Michael O Bernicia recently made several claims in an article and podcast about people he was working alongside to find justice for those who have suffered due to midazolam.

So far, Michael O Bernicia has not provided any evidence to substantiate those claims and has clearly stated that he does not yet have any evidence to support them.

The following is a statement published by Clare Wills Harrison, a lawyer who has worked tirelessly exposing the midazolam scandal over the past 18 months and counting, in response to the claims made by Michael O Bernicia –

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Right to reply from Clare Wills Harrison to Mark Devlin’s Good Vibrations podcast of 6th October 2021.

Date: 6th October 2021

‘It is extremely sad that I find myself having to make a further statement about misleading, unfounded and damaging allegations that continue to be made about me, by Michael O Bernicia.

Today a podcast was released by Mark Devlin during which Mr O Bernicia repeated his allegations against me, (and 2 other parties), whilst expressly admitting that he “cannot say if any of the parties he named in his article” carried out what he claims.

It pains me to have to now put Mark Devlin on notice about the Malicious Communications Act 2003 and the Public Order Act 1986. I have, for the most part, enjoyed listening to the various podcasts Mr Devlin puts out. However, it is simply unfair, and sadly mirrors the current system we are all living under, for Mr Devlin to allow a guest to make serious allegations about me, without giving me a right of reply.

For the record I once again state that the allegations made by Mr O Bernicia about me are not grounded in truth, nor evidence, and are simply malicious. 

In reply to the allegation of attempted murder levied by Mr O Bernicia against me, I would like to state the following:1. I did indeed attend a UCT gathering in August. I arrived late on a Friday night and therefore did not meet the vast majority of people until Saturday. I left the gathering on Sunday morning. 2. I did not poison anyone. 3. Several attendees including myself, my husband, and a gentleman called Mark Oakford were seriously unwell after that weekend. My illness lasted for around 3 weeks. My husband and I were so concerned about Mr Oakford being unwell that we spent several hundred pounds of our own money sending him various vitamins and a nebuliser, as we were aware that he did not have the means to buy these items himself.

As to the claim of stealing evidence, I refute this. I provided the midazolam prescribing data that I had sourced and collated into my own spreadsheets, to Mr Oakford upon his request, and on the basis that he, I and Michael would work together to produce reports and graphs from this data. The data I compiled was from public data, NOT, private data. Every piece of prescribing data in my spreadsheets came from the NHS English Prescribing Database, which anyone can access.  It had taken me several months to collate the data that I had obtained, and I have no problem admitting that I did not have the expertise to put the same into graphs or interrogate it in the manner that I felt Mr Oakford was capable of doing.

Following several weeks of working with both Mr O Bernicia and Mr Oakford on the data, it became clear to me that they wanted to run a case on midazolam in a certain way, and I did not agree with the way they wanted to run it. This is not unusual. Legal professionals in particular have differing views about how best to proceed with cases. I am not saying that the way I wanted to run the case is the only or correct way for it to be run, just the best way I knew how to run it. 

It also became clear to me during this time that Mr O Bernicia and Mr Oakford work in a very different way to me. This is not a criticism, and again, is not to say their way is wrong. It is just a way that I realised that I could not work alongside.

Given the above, I extricated myself from Mr O Bernicia’s and Mr Oakford’s proposed case. I did it politely in the public arena, (due to the witnesses involved), and wished them luck with their case. I wished them luck on the basis that it can only be a good thing for the victims of midazolam, if someone, anyone, succeeds with bringing justice for the families involved. It does not matter to me if justice is obtained by Mr O Bernicia, me, or anyone else. That is because it is the victims that matter. No others.

When I extricated myself from Mr O Bernicia’s and Mr Oakford’s proposed case, I asked for the data I had been promised by Mr Oakford. It was not given to me, and neither was my own data that I had collated returned to me. 

