-Caveat Lector-
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/8833326?source=Ev
This isLONDON27/01/04 - News and city section
Was Dr Kelly murdered?By Isabel
Oakeshott and Hugh Dougherty, Evening Standard
Medical experts today raised the possibility that weapons expert David Kelly
did not kill himself.
Three senior specialists said they could not accept the evidence of how Dr
Kelly died presented to the Hutton Inquiry.
They believe that the cause of death as told to the inquiry was "improbable"
and called for a full inquest, raising the theory that Dr Kelly was murdered.
Their dramatic intervention comes the day before publication of Lord Hutton's
report into the circumstances surrounding Dr Kelly's death.
And at the weekend one of Dr Kelly's closest friends said she did not believe
he had committed suicide and claimed he had received death threats.
Dr Kelly was found dead near his Oxfordshire home last July after being named
as the source of a BBC report claiming the Government "sexed up" a dossier on
the threat from Iraq.
The inquiry was told that he bled to death after cutting his wrist. There was
evidence that he had also taken painkillers.
But in a letter to The Guardian the specialistsdetailed flaws in the official
explanation given by a Home Office pathologist.
The medical experts told the Evening Standard today that they were not
accusing anyone of murder but added: "The picture is not a happy one."
Today Oxfordshire coroner Nicholas Gardiner, who is considering holding a
full inquest into his death, revealed he had received "numerous" letters
questioning the account given to the inquiry.
The group of specialists, who include a trauma consultant and an
anaesthetist, said they believe Dr Kelly could not have died as a result of
cutting his wrist and taking an overdose of painkillers.
Speaking on behalf of a number of medics, consultant surgeon David Halpin
said: "There are all sorts of evidence that are most unsatisfactory.
"The picture is not a happy one. We would like this inquest reopened, so that
in this very important case, no stone is left unturned."
During the Hutton Inquiry forensic pathologist Dr Nicholas Hunt concluded
that the scientist bled to death from a selfinflicted wound to his left wrist.
Dr Halpin said today: "As specialist medical professionals, we do not
consider the evidence given at the Hutton Inquiry has demonstrated that Dr Kelly
committed suicide.
"We find it difficult to accept that a cut, such as the one described, could
result in death. It is very unlikely that this injury would have been fatal."
He added: "Because the case was so high profile, I imagined that the autopsy
and inquest would be carried out to the highest standard that our state could
muster.
"But the more I thought about it, the less certain I became that he could
have died from a cut to the left wrist."
Dr Kelly's body was found slumped by a tree in woods near his home.
Lying next to him were the Scout knife he had had since he was a boy, his
watch, his flat cap, his glasses, a container of his wife's painkillers and a
bottle of water.
Dr Hunt told the inquiry that the only artery involved - the ulnar artery -
had been completely sliced through.
But Dr Halpin, whose views are supported by diagnostic radiologist Stephen
Frost, and Searle Sennet, a specialist in anaesthesiology, said: "Arteries in
the wrist are of matchstick thickness and severing them does not lead to
life-threatening blood loss.
"When the artery is completely transected, as apparently happened in this
case, it retracts and the blood begins to clot. This limits the blood loss."
Today Mr Gardiner told the Standard he has received "numerous" letters
questioning the official version of Dr Kelly's death.
"This is just one of several I have received to this effect," he said. "I
hope to take any views into account on this matter."
Mr Gardiner formally handed over the powers of his inquest to Lord Hutton
after the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer, used a little-known law to order that
it be combined with the public inquiry.
"I expect to have a hearing in March at which I will make my ruling," said Mr
Gardiner today. The Hutton Inquiry had itself heard dramatic evidence that Dr
Kelly, 59, had forecast his own death.
He told a diplomat: "I will probably be found dead in the woods."
In the days before he died, he told one friend: "Many dark actors are playing
games."
This weekend a friend of Dr Kelly's, Mai Pederson, broke her silence to say
that she believed the weapons expert had been killed.
She told the Mail on Sunday: "I told police that the fact he was found dead
in the woods to me was not surprising.
"The fact they said he committed suicide was. His job was dangerous. He knew
it could cost him his life. He got death threats."
But her statement had not been passed to the Hutton Inquiry and key medical
evidence which would normally be made public at an inquest was
