A Character Assassin Caught in the Act
http://www.ageofautism.com/2009/03/a-character-assassin-caught-in-the-act.html
At the source of the General Medical Council’s (GMC) investigation and trial of Dr. Andrew Wakefield lies a man named Brian Deer. In his first Sunday Times article on February 22, 2004, Deer accused Wakefield of launching a “public panic” over the connection between the MMR vaccine and autism by failing to disclose his conflict of interest and participation as an expert witness on behalf of a group of families involved in vaccine litigation against the British government. Since then, Deer has alleged many things. Among them are the following: that he is an independent, investigative journalist; that he is not a complainant in the GMC investigation; that Wakefield is guilty of medical misconduct; and that Wakefield and his co-authors committed scientific fraud.
According to documents obtained by Age of Autism (Melanie Philips of The Spectator reported on these documents last month, but we provide for the first time a copy of the key document HERE and new information on Dr. Wakefield’s complaint against Deer; a copy of Dr. Wakefield's original 3/13 complaint to PCC is HERE and the addendum is HERE. Deer’s claim that he is not the complainant in the GMC investigation is false. In a February 25, 2004 email addressed to Tim Cox-Brown of the GMC, Deer first listed the GMC reference numbers of Drs Andrew Wakefield, John Walker-Smith and Simon Murch, and then wrote the following opening sentence.
“Following an extensive inquiry for the Sunday Times into the origins of the public panic over MMR, I write to ask your permission to lay before you an outline of evidence that you may consider worthy of evaluation with respect of the possibility of serious professional misconduct on the part of the above named registered medical practitioners”
This statement stands in stark contrast to
claims Deer has recently made denying he was
a complainant in the GMC investigation. On
February 19, 2009, amid growing concern over
claims that Deer had failed to disclose his
conflict, Deer made the following statement
on a public blog,
“the GMC’s procedures include
monitoring media coverage for possible cases
to be referred to fitness to practise
committees. The GMC - following its own
procedures – then approached me and asked if
I had anything to substantiate what had
appeared in The Sunday Times. I willingly
supplied them with many of my files on the
subject.”
In the copy of the document obtained by Age
of Autism you can see for yourself that Deer
is lying:
• He was not approached with an inquiry from the GMC, rather he approached the GMC himself and was “writing to ask [their] permission” to do so.
• He did not provide substantiation for an existing inquiry, rather he took the initiative himself “to lay before you an outline of evidence.”
• He did not presume that the GMC was following up on his article from three days before in pursuance of its own procedures, rather he urged they follow up on evidence “that you may find worthy of evaluation.”
• He did not merely respond to the GMC’s monitoring procedures, rather he sent Cox-Brown the GMC reference numbers for the three doctors, a clerical detail that only a complainant would think worthy of inclusion.
In her thorough report on Brian Deer’s role in the GMC trial, “A Deer in the Headlights”, Melanie Philips placed Deer’s introductory sentence to Timothy Cox nearly halfway through a lengthy article. We suspect that many may have missed this key statement. It proves clearly that while Deer has represented himself as an objective journalist, he has been reporting on a complaint that he made himself. Playing the dual role of journalist and complainant, Deer has misrepresented himself as an independent party. In the ultimate irony, Deer is guilty of the same offense—failure to disclose a conflict of interest—that he accuses Wakefield of committing. As one source close to the investigation commented, “that’s not just a smoking gun, that’s a video of Brian Deer pulling the trigger.”
In the years since his original article launching a widespread campaign of character assassination against Dr. Wakefield, Deer has written infrequently for The Sunday Times (before his February 8 articles accusing Wakefield and his co-authors of falsifying clinical records, Deer had written nothing for the newspaper since July 15, 2007) and has no other visible means of support. This previously unseen document demonstrates that Deer has lied about his role as a complainant in the GMC. It also raises a disturbing question.
If Brian Deer is lying about his role as a source of the GMC complaint against Dr. Wakefield, what else is he lying about?
Dan Olmsted is Editor and Mark Blaxill is Editor at Large for Age of Autism.
Posted by: Mark Blaxill | March 21, 2009 at 02:13 PM
It is very clear from the other documents in Wakefield's second complaint to the PCC, as well as the letter published here, that Deer was trying to exercise pressure to prosecute Wakefield. He was making the running, as several remarks suggest.
For instance on 1 July 2004:
"I trust that you will notify me, in whatever way is appropriate, of how my concerns are progressed."
Or 12 February 2007:
"I’ve several times previously written to the GMC, or to its solicitors, Field Fisher Waterhouse (FFW), regarding my investigations for the Sunday Times and Channel 4 into the serious professional misconduct in which the above named practitioners were involved, between mid-1996 and late 2001, while they were employed at the Royal free hospital, Hampstead. My first email was dated 25 February 2004, summarizing my findings as of that date. I’ve made my submissions as a matter of public duty.
"Although, quite properly, I’ve received no information from FFW, or from the GMC directly, it’s clear from open sources, such as court proceedings and press coverage, that some considerable investment has been committed to looking into the matters I’ve raised."
http://www.ageofautism.com/2009/03/addendum-to-complaintmar-20-2009dr-andrew-wakefield-filed-a-complaint-on-13th-march-2009-alleging-that-mr-brian-deer-fals.html
After all, it is one thing to have an investigation (as proposed by John Reid and supported by Wakefield who did not believe he had anything to hide) and another to mount a prosecution.
Posted by: John Stone | March 21, 2009 at 02:08 PM
Time to move on.
Posted by: sdtech | March 21, 2009 at 02:07 PM
One thing that you are very obviously missing is a simple fact; Brian Deer is guilty of what you accuse Dr. Wakefield of. I'll capitalize it for you so you can get the picture into your miniscule and obtuse little mind.
BRIAN DEER LIED! PLAIN AND SIMPLE; HE LIED!
You and the rest of the va