Since extricating myself from Mr O Bernicia’s and Mr Oakford’s case, I have been accused of attempted murder of a person unknown, with no evidence to support this accusation, and also accused of trying to scupper a case over an issue that I have worked on tirelessly for over 15 months.

My professional reputation has been damaged, my family have been upset, and disgraceful and hurtful things have been said about me, all as a result of what Mr O Bernicia wrote in his recent  article.

Sadly Mr Devlin has now aided Mr O Bernicia to continue to promote malicious and damaging untruths about me, without asking me for any comment, or my side of the story.

These are surely not the actions of people who want to “do no harm”. This behaviour is surely not the behaviour expected from people who say they care about others, and who want the world to be a better place.

Neither Mr O Bernicia nor Mr Oakford have ever raised with me personally, any of the allegations that have been made against me. Mr O Bernicia has simply made up his mind that what he says happened, and his circle of followers have been encouraged to share his article, defame my name, and cause unwarranted distress to my family. In particular a gentleman calling himself Jonathan Trapman has delighted in spreading hate and untruths about me.

Since March 2020, and as a consequence of my personal experience of seeing what happened to my clients and others, speaking to various whistleblowers, and latterly speaking to the families of those affected by this, all I have ever wanted is the truth of the matter to be aired, and for the world to be a better place. I began trying to formulate a case on the issues arising around Midazolam from that date, as a result of those experiences, a long time before Mr O Bernicia became involved, and there are plenty of independent people who can attest to this.

I firmly believe that neither the truth nor justice can be achieved if some individuals continue to sow hatred and division amongst people. We have all been through too much over the last 18 months as a result of a system that does just that. To continue to conduct similar behaviour, whilst claiming to be beyond reproach and standing for truth and natural justice, is disingenuous to say the least.

The people that have taken part in this damaging and hurtful smear campaign about me, should, I believe, be ashamed of themselves. I am not so bothered about what it has done to me, but it has affected and hurt my family, and that has deeply upset me. My family have been through alot over the last 18 months, with deaths and ill health diagnoses. They do not need any further distress.

I have in the past been a vociferous supporter of Mr O Bernicia and his efforts to obtain justice during the last 18 months. Indeed I am happy to state that I provided Mr O Bernicia with a witness statement for his last PCP. It is therefore somewhat of a surprise that he now seems to believe that I am some sort of “agent”, along with accusing me of other things. I do not think an agent would have readily provided a credible, useful and personal witness statement for him. Do you?

Mr O Bernicia’s article has had a serious and damaging effect on my life. As I have previously stated, malicious communications by anyone are prohibited. S127 of the Malicious Communications Act 2003, makes it an offence to send a message that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character over a public electronic communications network.

Further, under S4A Public Order Act 1986 it is an offence to intentionally cause harassment, alarm or distress to a person and Mr O Bernicia did so by making threats in his recent article that I and the other parties named therein, should watch our backs.

The continual spreading of the false claims in Mr O Bernicia’s article, and now the addition of the podcast, have and continue to cause myself and my family, alarm and distress, and this is clearly intentional given that I, and the others named in his recent article, have publicly asked for Mr O Bernicia to remove the same, issue an apology, and tell his followers to stop sharing it.

I now find myself in the unusual situation of having to approach the police about this matter. If indeed someone was poisoned at the meeting in August, I feel it is my duty as a lawyer to report thistle , and to assist the police in any way that I can, to find out if the offence was committed, and if so, who by. I say this as I feel that it is the right and safe thing to do for the individual purportedly affected. Given Mr O Bernicia has stated that there is a blood sample, I am hopeful that this may assist with any police investigation.

In ending, I would like to say that it may come as a surprise to many that I still wish Mr O Bernicia success with his case. Some may find this odd. However, just because he has set about with a campaign of lies about me, seemingly to destroy my life, does not mean that I wish a case over this serious issue to fail. I have always maintained that the victims of Midazolam deserve for the truth to be heard, and my position on that will not change.

Clare Wills Harrison ‘

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