Paying For Justice?

A father whose son's body was found in a concrete mixer lorry told today of his shock after he was sent a bill of more than £1,700 for its upkeep and preparation for the inquest.

Say what?

Lee Balkwell, 33, was discovered crushed between the vehicle's drum and chassis on a pile of cement at an Upminster farm in 2002.

Police had decided the death was an accident but the 2008 inquest ruled the father of one was unlawfully killed.

Interesting…

Mr Balkwell believes that his son was murdered and his body placed in the mixer as a cover-up.

Kent Police are now reviewing the case after an independent probe into the original inquiry, at the request of the Independent Police Complaints Commission, uncovered major flaws by Essex officers.

Even more interesting…

Mr Balkwell, 64, said he received the demand last month from Scammell Commercial, the firm employed to maintain the lorry. He said the bill for £1,706.52 related to preparing the vehicle for viewing by the jury in 2008.

It states that the cement mixer was "cleaned, rewired and fitted with a new battery" so the jury could view it in "full working order".

Mr Balkwell, from Hornchurch, said: "The lorry is part of the crime scene and they expect the father of the man killed to pay for its upkeep. We have enough to remind us we don't have our son any more without getting this bill.

"It's been nearly nine years, we've had three delayed inquests and they wouldn't let us have an inquest for nearly six years. This is causing us a lot of pain but sometimes you have to push yourself to find out the truth. We've spent more than £100,000 so far on inquests and lost the house over it."

When the Chinese authorities bill the family of a condemned man for the bullet used to execute him, it’s seen as ‘barbaric’ and ‘inhumane’.

So why are their no anguished CiF columns protesting this?

His representative Tony Bennett said: "The bill was first presented to Mr Balk- well three years ago. He wrote to the coroner and police asking if they could pay it and assumed that had been done. He had no reason to think otherwise.

"We believe it's the coroner's job to pay because it was the coroner who asked for the lorry to be preserved and it was a central part of the inquest."

Quite!

Essex Police and the coroner said the bill was "under consideration".

David Scammell, chief executive of Scammell Commercial, refused to comment.

Nice little advert for your company, eh? I wonder if you agree that ‘there’s no such thing as bad publicity’?

But it’s hard not to see this as more than just simple state incompetence and unfeeling. Is it really more of a ‘Query our conclusions and we’ll make it hard for you’ tactic..?