The Dunblane massacre

[Steve_uk]

This took place twenty-five years ago today. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2ycgc5

[Steve_uk]

In some ways there's a welter of information, which would take months to assimilate. The Cullen Inquiry did delve into Police interaction with the perpetrator, who had heretofore avoided prosecution through animal cunning and stealth. In October 2005 some edited documents were released through a review of the 100-year closure order by the Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd, but we don't know the exact number of those still being withheld. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-46721297

[Steve_uk]

I'm going to post two contrasting reviews of Sandra Uttley's book, Dunblane Unburied. It does seem haphazardly written, but is probably the one the Establishment most fears. I have read excerpts from it and will post in due course. There are three other books written, though two were unobtainable at the time of writing. They are: Predicate: Thomas Hamilton and the Dunblane Massacre by Peter Sotos, which seems to go off on a tangent on paedophilia and child pornography to the detriment of incisive criticism. The others are Dunblane: Our Year of Tears by Peter Samson and Alan Crow and Dunblane: Never Forget by Mick North, both books containing relatives' testimonies of that fateful day.

[Steve_uk]

Society has somehow been conditioned to avoid discussion about Thomas Hamilton. Revisiting his life would supposedly be painful for the parents of the victims. Re-examing interesting witness testimony is not allowed because protecting the identity of innocent children is paramount.

Against this backdrop, the lid has been firmly closed on discussion about many aspects of Thomas Hamilton's life. Sandra's book, conversely, raises a long series questions about the activities, and moreover acquaintances, of Thomas Hamilton. These questions arise mostly from examining official records which can be independently verified by the reader.

 How did Thomas Hamilton obtain and keep firearms licences for years when he was known to authorities to be unsuitable? Why were the checks and balances of the law at the time not effective?
- How did Thomas Hamilton manage to tyrannize and intimidate so many boys at his clubs and summer camps for years without being stopped, even though many parents complained to the police and councils?
- Given that Thomas Hamilton was known to be fond of photographing and videoing bare-chested young boys running around in shorts or swimming trunks, why was he allowed to continue doing this?
- Who were the regular visitors behind the closed curtains of Thomas Hamilton's home? Why did all the acquaintances of Thomas Hamilton at the Inquiry describe their contact with him as remote, infrequent and uninteresting?
- Hamilton bought new shirts a few days before the shooting. Yet when his house was searched after the shooting, the only clothes and cash that police found were one jacket and four 10p coins (and an empty wallet). Did he really intend to commit suicide that day? Or flee? Why did he stop after killing 17 people in 3 minutes? He had plenty of time to continue shooting - or to flee. Did someone stop him? (both Derrick Bird and Michael Ryan held out until the bitter end). Or, indeed, did someone else do the shooting, then quickly set him up as a suicide before fleeing via the fire exit?

The book identifies a number of key witnesses, whose evidence the Cullen Report inexplicably has disregarded:

* off-duty police officer Grant McCutcheon, who unwittingly appeared at the crime scene while taking his children to the school, he was the only police officer to see Thomas Hamilton dying. In his statement (not submitted to the Inquiry) he says he saw two pistols beside Thomas Hamilton (the official report says there were two pistols plus two revolvers and that Thomas Hamilton shot himself with a revolver).
* Jamie Cook, the pupil whom Hamilton repeatedly asked about directions to the Assembly Hall and to confirm that assembly begins at 9.30 (which on this day it didn't - the pupils went to the gym instead);
* David Scott, the student teacher who supposedly witnessed Thomas Hamilton's act of suicide but, despite his enormous significance, did not appear before the Inquiry and bizarrely is not even named in the official report (every other significant staff member at the scene is named; this one however is only identified anonymously as "a student teacher");
* the unidentified man who drove off after talking to Thomas Hamilton outside his house between 8.00 and 8.40 a.m.; or the neighbour Cathleen Boswell Kerr who witnessed this;
* Acting Detective Constable Graham Capes, who supposedly saw Thomas Hamilton's van setting off half an hour earlier than the official version and taking a road which leads to Bannockburn, not Dunblane.
* Ambulancewoman Alison Irvine, who arrived at 9.57 to see no uniformed police officers or marked cars at the school (moreover, the official report states the exact time of almost every event except the arrival of the police).
* DCS John Ogg, who states emphatically that headmaster Ron Taylor called the police on their non-emergency Stirling number at 9.41 (the report states he made an emergency call to the police at 9.41; Ron Taylor himself states emphatically that he dialled 999);
* Neighbours Grace and Jim Ogilvie, who saw regular visitors at Thomas Hamilton's house right up to his last days (while no witness at the Inquiry admitted visiting him during the last months of his life);
* and many others.

