Now I could curl up and keep quiet or I could just continue to articulate the events of these days.
As Ive progressed from day to day and gradually collected the bits of this story that I had no concept of before this year.. and pieced them together timidly at first.. not really believing the extent of the irregularities because of my own blatant culpability and due process legal condemnation all these years.
But as time went by and the fragments coalessed.. in various letters, and in my journals..I was able to share them with a few I trusted.
The revelations were observed and put on ice as improbable.. without coherent proof or witnesses and too little too late for any futile legal appeal.. and as such .. irrelevent in the whole scheme of things. Nothing I have uncovered here will change this situation now so firmly set in stone.
So.. anyway.. As you may know.. I continued to share various rather disjointed versions of the same thing over and over again with more and more seemingly interested friends and family.
The responses varied enormously.. most just "hmmfed" and went quiet.. some expressed kind words of sympathy and I could see their shoulders shrug in my minds-eye.. and most were horrified.. and responded with what seemed to me to be genuine consternation.
Well.. I put as much of what I had learnt out for examination and critisism by any and all that were interested enough to trawl through the often rather crudely garbled versions that I had managed to punch out letter by letter on this tiny toy fone.
I still have not managed to get the simple facts listed coherently enough to make easy logical reading even though by this time.. everything has started to make sense so clearly in my own head.
As Ive reiterated to every friend.. this information, however presented, is not going to change anything with my case or my captors.
Its not going to set me free from here or embarrass the prosecutors.
They will deny everything through their veiled amusement.
There is no proof, and the only witnesses here in all this are convicts who will not even give me their names because of the very real and dangerous influence of the criminal structures that got me here in the first place.
So there is nothing here other than a line up of events that interface perfectly with those that were alledged to have happened on the day of my arrest.
All we know.. assume and have unearthed.. has been set out for you to look at, so that you can decide for yourself what you want to make of it.
Similar cases and incidents may be compared and used to gauge the validity of my testimony and then can be assembled as logically as possible for your own un-affected and independent assessment.
There is no pressure or urging to make your own mind up over all this.
Nothing will change this situation and I dont intend for this to do anything like that.
Well you may then ask.. what purpose sharing all this irrellevent information may be about.?
I aknowledged most, if not all my indiscretions long ago, as I was so unceremoniously paraded in front of the world by my captors on allegations that were on the face of things..legally acceptable and almost credible.
But.. right from the beginning.. everything they did to me.. every legal procedure was flawed and blundered through with the momentum of a freight train.
Three primary offences were listed by them.
Posessesion of an old tyre containing a hidden amount of hashish.. or cannabis resin.
A tyre which was loaded into my vehicle along with other tools and equipment by two local citizens employed by the same company that contracted my company to transport cement for them to Iraq.
My company's "valuable" clients... for whom I frequently carried cash payments for my office in Kuwait.So there was no suspicion or clandestine activity and absolutely no cause for me to have suspected any foul play.
My cooperation in facilitating with these small tasks was all part of ensuring that my company continued to get further very lucrative haulage contracts.
That in itself, was reward enough for me.. I received no payment from them except chocolates for my wife once.
There is no further simpler explanation for my having possession of this damned tyre.
No finger prints or contact by me whatsoever were noted because there were none, and they knew then, what we did not.
They knew I would have no idea of the nature of this cargo that they had given me.. to hand to the police.
I drove directly to the location as directed and handed the whole pile of tools and equipment to the waiting police who only wanted the tyre and very strangely knew all about its contents.
Possession of a few cases of whiskey and vodka.
And thirdly... Possession of cash.
There were no banks or ATMs in Iraq and everything was on cash only basis.
You would be shocked at the cost of ship berthing and bunkering..services supplied by my company in Iraq, and paid for, in green notes carried by me.
The cash I carried that day, was small change... petty cash..and was stacked neatly in my briefcase and accompanied by documentation accounting for every cent, and that it belonged to three different companies which relied on my efficient delivery on regular basis.
a) Haulage payments for my company.. b) equipment hire payment by MM engineers.. and c) an entertainment allowance for KellR.. to be delivered by hand also all separately and meticulously documented in their own marked envelopes.
All this cash was authorised and legitimate.
As a logistic supplier.. my company was able to source and supply alcoholic beverages from a number of international venues.
We ran a very lucrative business supplying military and contracting groups with a wide variety of products.
My collegues and I used to supply a Rumanian transport contractor..Jumbo.. with whiskey packed into water boxes.. which he used to distribute by truck into Saudi.. Kuwait and Iran.
Exactly how he did all this we did not ask.. he was discrete and a very big customer of ours.
By arrangement I was able to procure from him.. the requirement for my office collegues and my two senior bosses back in Kuwait.. and this is what I carried with me in the company owned vehicle on the day of my arrest.
This amount of liquor was authorised by my bosses.. but I aknowledge..was an illegal cargo in Kuwait and by my own choice and risk.
None of this was sold or for sale by me. It was all paid for, by my company.
Half of it was earmarked for the end of year function at the British Embassy.
So yes.. I carried some incriminating items... but over time it became ever clearer to me.. that I had good reasons for being in possession of all of this.
The cash and liquor my own aknowledged indiscretion for which I am ever regretful.. but the involvement with such a capital offence as "trafficking in hashish", has been a very bitter pill for me to swallow all these years.
