Wedger pushes SRA, invites ‘testimony’ from survivors

It’s been a while since we heard from ex-Met police officer Jon Wedger, but yesterday he and his friend Lou Collins released an interview on Collins’ radio show and blog.

“An Interview with Jon Wedger 1 year on—Satanic Ritual Abuse” is pretty much what it sounds like. Following a review of the various physical challenges which Wedger took on in 2018 (walking from Parliament to Manchester, cycling from Parliament to Penzance, swimming round the Isles of Scilly, where he claims “dark forces were at work” as there were a lot of stinging jellyfish about), he and Collins settle in to discuss the difficulties he’s encountered in his campaign.

Wedger says he’s sat down with cabinet ministers, sexual abuse survivors, and therapists.

He claims to have met with “one of top criminal profilers in Belgium”—we assume he is referring to Carine Hutsebaut, a “Commissioner” at the ITNJ cosplay in London, about which we’ve written fairly extensively.

Hutsebaut is particularly noted for her interest in the debunked Pizzagate conspiracy theory, as well as “global pedocriminal pedosexual networks“, chemtrails, QAnon, and various health frauds such as “vaccines cause autism”.

Wedger also mentions having sat down with “former gangsters”, a reference to Kray twins enforcer Chris Lambrianou, who is linked to the “Jesus Army”, described by some as an abusive cult:

Trolls, trolls, trolls…

Wedger and Collins agree that one of the worst problems he’s faced in the past year is relentless trolling:

Collins: You’ve been targeted by, you know, you’ve had various things happen to you. Has that increased, or has it sort of like, uh…

Wedger: Well what’s happened is, the trolling came soon as I started raising money, that came, and it did increase, and it got to a bit of a fever pitch, and I’m not going to name names, but we all know who it was, uh, luckily, you know, there’s no words for these people. There’s no words, and I said this from the very start. the one thing that causes any campaign of this nature to fail is division. It is divide and rule. Anyone who seeks to drive a wedge between any of us doing right must be looked on with incredibly suspicious eyes. There was another campaign by someone else that I’m going to class as double despicable, and that’s because he’s an ex-copper. And he’s tried doing it. And I think that’s a bit like, um…

Collins: Kind of horrendous.

The “double-despicable” campaign “run by an ex-copper” is a reference to some questions raised by Julian King, who runs an organisation called the Independent Police Support Group. Just last month, King posed some uncomfortable questions about Wedger’s claims to be a “whistleblower”.

Wedger: And you know, I don’t know what motivates them. Maybe there’s guilt, maybe there’s jealousy, but none of it is benevolent. And they can sod off because I’ve really not got words for them, Lou. I really haven’t got words for these trolls, and really, they are exposing themselves when they do this. I mean, stupid little things that they’re picking up on. I mean, one fellow has gone through every single one of my interviews, and picked up every inconsistency that he can, and said, ‘look, I’ve found Jon Wedger out’, and I think one of them was, I think I was a week out on one of my dates that I gave. Now there’s a term in law, you know, that discrepancy does not constitute a breach. And this is what it is, you know, there’s always going to be discrepancy, especially when you have suffered like myself and many others have, you do suffer mental trauma, and…

Collins: Course you do!

Wedger: …and lapses in memory and everything else, so, um…but no, on the whole I’ve broadened my shoulders with them, I don’t care for them any more, and I’ll just say to anyone that does look on all that, that you’ve just got to take it for what it is. Everyone has their critics…

Collins: It’s the people that are putting it out there, and are supplying the information, they’re not hiding their faces, their names are out there, their faces out there. These people who are attacking are behind the shadows. There is no names. 

Wedger: Oh yeah, yeah, that’s right. Well the other thing is…I mean one group that I’ll happily name is a group called Hoaxtead. 

Collins: Right.

Wedger: I mean, they must be the most vilest campaign group I’ve ever come across, and I’d encourage anyone to look at their work. Not that I want to advertise their work, cause it’s absolutely disgusting. And what it is, is a group in my opinion that have got Satanic roots! They centre anyone that starts exposing the negative religious connotation to abuse, which is Satanism, and it is real, and it is prevalent, and there have been dozens of cited cases in recent criminal history in our Crown Courts, where Satanism has been used, and Satanists have been convicted for that reason. So this is not a myth, it is reality, and it does go on. Satanism does go on. 

Yes, Satanism definitely “goes on”. No doubt about that—just ask James Hind, who has commented here as Satanic Views for nearly four years.

However, we would be very interested if Wedger could provide us with a list of actual criminal cases involving “Satanic ritual abuse”. As we wrote a few days ago, horrific crimes are committed against children who are believed to be possessed by evil spirits—but those crimes are committed by religious fanatics who believe that children can be “possessed” by evil spirits.

This is not the same thing as SRA, and to claim that it is betrays either fundamental ignorance or extreme disingenuousness, we don’t like to guess which.

‘All us brave whistleblowers’

Wedger throws in a good word for Mike Veale, former chief constable of Cleveland Police, who resigned last month and is currently facing and investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC); he claims that Veale was pressured out of his job by MI5, and that “this is what the Establishment does to all us brave whistleblowers”.

Claiming that “the rape of a child is probably the biggest, most lucrative crime there is”, Wedger urged listeners, “So get on board, because we need each other. I need your testimonies, I will bravely put your testimonies out, but you need to stand by”.

This call for survivors of sexual abuse to bring him their testimonies so that he can make them public—sorry, bravely make them public—strikes us as a very poor idea indeed.

First, should survivors really be bringing their stories to Wedger, who is no longer a police officer, rather than to the actual police? He has expressed some very odd ideas, affiliated with some very dodgy people, and has stated outright that he does not trust the police, so how does he propose to assist any survivors who might approach him?

What does Wedger propose do with the information he receives from any survivors who do accept his invitation? Does he have protocols in place to protect people’s confidentiality? Will he be able to assist anyone in coming to terms with their abuse? Will he be able to help bring abusers to justice?

By his own account, all Wedger has to offer survivors is publicity, but that’s okay, because he seems to think that’s all they really want:

Wedger: When you speak to the victims, you say, “What to you actually want?” and they all say, “We want the world to know what went on”. I’ve got a platform for it now, and I talk about it. For me, there is no other subject, because this is the end of humanity if we allow our children to…

Collins: Children are our future, this is why we’re here, we’re here to recreate. We’re on this time, this earth, this plane for a short time, we’re here to create, and we have children…

If Wedger’s unswerving belief in SRA weren’t enough, his dedicated self-promotion and puffery, as well as his emerging status as a full-blown conspiraloon, ought to be sending up some serious red flags for anybody who cares about the well-being of survivors of abuse.