[Steve_uk]

In the interest of balance (and before you fork out £50) I add a review from a dissatisfied customer:

It's difficult to put into words just how appallingly bad this book is. Ignoring the actual content for now, the first thing the reader notices is how poorly it is written. One would expect that the author would do some preliminary introduction for a bit of background, discuss the events leading up to and after the massacre and then move onto her cover up allegations. Instead, you're greeted with a narrative that's all over the place, jumping backwards and forwards with huge swathes of meaningless and unimportant comment.

The cover up allegations veer from the far fetched to the downright ludicrous and whilst the author keeps alleging a cover up, it's not always clear what she is suggesting was actually covered up. There is suggestion that Hamilton may have been killed by the Police rather than him having committed suicide. Why the Police (who were criticized in the Cullen report) would want to cover this up is never explained.

The allegations continue to get more ridiculous - the Police may have been following Hamilton and allowed the shootings to happen. A Masonic group may have prevented some of the evidence coming to light. A paedophile gang that consisted of high ranking civic figures may have suppressed some of the evidence because Thomas Hamilton was known to them, was one of them or was friendly of them. If the subject matter wasn't so tragic, these claims would be laughable. Particularly so since the author offers NOT ONE piece of evidence to back any of these claims.

Three different people can see the same single incident and have three different interpretations, and never is this more obvious when people have to give evidence or appear in court. This seems lost on the author who accuses some witnesses of lying because their evidence differs from somebody else's who the author has chosen to believe.

There are some witness statements at the end of the book that at least give some insight into the kind of man Thomas Hamilton was (something Ms Uttley fails to do) but even this is clouded by a collection of meaningless and unhelpful e-mails between the author and some people referred to as J, S, and G.

I understand that the pro gun lobby helped fund some of the earlier print runs of this book but I cant for the life of me understand why. It's so badly written I fail to see what they could possibly have gained from it's publication becuase it doesn't read as particularly biased either way.

The tragedy that was Dunblane deserves a far more readable and accurate book. Avoid this one.

[guest29835]

How did Thomas Hamilton obtain and keep firearms licences for years when he was known to authorities to be unsuitable? Why were the checks and balances of the law at the time not effective?

How was he known to the authorities as unsuitable?  And in what sense was he unsuitable?

[Steve_uk]

How was he known to the authorities as unsuitable?  And in what sense was he unsuitable?

Well parents had made numerous complaints about the way he had treated their children in his care. But he had ingratiated himself with Police by offering them discounts in his Woodcraft DIY shop. He had seen Michael Forsyth MP in person and seemed to have won him over. He made complaints to the Ombudsman and won his case.

[guest29835]

Well parents had made numerous complaints about the way he had treated their children in his care. But he had ingratiated himself with Police by offering them discounts in his Woodcraft DIY shop. He had seen Michael Forsyth MP in person and seemed to have won him over. He made complaints to the Ombudsman and won his case.

In general terms, what were the complaints about?  What had he allegedly done?  What evidence was available to back up the complaints?  What did he complain to the Ombudsman about?

[Steve_uk]

In general terms, what were the complaints about?  What had he allegedly done?  What evidence was available to back up the complaints?  What did he complain to the Ombudsman about?

Well he organized one trip to the Highlands as Scout Leader (he was the only adult) but no accommodation had been booked and he and eight boys ended up sleeping in a camper van. There were dangerous and inappropriate activities occurring on Scout trips along with insanitary conditions. There were rumours about his activities, which Hamilton attempted to scotch by appealing to the Ombudsman in 1984. He won his case because it seems some parents backed him up. Incredibly it also seems that Michael Forsyth MP had been on his side. https://youtu.be/3bi6Hl4VSPg

[guest29835]

Well he organized one trip to the Highlands as Scout Leader (he was the only adult) but no accommodation had been booked and he and eight boys ended up sleeping in a camper van. There were dangerous and inappropriate activities occurring on Scout trips along with insanitary conditions. There were rumours about his activities, which Hamilton attempted to scotch by appealing to the Ombudsman in 1984. He won his case because it seems some parents backed him up. Incredibly it also seems that Michael Forsyth MP had been on his side. https://youtu.be/3bi6Hl4VSPg

If Michael Forsyth MP was on his side, maybe that's because he is a very fair man who thought Hamilton was being treated unfairly?  Sometimes things are what they appear to be.

