Home Office Large Major Enquiry System

HOLMES

Home Office Large Major Enquiry System (HOLMES) is an information technology system that is predominantly used by United Kingdom police forces for the investigation of major incidents such as serial murders and high value frauds.

HOLMES is a single application which was developed by Unisys and McDonnell Douglas Information Systems (in competition, not co-operation) for the Police Information Technology Organisation under a private finance initiative. It provides total compatibility and consistency between all the police forces of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, as well as the Royal Military Police.

HOLMES is named after the fictional Arthur Conan Doyle private detective character Sherlock Holmes.

Background

HOLMES was introduced in 1985 and enabled law enforcement agencies to improve effectiveness and productivity in crime investigations. Like the later HOLMES 2, it was an administrative support system that was primarily designed to assist senior investigation officers in their management of the complexity of investigating serious crime. To this end, HOLMES carefully processed the mass of information it was provided with and ensured that no vital clues were overlooked.

HOLMES was also used to support the Police UK Casualty Bureau providing facilities to record reported missing persons, casualties, survivors and evacuees. The application provides matching facilities to aid the reconciliation of missing persons with those involved in the incident.

But the system had crucial weaknesses, too. It provided very little support to the investigation of the crime per se and had only very limited opportunities to link separate incidents, especially across police force boundaries. What was needed was a solution that allowed an increased amount of information exchange combined with better use of the information.

Use in evidence gathering

Football hooliganism

In the summer of 1987 HOLMES was used in conjunction with a West Midlands Police undercover operation known as Operation Growth as an aid for undercover police officers who had infiltrated a notorious gang of football hooligans known as the Subway Army (later the Bridge Boys) who followed Wolverhampton Wanderers FC.

Previous trials of football hooligans had collapsed due to the way undercover police gathered evidence while on the job. Any evidence gathered during Operation Growth was collated straight to HOLMES which in turn secured successful convictions and the jailing of 18 hooligans in June 1988.

Lockerbie bombing

On 26 February 2012, Dr Jim Swire reacted to the publication of John Ashton's book "Megrahi: You Are My Jury". His article in The Herald reads in part:

"The Megrahi court was deliberately denied vital evidential material which, had it been heard, might have introduced insuperable doubt as to the prosecution case, and the cause of the absence of that material from the court hearing is still, 23 years later, unknown.

"On the night of December 20/21 1988, 16 hours before the catastrophe, a nightwatchman at Heathrow called Manly discovered evidence of a break-in allowing entrance to "airside", close to where the luggage container [later shown to have contained the Lockerbie bomb in its suitcase] was loaded up for PA103 the following evening.

"In January 1989 Manly was interviewed by Scotland Yard Special Branch. The interviewing officer actually had the disrupted padlock on the table during the interview.

September 11 - Front Page News

"Following the detection of the Heathrow break-in no action was taken to discover who might have broken in, nor why. The 16 hours ticked away while flights continued to take off as though nothing untoward had occurred there. Yet it was not until after the Zeist court had reached its verdict against Megrahi, with his alleged placing of the bomb in Malta, that the news of the break-in finally surfaced.

"The break-in's finder, nightwatchman Manly of Heathrow, amazed and angry after the verdict, came to ask Megrahi's defence team why they had not used his evidence. This news actually broke on September 11 2001 and so was largely submerged by the dreadful news from New York.

"What about Dumfries and Galloway police: are we to believe that they did not get wind of the break-in in January 1989 when they were in charge of the investigation? Unlikely one would think, as they became accustomed to using the very same computer programmes (HOLMES) as were being used by the Metropolitan Police. Unlikely unless some powerful block was placed on their access to The Met's files.

"All we know is that the Crown Office, with whom they worked, has told us that it was unaware of the break-in evidence until after the conviction of Megrahi."

On 2 April 2012, the Chief Constable of Dumfries and Galloway police Patrick Shearer wrote to Dr Jim Swire:

Dear Dr Swire,

I refer to your recent correspondence headed ‘Apparent Suppression of Evidence’. This letter seeks to fulfil the undertaking I gave you to provide you with an unambiguous response to concerns you raised regarding the handling of statements and evidence in connection with the insecurity detected at Heathrow.

I can confirm the following:

1. In January 1989 BAA security notified the Metropolitan Police that an insecurity had been detected within terminal 3 at Heathrow during the early hours of 21 December 1988.

2. The Metropolitan Police passed this evidence to the Police Incident Room at Lockerbie and Actions were raised to investigate this matter.

3. During the course of this investigation Mr Manly, the BAA Security Team Leader who discovered the insecurity, was interviewed by an officer from the Metropolitan Police and a statement was obtained from him. The interview took place on 31 January 1989. A number of other witnesses were also traced and interviewed regarding the insecurity.

4. Mr Manly’s statement was passed to the police incident room at Lockerbie and was registered on the HOLMES system on 2 February 1989. This statement and those from other witnesses identified at Heathrow were considered by enquiry officers at the time in the context of a range of emerging strands of evidence.

5. In 1991 the police report outlining the evidence against Mr Megrahi and Mr Fhimah was submitted to the Crown Office. This report did not contain a reference to the insecurity at Heathrow and made no mention of Mr Manly's statement.

6. The surrender of Mr Megrahi and Mr Fhimah for trial in the Netherlands prompted a massive preparation exercise during the course of which over 14,000 witness statements were provided to Crown Office in 1999. Mr Manly's statement was included in the material supplied to the Crown Office though again the police made no reference to it.

7. In 2001, as a result of Mr Manly contacting defence representatives, the insecurity at Heathrow was subject to a fresh investigation, the Crown Office disclosed the relevant statements to the defence and as you know the matter was considered during Mr Megrahi's first appeal. The appeal judges, in rejecting the appeal, made it clear that their assessment of the significance of this additional evidence must be conducted in the context of the whole circumstantial evidence laid before the trial court and concluded that "it cannot be said that the verdict falls to be regarded as a miscarriage of justice on account of having been reached in ignorance of the additional evidence" As the Lord Advocate explained at the meeting in London it is not for the appeal court to look at the case "afresh", it has to consider the new evidence in the context of the whole case that the trial court had before it.

In summary I can categorically state that no suppression of evidence took place and I hope this information alleviates your concerns in that regard.

(Signed) Patrick Shearer, Chief Constable.

HOLMES 2

Against this background, the British police forces started a plan to replace the existing system with a new, improved version in 1994. The new version, HOLMES 2, overcame the known weaknesses of HOLMES. Additionally, it is more flexible for future changes and provides a speedier and more efficient access to information.

The HOLMES 2 version was finally released to the first forces in 2000, while the last forces became operational in early 2004.

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References

This page imported content from Wikipedia on 13 February 2023.
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