Depressing news from Spain…….

Trevor Wade in happier times

For the past year I have been actively supporting the plight of  a Lincolnshire pensioner who was arrested in Spain after being duped into driving a car which contained £22 million worth of cocaine. Most criminals will tell you they are innocent or have been stitched up and for that reason alone I don’t tend to get involved in miscarriage of justice cases unless there is clear evidence that the person involved is innocent. But I have absolutely no doubt that the case of  Trevor Wade passes that test. Trevor’s plight is detailed in the revised edition of Hoods, so I won’t duplicate those details here but in short, the biggest problem is that Trevor has been held in prison now, without trial, since September 2007. Today I feel an overwhelming sense of anger and sadness after I learned that his lawyer believes a trial may not take place until April 2011. It is frankly shocking that a 66-year-old man in poor health, against whom there is no evidence other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time, can be left to rot in a foreign prison without trial for almost three years. I do not blame the Spanish for Trevor’s plight, they were only following the trail given to them by British investigators at the Serious Organised Crime Agency. SOCA has admitted it has no evidence on Trevor Wade but says it cannot interfere in the judicial process of a foreign power. Ditto the Foreign Office. But the fact is they don’t appear to be doing anything else to resolve the matter either, almost as if to say they would rather it was swept under the carpet than admit when a costly mistake has been made. If this had been a case of a foreign national in the UK then Trevor would undoubtedly be home with his family by now, either because there was no case to answer or through abuse of process rules. Even in the unlikely event he had gone to trial in the UK he would certainly have been given bail until the date of the hearing. At present, he is struggling to survive the regime in Leon Prison where the odd piece of Spanish Tortilla is often the only food he looks forward to eating. If there is anybody out there, either in SOCA or the Foreign Office, who has a conscience I would suggest that now is the time to make yourself known because all the apologies and platitudes in the world are going to mean nothing to Trevor’s family if he ends up living out his last days in that Spanish cell.

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