I am just trying to understand why it is assumed that Hamilton should not have had a firearms certificate.  From what you say, it looks like there was nothing that anybody could prove or pinpoint that would have been enough to disqualify him in the eyes of an officer examining him.  At the end of the day, people can say this, that and other, but unless things can be established, it amounts to little more than discriminating on the basis of gossip and unsubstantiated claims and rumour.

It also occurs to me that Hamilton, being a single man with involvement in the care of young people, was in a particularly vulnerable position.  It's the easiest thing in the world to make an allegation, and it is not uncommon for groups of people to band together like a mob against an individual who is odd or eccentric or thought of as 'weird' and start repeating allegations and making new ones.  I have seen this happen and it can reach the point that it takes on a life of its own, with hardly anybody stopping to reflect on whether what it being said is fair or has any basis. 

Dunblane is a small rural town in central Scotland.  It's a bit out of the way and quite a large section of the population living there will be the types who are narrow-minded and rush to judgement about people.  A character like Hamilton, who has lived conspicuously in the general area for much of his life, would be well-known and the subject of gossip and rumour, some of it true, much of it untrue and malicious mischief-making.

It is said that Hamilton was a paedophile or some sort of child molester, but there is nothing conclusive that establishes this and the bits of evidence that supposedly do so are either claims that were only made after the shootings, or anecdotes that are open to wide interpretation.  As an example, it is claimed that he had photos of semi-naked boys from his Boys' Club on his living room wall, but we must remember these were more innocent times and it may be that Hamilton had those photos on his wall simply because it was his Boys' Club and he wanted to be reminded about his work, which he may have been proud of.

I do wonder if in fact Thomas Hamilton was not a paedophile or child molester and what really occurred here is that after living all his adult life as an unhappy and misunderstood person, he eventually snapped.  My theory on this centres around the fact that Hamilton had a grievance against the headmaster of the school where the shootings would take place.  I think this enraged Hamilton, not because he was up to anything seriously untoward, but because it was one more instance of somebody grabbing the wrong end of the stick.  It is possible that Hamilton initially decided to kill himself and the headmaster, maybe bringing ammunition with him because he had a vague plan to take the headmaster hostage rather than commit murder-suicide straight-away; but, when he arrived at the school, his plans changed and he decided to kill himself and some of the children - this may have happened because the headmaster was absent from his office at the relevant moment.

- Hamilton bought new shirts a few days before the shooting. Yet when his house was searched after the shooting, the only clothes and cash that police found were one jacket and four 10p coins (and an empty wallet). Did he really intend to commit suicide that day? Or flee? Why did he stop after killing 17 people in 3 minutes? He had plenty of time to continue shooting - or to flee. Did someone stop him? (both Derrick Bird and Michael Ryan held out until the bitter end). Or, indeed, did someone else do the shooting, then quickly set him up as a suicide before fleeing via the fire exit?

It could well be that Hamilton was killed by somebody else present and this is one of the reasons for Boyd's closure order.

[Steve_uk]

If Michael Forsyth MP was on his side, maybe that's because he is a very fair man who thought Hamilton was being treated unfairly?  Sometimes things are what they appear to be.

I am just trying to understand why it is assumed that Hamilton should not have had a firearms certificate.  From what you say, it looks like there was nothing that anybody could prove or pinpoint that would have been enough to disqualify him in the eyes of an officer examining him.  At the end of the day, people can say this, that and other, but unless things can be established, it amounts to little more than discriminating on the basis of gossip and unsubstantiated claims and rumour.

It also occurs to me that Hamilton, being a single man with involvement in the care of young people, was in a particularly vulnerable position.  It's the easiest thing in the world to make an allegation, and it is not uncommon for groups of people to band together like a mob against an individual who is odd or eccentric or thought of as 'weird' and start repeating allegations and making new ones.  I have seen this happen and it can reach the point that it takes on a life of its own, with hardly anybody stopping to reflect on whether what it being said is fair or has any basis. 

Dunblane is a small rural town in central Scotland.  It's a bit out of the way and quite a large section of the population living there will be the types who are narrow-minded and rush to judgement about people.  A character like Hamilton, who has lived conspicuously in the general area for much of his life, would be well-known and the subject of gossip and rumour, some of it true, much of it untrue and malicious mischief-making.

It is said that Hamilton was a paedophile or some sort of child molester, but there is nothing conclusive that establishes this and the bits of evidence that supposedly do so are either claims that were only made after the shootings, or anecdotes that are open to wide interpretation.  As an example, it is claimed that he had photos of semi-naked boys from his Boys' Club on his living room wall, but we must remember these were more innocent times and it may be that Hamilton had those photos on his wall simply because it was his Boys' Club and he wanted to be reminded about his work, which he may have been proud of.

