near Scunthorpe.

Stephen, who is just over a

year old, had been taken to a

market in Albion Street, Leeds,

to raise awareness about hedge-

hogs when Mr Tett’s Vauxhall

Combo van was stolen.

He was found by a couple near

a park in Middleton, Leeds,

alongside a bag of the charity’s

business cards.

Mr Tett said: ‘The couple

had taken him back home and

said they couldn’t just leave

him there.

‘We did offer them a reward,

but they said “don’t be silly”

and instead gave our charity a

donation. They were lovely.’

He added that the van has

still not been found.

Safe and sound: Stephen

Cleared: Paul Bussetti and the effigy of Grenfell Tower

By Arthur Martin

‘I’m appalled at

the disclosure’