£50k boost for f ighting fund from Lord Ashcroft
THE fund to finance Alexander Blackman’s legal campaign in his fight for justice has been boosted by a £50,000 gift from businessman, pollster and philanthropist Lord Ashcroft.
Amid an extraordinary outpouring of public generosity, the donation from the former Conservative Party deputy chairman and treasurer is the largest single contribution to the campaign yet.
Last night – with reader donations now topping an incredible £300,000 – it helped push the overall total beyond £350,000.
Lord Ashcroft said: ‘It is important that justice is allowed to run its full course, and I am pleased therefore to help Sergeant Blackman make his case.’
The military historian has a longstanding interest in the well-being of Britain’s Armed Forces.
In 2012 he was made Prime Minister David Cameron’s tsar for veterans. An authority on gallantry, Lord Ashcroft has also assembled the world’s largest collection of Victoria Cross medals.
He spent £5million building an extension to the Imperial War Museum in London in which the VCs are on display.
He has also written no fewer than five best- selling books about the bravery of Commonwealth military servicemen and women.
In the past 30 years he has given several million pounds to charities and other good causes.
He founded Crimestoppers and the Ashcroft Technology Academy, and has also signed up to the Giving Pledge – meaning that he is one of a small number of wealthy individuals or families worldwide who have promised to donate more than half of their wealth to worthy causes.
Sgt Blackman’s wife Claire Blackman said last night: ‘We are hugely grateful to all donations large and small but Lord Ashcroft’s generosity is overwhelming.’
Cheques and online donations continued to pour in from members of the public yesterday who are clearly outraged by the injustice.
Many were accompanied by messages demanding Sgt Blackman be given a fair trial and released from his incarceration.
Colin Peter, of Hemel Hempstead, in Hertfordshire, wrote: ‘We send
‘Justice has to run its full course’
them to give their lives for our security, then we judge them when they stumble.’
Ken Robinson said: ‘I was under the impression that a man must be tried by his peers.
‘Those who have not experienced battlefield conditions are in no way fit to act as judges on a man who went through hell, as many of our soldiers do!’
And another reader, Janis Whiddett, wrote: ‘A shameful episode in British j ustice on someone we should be celebrating.’
The money that is being raised for Sgt Blackman will fund his new team of lawyers, who have at least a year’s work to challenge his imprisonment. Their first step is to prepare a lengthy report for the Criminal Cases Review Commission, the statutory agency that considers potential miscarriages of justice.
They must introduce compelling new evidence that has not been heard before by the court martial or during Sgt Blackman’s first, failed, appeal last year.
If the CCRC believes there is a valid case, it has the power to send it back to the appeal court.
The whole process will be costly, and take months, but thanks to the generosity of readers – and Lord Ashcroft – Sgt Blackman and his wife have been given fresh hope.