I do wonder if in fact Thomas Hamilton was not a paedophile or child molester and what really occurred here is that after living all his adult life as an unhappy and misunderstood person, he eventually snapped.  My theory on this centres around the fact that Hamilton had a grievance against the headmaster of the school where the shootings would take place.  I think this enraged Hamilton, not because he was up to anything seriously untoward, but because it was one more instance of somebody grabbing the wrong end of the stick.  It is possible that Hamilton initially decided to kill himself and the headmaster, maybe bringing ammunition with him because he had a vague plan to take the headmaster hostage rather than commit murder-suicide straight-away; but, when he arrived at the school, his plans changed and he decided to kill himself and some of the children - this may have happened because the headmaster was absent from his office at the relevant moment.

It could well be that Hamilton was killed by somebody else present and this is one of the reasons for Boyd's closure order.

I take a different view. I think he was obsessed with control, whether this was achieved with a gun, through physical force or mind-control. He studied the Children Act of 1989, which introduced stringent conditions on persons running clubs for under-eights, so he proceeded to recruit over-eights. In the Cullen Inquiry it came out that Hamilton on Thursday 7th March 1996 had asked Jamie Cook, a member of one of his clubs, what time assembly took place at the school along with other questions about the school layout.

It's quite evident to me that Thomas Hamilton was a broken man bent on revenge, that the allegations made against him were true, whether they could be proved in a court of law or not, that he possessed no professional qualifications to run such clubs, that he was an unsuitable candidate for possession of a firearms certificate, and that the attack on children of Primary age had been planned days in advance.

[guest29835]

I take a different view. I think he was obsessed with control, whether this was achieved with a gun, through physical force or mind-control. He studied the Children Act of 1989, which introduced stringent conditions on persons running clubs for under-eights, so he proceeded to recruit over-eights. In the Cullen Inquiry it came out that Hamilton on Thursday 7th March 1996 had asked Jamie Cook, a member of one of his clubs, what time assembly took place at the school along with other questions about the school layout.

Yes, this evidence was heard by Cullen from a nine year old boy.  What do you mean when you say the Cullen Report disregarded this evidence?  Surely such evidence can only assist the official narrative?

It's quite evident to me that Thomas Hamilton was a broken man bent on revenge, that the allegations made against him were true, whether they could be proved in a court of law or not, that he possessed no professional qualifications to run such clubs, that he was an unsuitable candidate for possession of a firearms certificate, and that the attack on children of Primary age had been planned days in advance.

I don't doubt that much of what was said about Hamilton was true, but my point is that even the stuff that was true would not necessarily have been enough in those days to disqualify Hamilton from a firearms certificate or contact with young people.  Society has become more risk averse now, and if Hamilton was around today, he would probably get nowhere; but, back then there was greater respect for due process, less formality and more of an autonomous attitude to risk and personal responsibility. 

Having photos of semi-naked boys on your living room wall sounds very incriminating, but is it?  Context is everything.  Hamilton ran a boys' club and the photos were of members of his Club.  Why shouldn't he have such photos on his wall?

I recall as a boy being able to buy jokey postcards from English working class seaside towns in Essex and the north of England that included photos of naked children.  Nobody seemed to think of that as anything untoward.  Society was more innocent back then and people in general were less high-strung and paranoid than today.

Why would Hamilton insist on the boys being semi-naked?  Well again I think back to my own school days and those old-style gyms where they made you climb ropes and mess around on pommel horses and so on.  We boys had to wear shorts only.  I think that was just the culture in education back then; there was no suspicious undertone or subtext to it.  I assume it harked back to some sort of neo-Spartan tradition in schools.

Then there's the accusation that a younger Hamilton made the children sleep out in a van when he was a novice scout master.  A big fuss was made about this, even at the time.  Well, I was in the Scouts and I recall being required to sleep in a bivvy bag on the summit of a Yorkshire mountain in the middle of winter.  I don't remember anybody getting into trouble for it.  Quite the opposite: it seemed to be expected that we would do this. 

You mention professional qualifications to run clubs.  I don't know this for sure, but I strongly suspect that virtually every Scout master I encountered as a youth between the ages of roughly 10 and 17 was completely unqualified for the role.  Most of them were ordinary blue collar types - factory workers, labourers, and so on - and probably had no formal qualifications at all, never mind in how to teach, instruct and mentor young people.  I recall two of them were labourers on a building site.  I imagine they learned how to be Scout masters mostly by watching other people do it.

