Yesterday the London Times broke the latest news on the fate of disgraced British climatologist Phil Jones, of the University of East Anglia (UEA). Jones breached the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by refusing to comply with requests for data concerning claims by its scientists that man-made emissions were causing global warming. The Times reports that the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) decided that the UEA failed in its duties under the Act but said that it could not prosecute those involved because the complaint was made too late.
What the Times and the rest of the media are overlooking is that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), not the ICO, is responsible for announcing the results of the police investigation into the Climategate scandal. The ICO is merely a non-departmental public body which reports directly to Parliament, sponsored by the Ministry of Justice and deals solely with data protection, FOIA regulations, privacy, electronic communications regulations and environmental regulations.
What is not being intelligently reported is that Jones is still liable as lead conspirator in the UK’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) and may face prosecution under the United Kingdom Fraud Act (2006). If convicted of the offense of fraud by either false representation, failing to disclose information or fraud by abuse of his position, he stands liable to a maximum penalty of ten years imprisonment.
In this article I shall demonstrate that the fuss over the FOIA infringement, although in itself succeeding in achieving no conviction, does demonstrate that the ICO has acted improperly and may have prejudiced the outcome of any prosecution Jones may face for far more serious offenses for false representation (section 2) and failing to disclose information (section 3) under the Fraud Act (2006).
I strongly urge interested readers to study the article shown here, written by Norman Baird, for a fuller explanation of the scope of the Fraud Act (2006) and the implications in the Professor Jones scandal.
Although the offense of fraud may be committed in three ways, we shall only need to apply two in finding reasonable grounds to bring a prosecution in this case. All three forms of the offense require proof of dishonesty and an intention (i) to make a gain for himself or another, or (ii) to cause loss to another or to expose another to a risk of loss. “Gain” and “loss” are limited to gains or losses in terms of money or other property.
The forms of fraud directly relating to Phil Jones are:
Fraud by false representation (section 2)
Fraud by failing to disclose information (section 3)
ICO admits Jones is guilty of failing to disclose
http://www.climategate.com/climategate-professor-phil-jones-could-face-ten-years-on-fraud-charges
