Yesterday, I pointed out that The Sun’s article on Gareth Williams’ death was full of speculation about how he may have been murdered by Al-Qaeda whilst offering no proof whatsoever to sustain this theory.
Today, the Daily Mail seems to be attempting to outdo The Sun in terms of baseless speculation:
The Mail’s headline is, at least, a little less brazen than The Sun’s but it’s still rather telling that it’s posed in the form of a question.
The online article, titled Did spy’s killer steal state secrets? MI6 agents search for ‘missing’ laptop or MP3 player after body-in-bag murder case (notice that the word “missing” is in quote marks), seems to be based entirely on this line alone:
Security services fear that his murderer could have taken classified material – possibly held on a laptop or MP3 player – which could be sold on to Britain’s enemies.
Again, no evidence is supplied to support the theory that “security services fear” this.
The Mail add:
Detectives yesterday spent a second day in the two-bedroom flat – believed to be one of several ‘safe houses’ in that area used by MI6 – looking for clues and trying to check if anything was missing.
A security source said: ‘Whatever the motives for this killing, there is the strong likelihood that items will have been taken and that is potentially a real problem because it may be difficult identifying exactly what he had at home.’
So, there is no missing laptop. Detectives are checking to see if anything was missing. It’s very possible that nothing was taken at all.
A possible link to Al-Qaeda (and even the Taliban) is implied with this line:
With much of the focus of MI6 on the terror threat posed by fanatics linked to Al Qaeda and the Taliban, one theory was that Mr Williams had been targeted because of his work.
In other words, the Mail’s reasoning goes something like this: Gareth Williams worked for MI6. MI6 mainly deals with foreign enemies. Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are foreign enemies. Therefore, Gareth Williams’ death must be related to that.
The Mail then, rather helpfully, provides a table of the many theories around Gareth Williams’ death:
Each and every one of these “theories” is based on nothing more than speculation, guess-work and spurious reasoning.
Again, just what we’ve come to expect from the Daily Mail…
Further down in the article the Mail informs us that:
Land Registry documents reveal that the block at number 36 is owned by a private company, New Rodina, whose details are hidden because it is registered in the British Virgin Islands and is not listed with Companies House.
The word rodina means motherland in Russian and Bulgarian.
Why they felt the need to mention that I’m not sure but, as worldwidewade said, the plot thickens…