McKie Fingerprint Case Fighting Fund and Public Inquiry

We have reported previously about the scandal of the McKie case and the justified calls for a Public Inquiry into the affair. Now the supporters of Ms McKie, a former policewoman wrongly accused of leaving her fingerprint at a murder scene, have launched a cash appeal to fight for an inquiry into the affair. Her father Iain has appealed for up to £100,000 to fund a judicial review of the government's decision not to hold a public inquiry into the case. If that isn't successful he believes the fund could finance a private prosecution.

Ms McKie, 43, from Troon in Ayrshire, was recently awarded a £750,000 out-of-court settlement by the Scottish Executive, following a nine-year battle to clear her name over a fingerprint at a murder scene that was wrongly attributed to her.

But the Scottish Executive has resisted mounting pressure to conduct a public inquiry into the scandalous conduct of the Scottish Criminal Justice system and SCRO (Scottish Criminal Records Office) in particular.

The executive has been trying to ignore calls for a Public Inquiry by claiming that the whole fiasco was due to "honest mistakes" but it is clear that this is not going to convince many people and the clamour for a proper - and public - investigation of this whole sorry mess is growing. An announcement that there will be a Public Inquiry is in our view long long overdue as the delays simply increase the suspicion that there is something badly rotten at the heart of the Scottish Criminal Justice establishment.
Rabbie