[Steve_uk]

To answer your points in one post it seems to me that information resided with Central Scotland Police, Strathclyde Police (for the Loch Lomond trip in 1988), he had been cautioned by Lothian and Borders Police in 1994 for an indecency incident, as early as 1993 George Robertson MP had misgvings: https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/12038563.two-mps-had-very-different-first-impressions-of-killer-thomas-hamilton-reports-iain-wilson-a-gym-scene-from-hitler-youth/

The child abuse and firearms certificate issues: http://dunblane.site/dspaulhughesreport.htm

It was left with two of the parents to take some direct action: http://dunblane.site/hagger.htm

[guest29835]

To answer your points in one post it seems to me that information resided with Central Scotland Police, Strathclyde Police (for the Loch Lomond trip in 1988), he had been cautioned by Lothian and Borders Police in 1994 for an indecency incident, as early as 1993 George Robertson MP had misgvings: https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/12038563.two-mps-had-very-different-first-impressions-of-killer-thomas-hamilton-reports-iain-wilson-a-gym-scene-from-hitler-youth/

The child abuse and firearms certificate issues: http://dunblane.site/dspaulhughesreport.htm

It was left with two of the parents to take some direct action: http://dunblane.site/hagger.htm

Thanks, but none of that answers my points.

There is nothing whatsoever in the Herald article to tell me that Hamilton was unsuitable for a firearms certificate or unsuitable to be around children.  It just comes across as a series of people who disliked him and/or did not approve of his Spartan methods.  Of course, people are entitled to take these views, especially when children are involved, and they can withdraw their children from activities. 

There is a paragraph in the article that mentions the boys were stripped to the waist and ordered about and what not by two or three men who were mingling among them.  My response to that is: So what?  I've already mentioned that when I was a boy, similar happened in the school gym.  I imagine this was the case in school gyms up and down England.  I recall when I was learning karate as a boy and then a youth, it was very rough-and-ready.  I was occasionally injured or knocked to the floor and on one occasion I suffered a black eye. I was expected just to carry on.  Probably nowadays you'd have child protection all over it.

I can't see any mention of a caution in the links you have provided.  It does say he was questioned under caution by police due to allegations, which is not the same as being cautioned, so maybe you've got that confused; but if I have missed it, then I apologise.  Being questioned under caution is just normal investigative procedure.  It doesn't imply guilt, and surely if there was anything in the allegation, he would have been charged anyway, not just cautioned.

Certainly, if I was in the same position as the Dunblane parents were prior to the shootings, I would want somebody like Thomas Hamilton investigated, and probably placed under supervision and monitoring for a while.  Yet it seems to me there was never any solid evidence for the various allegations.  It was all rumour, gossip and unsubstantiated claims, and you don't mention in your posts that he enjoyed wide support in the community.  Evidently, lots of parents liked him and trusted him.

Maybe this explains why Cullen disregarded Jamie Cook's evidence?  Like me, Cullen may have sensed that, while Hamilton was certainly a strange bird and 'one to watch', as they say, at the same time he was largely the victim of community malignation and the complaint from the headmaster was the last straw: the shooting happened because, in the end, he snapped.  It's a theory as good as any other, I think, and it may also explain the closure order.  It could be that a fuller examination of the tragedy at Dunblane would reveal information that does not reflect well on the community-at-large, hence Cullen and Boyd decided to frustrate any further investigations and inquiries in the interests of sensitivity to the families of the dead.  I also have a hunch that Hamilton in the end didn't manage to shoot himself, but was instead executed by somebody else present.

But even if I am right about all this, none of it can excuse Hamilton's actions.  He is beyond the pale.

[Steve_uk]

Well let me be more specific in some of the allegations which came out in the Cullen report:

In camps in the 1970s Hamilton allowed boys as young as 14 to consume alcohol. One boy was paid to strip to the waist and suffer .22 air gun pellets fired into his back at 50 yards. This would sometimes cause injury but payment would be withheld if he called out. At another camp Hamilton tried to get a boy to swallow a bullet. On another expedition one boy awoke in the middle of the night to find Hamilton seated on a box pointing a gun at him.

There are so many allegations made about the disorganized running of Hamilton's camps and sports clubs in the Cullen Report, the taking of photographs of the boys in swimming trunks, the slapping of boys on occasion, his refusal to allow the boys any parental contact, the poor quality of food, the insanitary conditions. It was obvious to the most casual observer that he possessed an unnatural interest in the boys within his care, yet nobody had the guts to do anything, secure in their own little empires, when they should have been doing the jobs for which taxpayers paid them.

It really makes me sick to dwell on it.