Also.. it was a bewildering and wholly dissapointing shock for all my team mates, who knew too, this was the work of very evil and powerful criminals.. and that there was not any possibility of our.. or my involvement.
So here I sit today.. still cloaked in shame and awkward silence as no one has ever been able to approach the reality of this situation with any logical alternative explanation.
That was until I was approached fairly recently by a number of individuals on completely separate occasions as I attended the education facility here.
Each one of these ugly drugdealing creeps approached me, at different times.. with an additional piece of information about the events that took place on the days leading up to my arrest.
They all claimed to recognise me from previous business transactions which, to me was mystery.
The only place they all saw me was in the full colour newspaper photos.There was no discrete blurring or black strip over my eyes.. the photos were clear.. and everyone saw my face that day.. near and far.Everyone in my company.. all the British Military who knew and trusted me..all the prisoners in every jail right across the middle east.. saw that article and full colour photos.
They made a meal of this so big that the scandal lasted weeks.
They feasted on me and my bewildered misery as my bosses and many collegues baulked in total disbelief as the appauling truth spread itself across the world.
I had no coherent explanation and gave up trying to figure out what had gone wrong.
Arabic word "Jelb" , meaning "Trafficker", was the filthy label that followed me wherever I went and still does to this day.
Ive been here six years and a year ago was the first time that elements from the extensive underworld imprisoned here near me but well separated... finally approached me as I sat out in the open watching a volleyball tournament. I cant quite recall exactly what it was that the first one said.. but it upset me so much and ....
It was nauseating.. and he followed me as I backed away in denial of the conflicting information he had.
It was adrenaline.. PTSD.. rearing its head as awful recollections of those terrifying events .. so long covered over... came flooding back as these henchmen smirked their ugly secrets to me. One in particular as the other nodded silently.
This total stranger.. a fellow pupil at the prison school, claimed to have known all about me.. where I was ,, and what I was doing,,, and with who.. and that was sickening and scary enough.
But what was worse was the huge amount of supplemented garbage that he had fitted in alongside all my perfectly legitimate and daily routines between Baghdad and Kuwait..
He told me through brown broken and missing teeth, that he had sat next to the controlling druglord right here in this prison in the same cell which he shared.. as the druglord discussed every detail of my movements with my lraqi supervisor back in Basra.
How the druglord and Danny discussed what l would be carrying and exactly what flight l would be taking, and even my estimated time of arrival in Kuwait.
Then he heard him setting up the details of an exchange with his lawyer..
This information was very sketchy but can be easily conceived.
The lawyer apparently even came to the prison to discuss complex and high level arrangements for the proposed exchange of information.
What happened next... as the stink breath told me he had heard blow for blow, as the druglord loudly gesticulated while talking on his illegal mobile phone.. was that there was a four or even five way conference call set up by them all.
Back in Basrah at my office l had working for me as Inchcape.. an english speaking lraqi supervisor.
Qusay..or Danny as he preferred to be called.
The druglord in prison in Kuwait phoned Danny who phoned me as l drove to go to my office that morning.
Danny who was in touch with a third party in jail.. requested me to collect their tools and contraband at a location in Kuwait.
Danny received the instructions from the druglord and relayed everything to me in english, as l drove along to do their bidding.
All this was monitored by the Cid drugsquad.. who were apparently.. the fourth party on the same conference call.
They were all speaking Arabic and l had little idea what they were discussing, nor did l care...and responded only to Danny who was the only one who spoke English.
l still have no idea of the extent of his involvement or participation in all of this.
As far as l was concerned... he and I were not doing anything subversive or illegal.
What comes to mind now, was the number of odd calls l used to get at all hours of the day and night in the weeks prior to this..when l was at my lraq office.
Calls from different people but most prominently... a lady.
It was an Arabic lady who was intent on doing business with Inchcape in lraq.
My understanding was that her international company, wanted to supply local haulers to undercut the present cement transport arrangements we at lnchcape already had in place.
She was evasive which l interpreted as cautious discretion ...and very insistent.
She asked me if she could set up a meeting with me at my office in Basra airport, and l explained to her repeatedly that l was not interested in any alternative or conflicting business arrangements.
She said clearly that she would make it all very worth my while.
I was not too keen or interested but she badgered me persistently until l agreed to meet her at 13H00 in the outside carpark on about first week of September.
I had nothing to lose, and any new business contacts in this competitive environment were always good to have on file.
I had promoted this networking activity vigorously over the years and had made an Inchcape presentation at the offices of the US Corps of engineers for the networking of all our mutual business contacts located in lraq.
Anyway.. l went to meet the lady and her colleagues in the parking lot as arranged...punctually at 1pm.. midday... and waited to no avail.
There was no call or a messenger.
Iraq contractors and even Kuwaitis are notoriously unreliable.. late or most often, held up.
After a half hour, l left and thought nothing of the entire episode.
This woman and her whole charade was all part of the CID sting operation designed to entrap me in their lascivious plot... and in so doing... free the imprisoned cartel druglords and shift the blame all onto me.
Well it all worked flawlessly..no one knew any of these details then and the more obvious evidencial ommissions were discretely overlooked and ignored.
My lawyer was so pleased to have saved my neck from the hangmans noose, that the more obvious aspects of my mistrial and conviction were ignored as they remain today.
To be continued....
