Reply #31: It took a court subpoena to get British Ariways to release records [View All]

[muriel_volestrangler]

which led to the conviction of an ex-Conservative cabinet minister. Horray!

After the first week of the Aitken libel action last June, the Guardianand Granada journalists looked glum. The former MP (he lost his safe seat in the May landslide) was lying all right, but he was lying with such charm, verve and enthusiasm that he looked and sounded like a winner. The case seemed lost. The dramatic story of how Aitken was finally defeated by his own lies is superbly set out in the final chapters of this book. The truth came out not by due process of law, but thanks to a mixture of journalistic diligence and sheer good fortune. The Swiss hotel where Mrs Aitken was in fact staying that September weekend had, by chance, gone bust. A Guardian reporter, Owen Bowcott, begged the receivers for access to records which would normally have been kept miles out of his reach. Against all the odds, permission was granted. By chance, the records included a reference to an American Express account, which revealed that Mrs Aitken had hired a car and dumped it in Switzerland at precisely the time she was meant to be paying the bill at the Paris Ritz. If Mrs Aitken had flown to Switzerland on Swissair, the flight documents would have been kept secret. By chance, she flew British Airways, whose staff, after the inevitable subpoena, released the necessary documents to the court in the nick of time: Mrs Aitken, it turned out, had flown directly to Switzerland. She had not been in Paris that weekend. She did not pay any bill at the Ritz. Aitken was a liar. To defend his own lies, he had enlisted his wife and teenage daughter to lie on his behalf in witness statements which, but for the last-minute revelations, would have added up to perjury.

http://lrb.veriovps.co.uk/v20/n01/foot01_.html

There is no way the media can get hold of flight records without a court order.